Roy reveals the Greater Mark of Justice which has been put on Belkar.
Cast[]
- The Order of the Stick
- Roy Greenhilt ◀ ▶
- Elan ◀ ▶
- Belkar Bitterleaf (also as illusion) ◀ ▶
- Durkon Thundershield ◀ ▶
- Vaarsuvius ◀ ▶
- Jaemin
- An Azure City Guardsman
Transcript[]
- Panel 1
Durkon: Ye got Belkar released? Have ye gone daft??
Belkar: Hey, and a happy "Good Morning" to you, too, loser.
Roy: Not released, per se... More like, "out on bail".
- Panel 2
Roy: He'll still be tried for killing that guard, but I was able to convince Shojo that it was in his best interest to schedule that trial for a later date.
Roy: Like, for example, the week AFTER we finish off Xykon.
- Panel 3
Roy: Until then, he's been remanded to my custody, and his split of the treasure will go towards paying for the guard to be raised.
Durkon: Aren't ye afraid he'll try to escape at some point? Like, in tha next 10 minutes?
- Panel 4
Roy: I have a little mystical help there, actually.
Roy: Vaarsuvius, do me a favor. Come over here and scan Belkar for magic.
- Panel 5
Varsuvius: Detect Magic!
A purple ray shines from V's eyes, revealing a mystical blue glyph glowing on Belkar's forehead.
Roy: See the blue rune on his forehead? It's called the "Mark of Justice", and it'll be there until his trial.
Belkar: They couldn't have put it on my arm or something, no. That would be too easy.
- Panel 6
Roy: The mark is a powerful curse that stays dormant—unless Belkar violates the terms of his release.
Vaarsuvius: And what constitutes those terms, precisely?
- Panel 7
Roy: One, he can't deal lethal damage to any living creature within the bounds of any city, town or village.
Roy: Two, he can't ever be more than one mile from my position.
Roy: And three, he can't piss me off too bad, because I have a command word that can activate it.
- Panel 8
Roy: If the curse is activated, he'll get sicker and sicker until he'll be incapable of hurting anyone. It's the perfect deterrent.
Belkar: I just want it to go on record that I can still knock someone's teeth out with nonlethal damage, so no one get ideas or anything.
Vaarsuvius: Perish the thought.
- Panel 9
Elan: Wow, Roy, Miko is sure going to flip when she hears that Belkar's been released
Roy: Actually, uh, we're going to keep this little arrangement here to ourselves.
- Panel 10
Roy: In order to keep his paladins from going nuts, Shojo isn't telling anyone about this deal.
Roy: Belkar has to keep the cloak and stilts on as a disguise while in Azure City.
- Panel 11
Elan: Isn't someone going to notice that Belkar's missing from his cell?
Roy: Shojo talked my dear father into providing a permanent illusion to cover things up...
Roy: He said it's programmed to be indistinguishable from the real Belkar.
- Panel 12
The Azure City prison where an illusion of Belkar taunts the guards.
Image of Belkar: Generic comment questioning your parentage.
Jaemin: Oh, that is IT! I have had it with this guy's trash talk!
Guard: Calm down, Jaemin, he's just trying to get you riled up.
Image of Belkar: Mumbled statement disparaging your masculinity
D&D Context[]
- The Greater Mark of Justice is based on the D&D spell Mark of Justice. Unlike the regular spell, the greater version seems to have a much more punishing effect when finally activated.
- Detect Magic is a 0-level (cantrip) Wizard spell that is able to detect magical auras.
Trivia[]
- This is the only appearance of Jaemin, the prison guard.
- Comic Number 42 was named Belkar Unleashed. This comic's name may be a specific reference to that.