Midon’s inquisitive blue eyes peered out from behind the goggles of his dark brown leather mask. Its elongated beak served as a permanent pomander, a useful tool in his line of work. I had to make due with a handkerchief and a handheld pomander to cope with the smells of the mortuary temple. I suppose the mask might have been an effigy of the god Ithulm, vulture-headed psychopomp of the Southern Isles, or it might just have been a practical shape. It had so little detail, I was inclined towards the latter explanation.
“Would you mind at least covering him up?” I asked, pointedly not looking at the body on the marble slab.
“Well, now I have seen everything – a prudish Priest of Craddix.”
“Midon…”
The leather-robed figure drew a sheet up to Magistrate Wilcox’s waist, restoring the naked corpse’s modesty.
“You never did tell me how you ended up in a position so unfitting your talents,” Midon said.
“Priest of Craddix is a hereditary title.”
“No, I mean Church Court Judge.”
“I was falsely accused and needed to get a change of venue to a court that wouldn’t maim me or hang me on the word of a half-blind shepherd and a drunken dancing girl. To do that, I needed a church office. Judge in Jinwick was the only open post.”
“I do wonder why it was so unpopular,” Midon said sarcastically.
“What can you tell me about my secular counterpart?”
“He’s dead.”
“I could tell that.”
“He was stabbed seven or eight times in the right side of the torso, perforating the lung and liver. There are no other injuries.”
“And that’s what killed him?”
“Eventually. He bled to death. He could have been walking or even running for several minutes before losing enough blood to keel over.”
“Great. So he could have been stabbed anywhere along the docks.”
“I can tell you that whoever stabbed him was likely right-handed and attacked from behind.”
“How do you know that?”
Midon walked past me, and I began to sigh, expecting another tangent. Instead, he suddenly whirled and seized me, arm wrapping about my throat. I pulled the arm away to prevent it from closing my windpipe and was about to call out for the guards when he jabbed two fingers into my side.
“That,” he said, “is how. You see, your instinct was to grab for my arm and leave your side undefended. Now, if I had the knife in my left hand and came at you from the front-”
“You don’t need to demonstrate,” I said, pushing his arm away.
“You would likely have cuts on your hands and arms trying to keep the knife at bay instead. He has none.”
“But still, a right-handed person on the docks is…”
“Most of them,” Midon said.
“What else can you tell me?”
“You need to drink less before you develop jaundice and die.”
“About Wilcox.”
“The holes are symmetrical, so the weapon probably is as well.”
“So, a dagger,” I said.
“Or something similar.”
“That doesn’t much narrow things down.”
“A civil magistrate must have many enemies,” Midon mused. “Every petty criminal who he’s sentenced, every pirate, corrupt official, jealous husband, jilted woman, and angry father…”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean that besides those who hated him for his official duties, he had a reputation as one prone to seeking feminine attentions, even when it was unwise.”
“Fantastic,” I said.
“Do you know if he wished to be embalmed and returned to Atlor for burial? Or can we inter him here?”
“I hardly spoke to the man,” I said. “He was annoyed that he couldn’t issue me citations, since the case would end up in my court.”
“Perhaps if you were a bit more upstanding of a citizen.”
“Midon, I am trapped here. It is impossible for me to pay the restitution I’ve been ordered to give for that damn gem I never stole. If I leave this island, I’ll have abandoned my jurisdiction, so it’s back to the secular courts, who’ll stretch my neck just for the hassle I gave them. This gods-forsaken spit of rock is my prison.”
“Don’t say that. We’re on holy ground.”
“Of a corpse-eater god!”
“Jasper, I know you’re badly hungover, so I will overlook it just this once. But do not blaspheme Ithulm in his own temple.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I just have no hope. No hope of leaving, and no hope of figuring out how to find our murderer.”
“Our? I just deal with dead bodies.”
“Well, err on the side of caution and embalm the magistrate. I’ll see if I can find out where he wanted to be buried.”
“That I can do,” Midon said.
I decided to leave him to that task and ascended the stairs to the main hall of the temple. The mortuary temple was dedicated primarily to Azerion but also to Ithulm and a handful of other obscure psychopomps. It was tucked away in a corner of temple square, adjacent to the primary temple of Azerion as judge. My office, such as it was, sat in a bricked-over niche on the side of that temple. I didn’t make it anywhere near the sanctuary it provided, as the exit to the mortuary temple was darkened by a looming figure.
The shaven-headed Azanjin had to be pushing seven feet in height. His dark, deep-set eyes were lined with kohl, contrasting his sharp, sun-bronzed features. His shadow darkened the vibrant pattern of his attire. The Azanjin preferred bold patterns, but rendered them out of dark reds, browns, yellows, and oranges. He had a sash made from some sort of spotted animal pelt, a mark of rank among that people. His arms were crossed, and on one hand he held a fly-whisk whose handle was ebony wrapped in gold wire. It matched the grip on the leaf-shaped sword hanging from his belt.
“Jasper Browne?” His deep voice asked.
“Is there something you require?” I asked, avoiding outright confirming my identity.
“The Star of Azanjin,” he said. Since diplomatic relations between Atlor and the King of the Azanjin were less than twenty years old and nothing had been known about them before that, the demonym had gotten slapped on all manner of things related to their kingdom. The Star of Azanjin was one such object with which I was too familiar.
“I’m afraid I don’t have it,” I said.
“Shame. I would have thought the man who stole it would have some idea where it went.”
“Why would you even think it is on this island?”
“Someone here approached our King with an offer to sell the jewel back to us. We had not yet reached an agreement on price, and he turns up dead in the street only this morning.” My eyes darted to the blade at his belt. While the tip was narrow enough, the body was too wide. Also, it would have been awkward to make eight shallow thrusts instead of just plunging it in for a single killing blow.
“How inconvenient,” I said, still churning through the implications of the man’s words.
“My king only cares that the jewel is returned to him and is willing to be generous with whoever has it. Even, perhaps, enough for your purposes.”
I glanced up at the broad features of the bald man, trying to determine how much he actually knew of my circumstances. My thoughts were interrupted by a small, polite voice who spoke up from behind him.
“Excuse me,” it said. “Might I pass?”
The tall man twisted to look over his shoulder, then stepped out of the doorway. A petite, Atlorian woman stepped through, parasol shading her alabaster complexion from the harsh sunlight. Her silk and linen dress was white and red and very neatly done. She had the appearance of a noblewoman, save for her polite attitude. She took me in, and her small lips gave a slight smirk.
“I don’t suppose you are the priest of this temple?”
“I am not,” I said, “You’re looking for Midon. I’m afraid he’s working in the basement, and the public is not permitted into that area.”
“I see,” She said, frowning slightly. “I’d heard he had the body of my betrothed. I know it can’t be true, but I haven’t seen him, so I must check.”
“Who is your betrothed?” I asked.
“Thornton Wilcox,” she said.
“Liar,” a harshly accented voice called from the doorway. “Thornton was my man.” The new arrival was a bronze Azanjin woman wrapped in a boldly patterned shawl. Her hair was tied in thick braids, like a trio of ship’s cables sprouted from her scalp and hung down behind her. The bald man shot her a foul look and barked something angrily in their tongue. She responded as sharply. Before their argument could break out, a third woman cried.
“You are both making up stories! The Magistrate promised ‘isself to me!” This newest arrival was dressed in a manner befitting a tavern wench in mourning, her face streaked in ashes and tears. As the denials and accusations began to fly, I made the mistake of interjecting.
“Ladies, I don’t know what’s going on, but I know for a fact that Thornton Wilcox has a wife back in Atlor.”
That’s when the shouting began in earnest.
So, now we know why Jasper drinks so much.
AI has invented some interesting new letters again.
*dives in*
I wondered if anyone would notice the featured images.
I don’t always get to it because I have to use the developer tools in my browser to see the whole image because they are always obscured by a white box containing the article title et al. 🫤
Gee, I just right-click on the part of the image that’s showing and select “Open image in new tab.” 🤷♀️
I don’t have that option. It’s like on the home page, those are not recognized as “images”.
I have a lot of custom CSS and JS mods going on this site (including eyepiece), so maybe I messed something up that way. No biggie.
Some months back, I noticed that every ad on my Kindle seemed to be for children’s stories, each with a cute cover illustration and a legible title, but the rest of the text was AI gibberish. Guessing the stories were generated as well.
It is dirt cheap to produce AI slop, so the business strategy is to flood the zone and hope enough people accidentally buy the slop to cover the cost, which doesn’t take many sales.
It is really disgusting and should be a capital offense.
Good news everyone! For the low price of $6.99 per month or just $69.99, you can be propagandized each and every day!
Didn’t they already do the same exact thing with a different name only for it to fail miserably?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNN+
Fox and the Blaze have been doing that for some time now.
It’s a good way for them to tell me they dont want me to read their site.
Lol. This one will go just as badly.
ugh Wikipedia says the beak mask became “fashionable” during the recent plague years. Such clever.
“… I made the mistake of interjecting.” <– Describes me far too well. It's my basic nature to answer any question honestly and with (likely too much) detail. I always wanna *react* right away, like there's some reward to it, rather than thinking it over, perhaps letting the moment itself sit for a bit.
I wish I were better at controlling my retorts, and I've become drastically better than I was, but it's a steady undercurrent of my nature. I'm sure that's mostly for the good, but I sure do notice the ill more. (One does.)
Telling those ladies about their 'One,' and especially like that?! Well, I frequently cross lines, I s'pose, but I don't puke over 'em like that.
I bet those gals hope he slips into a soothing, *deep* slumber that eve. They might volunteer to assist!
Read the Continuation of this story in two weeks, Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel.
‘As the denials and accusations began to fly, I made the mistake of interjecting.’
A rookie mistake. I thought for sure this guy was going to sneak away. I can see how he got a jewel theft pinned on himself.
Unfortunately, it’s his job to deal with these three.
Good stuff, UnCiv – looking forward to future installments
While commenting on the Young Republican group chat fallout, Robby (the one who left his wife for a young Asian boy) called Nick Fuentes literally “pro-Hitler.” I can maybe accept the description he also used of being anti-Semitic (of course, Robby also called him objectively racist), though he’s really just opposed to Israel’s bullshit, but I’m highly skeptical that anyone could actually demonstrate that he is a fan of Hitler. The guy was #1 on Spotify for a brief moment when a mere fan began to upload his podcasts, He’s nowhere near as radical as they (on the left and right) want to paint him.
I watched his talk with Dave Smith.
Fuentes was nowhere near as clownish as I remember from early clips of him. There is a lot of talk about Israel and Fuentes thoughts on Israel. There is talk of whether or not Fuentes is a Holocaust denier at the end. I don’t remember any talk specifically of Hitler, as opposed to talk of Nazism in general which did come up during the Holocaust denier talk.
It was a three hour talk, and it was something I listened to last week, so my memory is a bit vague. Fuentes is a Nationalist and a Christian. He opposes killing. And has some racialist views.
Nick Fuentes calls for death penalty for Jews.
X https://share.google/fRNP4KNUtneeIYvTp
Page doesn’t exist.
“Hitler was really fucking cool.”
Nick Fuentes
https://x.com/RightWingWatch/status/1615370123442790400
I have paid zero attention to that person and am frankly baffled at why anyone does. There are a lot of assholes out there but why does that one get clicks? No idea.
This is the early clownish stuff I remember.
Jews control our government
/Nick Fuentes
https://x.com/NickJFuentes/status/1952809902499336420
But what if they do?
Genuinely can’t tell if this is snark.
I don’t watch Fuentes and until recently just accepted the general description of him as an actual alt-right (a word that doesn’t get bandied about as much anymore) persona. I’d be fine with the description of anti-Semitic. He’s called himself that, though how serious he is when he says it is best left to others to gauge. I’m not sure.
But saying he’s actually pro-Hitler and not just edge lording seems a bit daffy to me. I know people who watch him (who accuse me of being too pro-Israel) so I’ll check in with what they think, but he’s basically a 4channer with a microphone as best I can tell. His “I love Hitler” clip seems to be mostly the sort of extreme humor and attempt to push buttons.
As someone who grew up chronically online but not quite in the same circles as Fuentes, it’s tough even for me to tell the difference between seriousness and humor in this subgroup of the right.
Like the group chat among the Young Republicans as one example. But Fuentes being the extreme.
Give me a break. He’s an open antisemite and Hitler apologist.
Anti-Semite? Yea, I’m not going to argue much against that. I unwittingly got my brother into this guy by dismissively labeling him a white nationalist anti-Semite to my brother who began to watch him and actually enjoy his stuff (my brother is pretty rabidly anti-Israel). I did that based on the description of him that I had heard among you guys over the years. So where am I going with this?
Is he actually pro-Hitler and a full blown Holocaust denier as his critics allege? I don’t buy it. And if he is, his following is massive and would have even me questioning what the hell the future of the right is in this country. If those things are true, there are a lot more fascists in reality than the discourse on this site would normally accept and it’s probably the single largest growing segment among younger right leaning males.
It’s a movement I don’t really understand. There’s misogyny in there that circles back around to being (almost?) gay, but they hate gays and trannies. While having both in their ranks (which is kind of like the Nazis). He’s a white Catholic nationalists that laments the population decline of whites while simultaneously shunning the institution of marriage at least on a personal level as far as I can tell. It’s hard to tell where the irony ends and the earnest begins.
But his honor doesn’t matter to me much. His popularity is undeniable and it’s growing. So I think everyone should try to understand it. The attempts to deplatform him or mock him into obscurity have failed. And posting short soundbites or off the cuff tweets that are meant to be inflammatory doesn’t explain it to me.
So to go back to the original post here, there’s a dismissiveness to Soave’s claims about Fuentes. The typical sort of disdain that the mainstream has leveled at him over the years. It’s not effective and if Fuentes is what his critics claim, it’s kind of actually dangerous. If his positions are more nuanced, his critics should actually attempt to engage with him rather than just throwing around labels like the left does. Because again – his popularity is rapidly rising.
OK, then. 🙄
I’m not seeing it, and I feel pretty confident in continuing to ignore his existence.
We can argue about how large his following is, but his uploads all get a few hundred thousand views and he was trending #1 on Spotify.
I didn’t really take Charlie Kirk seriously, either.
“Jews already took over the west.”
/Nick Fuentes
https://x.com/NickJFuentes/status/1942300753936408630
The United States defeated the wrong enemy in WWII.
https://x.com/NickJFuentes/status/1795186352566218845
The United States shouldn’t have gotten involved in either world war.
Nazis and Communists fought as hard as they did because they were two sides of the same coin.
Jews act as a transnational syndicate.
/Nick Fuentes
https://x.com/NickJFuentes/status/1890389751032582168
I do want to say that I appreciate you engaging, Chafed. I’m not a Groyper (a term I only learned recently) and my intention is not to defend the honor of Fuentes. I don’t think I’d agree with him on much and I’m only vaguely familiar with his culture war stances. But the mockery, ridicule and dismissiveness are not stopping his popularity from rising.
But the mockery, ridicule and dismissiveness are not stopping his popularity from rising.
On Fuentes popularity: I saw on another site a thread on why Trump team dropped him. The Trump team considered bringing Fuentes around. When they did digging into him, they found lots of bots behind his page views and the like. That’s the real reason they dropped.
A Fuentes fan I know (Chafed, who is not me, this isn’t a “asking for a friend” euphemism) claims this is full of shit and the real reason the Trump team dropped him is Israel.
When Tucker Carlson had Candace Owens on, Fuentes came up. I dug through the comments. Lots of posts that looked bot-like posting some variation of “Have Fuentes on!” “Debate Nick Fuentes!” etc.
The local commie rag reminded me that No Kangs took place in a park, not the central square as I would have expected. They claimed “thousands” attended so more likely “hundreds” – including the commie mayor and some state rep I never heard of because everyone around here runs unopposed so it’s not like I voted for them.
I almost wish we got actual “authoritarianism” so these ignorant fools could learn a thing or two.
I doubt hundreds – maybe Dozens
The accompanying pic looks like a few hundred. I have no doubt that the aging hippie + hard-left ratfucker set can add up to several hundred in a one-Party metro of ~100K people.
They probably count everyone who drives by.
Well, watching the Mariners
screw the poochfuck the dog.Not going to be interrupting talk radio for the rest of the season?
🥴 I didn’t even know that contest was still in play.
IDGAF about tonite’s SNF so what the hell.
Although to be fair, I’m not sure I’m terribly invested in finding out which team gets the honor of losing to the Dodgers this year.
There is that.
But I wont start rooting for Canadians!
Over Seattle? I will.
But I have already mentioned my soft spot for Toronto.
We all have our limits.
Now that’s how you do romantasy.
And Midon is sarcastic and literal. How many wives does he have?
As of this story, Midon is not married. He has a subplot in the planned sequel where he seeks to change that.
Thanks for the story UnCiv. I look forward to coming installments.
+1 fun
I like this universe.
I have spent the last four days VBA coding my brains out (with a lot of help from ChatGPT, ngl). Got the fucker to work. Looks a tidge unsophisticated, but didn’t have time to dither over font choices. I’m wiped.
And you know what? I feel no thrill of accomplishment. I just did something I should be massively proud of and it’s like, I don’t really care. I am possibly the LEAST competitive person you’ll ever meet. Winning for me is like … okay. Yay?
Glad Im not in this fight
I could fix that, but they scheduled the next installment already.
So I’m annoyed at a point in the main story for Pokemon ZA.
So the main championship plot has you climbing from Rank Z to Rank A by defeating other aspiring trainers. In the base format you have 25 matches, which can be spaced out every four levels and still wrap up around level 100.
But what they decided was that would be too boring, and at only Rank V they give you a shortcut to Rank F via cronyism. I feel robbed of my achievements.
Mornin’. Well I forgot my work vest. No worries, I’ve bummed a hand -me-down, an orphan minor miner in the harrowing aisles.
Be well all. Eagerly awaiting Game 7 tonight, 61hrs off begin at 2pm. Kick ass and run out of gum.
Better than kicking gum and running out of ass.
Ted runs a Burro ranch.
How can I run out of ass? I’m sittin’ on one. Taut.
Good stuff, UCS.
Wake up sleepyheads!
☔️🤷🏼♂️
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUc_jXBD9DU
🎶🎶
Morning, Sean.
Good morning, Sean, Efe, Ted’S., U, homey, Roat, and DEG!
Morning, GT.
Hey there. Apart from having to be in the office, how are you today?
I donno. I spent my commute in coming up with bad puns.
Time well spent. My commute usually just inspires me to come up with new cuss words.
I haven’t even been able to deploy sassafrastic yet.
What’s wrong with the old cuss words?
When I’m stuck in traffic I run out of them.
Not very Stoic of you, GT.
suh’ fam
whats goody
It’s an office day today.
Not sure I’m happy.
I had office days last week, and honestly got a lot of nothing done.
Now Ill be out on a project complaining that I can never get any administrative stuff done…
https://dataconomy.com/2025/10/20/amazon-down-widespread-aws-outage-takes-down-internet/
They should try rebooting it.
I’m glad we aren’t part of the internet.
What could possibly go wrong?
Mornin’. Rainy day here in southern NH. Time for the gym.
I wonder if I should relent in wordplay during the summer when I get angry. I keep coming up with Hot Cross Puns.
🤨
😉
I told you I spent my commute thinking up puns – where else would I deploy them?
Wait until the AM Links. Swiss isn’t here yet.
Sounds like a way to waste good cheese.
Whatever happened to that guy who wrote long posts about burro round – where to get it, how to prepare it. I think he was French. For a while he came out with a new ass ass in screed each year.
I alreeady used my ‘tankless job’ quip about the infantry, but do you know why they never competed in bodybuilding events against the other arms? The artillery always had the biggest guns.
😑
😥
Old people, young aimless people, people with percieved grudges…all I can understand why they went out protesting.
The furries though – real or people ‘hiding’ their faces?
I know the tactic is purposefully hide your faces, claim it is cause if you don’t you will be targetted (the irony there is off the charts), doing so you know news will report it is as fact out of fear.
The paycheck.
Schuemer set up his Dem base to get screwed.
Reports of some Dems wanting to use the “No Kings” totally spontaneous as leverage for their shutdown shenanigans will backfire. All their fringe ideas were all on display and now they are in a position to either capitulate to the Repubs or hold out longer, giving R Senators the ammunition and draw ire from the nutters. Their party is wholly fractured at the moment.
Only other long game tatic they have is to bully the Rs into dumping the filibuster rule.
Don’t dump the filibuster – require them to actually hold the floor and talk.
Work beckons. It was a weekend of working on the house as well. Jeez. I hope it slows down down a bit soon.