Grrl Power #1321 – Afterglow vitae
That particular spell just so happens to require the blood of a dude you recently banged six times in a row. Hey, I don’t make the rules. Okay, fine, it really only requires a drop of blood from a “dual cultivation” partner. However you manage that result is your business.
There briefly existed a version of this page where excess blood from the ring left bloody streaks all over Sciona’s shoulders, boobs and hips, but the dialog felt a little too casual for stacking gory afterglow on top of Sciona’s concerning reveal. The dude is already simultaneously trying to not break out in a flop sweat or pop an inappropriate level of boner. See, in this case, he doesn’t want to go to 100%, because that would indicate he’s not taking her seriously even after seeing her do magic right in front of him, or he’s into whatever danger she’s implying, or he’s signaling his submission via fear boner. But also, he doesn’t want no movement, cause a sexy sex partner is straddling him, and she might be offended if he pulls back inside himself. This isn’t really conscious thought out, there’s just a subprocess in his brain that says, “Okay, ideally we throw out 25%. 33 tops.” That subprocess pops a note to the chemistry demon running the whole thing, and at the same time shouts at the hippocampus to stop remembering all the noises she made last night, cause it’d throw off the mix.
So that’s why I decided that Sciona, being an expert blood mage, added a bit to the spell that makes the excess blood go all powdery and waft away into nothingness.
The new vote incentive is up! (Finally.)
I’m revisiting a panel from a recent page, but I included some comic reactions and a few outfit swaps, so hopefully you all enjoy it. I also plussed up the art from the comic version a bit, though I suspect that despite the time I spent on that, not a whole lot of people would immediately notice that, so I’m gratuitously pointing it out here.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
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"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
His friend told him. They’ll never find the body
Althought its possible she’s targeted him for possession by another Alari ghost in this case
That, or she actually wants him as a bedslave.
Honestly, for all her claims about him only being “acceptable”, she does seem surprisingly forthcoming with and fond of this guy, so it would not surprise me.
This, if you ask my opinion. If she meant to make him a body donor, there would have been no point in giving him instructions about how to improve his performance. It seems to me Sciorpia is on a minion recruitment drive of late. First the Senator, then his daughter, then this guy. In the latter case, he got earmarked for sex slave first and foremost.
The Alari seem to be Matriarchal. It might be a perfectly normal thing for their nobility to have sex slaves who serve to pleasure them. I think she even suggested she’d keep Deus around as one when she thought the Alari were going to completely conquer Earth
Should have listened to your friend last night, fella.
Because now you know stuff Sciona will kill to keep secret, so you’ll be looking over your shoulder and checking your every word, all the time.
That, or you join team evil at an entry-level position (puns duly intended).
IMO, we are seeing another case of minion recruitment on Sciona’s part. Just like with the Senator’s daughter, she is forthright with who she is and what she doies, because she has earmarked this guy as favored boytoy. Had his performance been unsatisfactory, chances are she would have found much less pleasant means of using him.
Or just walked away after wiping his memory of specifics. She *is* trying to keep a lower profile now.
The only thing she hasn’t killed is his boner. Comic book evil is hot so the only thing you have to ask yourself is if she is going to kill you before you finish and if death by snu snu is an acceptable exit. Some men live for danger. They just don’t live very long.
If she magically enhances you in a way you can actually keep up with her crazy shenanigans.
death by snu snu is obviously the right choice in this scenario.
though I would prefer Dabllers way of eternal live through snu snu.
The sad part is this might still be a net improvement over some of his past “dates”.
damn… I was diggin the shortish haircut
Unfortunately for you, it seems another thing Sciona very much likes to have besides great boobs is long hair (when it it does not get entangled with body armor) with her original color. Can’t say I disapprove her preferences.
OK this is just TOO weird. Call me when it’s over.
YMMV. I find this glimpse in the sex life of a hot, ruthless, and competent supervillainess much more interesting (and original) than even more slice of life comedy from the Archon crew. Neither advances the plot much so far, but the ‘Peggy gets her leg back’ subplot had exhausted its narrative usefulness. Now if this somehow would also give us more info about Sciona’s master plan, or advance the plot about her, it would be excellent.
The slice of life stuff got old because Dave writes at the same pace as Dragon Ball Z but with the padding replaced with jokes.
This is just straight up plausible deniability porn.
Also, he is seemingly confused on how the body works. Guys don’t control erections, it’s an automatic response. People who were hung to death, right after their neck snapped, also had that response. There is no ‘he didn’t want to do it because it showed submission or that he wasn’t respecting her.’
It was: ‘his had a fear response which resulted in one or not.’ I’ll come back in a few months and see where we are, I guess. Just amazed that a guy who has lived his whole life as a guy seemingly isn’t aware of how his own body functions and instead reinforces the stupid ‘You can’t assault a guy’ trope with comments about controlling or showing.
You’d be surprised what willpower and kegels can achieve with proper training, but you should also remember the part where Dave says “the chemistry demon” and maybe take his entire commentary with a grain of salt re: how literal it is.
You have a point, but honestly, do you truly deem this softcore porn? It barely begins to be in the same building of it, by my connoisseur standards. For the most part, it is morning-after postcoital bed talk between two people in lingerie or covered by sheets discussing their relationship status (sort of) and background, something that has been standard narrative fare in mainstream fiction since the Sexual Revolution. No frontal nudity, no naked boobs, hardly any sexualized touching. Only in the last two panels, it comes barely close to a sexual scene, and this only if Sciona is serious about having another round or at least some serious making out for the road.
As I am concerned, my preferred kind of fiction combines violence, sex, and laughs. This webcomic makes all of us at risk of OD’ing on comedy filler, but the erotica component has been doled out in moderate and infrequent amounts, so this scene is right up my alley. Moreover, I am greatly interested in the new, more nuanced version of Sciona and her subplot.
I’m not the poster above, but yes I would deem this softcore porn.
Nudity isn’t really the deciding factor, otherwise the Vitruvian Man would be deemed pornographic, but there’s definitely implied sex from this scene.
Nosferatu (2024) would be hardcore porn because they’re literally depicting sexual acts AND the last scene heavily implies pedophilia between the ancient count Orlok and the girl who looks barely adolescent.
Maybe I’m wrong about the Vitruvian man not being pornographic but I’ve seen that displayed in the entrance of a childrens’ science museum so if it is that really shouldn’t have been there.
You have a point about general classfication, but as it concerns this specific scene, it does not really look like a sex scene to me, esp. taking its continuation in next page. You have two people the morning after a one-night stand discussing their background, relationship status (sort of), and future dealings before they part ways. Sure, among other things, they discuss their recent and future sexual interactions, but they could say and do pretty much the same things fully clothed and having breakfast in a diner.
…. Sephiroth, that you?
LOL! She is certainly rocking his hair style – and it looks really good.
How does blood manipulation lead to hair growth?
Blood MAGIC, there’s a difference. The blood is just fuel, it doesn’t have much bearing on the desired effect
Transmutation?
I belive that they can control their physiologhy completly.
Basicly express their bodies to the best.
Sort of like one of like one those old army comercials, “Be all that you can be”.
It’s going to feel really good throwing her into a magnetar, a black hole is too good for her kind. A magnetar in non-Euclidian space.
His friend did warn him that they would never find his body if he went with this woman. I bet he is thinking along the lines of “How did she know?”
Rodney Alcala “The dating game killer” seems to have a copycat 30 years after ( Rodney Alcala had won ” The dating game” in 1978 and the timeline of Grrl power is in 2008 )…
It’s probably female intuition, the episode’s bachelorette, Sheryl Bradshaw, who subsequently refused to go out with him because she found him “creepy”.
I bet his stream of consciousness is is along the lines of “how can I stay alive and get a chance to be with this dangerous but sexy and interesting goddess”.
so what is the countdown to the reveal that he is also some kind of super? 3 comics? 2? 1?
She pretty much already said it last page. No body hair.
He is now to be taken over by another Alari.
Possible, but less and less likely IMO. She seems too fond of him for that and there would be no point in explaining her background and giving him instructions on how to improve his bedroom performance. We already know she has minions (the Senator and his daughter) that she does not deem convenient to turn into meat puppets for Alari ghosts. He might well be a third case.
I’m sure it’s been discussed before but it seems likely that if there are 99%ile supers like Maxima there are bound to be 1st% supers as well. He gets the hot bod but his power is minor or so fringe that there is no circumstance where it is ever expressed.
It’s nice to see honesty in a relationship.
She’s trying to make herself like she used to. Can’t say I disapprove! :)
‘I’m an alien… … Prominent U.S. Senator’
‘That old trope?’
Just to point out, she just mentioned she is possessing the body of a DEAD woman.
I feel this guys is focusing on the wrong parts of her sentence there. Or he did hear and has the presence of mind not to piss off the space ghost any further….. which is rather impressive, I might add
In the Grrlverse, it is widely known that supers, aliens, and in all likelihood demons as well walk among humans. Meeting someone that is two out of three is exceptional, but not an outside-context event. The leap from that to believing in possession and reincarnation magic is not that great. Esp. when the self-styled alien sorceress possessing a dead super just used blood magic to change her body. He apparently likes the challenge of dangerous women and seems able to think on his feet. He may well fancy the opportunity of being the boytoy minion of a hot and powerful supervillainess, esp. if it guarantees him the best sex of his life.
So if you have a super with high resilience, say Achilles, is there a limit to how much coke they could do?
I imagine that there’s a physical limit to how many drugs Achilles could do at one time, even just because it’d fill up his stomach/lungs, saturate his bloodstream to the point that he couldn’t absorb any more, or he’d pass out from their effects. He just would’t die of an overdose.
So, she’s still trying to keep a low profile, and is chief of staff of a senator… and yet, is going to go to work the next day with white hair that is 2.5 ft longer. That’s asking a lot of ‘change blindness’.
I guess she can claim dye job and hair extensions… or whip up an illusion?
As you say, it is something that can be easily justified as a dye job and hair extensions combo. No need to spend blood for an ongoing illusion spell to hide it.
Test post
Wait, I’m so lost. When did this possession happen? Was it before or after the character was introduced that she died and was then possessed? I feel like I completely missed a vital change here.
Re-read from when Archon went through the portal and you’ll be all caught up.
Do you have a page #?
#646-649 (Sciona sacrifices her recently-recovered Alari body to allow a crowd of Alari ghosts to cross the portal to Earth with her)
#743-746 (Sciona possesses the body of a dead Mexican supervillainess that was killed by the cartels for stealing from them)
At that point, if you click on the link of her name in #746, you can see all the subsequent entries concerning her new life.
So, her superpower does not just work as super-cocaine, but super-viagra as well? If so, chances are it works like a versatile and inherent drug factory (and quite possibly an alchemy lab as well, esp. for a blood sorceress), with the output to be injected with a touch. Apparent synergy with blood magic for all kinds of biomanipulation effects is huge. Sciorpia won the lottery with her new body and is much more powerful than before.
I’m expecting that this could be something akin to what the protagonist of a novel called “The Rook” had going on (if you haven’t read it, think of it like a conspiracy thriller in an SCP-style world as written by Sir Terry Pratchett – don’t bother with the TV adaptation, as much as a fan of Adrian Lester as I am, the show missed the whole point of the novel and had none of the comedic angle). That book starts with the protagonist getting her memories erased and, as the book goes on, we learn that her “original self” had a lot of psychological hang-ups over her biomanipulation powers and never got all that good with them, but the “new self” has no such problems and become far more powerful than anyone could’ve predicted.
I get the feeling that the original owner of Sciona’s new body didn’t have the chemical or biological knowledge necessary to make full use of her ability. But Sciona’s a blood mage – biochemistry is something I expect many blood mages learn as a secondary aid to their magic. Or at least to assess how much use a particular blood sample is as fuel.
Indeed. Sciona has several flaws (although she seems to have toned down a few of them in this new life) but she is diligent in the cultivation of abilities useful to her calling and goals. E.g. she learned enough about biotechnologies applied to blood magic to discover how to unlock specific superpowers in herself (albeit imperfectly) and create a golem that could copy any superpower (and evolved in a sapient, independent supervillain) with just a few blood samples from people who have the same abilities. It’s close to the biotechnologies Holy Grail in any setting where superpowers with a genetic basis exist. Only Deus has managed to do something similar coming from a different angle. Her Dr. Doom credentials (mastery of a combo of magic and super-science) are impeccable, even if she focuses on a specialization, unlike Victor.
Chances are the original Escorpia was a grown-up street kid that never mastered anything but the simplest and crudest uses of her superpower. This was likely one of the reasons that got her killed by a couple cartel thugs that Sciona effortlessly wiped out. Sciona, OTOH, has all the scientific expertise to unlock pretty much any gainful use of the power and synergize them with blood magic. This makes her much more powerful than her previous Alari self or the original owner of her new body.
Even More honesty and straight forwardness! I am liking this crazy broad more and more!
Even if she remains true to her Alari supervillainess mindset, the experience of her current lifestyle seems to have smoothed out a lot of her roughest edges considerably, in comparison to her previous version. I like this more nuanced version a lot.
Is it just me, or the thrill of getting her preferred hairstyle back and their sexy talk are making her seriously consider round seven (or at least some parting making out)? It seemed she was preparing to leave in the previous page, but her body language in the last two panels suggests another course.
I bet his inner monologue reaction to the disclosure of her background included the line “well, this explains a lot”.
It doesn’t really excuse her behavior, but when we first saw her she consisted of the top piece of her head stapled (badly) onto the body of a male orc(?) Apparently this state of affairs has persisted for a long time (200 years or so?)
We’ve seen she likes being female and attractive. And not all that good at blaming herself for actions that led to that state of affairs. So I can see where she would be peeved at the world.
Things are moving more towards what she sees as ideal, so perhaps her mad-on has cooled down a little.
You have a point. Chances are the combo of getting a body she sees as close to ideal and damn useful, and the experience of living in it, are causing her to mellow somewhat. We also knows she enjoys the opportunity of tasting the sensual pleasures her preferred body makes available.
Moreover, she is still a long-term infiltrator of human society as a supervillainess and alien invader, but now she can openly interact with humans instead of living in hiding as a monster. This is likely another factor influencing her to a more nuanced approach. Although being the chief of staff of a corrupt US Senator she dominates probably does little to tone down her cynicism about human society and villainous mindset.
Presumably Sciona will eventually barge back in on the main story and wreak her vengence upon Archon!
…Wait, does she want revenge on Archon? Like, they tried to stop her making a portal… but they failed. And it turned out the portal was to an exterminatusified world, but again, not really Archon’s fault. And… uh…
What else was there?
Maybe Sciona ISN’T going to try and get terrible vengence on Archon, in a suprise twist that has villains everywhere decrying her for scorning tradition. Maybe she goes and causes trouble for Deus instead (which from his perspective, would be a deus ex machina moment, and that’s delightfully ironic), tries to usurp leadership of his Alari…
Since her ‘rebirth’, Sciona seems seriously focused on (re)building her power base and keeping a low profile, apart from R&R moments such as this one. When she met Maxima, Dabbler, and Deus, she tried hard to keep her facade, even if Deus quickly recognized her, apart from a few angry glances she slipped into and justified as a resting bitch face problem. As such, I very much doubt she’d seek vengeance against them in the near future. If Archon and her clash again before long, it shall likely be because their goals somehow collide in a hard-to-avoid way and they stumble into it.
Apparently, she has the ability to enjoy sex even if not adequately lubed. So she might give the guy a firestarter and see if she can make him explode by sex only. (That would be a terrible trend if it caught on.)
I think that to make herself lube on command is trivial for a blood-sorceress & biomanipulation super that can make her hair grow and change style at will, and give super-viagra on touch to her partner. That, and we have seen she likes rough sex.
Did we ever find out what an Alari blood sorcerer was doing on a backwater like Earth in the first place?
A backwater that holds the key to a huge pool of power unavailable anywhere else in the known universe. Like anyone else in the know and able to make a move, she was here to try and take control of all that supers goodness.
anyone else thinking of “Mirage” from “the Incredibles”?
I thought she was holding some weird alien device in the first panel that was squirting a tentacle…. took me longer than it should to realize that was just the hub of the ceiling fan behind her casting blood magic.
Fun fact don’t ever do a line of Viagra it makes your nasal tissue swell up and it feels like you belly flopped into water from a four story jump
I see we’ve progressed past “barely-disguised”. This is just straight up the writer’s fetish, looks like.
I admit I have a serious liking for superhero erotica (the natural intersection of my taste for post-Comic Code superhero fiction and porn), which is one reason among several I like this subplot much more than say the Nth dose of comedy filler. However, as far as I can tell, there are several kinks in it that may apply. I am curious, what exactly are you labeling as the writer’s fetish?
Judging by the start of her previous string of appearances (https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-1247-soul-x-sole/), Dave has a strong affinity for pseudo-dominatrix, sexually-aggressive women. No judgement, but it doesn’t make for compelling storytelling watching him indulge his fantasies right in front of us. Especially right after we just got done with a major character moment for Peggy.
I actually don’t have a thing for dominatrixes. I just have trouble imagining a supervillainess who isn’t sexually confident if not downright aggressive.
For those in the know, how much influence Sciona’s cover identity is currently controlling as the Chief of Staff (and power behind the throne) of a prominent US Senator? And how much of Escorpia’s background as a cartel member did she have to cover up in order to pass any background checks to qualify for the position, if any?
On second thoughts, and re-checking the relevant parts of the story, I noticed that Sciona is Chief of Staff to one Senator, which she probably turned into a meat puppet for an Alari ghost. However, she has under her thumb at least another Senator, whom she made an addict of her super-cocaine touch and whose daughter she recruited as a willing minion. They look like entirely different persons and their circumstances seem rather different, so I assume they are different people.
No idea who she is or why she matters.
She’s only one of the longest-running antagonists in the entire story. She’s changed bodies twice since, but she first showed up on page 489.
Not to mention the (second) most important supervillain character in the story so far. Whether she is the best or second best basically depends on whether you deem Deus a villain or not.
Growing a full head of white hair overnight isn’t going to raise any red flags for watchdogs or conspiracy theorists, definitely not. Seriously, if Archon doesn’t get at least three calls from nervous political interns reporting a possible super government infiltration, I will be surprised.
Nothing that Sciona can’t easily justify as having a fancy about changing hairstyle and getting a dye job and hair extensions. Anyone that knows ger and sees the new look is going to assume the same. To think differently, you’d need to scrutinize her close and hard enough to acknowledge w/o doubt it is her natural hair, and be knowledgeable to tell the difference. Hard to do that in a joh environment, esp. w/o looking like a creep or paranoid.