Conan the Barbarian - The Black Colossus

We read and react to Robert E. Howard’s “Black Colossus." Grave-robbing and treasure hunting goes wrong and unleashes an ancient evil to sweep across the nations. We get to see Conan as a military commander when he is chosen by prophecy to assume a position of leadership in one nation's military defense against the hordes that have been assembled from the south. 

Transcript

Welcome Back And Story Setup

Michael Kentris 0:04

Hello and welcome back to Brothers Reading Books. We are your hosts, The Brothers. I am Michael, and I'm joined by my brother.

SPEAKER_01 0:12

Hi, William.

Michael Kentris 0:14

Hey William, how are you? I'm doing pretty good, are you, Michael? I am great. That's not true, that's a lie. I am actually incredibly tired. I had to work this last weekend. But I am happy to be here with you and our dear listeners as we continue our journey through the corpus of Conan the Barbarian. So, what do we have in front of us today? So today we will be covering the story Black Colossus, and it does have a lot of the elements that we have grown to know and love in a lot of these short stories. And what elements are those?

SPEAKER_01 0:51

So we have Conan as a mercenary in this situation. There is, of course, Conan, yes. It is typical depiction of black hair and smoldering blue eyes, and we have some mystical elements of an evil sorcerer from the desert.

Michael Kentris 1:11

Right. Yeah. We've got mysterious ancient powers, impending doom, beautiful ladies, as usual. So yes, uh, we we've got kind of the the trifecta of of Conan. Lots of fighting, women needing rescuing, and uh ancient dangers. Yes. Start us off your start us off your will. What are we beginning with in this story?

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Absolutely. So we do have a quote here from E. Hoffman Price, who turns out is a real author half of the time. It's difficult for me to ascertain whether or not we're dealing with a in-universe work or a real face of fiction, but the night of power when fate stalked through the corridors of the world like a colossus just risen from an age-old throne of granite.

Michael Kentris 1:56

And that's from the girl from Samarkind, we'll say. So that's maybe how it's like Final Fantasy X.

SPEAKER_01 2:02

Right. Right. So uh we actually start off from a different point of view than our typical

The Thief And The Ivory Dome

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Conan here.

Michael Kentris 2:11

We are following a thief, Shevatas, uh, as he is kind of stalking through these mysterious ruins of I wasn't sure how to say this. Kuth Kuthims, Kuth Shims? How did you I I kind of went uh like old, you know, Egyptian-ish. I was thinking like Kuth Chemis.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Okay. Yeah, absolutely.

Michael Kentris 2:35

I don't know. I don't know. It was like I was thinking like, how would how would we say this in like uh you know, like a Brendan Fraser's mummy sort of situation? But yeah, we start off with only the age old silence brooded over the mysterious ruins of Kuth Chemis. I'm sorry. Was that how you pronounced it? You know, it really it's it's anyone's guess. Alright. I think it's the only time it gets mentioned. But fear was there.

SPEAKER_01 2:57

Fear quivered in the mind of Shemitas, the thief driving his breath quick and sharp against his clenched teeth.

Michael Kentris 3:03

And so we get a really nice description here of the ruins, how these colossal monuments of desolation decay, sort of dotting the landscape. We have various descriptions of how they're depicted as different bodily aspects, so like his teeth jagging out of a mouth, some of them missing. And I thought the description here, the imagery was very striking. Yes. Yeah, it's very evocative. And I noticed that we do get some some words here, like um they mentioned the fallen cyclopean blocks of stone, which is a phrase that I very much think I've read in Lovecraft as well. Okay. So what would that be, a cyclopean block? I am so glad you asked. So uh a lot of times, so far this kind of goes back to you know my area of interest with the classic Greek era, or you know, even the uh antique. But um essentially the Cyclops were the sons of Poseidon, and they were considered relatively rough figures, you know, we kind of get various figures such as the one in the Odyssey, and so they have very rough hewn, the kinds of things, obviously very large. So I kind of think of them as like large and rough.

SPEAKER_02 4:17

Okay.

Michael Kentris 4:18

Just as a general characteristic.

SPEAKER_01 4:23

Well, that's very helpful.

Michael Kentris 4:25

But uh yeah, as we kind of get further and further into here, from horizon to horizon, no sign of life, only the sheer breathtaking sweep of the naked desert bisected by the wandering line of a long dry river course. In the midst of that vastness of the glimmering fangs of the ruins, the columns standing up like broken masts of sunken ships, all dominated by the towering ivory dome before which Chevatas stood trembling. So yes, our point of interest, the dome. The dome. So yes, the dome itself was of pure ivory which shone as if unknown hands kept it polished. Likewise shone the spired gold cap of the pinnacle and the inscription which sprawled across about the curve of the dome in golden hieroglyphics yards long. No man on earth could read those characters, but Chevatas shuddered at the dim conjectures they raised, for he came of a very old race whose myths ran back to shapes undreamed of by contemporary tribes. So, yes, mysterious dome. Right. So yeah, we're they're very much like leaning into the like evocation of like ancient Egyptian kind of grave robber-esque uh sorts of stories, which at the time that they were writing this would have been relatively recent, like you know, the uh the whole Egyptology mania sort of thing would have been fairly recent. That was like I think kind of like in the Victorian era, if I remember correctly. Is that right? I don't know, but that sounds correct. Let's say yes. So so it would make sense to kind of use that, right? It's kind of a a stand-in for things that are ancient. You know something that I just learned recently, that uh the pyramids, for example, were already ancient at the time of like the the book of Exodus in the Bible. So they weren't they weren't building those like giant pyramids any longer. That's from like kind of the old kingdom in Egypt. So even even in depending on you know how you date things, there's a lot of debate about that, right? But let's just say from the Bronze Age, so sometime kind of in the like 2000 plus BC era, these were already ancient things. So for us, like even more ancient, if you will. So I think it's like it's kind of leaning into that, like this is you know things that are forgotten, no man alive can read this, yada yada yada. So so yeah, I think uh they're very much leaning on that perhaps well-known trope even at that point in time. For us here, in our current year of the Lord, 2026, oh already like a hundred years old, this story might be, or is close to. Yeah. But yeah, so I think it makes sense. But uh vengeance upon ancient. Yes, it's very old, as they say. And we get a little bit of a character study of Shivatis here. He's Wiry Life Master Thief from Zamora. So we've encountered Zamorans before, and they have been characterized in certain ways, Will. If you had to characterize Zamorans, as far as the Conan stories. They're very seedy characters, you know, doing a lot of the ne'er do well stems most of the Zamorans we've met so far have been thieves.

SPEAKER_01 7:31

Yes. It's the it's their primary export is thievery.

Michael Kentris 7:35

Right. So yeah, uh such as it is. Yes. So um so this guy, he's in a loincloth of scarlet silk. He is dark, vulture like face, keen black eyes, long, slender fingers, and he has a jewel-hilted s sword in a sheath, and he handles the weapon with exaggerated care, even flinching away from contact of the sheath with his naked thigh. Yes, and we hear a little bit uh his name, right, it's just in case you don't know. Uh he's a thief among thieves, whose name was spoken with awe in the dives of the maul, and the dim shadowy recesses beneath the temples of Bell, which in this world, Bell's the god of thieves. And uh we remember the maul from Conan previously, I think that was the Tower of the Elephant.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

That sounds right.

Michael Kentris 8:27

Right, right. It has been mentioned before, yeah. Yeah, he he stabbed the one guy who insulted him, who I think that guy was a kidnapper and slave trader.

SPEAKER_02 8:37

Mm-hmm.

Michael Kentris 8:38

And uh Yeah, he was so Conan was in some bar in the mall, a tavern, if you will. A single candle, yes, plunge the room into darkness. Yes, I remember that. So anyway, so yeah, he's he's from some rough parts of town.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

So, like you said before, kind of alluding to the grey robbing thing, that's exactly what he's here to do.

Michael Kentris 8:58

Nobody's been able to get into this dome. It's been untouched by time. Any fool could see there was something unnatural about the structure. The winds and suns of three thousand years had lashed, yet its golden ivory rose bright and glistening as the day it was reared by nameless hands on the bank of the nameless river. And then we get a little bit of a cartographic lesson orienting where we are. Right, right, right.

SPEAKER_01 9:22

Which I kind of glossed over because I uh I struggle with visualizing some of these pieces, but so this desert was the mysterious expanse lying southwest of the lands of Shem.

Michael Kentris 9:35

Southeast, Will. Sorry, yeah, southeast. It's southwest, though, of was it a few days around Kellogg's out to the southwest? The river Styx. The river Styx, so close to Stygia there. And yeah, at the bend b at the bend began the land of Stygia. And yeah. Eastward we have the Hyrcanian Kingdom of Tehran.

SPEAKER_01 9:57

So we get just some general orientation. We get Koth, which is what, a week's ride northward, and westward we go into Shem.

Michael Kentris 10:05

Right. There you go. And yeah, I I think it's it is somewhat helpful, right? Because uh we are fortunate enough to have a map of the Hyborian age available to us. But a lot of people reading this in like a magazine probably would not essentially. We we know we are in the the deep south of of this land, which makes sense because we're in desert, but so he's traveled, he's looted all over his travels, but now he is hesitating and shuddering. The highest adventure and mightiest treasure of all. In that ivory dome lay the bones of Thugra Kotan, the dark sorcerer who had reigned in Kuchemis three thousand years ago, when the kingdoms of Stigia stretched far northward of the great river over the meadows of Shem and into the uplands. So who is who is Thugra Kotan? He is the last magician of Kutemis. Grey eyed, tawny haired barbarians and wolfskins and scale male had ridden from the north into the rich uplands to carve out the kingdom of Koth with their iron swords. So so he was basically the the guy presiding over the decline and kind of barbarian invasion of of the lands of Stigia, which, I mean, that's kind of a typical trope, uh, I think, historically speaking, too, right? We we saw that obviously like the classic example would be like the Roman Empire with the the Goths coming down um like in the four to five hundreds, and then on the Eastern Roman or B Byzantine Empire, we saw similar things with like the the Persians and then the Turks coming in from the uh the and yeah, lots of empires, like I think the Chinese I forget which dynasty in the uh the Chinese kingdoms, they would have the Mongols coming down, right? So it's always a question of these barbarians coming into these more quote unquote civilized lands and raiding and conquesting and so on and so forth. So it's a it's a I think a fairly typical cycle, and I think it's mentioned maybe in the introduction of this edition that we're reading, like the cycle of civilization and barbarism. So I think this is like kind of the one of those examples of Howard exploring those themes a little bit. Absolutely. Like you said, it's sort of that cycle of we we build up, we get civilization, and then it becomes soft, and then barbarians come in, decimate it until they build their own society, civilization, so on and so on. Right. Yeah, it's kind of like that meme. Um, right? Was it uh strong men create good times, good times create weak men, weak men create bad times, bad times create strong men. The fancy word for that is anacyclosis. But um, right, we're not just about memes here. But uh but we are about memes. So yeah, it um it does, I think, help as a conceptual framework in terms of like the you know the rise of empire, decadence, and then the decline. Um so yeah, anyway. Unlike in real life, uh Thugura Kotan had swallowed a strange, terrible poison, and his masked priests had locked him into the tomb he himself had prepared. So that's a little bit of a deviation there from uh most of the historical examples we were just talking about.

SPEAKER_01 13:19

To an extent, I'm sure, you know, a number of royals or aristocrats have taken poison in the face of imminent death by violence.

Michael Kentris 13:27

Yes, probably not with the expectation to rise again, though. Correct, yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

Hmm. I love this next line as devotees died about that tomb in a crimson holocaust, but the baryons could not burst the door nor even mar the structure by maul or fire.

Michael Kentris 13:43

So again, he is shut up and there. And it has been shut for three thousand years. Sorry, in my head, again, this is probably aging me. I think back to the the intro to the original Power Rangers. Do you remember uh where Rita Repulsa?

SPEAKER_01 14:00

That's right.

Michael Kentris 14:01

Like finally, after 3,000 years, I'm free to conquer Earth.

SPEAKER_01 14:07

Free to be able to do that.

Michael Kentris 14:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:10

I think I think she was locked up for 10,000 years.

Michael Kentris 14:12

10,000, sorry, sorry. But yes, yeah, right. Same character. Obviously the Power Rangers were big Conan the Barbarian fans. But yeah, anyway. So we find out, right? This this sepulchre has been unmolested over this period of time. Many thieves have tried to gain the treasure which Fables said ledly heaped about his moldering bones, and many a thief had died with the froth of madness on his lips. So lots of weird stuff here. And he is basically here to try his luck, the greatest challenge of his thievan career. Right. It seems like a very similar situation as we had with the Tower of the Elephant. I forget that character's name, the thief in that one. But it's very much like I'm a very well-known thief. I've done all sorts of stuff and not planned this great caper for I don't know, his his Magnum Obis or Right. To steal the big one. Yeah. Right. Yes. So what do we have next, Will, here? So it sounds like unlike most of the thieves that we've encountered so far, Chevatas is actually able to gain entry into this place. So obviously he's still very nervous. Lots of shuddering and trepidation as he sort of navigates his way to the front of this dome. And we get a lot of information here, kind of like more about Thugra as well. So nearby had been the pit, dark and awful, wherein screaming victims were fed to a nameless and morphic monstrosity, which came up out of a deeper, more hellish cavern, a lot of sacrificial stuff of captives to set the serpent god of Stig Stigia. But uh legend made Thugra Kotan more than human as worship, yet lingered in a mongrel degraded cult whose votaries stamp his likeness on coins to pay the way of their dead over the great river of darkness of which the sticks was but the material shadow. But he put aside his fears and mounted to the bronze door whose smooth surface offered no bolt or catch. But uh he's got nimble fingers and sensitive fingertips, and he found some projections too small for the eye to detect, and he pressed carefully according to a peculiar pattern, and does a little magic here, surprisingly.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

He mutters a long forgotten incantation, and then does a very precise, exact center of the door sharp below to go ahead and open the door, which retreats inward, and the breath hissed explosively from his teeth as he did so.

Michael Kentris 16:41

Yes. So we now learn the purpose for the sword. There's a serpent twenty feet long with shimmering iridescent scales. The sword drips a greenish liquid exactly like that which slavered from the similar fang, or scimitar fangs of the reptile. So the blade was steeped in the poison of the snake's own kind. And the obtaining of that venom from the fiend haunted swamps of Zingara would have made a saga in itself. It's really funny because it's exactly like the same vibe that we got with the Tower of the Elephant. Right, the story of obtaining his black lotus poison. Yes. That would have been a tale all on its own, young Conan. Yes, uh there are some definite parallels here in the introduction. So it shoots out like a stroke of lightning, and for all his quickness of nerve and eye, Shavadas had died then but for chance. His well laid plans of leaping aside and striking down the outstretched neck were put at naught by the blinding speed of the reptile's attack. So he luckily stabs it in the mouth, essentially, by sheer chance, and the serpent dies poisoned, and he continues into the building. So yeah, he gingerly steps over it and goes into the dome, thrusting against the door, and he cries out because instead of utter darkness, he had come into a crimson light that throbbed and pulsed almost beyond the endurance of mortal eyes, which made me think, and I know we're doing a lot of dancers here, but the episode of Seinfeld when Kramer has that chicken restaurant open up across the street, and there's the bright red side just like constantly coming into his room. Yes, absolutely. And similarly drove them to madness. So I love this description of the treasure because it is just so over the top. It's an entire paragraph in and of itself, if I may indulge here. The treasure was there, heaped in staggering profusion. Piles of diamonds, sapphires, rubies, turquoises, opals, emeralds, ziggurats of jade, jet and lapis luzuli, pyramids of gold wedges, teocales of silver ingots. I had to look up what a teocali is. And it's basically like a Native American ziggurat.

SPEAKER_01 18:54

Okay.

Michael Kentris 18:55

Think like Chichen Itza. So he's basically just using like like zigarette, pyramid, a teocallus. Technically, a teocalis and a ziggurat are like the same. They're more temples. A pyramid is a tomb. Important distinction. Okay. But they all have the same triangular sort of shape. Or pyramidal shape, if you will. That sparkled and shimmered under the crimson glow with a million scintillate lights.

SPEAKER_01 19:17

Every now and then Meg and I talk about what we want to be done with our bodies when we pass.

Michael Kentris 19:22

And honestly, I think getting our skulls gold plated and having moonstones put in our eye sockets would be a pretty good way to go. Pretty good? Yeah. No, actually uh we were we were talking about that in our household just the other day as well, and we were we're uh talking about the practice in some parts of Europe, like Greece and Italy, about um ossuaries.

SPEAKER_01 19:44

Yes.

Michael Kentris 19:45

Where you basically like you think of like at the scene near the spoilers, the scene near the end of Romeo and Juliet where they're aligned at the carnal house, right? They're on a slab, supposedly dead. Right? Do we have to say spoilers spoilers for things that are over like 400 years old? I think Romeo and Juliet is accepted knowledge at this point. Um essentially what would happen is you would lay your you know your loved one out on a slab, their body would decompose, and then you would come back, clean the bones, and then put them into an ossuary, like on a shelf somewhere. And turn them in walls. Um, you know, like uh a classic example of things like that are things like the the catacombs under like Rome and Paris and things like that. Um yeah, anyway, so I don't know. I'm not opposed to the idea. Maybe it's old school. Anyway, all right, so lots of treasure. Uh I'll I'll see if I can find some moonstones that fit you well. Thank you. Assuming that I don't pass first, which is very profable. I mean, there's only four years between us, you know.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

There's a little out there, it's not a good thing.

Michael Kentris 20:49

That's right. Maybe you'll get by a car or something. You never know. Uh, morbid. Alright, so Shavas looked, blood drains from his features, his marrow turns to ice, the skin of his back crawls and wrinkles with horror. Suddenly he found his voice in one awful scream that rang hideously under the arching dome. Then again, the silence of the ages lay among the ruins of mysterious Kuthemmis. End part one. You

Rumors Of Natok’s Rising Horde

Michael Kentris 21:15

know what his problem was? Mindset. He didn't have enough cat-like descriptors.

SPEAKER_02 21:20

That's true. He's no sheep answer.

Michael Kentris 21:25

Oh my goodness. So with that uh that kind of cold open, if you will, so we are now into the story proper. So that being said, we get a lot of I like this. Uh this is this is very evocative of a lot of like modern fiction. I think of like the beginning of a lot of Wheel of Time books where they start with like, you know, There was a wind that began. It was not the beginning, but it was a beginning. Similarly, we get like rumors drifted through the Meadowlands, into the cities, ran along caravans, blah, blah, blah, on and on. Like it's the it's the kind of materialistic description of of a uh of a concept. So I always enjoy that. It kind of like makes it more physical, if you will. So it's basically saying that uh it's come all the way out from the south via all these trade caravans, word of mouth, so on and so forth. And the rumor was that there is a new prophet in among the nomads far beyond Stigia. And apparently these Stiggians themselves are not connected. But they they have here a desert sorcerer called Natak the Veiled One, for his features were always masked. It's all about branding. Right. So so yeah, right, they say that his his goal was the uplands of the high of Hyboria here. And his chanting votaries. So which fits, right? We heard this history lesson about the extent of the old kingdom going up to the lands of Koth, which was the southernmost part of Hyboria, and this guy wants to reconquer all the way up to there.

unknown 22:53

Yes.

Michael Kentris 22:53

A rumor said Natak had wheel welded thirty nomadic tribes and fifteen cities into his following that a rebellious Stiggy Stigian prince had joined him. This latter sent the affair an aspect of real war. So Yeah he's got quite quite a horde here that he's using for

Yasmila’s Night Terror And Mitra

Michael Kentris 23:10

this purpose. Yes. So we learn finally where our story is set and this is in the city of Koraja which is essentially in my mind it's kind of like a city state right we we learn that it is kind of carved out of Shemite by Cothic adventurers. So we have the King of Ophir who's holding the young king of Koraja captive. And then we've also got the Pinurius King of Koth appears like I believe tax heavy if I remember correctly.

SPEAKER_02 23:41

Okay.

Michael Kentris 23:42

So and then we uh we come to the young princess Yasmila the king's sister obviously this being a current barbarian story she is beautiful minstrel singovit. So we get this very I guess horrific scene essentially she is being visited by some undescribable horror essentially yes Princess Yasmella lulled not on that silken bed so yeah we get a description of Gan just elaborate decor, just ostentatious she lay naked on her supple belly upon the bare marble like the most abase suppliant, her dark hair streaming over her white shoulders, her slender fingers intertwined, and she lay and writhed in pure horror that froze the blood in her lithe limbs and dilated her beautiful eyes, that pricked the roots of her dark hair and made goose flesh rise along her supple spine. Above her, in the darkest corner of the marble chamber lurked a vast, shapeless shadow no living thing it was clot of darkness, a blur in the sight, a monstrous night born incubus might have been a figment of a sleep drugged brain but for the points of blazing yellow fire that glimmered like two eyes from the blackness. And we get some horrible hissing shuddering voice here. Yes. You are marked for mine, princess, came the gloating whisper. Before I waken from the long sleep I had marked you and yearn for you, but I was held fast by the ancient spell by which I escaped mine enemies. I am the soul of Natak the Veiled One. Look well upon me, princess soon you shall behold me in my bodily guise and shall love me. So creepy. Right I did enjoy this next part also like the ghostly hissing dwindled off in lustful titterings like some things in Conan, it is over the top which that it's part and parcel of this genre, I would say where everything's just larger than life the emotions, the descriptions I think excess is probably a good descriptor to apply to this genre of swords and sorcery. More right so we get a little more conversation here and he's like you'll be my queen I will and this is you know where things get a little let's just say explicit I will teach thee the ancient forgotten ways of pleasure and before the stream of cosmic obscenity which poured from the shadowy colossus, Yasmila cringed and writhed as if from a whip that flayed her dainty bare flesh So yes, I I hear here they use the word dainty several times. So yeah, basically this this thing's like I guess emotionally abusing her right now. Sure. And uh saying like I don't know it it's such a weird plot device to an extent that it's like like why this princess like obviously we are meant to be aware that she is very beautiful. So is it just just because of her beauty? I don't know. It seems strange for an ancient ancient sorcerer to be like so on about that. But it does it does. It seems like he does have kind of an ulterior purpose later on but Right that is true. But right but right now it's definitely like why is why is he just trying to use some I had here Eldritch sutra to try yes so eventually it goes and she wakes up one of her kind of ladies in waiting here, the Tisa and she's like it was here again and uh she's like oh princess it is evident that no mortal power can deal with it and the charm is useless that the priests of Ishtar gave you therefore seek you the forgotten oracle of Mitra. So we have Mitra again here. So they say here the Kothians had long since abandoned the worship of Mitra forgetting the attributes attributes of the universal Hyborian god of information about some of their practices here that Ishtar was much to be feared and all the gods of Koth, Kothian culture and religion had suffered from a subtle admixture of Shemite and Stigian strains. The simple ways of the Hyborians had become modified to a large extent by the sensual, luxurious yet despotic habits of the East And I I made myself a little note here so this is a very common trope actually describing people from the East in fact you see it in ancient plays such as Aeschylus in his work The Persians and in Agamemnon where they they talk about the excesses of like Persian kings or kings from the East and um so this excess of wealth and decadence being attributed to the East is a very ancient thing actually for for those of us in the West to do. So she's like Will Mitra help me and she's like surely he will seek the shrine I will go with you and we again get like this this difference in religious practice here I will go naked on my knees as befits a suppliant lest Mitra deem I lack humility and then Vadisa says put on some pants right pull yourself together. Mitra would have folks stand upright before him not crawling on their bellies like worms or spilling blood of animals all over his altars. Thus objurgated you know what they uh it just makes you think people back in the day read books. So uh but yeah I think this is one of like the old DD schools of magic objuration which basically means to like like chastise or rebuff to correct. Anyway, so they go down right there walk in through the castle they get to Mitra's shrine and what do they find there will so first off it's been kind of neglected it's down in the basement and so but they do get there eventually the arch ceiling is crusted with jewels the floor is set with blocks of crystal and the walls are decorated with the golden friezework and so they keep going down and yeah the shrine long forgotten except by a faithful few and royal visitors to Kouraja's court mainly for whose benefit the fame was maintained. Yes Mela had never entered it before though she was born in the palace probably a very big big palace. And so they go ahead and actually get there and plain and unadorned in a comparison to the lavish display of Ishtar shrines there was about it a simplicity of dignity and beauty characteristic of the Mitrin religion. So again lofty ceiling not domed though plain white marble floors and walls the former with a narrow gold frieze running about them and behind an altar of clear green jade unstained with sacrifice so the pedestal whereon sat the material manifestation of the deity and very, very sort of handsome man as a sort of symbol of Mitra he's got magnificent magnificent shoulders, clear cut features, patriarchal beard, thick curls of the hair confined by a simple band about the temples This though she did not know it was art in its highest form the free uncramped artistic expression of a highly aesthetic race unhampered by conventional symbolism. Yeah there was a lot there as far as like what do we make of this? I wasn't sure how much symbolism to put how much stock to put on this obviously he spends some some words on this so it must mean something to him but I think I think it's again just kind of contrasting the simplicity with decadence perhaps I think that's yeah. Yeah like it's supposed to be like an idealized human form, quote unquote. And I like this this is but the emblem of the god none pretends to know what Mitra looks like this but represents him in idealized human form, as near perfection as a human mind can conceive he does not inhabit this cold stone as your priests tell you Ishtar does. He is everywhere, above us and about us and he dreams betimes in the high places among the stars but here his being focuses, therefore call upon him so um if I may indulge in a digression for a moment. So if we think about like ancient paganism, right? So that was kind of the idea was that you would have different kind of manifestations or instantiations of like let's say Zeus or Athena or Hermes and so like different cities would have different idols to like the same the same gods essentially and so how could the god inhabit multiple different idols at the same time and so this was sometimes what they would like they they basically said like oh they can be in multiple places or different versions of them can be in multiple places. Um and that's why sometimes you'll see uh things like like what do you say like Pallas Athena or like Zeus uh Boergies so these are like attributed to different things or like Apollo at Delphi right so these are like specific instances of of the deity and then we kind of invert this and this is my bias here, but I believe this is a kind of subtle nod to Christianity because or if if you like the Judeo-Christian tradition which was an inversion where essentially so a lot of times right pagan worship would involve making the idol. But if we look back like at Genesis, right, where Adam is made in the image of God. So Adam or humankind is the idol of God. So it's an inversion in as much as like with with these kind of ancient pagan religions, gods were in the image of man, but in like the Judeo-Christian tradition, man is in the image of God. So it's an inversion of that kind of thinking. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_01 33:30

Somewhat I I think I get the gist of it yes.

Michael Kentris 33:33

Yeah but I think that's what they're saying here is that like Mitra is this like more elevated form of worship. That's that's how I take it but I have my own biases as far as that goes so do with that what you will. So anyway what happens next? So uh basically as they enter yes Mela is kind of wondering like oh what should I say and I think it's kind of funny because her handmaiden Vatiza it's like before you can speak Mitchell knows the contents of your mind and then literally he like just starts speaking to them.

SPEAKER_01 34:06

It's like speak not my daughter for I know your need Yes and basically he tells her go forth upon the streets alone and place your kingdom in the hands of the first man you meet there that's pretty explicit.

Michael Kentris 34:21

That's pretty you know as far as seeking guidance I appreciate the lack of ambiguity Right it's not prophecy where it's just like seek the one shrouded in shadow for he will blah blah blah it's all like just go outside tonight first guy you meet put him in charge. That's right okay which to be fair is what she does. Right she follows orders what she asks for them she dons a cloak she masks herself a little bit so there's she's the princess and goes out onto the street by herself.

Conan Meets The Princess

Michael Kentris 35:00

Yes. So as she goes it does not take very long before a figure appears on the eerie street. She'd never gone outside alone so this is a whole new thing for her walking outside unattended and we have a man a tall man in the chain male halber of a mercenary. She braced herself then darted from the shadow holding her cloak close about her. Zaha his sword flashed half out of his sheath. It halted when he saw it was only a woman that stood before him but his quick glance went over her head seeking the shadows for possible confederates. So he thinks might be like some sort of trap to get uh ambushed. Which to be fair isn't completely unfounded it seems like there are never do wells always about so who is this mysterious figure?

SPEAKER_01 35:40

Well yeah we know that torchlight Glenn and Doling on the polished blue steel of his Greaves and bassinet, a baleful fire glittered bluely in his eyes obviously not a Carthian when he spoke she knew he was no Hyborian. There was a wolfishness about his care this warrior that marked the barbarian the eyes of no civilized man, however wild or criminal ever blazed with such a fire So obviously it's Conan Yes So yes we are we are here with Conan.

Michael Kentris 36:10

Have they shut you into the street he asked in barbarous Cothic reaching for her. I've but come from the last wine shop open. Ishtar's curse on these white livered reformers who closed the grog houses let men sleep rather than guzzle they say aye so they can work and fight better for their masters soft gutted eunuchs I call them so Conan's been drinking and he's he's he's not done for the night, you know?

SPEAKER_01 36:32

I do appreciate that Conan disapproves of closing time she avoids his clutch with a little twist of her body and she's just trying to make sure that she doesn't reveal her identity quite yet and she's like oh ho ho ho not here come with me and again he's just very suspect still is like where?

Michael Kentris 36:54

Are you taking me to some den of robbers? Right. So yes and he's like you're as bad as a Hyrcanian woman with your damnable veil. Uh here let me look at your figure anyway so he pulls the cloak back and he he sees that she's dressed richly and he's like who the d you're no street wave like he's suspicious. So unless your Lehman robbed the king's Saraglio if we were closed, right? So like uh basically some some rich person's we looked this word up before Saraglio. I think it was a a place for entertaining in an Ottoman courthouse court courtyard I should say. So she's trying to basically just like get him back to talk with him. So he hesitates but again he kind of just assumes her to be either a noble lady or the handmaiden of a lady and so he does follow her and tigerish is used several times to describe him as he has what is it here?

SPEAKER_01 37:53

His male could not conceal his hard lines of tigerish strength.

Michael Kentris 37:57

Everything about him was tigerish, elemental untamed Yes Yeah. She feared him, told herself she loathed his raw brute strength and unashamed barbarism, yet something breathless and perilous inside her leaned toward him. The hidden primitive chord that lurks in every woman's soul was sounded and responded. Gross I like this dot dot dot She was frightened and fascinated by her fright. It is right this is the thing right I know Conan the Barbarian was written mostly for like young men to read that was like the target audience but some of this stuff very much reads like romance novel coded that's fair but anyway I mean it's not it's it's it's over the top right it's that excess it's an excess. So she finally comes back leads him past the guardsmen he eyes them as a fierce dog might eye a strange pack and Vatisa appears again and she's like oh my princess right as he's uh drinking some wine and he's like princess the wine jar crashed to the floor so I like this he he jumps back and then he pulls his sword and it's like you know it's like two women who are like unarmed against uh Conan the barbarian here. So it's just kind of a ridiculous tableau I think.

SPEAKER_01 39:18

His eyes blaze like a trapped tiger's again the tiger.

Michael Kentris 39:21

And ultimately she tries to comfort him and calm him down. Do not be afraid I am Yasmela but there's no reason to fear me. And ultimately he's still suspicious like why did you lead me here? What manner of trap is this? There's no trickery she answered I brought you here because you can aid me I called on the gods on Mitra and he bade me go into the streets and ask aid of the first men I met.

SPEAKER_01 39:42

This was something he could understand. The barbarians had their oracles he lowered his sword though he did not sheathe it well Fury's Milla you need aid he grunted your kingdom's in a devil of a mess but how can I aid you if you want a throat cut of course like simple Yeah right he's a he's a simple guy.

Michael Kentris 40:00

So he lays his sword across his knees and right she she's staring at him noticing the breadth and power of his hands, not the stubby, undeveloped paws of a troglodite with a guilty start she found herself imagining those strong fingers locked in her dark hair. I mean Conan irresistible to the ladies obviously I like this so we get our usual description here, do we not?

SPEAKER_01 40:24

Yeah we So yeah in his dark scarred face there a suggestion of moodiness and without being marked by depravity or definitely evil there was more than a suggestion of the sinister about his features set off by his smoldering blue eyes a low broad forehead was topped by a square cut tousled mane as black as a raven's wing Who are you?

Michael Kentris 40:44

she asked abruptly Conan, a captain of the mercenary spearmen. So and then he basically just like tosses back the rest of the uh wine cup. So and he says I was born in Sumeria. It meant little to her a wild grim hill country which lay far to the north peopled by a fierce moody race so uh and he's like why why do I need aid Conan like and it basically goes down like what we've learned about the king is in an Opherian prison Koth is plotting to enslave you this sorcerer screaming hellfire and destruction down in Shem and your soldiers are deserting every day. Which is a lot that's a lot to be dealing with.

SPEAKER_01 41:23

And see yeah it's like oh why are my desert soldiers deserting some are being hired by Koth many think Haraja is doomed and many are frightened by the tales of this dog Natak the dog This dog if this is a drinking game if anyone's playing a drinking game while listening to this if we say dog drink.

Michael Kentris 41:40

So we learn about Alric who is a general and you know she's like will you go over to Natak he's like no what's he what's he going to pay us with he doesn't have money to pay mercenaries and she asks would your comrades follow you I was like what do you mean? I mean that I'm going to make you commander of the armies of Karaja. Commander yes cry by what will your perfume nobles say? They will obey me have Count the Speed's come to me at once and the Chancellor Taurus Lord Amalek and the Aga Shoprost basically can you lead men? And he's like Yes well I can try it's like it's no more than sword play on a larger scale. So yeah he he seems confident in his abilities and we so now we have the people she has summoned here. So we've got uh Count the Speedies tall black locks curled and scented right he's one of our kind of foppish nobles a slightly affected manner but the thiews under his silks were steely so he's not just a fop. That's right. We got Taurus an elderly man in an ermine fringed robe lined features and basically he's like Ophray will not move until we have met this invading horde so he's like basically saying like we've got the an enemy at our back and they're waiting for us to get carved out by another enemy first. Yeah. And so then we got Amalric also Nimidian large man with a lion like yellow mane. And she tells them hey we're gonna march southward and there is the man who shall lead you and obviously they're all ghast at the idea. Mitra protect us exploded Amalric that's Conan the Northron the most turbulent of all my rogues I'd have hanged him long ago were he not the best swordsman that ever donned Hauberk. Yeah I love this reveal right she jerks back the velvet curtains and he's just like sitting there with his feet up chewing on a beef bone yeah so like this is this is your new commander is just chomping away which to be fair I I would also be yeah like the queen is the princess is not well. Right. And so so yes we get some objections from from the various quarters here and so eventually she has to kind of say count the speedy is like if you're not gonna serve just get out of here and then Almerca's like fine whatever more or less what do they call them a cone in the throat slitter. So uh they you know she gets some new armor for Conan and Yep, basically she's like, You look good. Uh, what does she say here? I have seen kings who wore their harness less regally than you. A vague shadow crossed his mind like a prophecy. In years to come, he was to remember Amalric's words when the dream became reality. Right, so we we who are the reader know that he becomes the king of Aquilonia at some point later in his life. All right. And then we've got this long description of the the army essentially marching out of Karanja. Uh, was there anything that really caught your eye

Making Conan Commander Of Koraja

Michael Kentris 44:30

here, Will? I mean, the main thing, I guess, is just kind of describing their numbers. So I didn't highlight it because it was just a very long plowing thing.

SPEAKER_01 44:43

But let's see. There are uh 500 strong led by Count the Speedies.

Michael Kentris 44:49

There was uh they were followed by the light cavalry on Rangey Steeds. There were 5,000 of these. Who else we got? We got some Karaja Spearmen, 500 of them.

SPEAKER_01 45:00

Then we've got mercenaries bringing up the rear, a thousand horsemen, two thousand spearmen.

Michael Kentris 45:05

I think I think that's the gist of their army composition. Yes. Men of many races, many crimes. Right, our typical mercenary company. Uh it's a mixed bag. Yeah. And they tell us who all is there. So we've got people basically from like all over these countries, right? The Hyboreans, the Gundarmen, the Corinthians, the Zingarians, Aquilonians. So yeah, a lot of a lot of Hyborian stock here. And then uh we have the princess, so she has decided to come along as well. Yeah, we get uh a little mention here that, like you said, the princess comes with.

SPEAKER_01 45:38

She dares not remain behind, she fears something, and kind of like an uprising. Maybe we better hang a few citizens before we start. And I saw it. No, one of her maids talked about, babbled about something that came into the palace butnite and frightened Yasmila, half out of her wits.

Michael Kentris 45:54

It's some of Natok's devilry uh uh devil tree, I doubt not. Conan, it's more than flesh and blood we fight. Well, grunted the Sumerian. It's better to go meet an enemy than to wait for him. Mm-hmm. Yes. Uh and I like this. Yeah, I like that he's like, she'll have to get out of those soft robes to to fight. And like Amric just like grins at him. It's like the women of the High Borne should not fight like your Sumerian women, Conan. She rides to watch the battle. Yeah. So yeah, exactly what you were saying there. It just it just like was funny.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

Yeah.

Michael Kentris 46:23

So yeah, they set out. Hell or plunder, comrades, march. So yeah, they are marching, those columns, they're coming through different areas here, uh, the terrain gradually sloping upwards. And so they come to an area with some low hills, and they camped on the northern slopes. And then there are some local hill tribes with whom they meet up as well, and so they kind of get some local intel about uh Natok's troops. So we hear five thousand war chariots, and then uh you know the rest is a little vague. I like this. Conan listened unperturbed. War was his trade, life was a continual battle or series of battles, since his birth, death, capital D had been a constant companion. It stalked horrifically at his side, stood at his shoulder beside the gaming tables, its bony fingers rattled the wine cups. Someday its bony grasp would close. That was all. So yes, then we get uh Princess Yasmila coming to visit Conan. Princess, you should be in your tent.

SPEAKER_01 47:27

I could not sleep. Her dark eyes were haunted in the shadow. Conan, I am afraid. Are there men in the host you fear? No man. Conan, is there anything you fear? He admitted the last the curse of the gods. And then she confesses, like, I am cursed.

Michael Kentris 47:42

I've seen a fiend from the abysses, it set its marks on me, whispering awful secrets. Drag me down to hell to be his queen. I dare not sleep. He'll come to me in my pavilion as he came to the palace. Conan, you are strong. Keep me with you, I am afraid. I mean, this is I think this is very typical of like the like if I think um back, I forget his first name, uh Frank. Frank Frazetta, right? The guy who did a lot of the the art covers for these pulpy novels back back in the day. And there would always be these, let's just say, voluptuous women and like muscle-bound men. The guy would be like holding a sword in one hand and you know, the woman in his other arm. Like that, that's that's the vibe here, right? It's just like this kind of over-the-top, like beautiful woman, muscle-bound dude who's like fearless. So, right, these are kind of larger-than-life kinds of emotions and characteristics is how it it kind of comes across to me.

SPEAKER_01 48:43

Absolutely.

Michael Kentris 48:44

Yeah, it's it's very much like, hey, here's a very fun scenario for the use the reader to go ahead and put themselves in this position to make it a little more immersive for the audience. So she's afraid to sleep, and basically he draws off his scarlet cloak and wrapped it about her roughly, as if tenderness of any kind were impossible to him. Right? It's it is very roman romance novel-esque. That is just like it's it's funny. Like if I were to read this to my wife, she'd be like it sounds like a romance. But uh yes, look, so she lies down and I like this, with a firelight glinting from his blue steel armor, he seemed like an image of steel, dynamic power for the moment quiescent. I like this here. They were immobile, but his eyes smoldered with fierce life. He was not merely a wild man, he was part of the wild. So and she goes off to sleep, wrapped in a sense of delicious security. So she sleeps for a while, wakes up, Conan still sitting there on the same rock, and there's a Shemite man speaking to her, or speaking to him, rather, and saying that the Natak is is near, essentially. So basically it's like, you know, my blood froze, it burned my soul like a red hot iron. I couldn't rest until I'd made sure. But he says that he, too, had gone to the ruins of Kuthemes. The door of the ivory dome stood open, the great serpent, transfixed by his sword, within lay the body of a man so shriveled and distorted I could scarce make it out. At first, it was Shavadas the Zamorian, the only thief in the world I acknowledged as my superior. And it's like there were no bones began con there was nothing, only the one corpse. So we learn now that yes, in fact, this is the origin of Natak, which I think was, you know, fairly well telegraphed at the beginning, but now our characters are learning of it. Right. So we get a little more information about Natak.

SPEAKER_01 50:39

Whence came Natak?

Michael Kentris 50:40

Out of the desert, on a night when the world was blind and wild with mad clouds, driven in a frenzied flight across the shuddering stars, and the howling of the wind was mingled with the shrieking of the spirits of the wastes. Vampires were abroad that night, witches rode naked on the wind, and werewolves howled across the wilderness. Real quick, that reminds me of Macbeth when it's it's the day after. And Macbeth has already killed the king. Again, another another Shakespeare spoiler, folks. Macbeth kills the king. And in the morning after, when his attendants come to summon the king, one of the courtiers is like, the earth did shake, and just describes like just how everything was quiet like crazy.

SPEAKER_01 51:20

And Macbeth gives like the very just simple answer, like 'twas a 'twas a crazy night. Twas a wild night. Yeah. That's how that's the vibe I'm getting here a little bit.

Michael Kentris 51:31

But yeah, just on a black camel he came, riding like the wind, and an unholy fire played about him. The cloven tracks of the camel glowed in the darkness, and then he dismounts and the beast flies away with gigantic wings, rushed into the clouds, leaving a trail of fire behind it. No man has seen that camel since that night, but a black British manlike shape shambles to Natok's tent and gibbers to him in the blackness before dawn.

SPEAKER_01 51:59

I will tell you, Conan, Natok is look, I will show you an image of what I saw that day by Shishan when the wind blew aside his veil, and he shows him the coin.

Michael Kentris 52:08

And it's the same coin that was minted with Thugra's face. Tan tan Princess's Milliphane. For the first time in her life. So anyway, yes, so yes, the big reveal is exactly as was expected. So yes, uh book four of our story.

March South And The Tomb Reveal

Michael Kentris 52:31

So dawn comes, we uh are we we have our army here. The nameless horror had been taking even more awful shape since she had recognized the coin in the Shemite's hand the night before. So she's kind of like ruminating on the horror in front of her, and we uh we have a uh coming we're coming up to this location called the Well of Altaku and the Horde of Ntak. So we've got our two forces basically uh inevitably moving towards one another. And so eventually uh Conan calls a halt, and as he does so, we get our first clash with one of his commanders here. Yeah, Thespitis is not uh liking the direction that Conan is having them like wait here near this this pass of Shimala. Uh Shamla, it sounds like and Conan's like, hey, we can't just like directly clash with them. They'd smother us with numbers. Besides, there's no water out there, we'll camp on the plateau. And he's respond like, my knights and I camp in the valley, and we are the vanguard, and we at least do not fear a ragged desert swarm. So i i yeah, it's funny. I feel like we get this sort of archetype of character of like incompetent commander who is like, we're gonna do things the way that my father did and his grandfather did before him, and dang nabbit, that's the way we're gonna do it now. Right. But it's not a good thing. Yes, it's very much like the classic trope of the prideful knight, uh, who is all about the the charge.

SPEAKER_01 54:03

Yeah.

Michael Kentris 54:05

And more about glory than victory.

SPEAKER_01 54:07

Yes, absolutely.

Michael Kentris 54:09

So yeah, I like this coin. Tell the dog brothers to ease their harness and rest. Which I always remember that like being like a phrase you would sometimes hear for like certain kinds of mercenary companies, like like dog soldiers. I'm sure it's shown up uh in other situations as well. So he's kind of positioned his troops around. He's got the mercenaries, the spearmen on the plateau. Right. So he's trying to keep the high ground, right? Basic, basic military strategy. Uh, you know, try and keep a narrow area so that your forces aren't uh, you know, exposed. It seems pretty straightforward tactics-wise.

SPEAKER_01 54:44

Yeah. I mean, I can't see any obvious indications that they should go out there. It's very much, yeah, if they have the inferior numbers. Try and maintain an advantageous position.

Michael Kentris 54:57

Yes. Then we get a little bit of a uh conversation with Amalric and Conan here. And Amalik does concede that at least he's arranged his lines well. So he doesn't have any objections as far as the position of the troops thus far, and then we get this description of a fog coming in.

SPEAKER_01 55:14

Yeah, yeah, I appreciate it. So they're in the middle of conversation, and basically they're talking about Natak, like, surely he's a man. It's certain Natak's devils can't follow us unawares. Mitra, what a fog! Just all of a sudden, like they s they think it's clouds at first, but then it's like this huge mist coming in from the north, like a great unstable ocean rapidly hiding the desert from view. And I just thought that was so funny, just like weird. This fog. It's like I feel like with the amount of magic re that we've seen on the uh part of Natalk so far, I would immediately be on guard about any sort of trickery afoot.

Michael Kentris 55:54

Right. And so they're like, okay, yeah, no use sending out scouts. They couldn't see anything. And Conan, in uh what I feel like we see sometimes with uh Native Americans or others, just like puts his ear to the earth and he he hears like horses and chariots, thousands of them, the ground vibrates to their tread, and buggerettes and pikes, you dogs, stand to your ranks. So basically he's trying to get everybody information now. Yes. So yes, he is not falling for the ruse here. And so at one moment there was like this giant rolling, fleecy billows, and the next, cloudless sky on a naked desert, no longer empty but thronged with the living pageantry of war. A great shout shook the hills. So, yes, our invaders have moved in under the cover of this magic fog. And so first we have these long line of chariots drawn by the great fierce horses of Stigia, and they they got fighting men, tall figures, hawk-like faces, bronze helmets, basically like the Egyptian stand-ins, yeah, to an extent. Accustomed to bringing down lions with their arrows. There you go. And then we have the warriors of Kush, wild men on half-wild horses. Then there are the warlike sons of Shem. So these are kind of horsemen in scale mail corslets and cylindrical helmets. In my head, these are almost like kind of like Mongol-esque. That's how I imagined it, yeah. Yeah, like the kind of classical archer cavalry kind of thing, which they call the nomad clans. And then uh so yeah, they've got kind of these this uh what would you call it? Coalition of of these different groups under Natak here.

SPEAKER_02 57:31

Yeah.

Michael Kentris 57:34

And so uh Count Thespedes is here to make more good decisions.

SPEAKER_01 57:40

The lifting of the mist has confused them. Now is the time to charge. The Cushites have no bows and they mask the whole advance. A charge of my knights will crush them back into the ranks of the Shemites, disrupting their formation.

Michael Kentris 57:54

Follow me, we will win this battle with one stroke. It's very uh confident. You kind of just like, nah, I think it's a trap. And it's like then you refuse to move? Like, be reasonable. We have the advantage of position, and basically I love that Conan is telling somebody to be reasonable. Right, absolutely. Yes. So uh Thespedes runs off, charges, and Yasmila's like, why aren't you following? It's like, because I'm not a fool, basically. Yeah. And uh Alaric is like, you grow sober with authority, such madness as that was always your particular joy. So yes, we we now know that there is a there's a charioteer, they see something coming along the the side of the enemy formation here, and the other figure it's two figures, there's a naked charioteer and a tall figure with a robe floating spectrally on the wind. And so he pours a thin stream from a vessel of gold in front of the desert horde, leaving behind this long, thin powdery line that glittered in the sand like the phosphorescent track of a serpent. Like that's Natak, swore Amalek. What hellish seed is he sowing? So as the knights are continuing to charge, having not slowed whatsoever, right? We now see that uh as their steel shot hooves struck this line, a terrific explosion rocked the desert. So some sort of gunpowder type thing, perhaps? Right. They just got blown up. It's funny that he's described as being like this dark sorcerer, but it seems like for the most part he's just using a little bit of chemistry. Right. Yeah, he's kind of like uh yeah, he's using trickery and chemistry. Right. Which to be fair is kind of what um I feel like some of our other sorcerers have done in the past as well. They don't rely solely on like magic, magic as I would think of it, like wielding energies. Right. It's like, hey, I brewed up this potion that's gonna blow shit up. But yeah, like you said, so the knights they run into it, and obviously, you know, you can't just stop on a dime. So the entire cavalry charge runs into this giant flame, and uh they all get burnt up and charred and die. Yeah. And yes, yeah, we get like screaming mangled horses. Yeah, so they are usual kind of like uh grisly imagery here. Yeah. And then we hear the troops are now starting to uh lose morale, let's say. Yes. And so we get people saying, We fight not men but devils, flee, flee. Who can fight Natal's magic? And I like this uh with a snarl, Conan bounded from his boulder and smote him with the beef bone. He dropped, blood starting from nose and mouth. And he's like, back to your post, let another take a backwards step, and I'll shear off his head. Fight, damn you. So yes, gotta whip him back into line. Keep the keep hold the line. So yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:54

Yeah, the the imagery of yeah, smote with the beef bone definitely stood with me.

Michael Kentris 1:01:00

It's like, oh my god, he's just bashing somebody on the head with like the leg of a cow or something. So, yes, it's like uh neither man nor devil comes up Sham La Paz this day, right? So it's basically like like we're gonna stop this. So we get to some continued formation movements here. Also, we've got the the nomads and they're moving forward. Behind them is the tall figure doing some sort of grisly invocation. So yeah, we kind of get this advance of of the enemy troops here, and he's worried about obviously more more tricks and traps. Yeah. And he specifically says that he is worried that he is more terrible in defense than in attack, and to take the offensive would invite disaster. So so he's kind of trying to hold position here, more or less. So Conan's thinking, his his troops are wavering, he's worried about his lines holding, and so he is asking one of the, I think it was one of the tribesmen here from the hills, is there any way mounted men can get down into the blind valley beyond that western ridge? It's like, yes, but it's a steep and perilous path. And basically he's like, he grabs Amalreck and says, Follow this man. And so go down, strike the horde from the rear. I know it's madness, but we're doomed anyway. We'll do all the damage we can before we die. So it's like, if I'm going down, we're taking as many as we can with us.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:18

Absolutely.

Michael Kentris 1:02:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:22

So yeah, the fight's still going on.

Michael Kentris 1:02:25

They go off to try and yeah, do that rear attack. And in a hurricane of thundering steel, the lines twisted and swayed, it was warbred noble against professional soldier, shields crash against shields, and between them spears drove in and blood spurted. So again, the the battle's raging on here. We get yeah, just a general description of you know, the madness of battle, just tooth and nail frothing now with fanaticism, ancient feuds, just people are dying, left and right. Yes. So yes, as this is going on, Conan notes one particular fighter, the mighty form of Prince Kutamun, uh or Kut Amun. I'm gonna go with Kutamun, just because of the Amun at the end there. But uh they have not closed in battle at this point in time. So we kind of get this back and forth, this bloody deadlock. Uh Hillmen holding the ridges, mercenaries, uh gripping their pikes. So they've got the superior position in armor, but the enemy has overwhelming numbers, so basically say it cannot endure. So eventually we do get he sees Amric's forces coming around behind, and so he sees the Karaja reserves who are trembling with eagerness. So he says, like, this day you become knights, and so he's like tells them to all mount up and follow him. So basically a bunch of not knights mount up and they start a charge here. Hill steeds and like this, 500 footmen, pauper patricians, younger sons, black sheep, on these half-wild Shemite horses, charging an army down a slope where no cavalry had ever dared charge before. So it's a reckless charge, basically. You know? And essentially, it works, right? Because they charge right as the rear of this formation is getting attacked by amorex lancers, and it basically uh breaks them the nomads broke and stamped, working chaos in the lines of their more steadfast comrades.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:24

Right. So yeah, the horde breaks, looks like things are things are on the up and up. Are actually winning, it looks like, and then we do, like you said, we get kind of a reference here to Prince Kutamun naked but for a loin clot clout.

Michael Kentris 1:04:41

Lane loincloth, I'm not sure. I think it's a cloth. It's gotta be, right? Right. His harness hacked away, his crested helmet dented, his limbs splashed with blood.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:51

The terrible shout he hurled his broken hilt full into Conan's face and leaping, seized the stallion's bride.

Michael Kentris 1:04:57

The Sumerian reeled in his saddle, half stunned and with awful

Fog, Explosions, And Holding The Line

Michael Kentris 1:05:00

strength, the dark-skinned giant forced the screaming seat upward and backward until it lost its footing and crashed into the muck of bloody sand and writhing bodies. So honestly, I'm kind of kind of surprised here because I feel like it's very rare for Conan to be caught unawares in like a situation like this. I mean, this guy's gotta be like well, I guess it's they call him a giant, but he basically knocks a horse over. So I do think of like that scene from the movie Conan the Barbarian where he punches punches a horse. Yes. So it it maybe that's where they got this from. But yeah, it's it's just again, right? It's ridiculous over the top feet of strength here. So basically just saying how tough this guy is as Conan leaps from his horse and begins to fight with him. And as they say here, in that mad nightmare of battle, the barbarian never exactly knew how he killed this man. He only knew that a stone in the Stiggian's hand crashed again and again on his bassinet. He's just like hammering on him with a rock. Right. Filling his sight with flashing sparks as Conan drew his dagger again and again into his foe's body without apparent effect on the prince's terrible vitality. So they're just right, this is like the the most basic knockdown, drag out kind of fighting, right? It's just like fierce, there's no elegance to it, it's just raw strength and who can last longer with their injuries. Right. Which, being that this is a Conan story, it is Conan. Right. So yeah, we never learned about Kut Kutamun the Shemite. So yes. So the the battle's starting to kind of taper down. It was like a Red Sea, lines

The Battle Turns On A Risky Charge

Michael Kentris 1:06:40

of corpses, slaughter everywhere. So as he's looking across the battlefield, an awful scream goes up, and he sees a chariot. No horse drew it, but a great black creature like a camel. So I see Natak, and next to him is this black anthropomorphic being that might have been a monster ape. There are a lot of monster apes in these stories, I've noticed. Yes. Or ape-like types of things. Yeah, I do wonder what the influence is there, just in terms of is that like when people were first like becoming familiar with depictions of like primates? Like animals, animals from Africa and stuff? Yeah. Maybe. Yeah, I'm not I don't remember exactly when things like like Safari and how those I mean it would probably be a generation or two before this was kind of being written, but who knows? Anyway, so Conan hears Yasmila's frenzied scream as he scoops her up into the chariot and wheels off and kind of running off. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, they can't strike at him, because again, talk's holding Yasmela here, so he's able to get away. And then Conan tries to get into the path of this chariot slash hurtling horror, but it sounds like the beast, the black beast, smotes him like a thunderbolt and sends him hurtling a score of feet away, dazed and bruised, with Yasmela's cry coming hauntingly to his stunned ears as the chariot roars by. Yes. So Conan, not being one to give up, jumps on a horse and starts racing after him. So as they run on here, they come towards these ancient ruins that are in the valley. And the I like this with a shriek that froze the blood in Conan's veins, the unhuman charioteer casts Natok and the girl from him. Great wings spread from a black horde that in no way resembled a Campbell, and it rushed upward into the sky. So basically he's like I'm out. So so so Natak just gets like dumped. And so they springs up, grabs the girl, and runs into the ruins. Conan pursues, finds that he has put Yasmila on a black jade altar, naked, and there's a weird light, and Natak is looking into the features that he had seen depicted on the Zugite coin.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:56

We get our kind of villain speak here from from because I have been betrayed and deserted by the demon I enslaved? I am Thugurkotan, who shall rule the world despite your paltry gods. The desert is filled with my people, the demons of the earth shall do my bidding as the reptiles of the earth obey me.

Michael Kentris 1:09:14

Lust for a woman has weakened my sorcery. Now the woman is mine, and feasting on her soul I shall be unconquerable. Back fool, you have not conquered Thugur Kotan. That is an excellent monologue.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:28

It's fantastic.

Michael Kentris 1:09:30

Yes, so he throws his staff at Conan's feet, its outline melts and rise, and a hooded cobra rears up. Conan swears and cuts it in half with his sword, which again, right, this is very evocative. This is like a story from Exodus, right? Moses casts the staff in front of Pharaoh and becomes a snake. Um or I should say the um yeah, right? So this is like a very old reference here. So next up, he grabs a scorpion, more than a foot in length, the deadliest creature of the desert. He kind of grins, kind of hesitates, then without warning, he threw his sword. I love this. Right. No one ever expects it. Right. This is like the second time I think we've read this, right? Yeah, caught off guard, Thugra Kotan had no time to avoid the cast. The point struck beneath his heart and stood out a foot behind his shoulders. He went down, crushing the poisonous monster in his grasp as he It's one quick uh insert here.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:24

So I'm sure you'll remember this as well from Stephen Bruce, the Vladimir Taltos, though it made me think of the quote No matter how subtle the wizard, a dagger between the shoulders will seriously cramp their style.

Michael Kentris 1:10:37

Right. Yes, 100%. It's very funny. It's like uh what kind of thinking like in video game tabletop RPG terms, what kind of ranged attack does a barbarian have?

SPEAKER_01 1:10:50

Throwing.

Michael Kentris 1:10:51

I throw my sword.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:52

Yeah. It's the uh improvised weapon.

Michael Kentris 1:10:56

Right, right. Anyway, so Conan goes over to the altar, grabs Yasmila, she's sobbing hysterically. It's like Crom's devils, girl. Loose me. Fifty thousand men have perished today, and there is work for me to do. And we get, again, some more of our purplish prose here. It's like no, she gasps, I will not let you go. I am yours by fire and steel and blood. You are mine. Back there I belong to others, here I am mine, and yours. You shall not go. And obviously, like most men would, he hesitates. So we kind of fade out, uh it's like we're panning out almost here. Uh the lurid, unearthly glow still hovered in the shadowy chamber, lighting the ghostly dead face of Thugura Kotan, which seemed to grin mirthlessly and cavernously at them. Out on the desert in the hills, among the oceans of dead, men were dialing, were howling with wounds and thirst and madness, and kingdoms were staggering. Then all was swept away by the crimson tide that rode madly in Conan's soul as he crushed fiercely in his iron arms the slim white body that shimmered like a witch fire of madness before him. The end. Uh-huh. So yes,

Kidnapping Chase And Sorcerer Showdown

Michael Kentris 1:12:10

fade to black. So yeah, uh, it's a very Conan ending, right? You know, like the day is one, much has been sacrificed, Conan gets the girl. So I I think we hit all of our typical genre tropes in this story. Right. The ancient evil has been killed. Right. For hopefully for good. The end question mark. No, I think it probably is. There seems to be no shortage of ancient wizards in the deserts far to the south of Stiggya. So so yeah, I don't think they're they're struggling for uh antagonists. So so yeah, that it was a fun little page turn, a little more kind of military fiction, uh, in terms of like troop movements, a bit larger scale of action than we sometimes see from Conan, but still very much a Conan story. What are your thoughts, Will? I enjoyed it. I don't think I liked it as much as some of the other ones we've read recently, but for the most part it was a lot of fun. I think for me personally, just kind of the high-level descriptions of the two armies for me just kind of gets lost in the amount of detail as it's being described. So it's it's harder for me to kind of visualize most of that. And so at times it just kind of like like my eyes glaze over. I was like, all right, we're reading, we're reading, and next to the action. Right. And I think I think there was a lot more world-building attempt in this, uh, kind of at a little bit larger scale. So we we had that, as you said, that geography lesson earlier about about the lands of Hyborea, and then also like the peoples, or at least the soldiers of these various regions as well. So again, I I know when we when we first did our introduction to Conan, we were talking about how he leans on these um, I mean, you could unfavorably call them stereotypes, as a shorthand for people to kind of slot in some real-world cultures, right? So we've got some that sound like like kind of Mongolian-esque, some kind of Egyptian-esque, various knights, the the blonde Gundermen who are kind of reminiscent of like Viking foot soldiers. So all these different kinds of stand-ins that he doesn't explicitly describe other than kind of some physical markers and kind of where they're from geographically. Right. So it's an interesting way to do it in as much as if we remember that they were published these in magazines and you know you had to a certain upper limit to your word count. So yeah, I perhaps it is a stylistic choice that was dictated by the medium at the time. I kind of think the classic example would be someone like Dickens who wrote serialized stuff that was getting published on a regular basis. So is this kind of in that same vein in as much as you know, I gotta make every word count. I think that would be a generous take on it, but perhaps it's true. But yeah, I overall I I enjoyed it as well. And it it's good. It I think we are fortunate that we have the map. It helps me kind of conceptualize things. You know, I think uh there's those memes that go around. I guess it's not a meme, it's from a journal article. But uh about aphantasia, right? The the inability to or like how does someone rate in terms of their ability to visualize something as a mental image, and they kind of have a picture of like an apple, and then a thought bubble cloud coming out of like five different people's heads. So I guess on one extreme there's like a fully realized, detailed image of an apple, and on the other extreme, there's like no picture. Kind of the same idea how some people don't have internal monologues, that kind of stuff. But um, but yeah, I think that is some people will have more difficulty kind of conceptualizing directions than others. That's that's fine. So, Will, what have you been reading lately in our modern fiction genres? So I recently started reading The Devils by Joe Abercrombie. So I think I think you know that I'm a pretty big Abercrombie fan.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:14

I've read a lot of his stuff, The First Law trilogy, The Age of Madness, which I've both enjoyed greatly enough to actually purchase physical copies of.

Michael Kentris 1:16:24

Very nice. And so, yeah, he released this last year, and I bought it when I went up to Stratford,

Final Takeaways And What We’re Reading

Michael Kentris 1:16:30

Canada, and they have a little bookshop there. So it's it's been on my short list of two to read. And so I was like, okay, I finished up Fires of Heaven, I'm gonna start this now. And I've been liking it a lot. It's been very fun, very similar to kind of like his prose and other his other books, where he just does he has a really good job of describing things, not just visually, but through other senses as well.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:55

Like I I appreciate how dirty things are because it doesn't gloss over the nitty-gritty.

Michael Kentris 1:17:03

Yeah, yeah. I've I've read some of I've not read as much Joe Abercrombie as you have, but he's definitely considered like the grimdark par excellence of the kind of the current era. Yeah. So definitely an excellent writer. It's just I know sometimes I have to be in the right headspace to read his books because I know there's gonna be like a lot of like emotional gut punches uh in those stories. And then uh yeah, I so for anyone who's interested, I would liken it to Creature Commandos, the DC series. So you got kind of like this Suicide Squad type retinue of never do wells who are helping escort a princess. So it's it's been it's been a very fun, much lighter read than I feel like the other other trilogies have been.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:48

Yeah, looking forward to fit. I'm about halfway through it right now.

Michael Kentris 1:17:51

So cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:52

How about you? What have you been reading?

Michael Kentris 1:17:54

Well, I most recently have been reading a book called The Pilot by Will White. And Will White is is an author I enjoy very much because he he kind of writes in a way that's very evocative of like kind of like shown in anime, to be honest. So The Pilot is the most recent book in a series. Uh the first one is called The The Captain, and it is essentially it's a it's a series that would fall into the genre of like science fantasy, I would say. So there's like definite magic, wizards, that kind of stuff. And then there's but it's like in space. So there's starships and laser blasters and all that good stuff. So it's definitely like a genre mashup. It's just a lot of fun. You know, the the main character's a wizard, and he's gotta collect various members for the crew on his starship. So also kind of building up a little motley crew kind of situation here. And uh it's it's been a lot of fun. You get a lot of weird enemies. There's like there's a race that's very much, I think, influenced by like the Borg from Star Trek, and then like giant alien space monsters, and there's one character who pilots like a giant mech a la Voltron. So it's just like all these like genre tropes just kind of mashed up, thrown together. It's just it's a fun read. It's it's not like high literature or anything, but it's it's fun, and it I like to read it for a little while before I go to bed or if I'm just relaxing. So uh so yeah, that's that's what I've been reading most recently. But yeah, so that you know, as you know, Will, I'm usually alternating. So I've I'm I'm a multi-book reader at any given time, so there's usually whatever we're reading for the podcast. Then I'm usually working through some ancient work, which in this case is a um I'm still in Aeschylus, so I'm working my way through the libation bears right now, so part of the orastaya. And then which I I do highly recommend, you know. A lot of th people think like, oh, these plays, this ancient classic works so dense. But some of it's just like really timeless and beautiful and really brings up a lot of powerful language, and you're just like when you think about like this was written like in like the fourth, fifth century BC. And just like that was over 2,000 years ago. And people are still like this is very relevant, like this emotion, this betrayal, right? For those who don't know, the Oristi is a one of the few, if not the only, intact trilogy of Greek plays that we have. I think we have like a dozen of his plays out of like over 70 that were reported to have been written. Which always makes me sad to think about like ancient works loss, you know, the whole the whole Library of Alexandria type uh loss there. Although in reality, the fire, there was not that much of a fire, it was more about mold and decay and just like breakdown, like poor maintenance basically for bad librarians. Yeah. Right. It's not as sexy of a story. But um but anyway, it's very these these timeless themes. So so I'm kind of working through that. And I I've been listening along with a podcast that goes through the great books called Ascend. So if people are interested in that kind of stuff, like the classics, I really enjoy Ascend the Great Books podcast. I've been kind of reading in tandem with them. Like they have an entire year of just Homer. So I went through like the Iliad and the Odyssey, and now we're doing the plays, and I'm a little behind on their reading schedule. But it's been very fun, but very educational. And then uh I'm usually reading some sort of Christian work. Uh-huh. Also, I'm reading a book, a book on the Jesus prayer. Okay. And uh then, yeah, just something for fun. So I guess like four or five books at any given time. Nice. Uh, which, you know, it means I'm a little bit slower, but but yeah, sometimes the mood just strikes you for for something in particular. And it's like I'm feeling uh a little more mentally present today. I'll read something a little more edifying and full, or it's just like I want the book equivalent of watching a TV show, then I'll read something else. So definitely. But yeah, so for our modern fiction folks, I would say if you like kind of really just Paige Turner action kind of stuff, Will White has a lot of good series. Um, I've read multiple of them. The Cradle series is great. It's like your typical like progression anime fantasy kind of thing with martial arts. Um, and then he has one which is uh kind of a mashup of like the age of exploration and um Lovecraft, basically. I think I've told you this one.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:31

Yeah, it's it's the like of Shadow and C, and then there's like the reverse one, like the C and Shadow.

Michael Kentris 1:22:36

I have been meaning to read those, so I will make a point to read those this year. But yeah, it they're very fun reads, you know. They they're good. Like he's a good writer, he's an enjoyable writer. It's it's something you kind of it's fun. It's fun reading. So highly recommend. Yeah. So that's I know I went on at length

Where To Find Us And Farewell

Michael Kentris 1:22:55

about that. So if you want us to talk more about our current reading, let us know. If you don't, let us know too, I guess. Yeah. Otherwise, uh, you can always find us online. We are on X at Brothers Reading. You can get us by email at brothersreadingbooks at gmail.com and our website, brothersreadingbooks.com. And I was you can click the little link in the podcast description if you want to just text us. So any suggestions, criticisms, make sure to address them to Will. And we enjoy you for we appreciate you all listening, and I hope that you have enjoyed your time with us. So have a good rest of the day, and we'll talk to you later.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:32

Talk to you later, Mike.