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I think the dryads are an interesting take on the concept. Humanoid tree creatures or spirits are standard folklore and fantasy fair, though usually, these depictions are more… hm… branchy, for lack of a better term. Most depictions I've encountered are in the Groot school of living tree creatures wherein they have a humanoid face and body-like trunk with a few bits of greenery for accompaniment. Delicious in Dungeon's take on the dryads is so humanoid they have a siren-like effect on the party. This is interesting, though I prefer the more typical depiction of these creatures.

Honestly the series' design for dryads is not really that new at all. It falls in line with every version of D&D's depiction of Dryads (Except 4th edition, which portrayed them as basically just Treants/Treefolk with boobs). And in Magic: The Gathering's 30-year history, I'd say about 3/4 of the dryads are closer to Delicious in Dungeon's take, and 1/4 are the tree-trunk-body version. Heck, most historical art pieces I can find just has them as looking like regular women with flowers in their hair.

I will say though that in the manga they looked slightly more plant-like, since being in black & white made their hair look more like grass.

Re: Kabru. He does register to me as Laios' foil. He's almost the exact opposite; he loves people the same way Laios loves monsters; he's a charismatic leader -whereas Laios is constantly criticized by Chilchuck and Marcille to be lacking in the ability to 'read the room'. And lastly, he's plenty ambitious with a clear goal of defeating the mad magician, while Laios - he's admitted as much to the orc chieftain that he's only beginning to seriously think about why he's adventuring in the dungeon.

But for some reason, I do not find the show to be painting him as a villain at all. My reasoning here is a bit shallow to be honest - and that's the 1st opening theme. Laios' party members, former party members and for some reason, Kabru, are shown one by one facing the viewers. If anything, it's the group of elves and the mad mage who are portrayed suspiciously - we don't see their faces either because their backs are facing us, or only their feet are shown. Of course, that can simply be because they don't play a major role yet, but the same goes for Kabru's party.

During the first half, I was actually expecting Kabru, Namari and Shuro to somehow join the party and help in fighting the red dragon to retrieve Falin. But now we know that's not the case. Judging from the latest trailer as well as the episodes we've seen so far, I'm just expecting a massive coalition to form between Laios', Shuro's, Namari's and Kabru's parties to fight the mad mage, the elves, or perhaps both.

I also have barely ever seen "branchy" dryads, and even among those who were, half of them were on a "woman stuck in a tree trunk" variety which is closer to the origin than just Groot.

Great world building this week Smile

I'm surprised that Laios didn't mention (if now one else from the group wasn't going to) running in to Kabru's group before.

I think the issue is just that it's black/forbidden magic, otherwise I don't think the rest would be an issue.

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What's less clear to me (and perhaps only me) is why this particular kind of magic is unacceptable when resurrection appears to exist in other forms. Forbidden magic is a long-running fantasy and fairy tale trope, so I can buy it at face value that some styles or varieties of mystical power are off limits for handwavey reasons. But there have been multiple mentions of resurrection, fees for such practices, etc. Maybe I missed some mention of it having to be done by a sanctified priest or something, but other than using monster meat as fuel for the spell it's not entirely clear to me why this kind of resurrection is somehow crossing the line (or maybe the monster meat part is the key). In any case, it will be interesting to see how this conflict pans out next week.

Based on Toshiro's reaction, his main concern is just that it's super-illegal, and that they've made Falin into an accomplice. He shows no interest in magical metaphysics, only the practical social consequences for the practitioners.

Yeah, that's more or less all we know for sure. The spell that Marcille used is in some way foundationally different from the revival spells we've seen others use, and is form of "ancient" magic that's currently illegal. We don't really know enough about the particulars to say why, but Marcille at least insists that there's no "good" or "evil" magic. Whatever powers-that-be govern the practice of magic would seem to disagree.

lossthief wrote:

Yeah, that's more or less all we know for sure. The spell that Marcille used is in some way foundationally different from the revival spells we've seen others use, and is form of "ancient" magic that's currently illegal. We don't really know enough about the particulars to say why, but Marcille at least insists that there's no "good" or "evil" magic. Whatever powers-that-be govern the practice of magic would seem to disagree.

I thought the explanation in a previous episode is that nobody is actually casting revival spells. Rather, they are casting healing spells until the body comes back to life and the soul reenters due to the dungeon's properties. Attempting to do that anywhere else would probably result in some form of failure since the soul is gone.

Although, I suppose the party did think that the revival team could have done something with Falin's bones as long as her soul was still linked to them. Perhaps they have some technique that is entirely different from the ancient magic that can transmute any meat into living flesh based on entirely different DNA. Something that couldn't also be used for immoral purposes, which seems to be the reason for it being illegal.

I'm just glad we're not going back up top. Well, that what it seems anyway.

If they did, I think that it would've suck the life out of show!

This have been a very fun show so far! I would rate it just behind Frieren: Beyond Journey's End as the two best shows for the past season!

[quote="blahmoomoo"]

lossthief wrote:

Perhaps they have some technique that is entirely different from the ancient magic that can transmute any meat into living flesh based on entirely different DNA.

That is the impression I get as well, everything was different about the way forbidden magic is cast. Resurrection magic was clean and akin to healing, in addition resurrection magic had a failure rate and the process for healing magic took longer for the extensive tentacle injuries. Meanwhile the forbidden magic required complicated markings drawn in blood with a chilling incantation that no one was happy to hear that immediately reconstructed the body. The meat being drawn back by Delgal to reform the creature as well as forming Falin from the dragon meat to begin with does seem to support that it was a cruder type of sculpting
that can do things like cross species barriers better than the much more predictable and accepted resurrection magic.

Re: Kabru, It really is hard to tell, he keeps having these moments that seem chillingly analytical. I think he headstrong and inflexible in his beliefs as opposed to Laios, who is empathetic and unflinchingly crosses taboos and endangers himself to help people, whether it was less savory gold earning methods or helping Marcille with forbidden magic. I feel like if his party isn't going to be an antagonist then his party could end up as a deuteragonist who is pursuing his own method of doing things in ways that obstruct the main party at times.

Honestly they should have shown some more gruesome resurrections since we know for a fact they sometimes need "materials" to reconstruct missing parts. Because going from closing minor flesh wounds to reconstructing a whole body sans the skeleton, really doesn't leave much room to begin to guess why the forbidden magic resurrection is forbidden while the normal magic resurrection isn't, other than because it is. We can't see why a special kind of magic is bad when we can't even grasp the basics of the normal kind of magic.

The thing about Dungeon Meshi is that much of it's lore and world building is provided piece-meal, or in some cases ancillary material.
It's also not the sort of story where characters will stop and say "I am doing this and these are the reasons why"; which can lend a more naturalistic feel to the dialogue, but; combined with the necessities of an adaption leading to some trimming, can leave things a bit vague.

Basically it comes down to energy source.
As Marcille mentioned in the Undine episode; magic users draw power from Spirits. They can also draw power from their own mana reserves but as we see with Marcille this can be dangerous if it's depleted.
All magic in this setting; whether it's resurrection magic, or using the Gnomish system or Elvish system or whatever; draws energy from spirits.
However; Ancient Magic seeks to draw power from a dimension composed entirely of magical energy. Drawing from this limitless pool allows for much more powerful effects and Marcille explains as much in episode 15.

So why did Marcille use Ancient Magic to resurrect Falin?
It's to do with the condition of her remains. Marcille feared that shoving her bones into a backpack and hoofing it back to the surface would sever what little connection with Falin's spirit still remained; either through damaging them or simply taking to long.
They already had the material needed to reconstitute her in the Dragon's corpse. Using the Dragon isn't really the issue in and of itself; at least where legality is concerned as sheep are regularly used for the same process, though of course using a dragon will raise some eyebrows.
But Marcille couldn't power a spell that would transmute that much flesh and reconstitute Falin almost from scratch all by herself (it's actually shown multiple times that only having one mage put's the Touden party at a serious disadvantage); so that's why she turned to Ancient Magic; she needed that energy boost to pull off the spell at all.

So why is this forbidden? This goes into spoiler territory but for those who are really curious; spoiler[basically the energy dimension is sentient and in the distant past broke into the material world and nearly killed everyone; it's entry points were sealed using the dungeons and the Elves jealously guard this secret to prevent anyone looking into Ancient Magic and starting another catastrophe].

And why is Marcille looking into Ancient Magic?
spoiler[Because she's a Half-Elf and due to a quirk of genetics can live to be a thousand and is horrified by the idea of everyone she knows growing old and dying. She wants to use the power of Ancient Magic to permanently increase everyone's' lifespans. She was interested in this dungeon specifically because of it's curse that keeps everyone's souls tethered to the mortal realm].

The stakes of the party resurrecting is irrelevant, the actual problem is that they have no feasible way to deal with Falin who is inhumanly strong and who if they kill her will instantly summon the mad mage again. It's been long since established that the dungeon has wrapped people's perceptions of resurrection (literally one of our party members here got murdered 2 times already) but even putting aside that dunmeshi will always mix it's seriousoments with a few jokes there isn't really any need to worry about the party getting killed so long as they have enough healers.

Laios being a freak despite how obviously bad the thing with his sister is is just how he is, though I can understand why that would deflate the tension (though the scene were he drops his sword when she calls out to him does do the job of showing that he is still worried for her well being)

Surprised that there was zero commentary on the whole part with Toshiro considering how important it was to the episode

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Having Laios remark that his transformed sister is the coolest thing he's ever seen right before she brutally murders a bunch of characters we're supposed to be invested in deflates the impact of their deaths.

I mean, that ties right into the concerns Kabru has about Laios as a person, he cares more about monsters than people.

Also, really? Not a single mention of Laios & Shuro's fight!? It's one of the most talk about and analyzed moments in the entire series!!! Did the reviewer feel unequipped to discuss the subject matter of Laios's very obvious neurodivergent-coding, and how that affects his relationships with other people?

Yeah, I can't say the existence of resurrection magic has ever really effected my view of the show's stakes, because the big driving plot device was only ever about a single, highly anomalous death with Falin inside the dragon's digestion. The magic also has limits and rules that are robust enough that death does still have meaning - if Marcille and the spellcaster in Kabru's party hadn't survived the encounter, everyone who died would have been screwed.

More directly, I don't think the deaths are supposed to be all that impactful, outside of their sheer brutality, and the fact that they're being dealt out by Falin. The driving drama is in seeing this strange, alien version of a character we - and importantly, the characters - are familiar with doing things totally out of character. We're supposed to be wondering why the magician has turned her into this, why she's mumbling about Delgal, and whether or not the Falin that we knew before is still in there.

By comparison, Toshiro and Kabru's parties are barely more than strangers to us or the main party, so their deaths are able to be brutal and shocking, while being slightly cushioned by knowing they could conceivably be brought back if the right characters make it out.

Similarly, I didn't find Laios' "so cool" line all that jarring, because it's totally in line with how he's reacted to previous monsters, and he also shakes himself out of it quickly, as if it was an intrusive thought borne from the shock of seeing his sister like this. That in turn feeds into the larger picture of Laios' personality, and how it clashes with others like Toshiro or Kabru.

lossthief wrote:

I didn't find Laios' "so cool" line all that jarring, because it's totally in line with how he's reacted to previous monsters, and he also shakes himself out of it quickly, as if it was an intrusive thought borne from the shock of seeing his sister like this. That in turn feeds into the larger picture of Laios' personality, and how it clashes with others like Toshiro or Kabru.

100% agreed here. Laios' behavior in that scene is not the slightest bit out of character for him.