Berserk 305 - Foundation

[LordMune]

[Evil_Genius]Berserk_v34c305.rar

[Aeriel]

Wow, thanks EG!

[geroprog]

First of all, thanks for the chapters!
Second, I'm glad there are bad things happening with the peoples, after the light. I hope there will be more blood!
Because, then Griffith will be truly the BAD guy in those stupid peoples eyes. all hell breaks loose!!!
and jun 26 it's not as far away, as i thought the next chapter will be.
Banzai!

[Facade19]

Let me get this straight...Is Elfheim covered in this light as well? Puck discussed how unicorns exist in Elfheim.
Dang it, the light is covering the entire world immediately. That is insane.
Thanks EG for an awesome release!

[Aetherfukz]

Thanks as always, EG!

Sweet chapter. Can't wait to see what will happen next. At least we got a glimpse at Guts and company again.
Seems like Griffith wants to shape the whole world according to his vision of it, and the Light seems to do that.

Though I can't quite put my finger on what the significance of the one frame was, that showed Guts (without his upper clothes all of a sudden) being "splashed" by the Light. At first I thought it would heal his Lightning-strike injuries, but at second though it could also be that the Light bounced off of him, because he is not bound by fate.

[War Machine]

Direct Download of this chapter is now available in the same place as always:

http://berserk.kicks-ass.net/

[Turd Ferguson]

Let me get this straight...Is Elfheim covered in this light as well? Puck discussed how unicorns exist in Elfheim.
Dang it, the light is covering the entire world immediately. That is insane.
Thanks EG for an awesome release!

The light is turning regular creatures into fantasy creatures. The unicorns at the end are the regular horses in the first frame of the second page.

[hbi2k]

One interesting thing to note: on Pages 6 and 7, we see Guts fully clothed and bandaged. Then on Pages 8 and 9, Guts gets hit by the light, and we see him without the clothes and bandages: we theorized last time that when people get hit by the light, they turn into their ethereal form. (Whether this is a permanent-ish change or just a very brief visual effect while being hit by the light remains to be seen).

Apparently in Guts' ethereal form at this point, he has his arm back, but he's still missing his eye. Which makes some sense if you think about it: he's been using his prosthetic arm for so long that he unconsciously considers it a part of him, but nothing has replaced that lost eye (and that was always the more symbolically significant injury anyway, considering the last thing that missing eye saw....) Guess some old wounds heal more quickly than others.

If (as seems likely given what we saw with the unicorns) things return to a changed, but still fairly fixed state once the edge of the light passes them by, it will be interesting to see whether Guts retains his arm or whether it returns to being a prosthesis.

If you look back at any number of previous chapters, it's also interesting to note that Schierke still usually has her dress and hat in her ethereal form, but that might just be a matter of being more practiced in manipulating her ethereal form than most people.

Turd-- Maybe those horses just always really, REALLY wanted to be unicorns, so that's THEIR ethereal form? (-: Wonder what would happen if that light hit a furry.

[Turd Ferguson]

Wonder what would happen if that light hit a furry.

A truly frightening thought. Horror beyond anything even Miura himself could imagine.

[Aeriel]

The light is turning regular creatures into fantasy creatures. The unicorns at the end are the regular horses in the first frame of the second page.

I'm not sure. Those unicorns were in the forest when we first see them, and they are not wearing any reins, nor pulling the plow. I think that they are regular unicornes, transported from the astral realm to material plane.

One interesting thing to note: on Pages 6 and 7, we see Guts fully clothed and bandaged. Then on Pages 8 and 9, Guts gets hit by the light, and we see him without the clothes and bandages: we theorized last time that when people get hit by the light, they turn into their ethereal form. (Whether this is a permanent-ish change or just a very brief visual effect while being hit by the light remains to be seen).

Apparently in Guts' ethereal form at this point, he has his arm back, but he's still missing his eye. Which makes some sense if you think about it: he's been using his prosthetic arm for so long that he unconsciously considers it a part of him, but nothing has replaced that lost eye (and that was always the more symbolically significant injury anyway, considering the last thing that missing eye saw....) Guess some old wounds heal more quickly than others.

Actually, if you take a closer look at his left arm, the silhouette is rather thicker than a regular arm. There is also an angular transition just beneath his elbow, which can be interpredet as the connection point between his flesh and his metalic hand.

[Turd Ferguson]

The light is turning regular creatures into fantasy creatures. The unicorns at the end are the regular horses in the first frame of the second page.

I'm not sure. Those unicorns were in the forest when we first see them, and they are not wearing any reins, nor pulling the plow. I think that they are regular unicornes, transported from the astral realm to material plane.

That's a good point. At any rate, it's clear that what is taking place is in Midland, not Elfhelm.

[fujinsan]

Lol this has got to be the chapter with the least bubbles in history. Must've been easy to translate. Yeah though looked at it real well that's gotta be his astral projection.

[The Herald]

CAN NOT READ! STILL AT WORK! DO NOT HAVE WINRAR! SLOWLY GOING CRAZY

[Facade19]

Tord, I am not so certain that Elfheim will not be affected somehow.
My first impulse reaction was to see that the unicorns represent some sort of disturbance to the flow of Elfheim as well.
However, I am still awed at how quickly Miura opted to have this explosion to spread, and in addition, how vast.
Makes things very interestingly. Why has fantasy become reality? Is the Idea of Evil going to make a comeback?

[Istvan]

Thank you so much EG! This was wonderful.

Is the Idea of Evil going to make a comeback?

A "comeback" sort of implies that it was loosing at some point, which I really doubt. If what you mean is will Idea enter the world itself, I doubt it. It will probably be closer, though, which may have some sort of important implication at some point.

[The Herald]

What I find interesting is that here we see ages old monsters, the hydra and the harpies, where if this were a mirror of the real world (which I believe Miura intends it to be) should be things that have existed in fantasy for thousands of years. Maybe that's why they have such power, because people believed that they existed or once existed and all have a present idea of what they are. I really enjoyed the shot from the moon's perspective, that was great. Before the light hit them on the ship Gut's metal arm was just wrapped in bandages, I'm assuming to keep it dry while on the ship. Also, his astral projection, if that is what that was, didn't definately have his arm, it just suggested that he did, but what we really saw was flames extending into his elbow on that arm. I personally found that his arm injury was more important literary wise because Guts cut it off himself to save Casca. And those were unicorns, not horses turned into unicorns, there's no suggestion at all that they were horses, just a unicorn 'noticing' something. In any case I'm very excited to see Guts and co. after like a year.

P.S. Thanks EG If I could I'd buy ya one of these < ---

P.P.S. What could be a better post to have as my number 666 than this one where we're discussing hell breaking loose. Literaly.

[DrPepperPro]

About the astral stuff in the new world:
I think that Guts' astral self only projects his more defining features, or what he's come to know himself as. The healing in the real world (like how Serpico or the old man healed in the church in Enoch) might be from the merging of their astral projection onto their real self. Now in this new world, after the light wave passes, it'll still look like "reality" but everything from the astral world, including one's own projections, should replace what was there before. We can see in page 19 how everything looks normal still, probably because all those normal people don't have much astral self differences. Also I do think that the cannon arm is still there.

The white hair is hard to tell, but I'd say it's gone. The lightness around that area also spills over into the hair around him and his eyebrow, plus I think the white hair normally went farther over, where on that picture it's darker. This could mean that the Berserk armor wont have those side effects that SK described to him. So Guts can enjoy his soup now. Guts' astral wound is still there, though that's likely because it was in the astral realm already, more than it being part of Guts' subconsciousness. The Brand is covered by the wispy stuff, but it's almost certain that it remains. And not sure on this one: but to me it looks like Guts' right bicep is slightly bigger than in the previous page.

A "comeback" sort of implies that it was loosing at some point, which I really doubt. If what you mean is will Idea enter the world itself, I doubt it. It will probably be closer, though, which may have some sort of important implication at some point.

I think he meant a comeback from when Miura got rid of its one and only debut chapter.


Also, unicorns were in Berserk already!
http://www.mangafox.com/manga/berserk/v24/c005/15.html

[Rolos]

Thanks EG!
I don't think its necessary for me to post another one of my drawings, its pretty obvious that the worlds have indeed merged and that it spans a hell of a lot more than just Midland.
I have to admit that Miura's work is starting to frustrate me a little.
Why does every single chapter have to be so awesome?
Saying "awesome chapter, thanks EG" becomes a little meaningless when every single chapter is a goddamn masterpiece. It kinda loses strength, as a statement.
He's driving me to a corner, forcing me to either make up new words, or look for new ones amongst the languages I still haven't mastered (according to the person sitting right beside me, English is one of them).
The thing about this chapter that really moved me was how it was shown that this was happening on earth, and earth alone. Idea, the astral world, the Vortex; they are all layers of an entire Universe (redundancy, I summon thee!), but that Universe is the human universe. An objective universe does exist.
I am not sure if I am saying this clearly enough.
What I am trying to say is that all those "supplementary Universes" exist because of humanity. What we are seeing is the illegitimate child of Plato's Ideal world and materialism.

[Facade19]

Rolos, slightly off topic, but there are some who would say that Plato's Ideas are a form of political rhetoric, such as the second master.

[Rolos]

That may be so (You know how those Greeks were....always ranting about how it was only in "Polis" that true happiness could be found), but thats not the most important accomplishment of Plato.
Far more important was his conception (wait, I am not sure if thats the word I should use in english....I meant to say understanding of) of the Universe as one composed of ideas, that through specification (for example, first you have the Idea of Dog. Then you have the Idea of small dog. Then you have the Idea of chihuahua . then you have Fluffy, your dog.) become objects, which we are able to perceive.
We can understand Ideas, not perceive them.
The berserk Universe is very similar to Plato's Universe, but there are some very important differences.
The most important of them is the hierarchy of the worlds.
In Berserk, the Ideal world exists because humans are there to create and sustain it, while Plato's ideal world takes precedence over physical reality, going to the point of being structured in a way that physical reality was "the shadow of the Ideal world", its manifestation.
One of the reasons I love Berserk is because of how incredibly deep and rich in meaning everything about it is.
I remember being close to orgasm while reading the chapter named "Shadows of Idea". You know, the in which the tower of conviction becomes a fake godhand birth altar.

[turkey]

I remember being close to orgasm while reading the chapter named "Shadows of Idea".

lol

So will this alter Guts relationship with the Berserker armor any? Does anyone know what this might means for Guts' powers? Does this change things?

[The Herald]

Yeah, everything is going to change, this astral explosion may even wake up Casca for all we know. I'm not going to speculate anymore. Miura just threw in the trump card with these last few chapters.

[dialdfordesi]

Turd-- Maybe those horses just always really, REALLY wanted to be unicorns, so that's THEIR ethereal form? (-: Wonder what would happen if that light hit a furry.

If I were a horse, being a unicorn would be my number one goal.

That being said, thanks again for the chapter, EG! I have never thought of the appearance of unicorns to be awesome in any way until I saw this chapter! It's pretty awesome that the realms of fantasy and the human realm have merged so quickly.

[KingFate]

Thanks for the very quick release, I can't wait to see where this leads.

[Sandman]

Thanks again EG you are the best...

HOLY SHIT this chapter blew my socks off... new enemies for Guts to wade through ... Miura take all the time you need drawing these awe-inspiring portraits of awsomeness...

Love the unicorn it was like a "WTF!!!!! No he did not just pull out the Unicorn!!!!! What a twist" (it was almost like the pirates)