Shem 'Etzem Archives - Page 3 of 4 - Milhamah: Fighting Words

Shem reaches for a miracle in Ep. 13 (Part 2)

Posted on June 28, 2019 by eczarnik

The action turns grim in “Milhamah” Episode 13 (Part 2), and it’s up to Etgar (and maybe a miracle) to save the day!

After Deli’s geyser blast hit Shem in the last scene, Etgar tosses Shem a life preserver — the Dalet foundational glyph. The glyph can alter reality through the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and a legend says its origins date back to God’s creation of the world.

But will it save a doubting protagonist like Shem? Only with the help of a mysterious fish (which is composed of other fish). Where did this helper come from, and why did it deliver the Dalet to a drowning Shem? The answer is unclear, but for now let’s call it a miracle.

At the end, Shem musters up enough faith and hope to make a prayer — a form of reality-altering speech that differs from the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, or Deli’s twisted magic. But time will tell whether divine intervention will come through…

Updates

Look forward to the next “Milhamah” scene, which should be released in a week or two! Also, I’m working on an Indiegogo campaign that I hope to have ready in July.

In addition, the Michigan Comic Con in Detroit is not too far away, so I hope to wrap up an Issue #2 by the end of July. So the upcoming month should be a busy one!

Evil gets the upper hand in Ep. 13 (Part 1)

Posted on June 5, 2019 by eczarnik

After a hiatus to complete print Issue #1, “Milhamah: Fighting Words” is back in action as good and evil strive for the upper hand in Episode 13 (Part 1): “A Name for Himself.”

Despite a bout of overconfidence, Shem ‘Etzem continues to struggle in battle. This time Deli actually finishes his water extraction special attack. But does it mean a watery grave for the Holy Tongue Society’s leader? We’ll see, though he’ll need to change tactics if he wants to swim and not sink…

Prepare for a steady string of story updates throughout June. I’m strongly motivated to wrap up this fight arc by then so I can move on to worldbuilding and other characters in the “Milhamah” universe!

Issue #1 in more stores

As a side note, “Milhamah: Fighting Words” is now available for sale at two additional metro Detroit stores:

Comix Corner: 32032 Utica Rd, Fraser, MI 48026
Warp 9 Comics: 21 W 14 Mile Rd, Clawson, MI 48017

Soon I’ll set up a page that will have all the store locations where you can buy “Milhamah” comics. And don’t forget the Storenvy page!

The urn returns in Episode 11 (Pt. 2)

Posted on February 12, 2019 by eczarnik

While the battle continues, the evil urn Deli startles our heroes from behind. The villain seems to be reformed … but not in a good way! Will Tiqwah and Etgar find what they’re looking for in the aural grid before it’s too late?

This is Part 2 to “Slaughter in the Water,” and you can see the earlier part here.

Things get technical behind the scenes in this episode, as it starts to explain how the “Milhamah” characters weaponize their alfons to make blessing attacks outside of their own natural ability. Gradually readers will learn about these things over the next few episodes, but I’ll give a preview here.

Basically, Tiqwah and Etgar connected the speech balloon and the foundation glyph to their alfons to make new letters appear in the aural grid.

The aural grid shows sound frequencies, and Tiqwah and Etgar are looking for ‘Ivrit ones to do new attacks. The evil Bavel Empire try to scramble these ‘Ivrit frequencies to make it harder for the heroes to do this. (Though in Bavel’s perspective, they believe they’re actually unscrambling their own language!)

Anyway, it’ll be up to our heroes to find the correct sequence of letters needed — a shoresh root — to code in an alfon attack, or a blessing. Will they do this next episode? Maybe…

Meanwhile, what is Deli doing?

Etgar shot the urn in Episode 9, but now the fiendish jar is back. Well, it used an Akkadian curse called walа̄du. Deli’s natural shoresh root is dalet-lamed-yod (דלי). He’s using a permuted power caused by switching the letters around, (ילד). This undergoes a consonantal shift, as in Akkadian the same Semitic root is spelled waw-lamed-dalet (ולד).

The pink seal beneath Deli contains real Semitic letters and words. The Akkadian for walа̄du in the center. The Paleo-Hebrew and Ugaritic letters for (ילד) are in the middle orbit, plus the six different root permutations in Aramaic-style Hebrew script. The outer ring has the alef-bet.

So as the comic says, Deli permuted or switched his powers around to heal himself through a rebirth. Of course, since he’s from Bavel, he does this through the power of trickery and evil. Next episode you’ll learn the difference between the Holy Tongue’s Society’s truth-guided blessings and Bavel’s manipulative curses, and why it matters.

A side note

Please take a moment to vote for Milhamah: Fighting Words” on the Top Webcomics site! The more votes we get, the more visible this comic becomes.

Also, if you haven’t signed up on our Instagram, Twitter or Facebook pages, please take a moment to do so!

Episode 11: Slaughter in the Water (Pt. 1)

Posted on January 29, 2019 by eczarnik

This new episode’s first part isn’t exactly a slaughter, but good and evil go at it for another round. The last time “Milhamah: Fighting Words” had this much fighting between Shem and Deli, Shem took a walloping. Check and see what happens here…

Action scenes always take more time to design than talking head panels, but the end result is often satisfying. This time I tried to make things more dynamic by breaking the panel’s perspective with Shem’s “osteoblast” bone shard missiles.

I also added more sound effects and used the negative space outside the panels to contribute to the storytelling. I’ll probably do that more, especially in my remastered print edition. The goal is to begin selling copies in April with a couple of comic cons on the horizon!

Storywise, while Shem’s limited attack moves are a punchline here, I look forward to giving him more to work with in the scenes to come. Plus we need to see what Etgar and Tiqwah are doing in Episode 11 Part 2!

In other news…

Just a reminder: You can also see “Milhamah” comics on Tapas and Webtoon. I’m trying to grow those subscriber bases, so if you use those sites, you can get automatic notifications when new episodes come along.

Also, you can vote for “Milhamah” on the Top Webcomics page site, which draws a lot of webcomic fans. I’ll be promoting this more in the near future. Help this series climb the ranks!

Episode 8: A Bout with Doubt

Posted on October 30, 2018 by eczarnik

In both fiction and in real life, evil adds insult to injury. It gloats and humiliates. It tries to make you doubt who you are and what you believe in. Sometimes it may even tempt you to question who God is.

In “Milhamah: Fighting Words” Episode 8, Shem ‘Etzem is faced with that same sort of evil from the Bavel Empire’s agent, Deli. Deli puts Shem up against the wall and then questions Shem’s loyalty to his own cause, the Holy Tongue Society.

Deli slanders Shem as an ogre and demon, but only looks at distorted outward appearances. For the record, Shem is human and not only has to fight a powerful foe, but people’s expectations over what a virtuous person should look like. Note also how the Bavel Empire accuses its critics not only of hypocrisy, but blasphemy!

This episode is also the first time that the 22 Foundational Glyphs are shown. These are tied to a non-biblical story of how God created the world through the 22 Hebrew letters.

In the fictional world of “Milhamah,” the letters (seen here in Phoenician or Ketav ‘Ivri “Paleo-Hebrew” style) are not mystical but tangible. After all, they exist in a world where grammar and parts of speech take human form.

As we end Episode 8, our hero may be conflicted and broken, but he’s not destroyed yet. Likewise, let’s persevere in our own lives — even when we don’t have all the answers neatly figured out.

Tag: Shem ‘Etzem