Unknown Lands - TV Tropes

Unknown Lands is a fantasy webcomic by Spider-Gwen artist Rosi Kämpe that can be read here.

An alchemist has called in a favor owed him by a raider in order to find help for his new home, where the local flora and fauna is being magically killed off by something a group of elves is doing. Together with a hunter from the dying woods the three of them set out to find a champion who is said to be immune to the magic of elves to ask them to save their home, but they do not yet know what it will cost.

Updates are sporadic and infrequent but ongoing, and first available to patreon supporters along with extra content.

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Unknown Lands contains examples of:

• Alien Blood: Dark Elves' naturally red blood has been turned blue. ^note 
• An Arm and a Leg: Inara uses her magic strings to remove the limbs and heads of some men hunting her.
• "Be Quiet!" Nudge: Upon hearing that Kai and Marya want to hire the Champion to kill the elves killing everything around their homes Mischief almost immediately starts to say that they'll do it before Inara elbows him to shut him up so that she can get a better feel for who they are first, and make a deal with them that will benefit her.
• Bloodlust: By nature Inara and Mischief are drawn to blood, though both generally ignore it. When they fight the elves they both give in at different points and lick it from their weapons with Inara eventually biting through an opponents throat.
• Blood Oath: Vard, Kai and Marya are bound to the Champion Inara for a year in exchange for her help through her drawing their blood while they swear fealty.
• Censor Steam: The parts of sex scenes that are available to non-Patreon readers, to ensure no story or character development is left out of the free version, are censored with steam and smoke.
• Cigarette of Anxiety: When Kai comes outside to join Vard after Inara points out she and him are not that different:
• Combat Medic: Mischief is the main group's very impressive magical healer, and is also their second most lethal combatant as a powerful mage with an understanding of blood magic. Kai, the other member of the group with medical knowledge cannot magically patch people up in the middle of battle and isn't much of a fighter either, though he does know how to use his knife if he has to.
• Covered in Kisses: After Marya rescues her wife from being sacrificed by elves she covers her face in kisses and the lipmarks take a second to fade.
• Covered with Scars: Vard has scars across his face, arms, and torso and a couple prominent ones on his legs as well. Kai helping him after he received the injuries which caused the scars that run across his face and his missing eye is why Vard owed him a big enough favor that Vard allowed himself to be dragged into the plot against his wishes.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: The Unknown Champion is introduced delivering one of these to a group that hunted her down in hopes of defeating her and eating her heart
• Distinction Without a Difference: When his name is questioned Mischief agrees that it's not his real name, and when subsequently asked what his name is replies Mischief.
• Electric Instant Gratification: Mischief has an electricity spell he uses on partners to pleasure them during sex. He uses a version of it to shock Vard awake one morning and Vard is quite pissed at the flirtatious overtones to the ensuing conversation.
• Enchanted Forest: The elves have enchanted the forest near Kai and Marya's home so that no one can find their abode within it, and they have been abducting the locals. The forest has become a spooky skeletal remnant of its former self and is teeming with magic.
• Facepalm: Vard pinches his nose is exasperated disbelief when Kai explains that he's asked him to come along as the "muscle" of their group. Vard points out that he does not have the build for it, but Kai asked him anyway since he knows how to fight and owes Kai a favor.
• Facial Markings: Elvish "starry" sight shows the Lovi'thar to be grey with lines on their faces and apparent dark voids in the middle of their chests even though they normally appear essentially human with longer sharper canines and slit pupils. Later Inara manifests those lines in her normal appearance when antagonizing an elvish noble.
• Finger-Snap Lighter: When Mischief first lights Vard's cig with a snap from several feet away Vard puts it out and gets a new one. Vard later becomes more receptive to such aid given his lighter's condition.
• Friend or Foe?: Inara shatters Vard's arm and breaks his nose when the trio first approach the champion since she mistakes them as being part of the group of hunters that were just trying to kill her. After she's had them all swear themselves to act as guards for a year in return for her aid one of her more wide range attacks nearly takes off his arm while he's fighting with his back to her with him only being saved because the group's other mage yanked him out of the way.
• Frustrated Overhead Scribble: Inara has an angry little tangle of lines above her head when she realizes that she can't kill Mirien yet since they need the elf's help, and since she's being accommodating she probably won't get to kill Mirien at all.
• Glass Eye: Vard's glass eye magically follows the movements of his remaining eye but he can't see out of it. He grosses out traveling companion Marya cleaning it.
• Happily Married: Marya and her wife Keilo are quite in love and devoted to each other. When the elves are trying to sacrifice Keilo her wife, who is usually hesitant to kill even when those she's fighting are doing everything in their power to kill her, snaps and starts killing those holding Keilo without hesitation.
• Healing Hands: While both Mischief and Inara know how to heal using magic Inara is only good at doing so with very fresh injuries, while Mischief is a superb healer. This doesn't mean that him using magic to put a pulverized bone back together quickly doesn't hurt though.
• Heavy Sleeper: Vard sleeps through being shaken and punched, his waker eventually resorts to magic to get him up.
• Hidden Elf Village: The elves in the forest near Kai and Marya's homes have hidden their abode with magic.
• Hiding Behind the Language Barrier: Mischief switches languages to talk about Vard to Inara right in front of him only to discover Vard speaks the language the next morning. This just makes Mischief excited.
• Horse of a Different Color: The elven royalty shows up riding an albino moose, while their retainers are stuck walking.
• Literal Maneater: Marya is secretly a skogsra, but she does not eat men anymore following her marriage. She has to hide her nature to live among humans and other less wild beings.
• Nature Spirit: Marya claims to be a benevolent type of nature spirit known to be kind protectors of the forests. She's actually a skogsra, which is still a nature spirit, just a kind that most humans would kill on sight as they're known for luring unsuspecting men in and eating their souls.
• Pillow Pistol: Vard sleeps with his sword hidden under the covers and a hand wrapped around the hilt unless he's very comfortable with the people he's with and his surroundings.
• Plant Person: Marya looks human enough so long as her back is covered but can become tree-like and merge with both living and dead plants, she doesn't need to carry arrows due to her ability to create wooden bolts and manipulate her bow.
• Psychic-Assisted Suicide: The Champion is introduced forcing her attackers to kill themselves and each other.
• Samus Is a Girl: Kai, Marya and Vard all assume the Champion, the best warrior and mage of the "Unknown" people, is a man, even when they find the champion and her companion they assume Mischief is the Champion rather than Inara instead of first looking for the very obvious symbol that they know marks the Champion.
• The Shadow Knows: Inara's black wings are not visible to the human eye, but they can occasionally be seen as part of her shadow. Elves on the other hand have no trouble seeing her wings and consider them and the type of magic she's tied to by birth a visual indicator that she's a monster.
• Sins of Our Fathers: Mirien makes it clear she's not entirely innocent and kind when she declares with perfect sincerity that Inara, Mischief and the rest of their people deserve the generations of trauma and being hunted and killed due to "their" actions, while talking about their long dead ancestors who upset the elves and caused the elves to spread word to everyone that killing one of their people and eating their hearts will greatly improve magical ability. She sees nothing wrong with blaming the innocent victims who came afterwards for the crimes of their ancestors against elves, and sees their suffering as justified and deserved despite them having a longstanding peace treaty with the elves.
• Wake Up Fighting: Mischief finds that Vard is hard to wake up, so uses a jolt of electricity to do so. When Vard is still groggily complaining, not fully awake and not remotely trying to get out of bed Mischief ups the ante by suggesting he uses that trick during sex which wakes Vard up fully and gets him out of bed trying to deck Mischief in the face.
• You Owe Me: Vard is decidedly unenthusiastic when he hears that Kai wants him to help track down an incredibly powerful mage and ask for their aid, especially as he says Vard is supposed to be "the muscle" which Vard points out he's not built for. When Vard is almost out the door Kai points out that Vard owes him, which gets Vard to very reluctantly agree to help.