Novalyst.
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Original Novalyst illustration
Earlier appearances

Portraits revealed through your current reading position.

character

Corcunda

Corky · Porky · the reunited mantaur

Whole again for only minutes — the reunited mantaur knelt to be ridden one last time and died smited by Grull to save the crew.

Story so far

Corcunda's wholeness lasts only minutes. Reunited mid-race, he is instantly marked for death by the war-god Grull, whose worship returned with his body — Grull declaring he is 'to be punished for not being troo.' Realizing the god will not leave until he is 'properly smited,' the mantaur makes peace: he assures Dong Quixote that returning to this form could never erase their love, thanks the old stripper for always holding true, and returns the scarf to Dong's neck. Rather than let Carl or Princess Donut fall, he kneels — 'It will be an honor to be ridden one last time' — and lets a lance-bearing Dong mount his back.

Together they charge Grull through a storm of Big-Ass Magnet-flung screws and dying slag elementals, and Corcunda is smited alongside his rider, satisfying the god and sending him back to the twelfth floor. He dies whole, loved, and a warrior again — the tragic prize of the quest Half a Prayer, Half a Song, won at the cost of both his life and Dong's.

Appearance

A whole mantaur again — a hulking bull-bodied centaur, naked, a bright jagged scar down the middle of his face and chest from the fusion, seams not quite aligned.

Role

The reunited mantaur who sacrifices himself, ridden into Grull one last time to spare the crew and end the god's threat.

Relationships

Dong Quixote — His lover and final rider, with whom he charges to a shared heroic death.
Grull — The war-god who marks and smites him, leaving only once he is dead.
Carl — Whose crew he refuses to let die, choosing his own smiting instead.
Half a Prayer, Half a Song — The completed quest whose prize was his brief, tragic wholeness.

Earlier in this series

Also appears in books you've already read — spoiler-safe to their endings:

Sources — 6 recorded facts, by chapter
Chapter 15
  • A vertically-split half-mantaur in a vinyl gimp suit — the long-lost best friend of the party's Dong Quixote.
Chapter 26
  • A vertically-split half-mantaur in a gimp suit — the dancer half of a being cleaved in two, and Dong's lost lover.
Chapter 62
  • The drugged dancer-half of the split mantaur, dragged to the factory heat by his captors just as his rescue was set to begin.
Chapter 63
  • Porky quietly meets Dong for the first time, still wearing the scarf Corky gave him, and confronts the wounded question of why he'd hated the man his other half loves.
Chapter 68
  • Whole again at last — the two halves fused mid-race back into a single mantaur, only for Grull to mark the restored being for death.
Chapter 69
  • Whole again for only minutes — the reunited mantaur knelt to be ridden one last time and died smited by Grull to save the crew.
Character sheet
LitRPG stats — unique to this series. Other books surface a different panel here.
Mantaur (reunited) LVL unknown
Character portrait