Testarotho

Rotho Capria has graduated from her cloistered life in the Nunnery and is about to join the Elysia Unification Council. Her first glimpse at the outside world is not a pretty one. Little did she know that behind the gates that protected her lies a divided land, one with differing cultures and religions who are all vying for a position of power, and beneath them all, the common people are suffering, oppressed on all sides, especially by Arsenal's "Inquisitors", who they refer to as "Testarotho". These Testarotho are the very same people Capria will be helping. Just like the Spanish Inquisition during the Middle Ages, the Inquisitors go around rounding up heretics and trying to convert them to the one true religion, that sanctioned by Arsenal. If they can't get this through reason, they try torture, and if that doesn't work, then there's always execution, preferably burning at the stake! Capria works under Father Garrincha, who seems like a nice man, but doesn't blink when he sentences heretics to death. The other two members of her team are Leonedus and Socrates. Socrates is part priest, part doctor. Leonedus is the main warrior, sporting a bazooka-like rifle that equals or probably exceeds him in size, begging the question of how and where he carries it. If he's not shooting people, he's knocking their heads off with it. Volume 1 is pretty much an intro to the setting and the characters, but already we're beginning to see that the Testarotho team is starting to question whether what they're doing is right or not. Capria's introduction is going to push them even further down that road because she hasn't accepted the violent status quo of this horrible new world. Brutality is the word that comes to mind after reading Testarotho Volume 1. It's a cautionary tale about religion and how there is never one true faith. Religions are simply literary interpretations of a divine source as put into words by impure humans. Since all faiths are corrupted by the unskilled hands of Man, humans will never be able to agree about one true God. So we kill people to settle the argument, because reason will never solve such a problem. Capria is a great Everyman character because her introduction to the world is a symbol representing the reader. We feel like she does, because perusing this world we are filled with loathing and disgust, just like her. One thing that is so comical that it almost ruins the serious nature of this work is Leonedus' "big gun". There is no way this guy could carry this everywhere he goes. He'd have back problems like I don't know what. And this huge 10 foot long rifle is hidden under his cape??!! Come on!! Maybe they'll explain it with some extra-dimensional scientific theories later one, but for now, it's just plain dumb, and mars an otherwise emotionally honest tale.