Ah! Finally got it! Chris Mustang=Christmas! That's pretty clever, there!

I love how she's in it as much as anyone, but her motivation (or maybe Roy's?) is a little clearer now. I mean, yes, there was Ishbal, and changing the country is an excellent motivation, but do you really think most people are gonna wake up one day and say, "I'm'a go change the country now!" without having the idea for it there first? Does that make sense at all?

On a completely different note: Poor Fuery. Takes all the abuse, doesn't he? But... *giggles* it's pretty funny.

This reply probably won't have much substance to it, other than "yay! I loved this chapter!" But I really did love this chapter. I figured even the new gluttony wouldn't last long because he's just so slow and useless...He can swallow things whole, but that's not so helpful if it takes too much time or if he swallows the wrong thing.
Pride really scares me now.

I want to know if having Mrs. Bradley is going to affect the Fuhrer at all. I'm sure he's alive, maybe it will force him to come out of hiding?
I was so happy to see Mustang's gang again.

Hmm...I'm beginning to question Olivia now...I think she's good, but if she's good, why doesn't anyone else seem to suspect it? "Father" seems completely oblivious.

I saw wut Arakawa did thar...



I'm hoping that she chooses the right side in the end, and that her involvement with the upper brass is only out of desire to ultimitely use them as pawns in her game. I always read her character as a true "chaotic neutral"-- not really aligned with anyone else's agenda besides her own:



This is in strong contrast to Mustang and his gang's 'Chaotic Good' nature.

My favorite part of this chapter by far has got to be the Ling/RanFan/Homunculi beatdown.
WHO'S HOUSE IS THIS? IT'S RANFAN'S HOUSE!!!!! Yeeeeah...

Thanks CodenameElizabeth for the scanlation

Okay, I just wanted to react on one thing : I start to believe that Mustang has no real intention to become President now. The way Olivia presented his plan to Father, it seems Mustang tries to be labeled as a traitor as soon as possible. Why would he want that, except for someone else (Grumman) to take him out and take power "legally", and so insuring stability for the country?

I wanted there to be Edwin in this chapter(even though Ed and Winry aren't together),but there wasn't any Edwin

There would be Edwin, don't worry, as soon as Kimblee pick her up in Resembool and go back to Central with her, to use her as a hostage And I'm sure Bradley will be with them

That is my prediction as well. Bradley wouldn't die that easily.

OMG!! O.O A D&D player here?? Yay!! \o/
Well, I'm still in doubt about the 'chaotic' part of her. She definitely has many guidelines she follows. Guidelines she created herself, but still, chaotic people are very... 'go with the wind'... I'm thinking she would be more a 'Lawful Neutral' or second interpretation of True Neutral...
Just like I've always picture Mustang's gang as a Neutral Good.
But, either way, alignments are always a slippery slope.

I just really wanna see Kimblee again

I reckon the Olivia thing will be drawn out as long as it can. She'll be made out to be a psychotic evil so and so, who follows Father's orders with great enthusiasm.

And just as we're all calling for her traitorous blood, she'll end up doing something crazy that helps out the good guys and it will be revealed that she really had good intentions from the start.

That's my take anyway.

And yeah, I'd go with Lawful Neutral rather than Chaotic. Olivia is like a rock in her beliefs and methods.

I know we aren't really discussing our feelings on her, but I can't stand Olivia. She's so.....boring. Not only that, she's just incredibly irksome. She demands all this respect that she most certainly hasn't earned from me (yet the complete opposite is true for ALL the characters) and....I dunno. She just rubs me the wrong way. I don't know what her purpose is, and I don't care, I just want her to either go away or get better. The same thing is true about Pride as well. Arakawa hasn't impressed me in the slightest with her most recent characters.

Yeah, I have to say she annoys me to no end as well.

I like the "Chaotic Neutral" idea of Olivia. She certainly does follow her own agenda at whatever cost (with the one exception of her own life, of course), but she doesn't seem to be high on a prioritized hit list for either side. It seems like she's flying under the radar for now, so whatever action she takes in the future could be the missing link in the chain that makes or breaks the whole good vs. evil concept. Whatever it is, it will inadvertantly help or hinder either side, though-- she's calculating what the actions of each side will do, and will follow what benefits her interests at the time because her interests are all that matter.

In this, I do agree, she's annoying. She's hard to make guesses on because of her self-interest, but I think that she will be a deciding factor in the end. I suspect that either she'll go with the side (Roy & co.) that's less likely to use her for their own gains, or she'll go to her grave for her past associations. It's really too hard to tell at this point, though.

Yeah. D&D FTW. I've rolled my share of D20's back in the day... (LOL GEEK.)

As for Olivia, I'm apparently in the same boat as a lot of you. She has been annoying me as of late as well. I'm waiting fro her to DO SOMETHING, which I'm sure will happen, at the correct place in the plot. She just came on so strong, and I loved her to death, but once she got to Central... NOTHING. Except for that one lulz-tastic scene w/ Alex at the family mansion. XD

I really hope that Arakawa makes it up to us in the end and that this is all leading up to something important.

It seems that Olivia really cooled down after the 'army of homunculi' incident. I think she's planning something, and her lack of action is her putting on her best poker face.

Yeah... I'm kinda confused about her, actually. At first, I didn't like her and, once she started growing on me, she started acting strange...

So I still don't trust her AT ALL.

I really think that there is something big planned between Mustang, Grumman and Olivia. Mustang is the one that will create the rebellion and give to Grumman the opportunity to grab power. Olivia is their inside woman, she will get rid of all the corrupt higher up that could contest Grumman. In the process, Olivia and Mustang would have sacrificed their lives, but Grumman will be able to get the country on the way Mustang wanted.

Sorry, I have to add something to this Olivia discussion...

...She usually doesn't get on my nerves, and I have faith that she's on Roy's side. My problem with her is how she treats Alex. Somehow, i dont find it funny. How can she put him down for leaving the war, when she wasn't a part of it? She doesn't know it was like to have to kill innocent people and watch their bodies dropping all around her, for no reason whatsoever. Sure, she heard about it, but nothing is the same as being part of it, so she has no right to judge him since she doesn't know a thing about the circumstance.

Plus I loved Alex since he first showed up in volume 2, so having some newbie come in and treat him like sh*t isn't something I can really let by easily...

I wouldn't count on Grumman in there, he's plotting against Mustang himself remember.

As I recall, that was just Miles's thoughts on Grumman's plan. We haven't seen any indication that this is true besides that, and I wouldn't put it past Arakawa to throw us a red herring on that one. I honestly don't think Grumman would be painted as the good guy all along just for this.

Uhhh, no. We having thought bubbles coming directly from Grumman's head, explaining in a great detail how he is going to screw Mustang and seize power for himself.

EXHIBIT A:



Grumman's planning to pull a fast one, no matter how you look at it.

Definately, Grumman had spent most of his life in the military. It would be really atypical for a big shot like him not to crave on power. I, too, suspect that Grumman is using Roy to overthrow Bradley for his own greed but it is still early to tell.

Yes, BUT RIGHT AFTERWARD, there is a bubble from Miles saying something along the lines of, "That's what someone like him might do." I really don't think that he's just using people for his own ends. He could be part of the larger scheme of putting someone more trustworthy at the head. I think we're being thrown a fast one, here. It's not 100% clear whether it actually is Grumman's own machinations, or Miles's imagination, but if it really was all Grumman's plan, why would Arakawa throw in Miles's thought?

If the thought process was Miles' then the whole lot would have pointed from Miles' head.

Grumman quite obviously went against his instructions to march on central, so Miles managed to pick up on his intentions from that.

If anything, what Miles thought immediately after is probably slightly mistranslated. Who knows, he could have been thinking "I wonder what he's planning . . ."

Those thoughts came from Grumman. The last thought was Miles. No question, no uncertainty. We can see it with our own eyes. Fast one's have been pulled on the reader before, but you can't discount something that is right there in front of your face.

To answer your final question: So someone can warn Mustang that Grumman is going turncoat on them . . . duh.

Yeah, I agree with you on that. But I don't think she treats him "directly" that bad... I somehow thing that their rivalry go way back, and that Olivia has always thought that her brother was "weak" Or perharps that she ressents being a woman...

No, it's the way she talks about him to her fellow generals and soldiers than unnerves me. Somehow, I think that if she was to talk like that in front of Miles, Miles might disagree with her, after all Alex refused to kill his people...

After that, I want to see Alex gets his sister's sympathy again by showing her that when it comes to something that is really worthy of it, he doesn't flee nor is "weak". Alex is just like Ed : he has chosen not to kill, and that's why he is so low in the hierarchy. Alex gaining his sister's trust appears to me as much as important as Scar somehow saving Winry.

Concerning the Armstrongs,

I really feel that the panels that focus on the two are really just showing that one is the foil character of the other, whether that affects the plot at all remains to be witnessed. I do like General Armstrong becuase she is the good guy who seems to brush off emotion, unlike Ed, Al, Alex, Mustang, Winry, Izumi (to some degree)

I almost feel like her "bad guy" counter part is Kimberly, in their dominating prescense in the series. (they also become major players in teh plot at the same time, probably just coincidence)

(i actually woudl think it is awesome if she turned evil, she would make an amazing bad person, despite what i said up there

The thing that is driving me crazy is that the bad guys seem to be getting less powerful

Scar, Izumi, Hohenheim, Ed, Al (maybe), Mustang, Armstrongs, Riza, Miles, Grueman, Chimeras, Greed, Ling, Foo, Ran Fan (really, they just need ran fan)

vs

Pride, Father, Sloth, Wrath(maybe), Envy (maybe)......

Idk, someone refute this, so i can feel actual suspense!

He choose her as his wife himself I'm sure he feels something for her.

I'm sure he chose her after she slapped him

lol, very true, he likes people that amuse him, and I'm sure her slapping him amused him even more than Ed pointing that spear at him during his practical part of the test and Olivier killing Raven to get herself a seat with the rest of the brass.

No, it's no translation mistake, Miles' final line is there to show that those last few panels were Miles' imagination, with Grumman thinking like that. It's just a tease to us readers from Arakawa... or a hint, if it ends up being true, we don't know the old man's intentions, that's true.



Put that way it's a little unfair. Remember to add to the "bad guys" side, for now, the whole of Amestris' military (sans East and North, which for now are stuck at the east, probably they'll attack later). All the main characters have come to a situation they have to hide and move surreptitiously (is that a word? ; ) to not get into trouble...

Even that, though, it's true that things are going quite smooth... In fact the bad guys have been slowly but firmly being downsized for quite a while, now. Ever since volume 10 or so.
But I take it that it's part of the manga's maturing "message" whatsoever... FMA's been quite a 'positive' manga for a long time now, , just compare volume 2's Tucker & Nina & the brothers' defeat with, for example, Volume 16, with Sloth's "attack" on Briggs (the first big events of each "half" of the manga), it hasn't had a rather tragic scene ever since the Devil's Nest raid (Ishval FB notwithstanding).
Guess you could say that since it is a maturing themed manga, the situation has been evolving altogether with the Elrics' resolve... The more they are decided to not let anyone die and the stronger/more mature they get, the less bad things happen around them.

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