As long as the flowers keep blooming, I will heal you.
As long as the sun keeps burning, I will protect you.
As long as we stay together, I will love and cherish you.
Always and forever.
— Sislo and Tetheril's wedding vows
Flowers of Etrea is a fantasy comic book/webcomic written and illustrated by Marcel Christian Rocha, and co-created by his wife, Elizabeth Rocha.
The story takes place in the titular land of Etrea. Living on the land's outskirts is the Happily Married couple Sislo and Tetheril. When the former's father falls ill, they must go out and find an elusive flower that holds to key to curing him. However, the world has changed a lot since the two started their life together, as all sorts of shady/dangerous characters lurk around every corner. Not the least of which is the Iron Industry, The Empire that reigns supreme over the land. Only through their bond and some friends old and new can Sislo and Tetheril hope to achieve their quest...but even that will be put to the ultimate test when it's revealed that Sislo and the Iron Industry are more connected than anyone thought...
Initially released as a regular novel in 2019, the story was more or less rebooted in 2021 as a graphic novel. The original story is, as of this writing, out of print.
Tropes:
- Action Girl: Every single named female character is more than capable of kicking ass.
- And the Adventure Continues: After the Iron Industry is left without its leaders, Sislo decides that he must go out and help those whom he once helped oppress, with his family and friends to help him every step of the way.
- An Arm and a Leg: Sislo gets his whole arm lopped off by Zama after he gets in the way to protect Tetheril.
- Arc Words: Ascension. It's brought up multiple times as something valued by Sislo's culture, in that those who perform great deeds will ascend and turn into dragons. After a whole story's worth of believing he was not worthy, he ascends in style for the final battle.
- Art Evolution: The character designs become progressively more refined and detailed as the story progresses.
- The Atoner: Sislo, BIG TIME. Helping to establish a tyrannical empire and massacring your surrogate father's enemies isn't exactly something you walk away from easily.
- Awful Truth: It is revealed by Ondiox to Tetheril that Sislo wasn't a slave to his empire, but his closest friend and a means to butcher his enemies, which he did without a second thought due to his hunger. Sislo is crushed when Tetheril learns of this, but it thankfully doesn't destroy their love at all.
- Battle Couple: Sislo and Tetheril, Gobby and Flint.
- Beast and Beauty: Sislo the rugged and monstrous-looking Cherufe is the loving husband of Tetheril the beautiful and kind dryad.
- Big Bad: Iron Lord Ondiox, ruler of the Iron Industry, and the root cause of all of Sislo's problems.
- Blithe Spirit: Tetheril managed to make both Sislo and Ovar completely (well, mostly completely for Ovar's part) change their ways of life just by being herself.
- To an extent, Sislo and Tetheril as a whole. According to Ondiox, they somehow managed to bring a little color into the lives of those they met, which goes completely against his visions of order and control.
- Cooldown Hug: The way Tetheril is able to get through to Sislo after he's fooled by Chela into thinking she died, nearly being consumed by blood-rage in the process.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Sislo would really prefer not to remember the time he was the ravenous slave of the Iron Industry. Or rather, when he was by Ondiox's side as they formed said industry.
- Death Seeker: Greiri wants nothing more than an honorable death after having lost everything and everyone in her life. She gets better.
- Deliberately Monochrome: 90% of the comic is black and white. Color comes into frame during moments of happiness/major development for the main characters, as well as action scenes, any and all blood, and, most striking of all, everything becoming fully colored when the Iron Industry is finally defeated, symbolizing their grip on the world being released.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: After having his past revealed to everyone and both he, his wife, and his friends being put through Hell by the Iron Industry, Sislo is finally able to gain the closure he needs to move on, get the rose needed to cure Tetheril's father, and even take the empire he helped make down.
- Empathy Doll Shot: A sign that things really went to Hell in the Ghost Town that is Frostbridge.
- Evil Counterpart: Zama and Chela are this to Sislo and Tetheril, respectively. For more info about the former comparison, see Shadow Archetype below.
- Eye Scream: Zama gets run through the eye with a wooden beam after an ill-timed charge, incapacitating him.
- Tetheril gets her eyes gouged by Chela during their fight, but heals them immediately after tapping into her true potential.
- Facial Composite Failure: The Wanted posters of Sislo and Tetheril leave a lot to be desired, particularly how they over-exaggerated the latter's front teeth.
- Faux Affably Evil: Lord Ondiox composes himself as a gentlemanly ruler in a nice suit more than willing to use words over brawn, but it does little to hide the tyrannical and brutal manipulator he is.
- Find the Cure!: The plot is kicked off by Sislo and Tetheril trying to find a flower that holds the key to healing the latter's sick father.
- Forced to Watch: Sislo is beaten enough by Ondiox so that he can only scream for him to stop unveiling the truth of his past to Tetheril.
- Chela forces everyone to watch Sislo briefly succumb to bloodlust when she tricks him into thinking Tetheril died.
- Gadgeteer Genius: Gobby and Flint are masters with machinery to the point of having constructed their very own robot to pilot.
- Ghost Town: The village of Frostbridge has been reduced to this ever since the Druden ransacked it, with Greiri as its sole occupant.
- Going Cold Turkey: Sislo would rather not go back to the times where he ate living beings while enslaved by the Iron Industry. The same can't be said about Zama, who relishes in flesh-eating.
- Happily Married: Sislo and Tetheril. Despite being complete opposites in appearance and dispositions, they couldn't be more made for each other.
- Heroic Second Wind: Tetheril is almost killed by Chela when her latent magical power awakens, and she immediately turns the tide in her favor.
- Sislo has his own, ascending into a dragon in the process.
- Horror Hunger: Sislo and Zama's taste for living flesh is treated as being akin to an addiction to drugs. While Sislo is doing everything to keep it under control, Zama has completely embraced it.
- Humongous Mecha: Gobby and Flint's main weapon is a robot that they pilot. It stands even taller than Sislo.
- I Hate Past Me: There is no one in this world Sislo hates more than the monster he was when he ripped and tore Ondiox's enemies apart back then.
- Industrialized Evil: The Iron Industry is basically The Empire, and it's choked almost all life out of Etrea. This is mostly reflected in the Deliberately Monochrome style of the story. When it's dismantled, full-on color returns.
- Interspecies Romance: Sislo, a reptilian Cherufe, and Tetheril, a fae dryad. And a damn healthy one, too!
- Gobby, a goblin, and Flint, a gargoyle.
- Mood Whiplash: After the absolute tearjerker that is Greiri's introductory chapter, we cut to Sislo trying and failing to get a steel door open while Tetheril stretches.
- Liar Revealed: Ondiox reveals to Tetheril that the story of Sislo being his slave was fabricated so that he could move on from his past as the evil Druden's right-hand man. It would have been doubly heartbreaking if Tetheril left her husband upon hearing this, but she didn't.
- Lizard Folk: Sislo and Zama are Cherufe, a kind of lizard-man (or in this world's case, Scalekin) Proud Warrior Race that got driven to extinction a while ago. Gargoyles like Flint are also a type of Scalekin.
- Love Redeems: Sislo was able to put away his past for the longest time thanks to his marriage to Tetheril. Turns out, he was able to move on from so much more thanks to it.
- Lovable Rogue: Ovar the thief. Turns out, most of his heists are for the sake of an orphanage.
- To a lesser extent, Gobby and Flint.
- Odd Friendship: Tetheril and Ovar. Despite him trying to steal from her, all it took was her giving him food to make him change his mind.
- Older Than They Look: Sislo and Tetheril look to be around close to the middle years. They are in fact over a hundred. The same goes for Ondiox and company.
- Our Dragons Are Different: According to Cherufe culture, dragons are those of their kind who have ascended after achieving a great feat.
- Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Ovar is a Twerg, which is pretty much a standard fantasy dwarf in all but name.
- Our Gargoyles Rock: They are a type of impish Lizard Folk related to the Cherufe.
- Our Nymphs Are Different: Dryads like Tetheril can control plant life, and, given enough age/power, grow antlers. Other than that, they physically resemble standard fantasy elves.
- The Power of Love: Sislo and Tetheril's bond is ultimately the most powerful thing they have against the bad guys. So much so that Tetheril still sees the man behind the monster that her husband once was when his true past is revealed.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The main cast consists of a married lizard-man and dryad, a short twerg thief, a strong viking-esque human, and a goblin/gargoyle pair piloting a robot.
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: Whenever Sislo allows himself to give in to rage and hunger, his eyes turn red as the blood he sheds.
- Revenge Before Reason: Greiri is absolutely determined to avenge her family and people, regardless as to how many people she pushes away or if there's even a future beyond that. She gets better by the end, especially now that Zama is dead at her sword.
- Seduction-Proof Marriage: Sislo isn't moved at all by a random succubus' advances (especially after it's revealed to be Chela in disguise).
- The Silent Bob: Flint doesn't talk at all, but is perfectly understood by Gobby.
- Shadow Archetype: Zama to Sislo. The former is basically the latter if he succumbed to his lust for flesh and violence. That, and what would happen if Sislo had kept working for Ondiox without question.
- Sheathe Your Sword: Sislo survives his fight with Greiri by doing nothing but tank her hits, knowing she's doing it out of suicidal grief.
- Shout-Out: The fight between Tetheril and Chela is directly inspired by the one between Seras and Zorin from Hellsing Ultimate, right down to an Eye Scream and the former trouncing the latter spectacularly in the second half. And even then, the fight is way less one-sided initially.
- Sislo and Ondiox's final battle brings to mind the one between Raiden and Senator Armstrong, especially due to both antagonists looking so much like each other.
- This immortal line near the end of Sislo and Tetheril's final battle.
Ondiox: What would you be without me!?Sislo: Time to find out. - Shut Up, Hannibal!: At least three are delivered to Ondiox by Sislo as the latter gains the upper hand over the former.
- Spanner in the Works: Ondiox's dream of a perfect world under his control falls apart in the end all because someone he knew and their wife went looking for a flower.
- Title Drop: Ondiox calls the rose "one of the rarest flowers of Etrea" to Tetheril. For further emphasis, the words are in red.
- Vice City: Syndstadt, appropriately called the City of Sinners by one chapter title.
- Wham Episode: Chapter 11 - Liar. In which the truth of Sislo's backstory is revealed.
Smile the while you kiss me sad adieu
Then the skies will seem more blue
Down in lovers lane, my deary
Wedding bells will ring so merrily
Every tear will be a memory
So wait and pray each night for me
Till we meet again
