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Tenebrais
Sep 2, 2011




Sleepless domain is a story about magical girls.



A great barrier protects the city from the nightmares lurking beyond. Within, everyone can live out safe and comfortable lives - except for a few hours around midnight, when the outer barrier weakens and monsters roam the city streets, trying to break into the buildings and prey on the people inside.



The inner barrier protects the city buildings themselves, but it needs to be guarded by magical girls - teenagers who were given a dream, in which they were granted their power. Although, like all dreams, no one remembers all the details.
Each night, hundreds of girls risk their lives in defence of the city. In return, they are celebrated; the whole city follows their lives and exploits. Everyone has their favourites, and shows their support by buying their merchandise. Such is life for a magical girl.



Undine, known by her title of Alchemical Water, was once part of Team Alchemical - until a patrol goes bad and she is left the only one still active. Now she's looking for the strange apparition that taunted her as she lay dying. She joins up with Heartful Punch, a very successful solo girl, as she tries to make sense of how her world works and keep everyone around her safe.



Sleepless Domain is written and drawn by Mary Cagle, of Kiwi Blitz and Let's Speak English fame. Weaving together rich characters, dark mysteries and pretty outfits, if the idea of a magical girl story that isn't aimed at children or paedophiles appeals to you, give it a read!

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Joe Slowboat
Nov 9, 2016

Higgledy-Piggledy Whale Statements



Did everyone see Cagle’s art of Undine if she were Alchemical Air? The Team Alchemical scheme is just adorable.

Tenebrais
Sep 2, 2011

Joe Slowboat posted:

Did everyone see Cagle’s art of Undine if she were Alchemical Air? The Team Alchemical scheme is just adorable.

https://twitter.com/cubewatermelon/status/1281355837492142083

Very cute, although blue matches her complexion better in my opinion.


I was rereading the comic recently and actually went through figuring out the cipher code that appears on the inner barrier sometimes. It was kind of fun, although until you figure out the first letter it's pretty tricky since it doesn't have spaces.

It also implies the barrier - or something in charge of it - is sentient enough to try sending messages to the girls, that can't read them.

Acebuckeye13
Nov 2, 2010


If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, crisis counseling and referral services can be accessed by calling
1-800-GAMBLER


Ultra Carp
Thanks for making the thread! This is a good comic and I'm excited to see where it ultimately goes. Honestly, my only criticism (at the moment) is that I wish Tessa would show up more—at the beginning it seemed like she was going to be a much more central character, but at this point her appearances (Which are one of the only ways in which we get to see glimpses of the non-magical girl side of the world) are pretty few and far between.

Also, bold prediction that's probably wrong: Cassidy isn't actually dead.

Ashcans
Jan 2, 2006

Let's do the space-time warp again!

Acebuckeye13 posted:

Thanks for making the thread! This is a good comic and I'm excited to see where it ultimately goes. Honestly, my only criticism (at the moment) is that I wish Tessa would show up more—at the beginning it seemed like she was going to be a much more central character, but at this point her appearances (Which are one of the only ways in which we get to see glimpses of the non-magical girl side of the world) are pretty few and far between.

Also, bold prediction that's probably wrong: Cassidy isn't actually dead.

I don't think we're done with Tessa, but I agree she's been pretty scarce lately and more from her view/story would be cool.

Predictions: I had thought that Cassidy was going to get recruited/turned by Goops, but that doesn't seem to be how it went - I definitely don't think we're 'done' with her, but I don't know what format we'll see from her going forward. Maybe she managed to survive, but it messed her up badly? Maybe having both copies 'die' strips her of her power? Maybe she ends up vanished, but reappears during hunting time as a single shadow? I do hope that she's not done because I think that would be a really tragic end on her story, but it's not like this comic doesn't have it's seriously bleak patches so maybe that's what we get. :ohdear:

Julius CSAR
Oct 3, 2007

by sebmojo
Comic extremely good

Wittgen
Oct 13, 2012

We have decided to decline your offer of a butt kicking.
Cassidy wanted more than anything to be a hero just like Heartful Punch. In the fullness of time, maybe we'll see that she got her wish.

habeasdorkus
Nov 3, 2013

Royalty is a continuous shitposting motion.
Cassidy at least got to poke out Goops eye, so she's got that going for her.

Apraxin
Feb 22, 2006

General-Admiral
my thoughts on that one character we're putting in spoilers

me reading the comic: no body, ambiguous magic powers, yeah this is a bait-and-switch, Cass's coming back

me reading the author's comments on twitter/patreon: oh wow Cass's actually loving dead

me thinking too much about the author's comments on twitter/patreon: she's being really flip about this honestly pretty grim event while sidestepping direct 'she ded y/n?' questions, there has to be some sort of twist, right?

in short, comic good and i genuinely have no idea what the answers to any of the current mysteries are gonna be

Rexxed
May 1, 2010

Dis is amazing!
I gotta try dis!

Mary Cagle is so prolific and even has a twitter for her cats!
https://twitter.com/CagleCats/status/978001542056837121

Tenebrais
Sep 2, 2011

Apraxin posted:

my thoughts on that one character we're putting in spoilers

me reading the comic: no body, ambiguous magic powers, yeah this is a bait-and-switch, Cass's coming back

me reading the author's comments on twitter/patreon: oh wow Cass's actually loving dead

me thinking too much about the author's comments on twitter/patreon: she's being really flip about this honestly pretty grim event while sidestepping direct 'she ded y/n?' questions, there has to be some sort of twist, right?

in short, comic good and i genuinely have no idea what the answers to any of the current mysteries are gonna be

Honestly, I think it's going to take a while for the cast to even realise what happened to her - no one was watching and she didn't leave a body, so no one has a reason to believe anyone died that night other than the fact she doesn't come home after. And she was already avoiding people after that big blow-out, so it'll probably take a while and a lot of rumour-spreading for people to figure out what happened to her.

Then, once it's finally sunk in to everyone that she's dead, will be the perfect time to reveal that she is in fact still alive.

rannum
Nov 3, 2012

a week from now some weird ribbony monsters based on the fear of being alone shows up

girl dick energy
Sep 30, 2009

You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?
I like Sleepless Domain. I’m glad it has a thread now.

That’s really all I wanted to say.

Roland Jones
Aug 18, 2011

by Nyc_Tattoo
Saw this thread the day it went up, was reminded of this comic and thought I should finally get around to reading it. Then checked the General Webcomics thread, which I had last checked sometime last year, and in the posts around where I resumed I saw a lot of SD chat. Then jumped to like twenty or thirty pages before the then-current one and almost immediately ran into even more SD chat.

And now today I finally went and binged the comic after having opened up the first page and leaving the tab open for two days. Am glad I've done so; it's pretty good.

Prediction: Gloopy ends up going and telling Undine what she did to Cassidy, to make her feel even worse and push her further from everyone else. Also Cassidy is super dead and not coming back.

Dr Subterfuge
Aug 31, 2005

TIME TO ROC N' ROLL
My prediction for the spoiler character: If Cass isn’t dead her consciousness in some liminal space connected to the Woman in White. Or in other words, if she’s not dead her consciousness hitched a ride back to wherever powers come from.

rannum
Nov 3, 2012

Here's a theory, unrelated to cass, that I had on discord back when this page showed up https://www.sleeplessdomain.com/comic/chapter-15-page-24

"It's too bad you're one of hers, we might have gotten along"

and then thought about again after this page https://www.sleeplessdomain.com/comic/chapter-15-page-29
"I hope it's not a sign of things outside getting worse"

Which I assume is "outside the town"


The "her" is almost certainly the important golden girl who hands out the dreams & manifests as the tiny golden animals . And Goops is clearly set as her opposite, right? And all the monsters, that she can both control & seemingly spawn, are based on fears according to cagle. So it'd make sense that if light girl is Dreams then Goops would be nightmares.

So...What if Goops can give her own "dream" (nightmare) to people. Specifically, I wonder if she's given out her "dreams' to people outside the barrier. The barrier cant keep her from messing with people (stalking, phone calls, physically interacting, sending monsters) but it's enough that she can't normally get inside people's heads.

And as for what her dream would do, "dark magical girl" is one option but one I keep thinking of is maybe whatever it does allows her to generate the monsters and it attempts to propagate from there. But the monsters might just be a means to an end, too.

possibly related:
* When you get lightly attacked you get full of screamy nightmare mouths. Zoe's cousin is still out of sorts and describes it all as a "bad dream", with the mother clarifying that nightmares like that happen with monster attacks https://www.sleeplessdomain.com/comic/chapter-11-page-7
* prolonged exposure just totally fucks you up. Melty eyes, death, the works.
* Undine's about to have a lovely nightmare and Gold Girl intervenes and puts a stop to that https://www.sleeplessdomain.com/comic/chapter-9-page-25
* While Tessa isnt the first time a girl's had her powers transferred (getting pregnant while a magical girl, for example) the way its presented I think the way she did it might have completely cut her off from Gold Girl. She's having pretty awful nightmares and while that might just be you know...trauma & depression...it seems notable that Gold Girl cannot intervene in her dreams anymore https://www.sleeplessdomain.com/comic/chapter-12-page-16 and I think that's specifically what has her on Goops radar

Tenebrais
Sep 2, 2011

Don't forget the golden creature that's chasing Goops around too. They're definitely connected somehow. Possibly it's the woman in white's corporeal form, in which case that exchange tracks pretty well with your theory.


I have a feeling that Goops is part of the barrier in some way, though. The way she melts into it, she's never separate, and she doesn't materialise outside of the hours it's active.

rannum
Nov 3, 2012

Tenebrais posted:

Don't forget the golden creature that's chasing Goops around too. They're definitely connected somehow. Possibly it's the woman in white's corporeal form, in which case that exchange tracks pretty well with your theory.


I have a feeling that Goops is part of the barrier in some way, though. The way she melts into it, she's never separate, and she doesn't materialise outside of the hours it's active.

Yeah I assume the girl & the animal are the same.


For goops being part of the barrier, I'm not sure. I think her never separating from it is just a part of her slinking in the shadows. Monsters can't get in the greater barrier during the day either, so I also assume she's more linked to the night.
ah, actually...in that page you linked where she talks about growing stronger. Is that the first time we've seen more than her head show up out of the goop?

FronzelNeekburm
Jun 1, 2001

STOP, MORTTIME

Dr Subterfuge posted:

My prediction for the spoiler character: If Cass isn’t dead her consciousness in some liminal space connected to the Woman in White. Or in other words, if she’s not dead her consciousness hitched a ride back to wherever powers come from.

I think the implication is that Goopy steals power from the light woman whenever the monsters kill a magical girl, so if there are any soul shenanigans going on, it's probably a bad time for anyone involved.

Mikl
Nov 8, 2009

Vote shit sandwich or the shit sandwich gets it!
Important news:

https://twitter.com/cubewatermelon/status/1283296147315011584



Zoe/Rue 2020

Twibbit
Mar 7, 2013

Is your refrigerator running?
Remember whoever gets last gets gooped

rannum
Nov 3, 2012

Twibbit posted:

Remember whoever gets last gets gooped



the dark magical girl was under our noses this entire time....

Ironic Twist
Aug 3, 2008

I'm bokeh, you're bokeh
It's hard to be a dark magical girl with a steel rod in your leg

Tenebrais
Sep 2, 2011

New page!

I don't think anyone will be surprised by that answer, but it's still very cute.

habeasdorkus
Nov 3, 2013

Royalty is a continuous shitposting motion.
The Character Poll is posted.

My objectively correct ranking:
1) Rue
2) Zoe
3) Cassidy
4) HP
5) Bud

(Had a hard time picking between Bud and Undine, they're both pretty great)

habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 12:44 on Jul 16, 2020

rannum
Nov 3, 2012

I went with Anemone, Undine, Rue, Bud, & Zoe

It was very hard figuring out if Kokoro got on here

Draga
Dec 9, 2011

WASHI JA!
1. Kokoro
2. Undine
3. Zoe
4. Rue
5. Anemone.

sirtommygunn
Mar 7, 2013



Rue
Ms. Cagle
Tessa
Zoe
background magical girl that has cotton candy pink and blue hair

Mikl
Nov 8, 2009

Vote shit sandwich or the shit sandwich gets it!
Zoe
Rue
Claire
Bud
Vedika

Pretty clearly the superior ranking 😏

thechosenone
Mar 21, 2009
Cass
Zoe
Rue
Undine
Kokomo

Dr Subterfuge
Aug 31, 2005

TIME TO ROC N' ROLL
Undine
Kokoro
Zoe
Rue
Cass

I'm boring.

Airspace
Nov 5, 2010

I'll raise.

Mrs. Wells
Arthur Clark
Miss Nasri
Ms. Baiha
Mr. Wells

habeasdorkus
Nov 3, 2013

Royalty is a continuous shitposting motion.

Airspace posted:

I'll raise.

Mrs. Wells
Arthur Clark
Miss Nasri
Ms. Baiha
Mr. Wells

I think this is going to have the biggest deviation from the median ballot. :allears:

jng2058
Jul 17, 2010

We have the tools, we have the talent!





Rue
Zoe
Vedika
Kokoro
Ruemom

Old Kentucky Shark
May 25, 2012

If you think you're gonna get sympathy from the shark, well then, you won't.


Bud
Zoe
Kokoro
Rue
Steffi (Magical Girl Pop Blitz)

:colbert:

Captain Oblivious
Oct 12, 2007

I'm not like other posters
Shameful lack of love for Undine in here :colbert:

Begemot
Oct 14, 2012

The One True Oden

Captain Oblivious posted:

Shameful lack of love for Undine in here :colbert:

Undine will place near the bottom of the poll as all the fans just assume everyone else is voting for her.

Mine was:
Rue
Zoe
Bud
Kokoro
Mrs. Cable

Mikl
Nov 8, 2009

Vote shit sandwich or the shit sandwich gets it!

Captain Oblivious posted:

Shameful lack of love for Undine in here :colbert:

The problem is that we only have five spots to vote for; for me, Undine and Kokoro just barely didn't make the cut, as did Cass.

Ironic Twist
Aug 3, 2008

I'm bokeh, you're bokeh
Rue
Zoe
Goops
Bud
Melty Frost

more votes for Goops pls, this story wouldn't exist without a monster heel

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cropoval
Feb 17, 2020

1. Undine
2. Cassidy
3. Anemone
4. Rue
5. Bud

It's hard, though. Lot of good kids in this here comic.

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