#and simplified a few things

[gaydexvocaloid]

avanna drawn with lasso tool ^_^

[chiscribbs]

I'm trying out a few different options for the colors/details of Future Donnie's design, mostly the arm coverings and his tech leg. I'm not sure yet which one works best - there are elements from each that I like. Might just end up Frankensteining two or more designs together in the end, lol.

Feedback encouraged, I need some help deciding which way to go with this. So, if you have any votes/opinions/suggestions, feel free to drop them in the replies!

[designernishiki]

yuki and majima have merciless cain instincts toward one another like true siblings. 10/10 impeccable dynamic

(bonus: slightly more hq profile pics)

[envosu]

also I've been working on this on free nights, but they're far from done. still need to fix the hair, add the wings, paint the face, make legs/feet, etc etc... but excited to get them done so i can start lychee and longan :^)

[finiel]

NIGHTINGALE

[rogdona]

[cxs-workshops]

Desperately need to update Quinlan’s “official art” but I’ve been hung up on which pose to use for weeks lmao

(1 is unique but I’m leaning towards 2 maybe)

[notemaker]

Some late night quick art studies! Im trying to learn how to balance sharp lines with rounder ones. It's fun.

[acrazybayernfan]

heyyy bestie do you think you could pls write a lil something something for mullendowski mayhaps 😳😳

Heyyy omg of course yes, a hundred time yes !!! They are my main source of inspiration (sorry guys I'm not doing you any justice but you're my muses anyway).

So here we go !

I'm sorry for taking so much time but I'm always slow when write in english and I also got a bit carried away by my imagination (long post warning). Also i have to apologize for my english, it's so bad 🤦🏻‍♀️ However, I really hope that you'll enjoy this, it's a theme that have obsessed me for the last months so... I'm using you to free me from it : )

It was summer; the sun shinned in a perfectly blue sky, the air was hot and the ground dry. Robert was oppressed by the heat, he was barely able to breath and was suffering from a terrible headache, and yet he was letting his horse galop aimlessly in the prairies while tears were felling freely on his cheeks. Each stride of his grey stallion created a cloud of dust that enveloped them and dried his throat even more but he wouldn’t stop because all this was giving him the precious illusion of liberty. 

Was it a quarter of hour later, or only five minutes or an hour, he wasn’t able to say, but Robert entered into a wood and consequently slowed down the speed of his mount. The peace and the freshness of this world under the foliage, brought a certain to form calmness to his tormented heart and his tears of rage were replaced by soft tears of sadness, less violent but perhaps more hurtful. 

He wandered in this wood for some time, unable to see where he was going and not caring about it when, all of a sudden, his horse abruptly stopped. The shock almost making him fall but Robert was an excellent horse rider and he instinctively regained his balance. In front of him a young man was standing in the middle of a cow herd, he was tall and skinny with hair of the color of honey. 

At this moment he most unexpected thing happened, the cows suddenly bowed before Robert while his own mount was doing the same but for the attention of the young herdsman who- in front of this situation- let out a loud laugh and then slightly bowed himself but not enough to hide his amused face.

“May peace be with you, Prince Robert. What are you looking for in these remoted woods?” There was a hint of cheekiness in the young man’s voice who was manifestly pleased with the context and with himself.

Robert, on his side, was way too taken aback by all this to see the funny side of this strange encounter, so he only asked, surprised, “How do you know who I am?”

The herdsman smiled again and answered: “These cows are sacred animals of Veles’ temple, they would only react like that in front of the god or in front of one of his descendants, and the royal family members are sons of Veles, since the king only has one son then it had to be you. Plus, you do look like a prince. “

The stranger lifted up his eyes to study Robert more closely and suddenly his smile faded away, replaced by a concerned expression. The young prince had never seen such an expressive, frank and open face before; his eyes, his mouth, his cheeks…were the perfect reflect of the strong feelings of his heart and of the quickness of his wit, which gave them a unique and fascinating sort of beauty. The cowherd walked closer to the prince, still attentively observing him. “Your face is so pale, my lord. Are you unwell? You should stay here for a moment and get some rest.”

Robert hesitated, making conversation to strangers had never been one of his strong point, neither was he willing to let someone see his weakness and his sufferance, yet there was something in the look, the voice of this young man that made all resistance vain and Robert complied. He prepared himself to slide of his horse’s back when the herdsman offered him his hand to help him to get down. As the heir of the throne, he had been trained to horse riding since his childhood, he was perfectly able to get off his mount without any assistance but, nevertheless, he grabbed the other man’s hand. 

As soon as Robert’s feet were on the floor, the strange cowherd exclaimed himself: “Your hands are so cold my lord!”. And without asking for any permission he started to rub Robert’s hands between his, and to gently blow on them. The young prince could have told him that it was pointless, because he was not only a son of Veles but also, by his mother, a descendant of Marzanna, the winter goddess, and no amount of heat would ever be able to warm up his body, yet the sensation was too agreeable for him to do that. The stranger’s hands were hot, hotter than man’s hands usually are, but their hotness wasn’t aggressive, like the heat that made him suffocate, no it was soft and comforting.

After a few minutes, the handsome herdsman looked up at him with a childlike expression, almost pouting and he said, disappointed: “It’s not getting better, my lord…” Robert repressed a smile, and gently pulled back his hands. “It’s normal, no one can do anything about it, it’s the nature of my body to be cold.”

This sentence was scarcely over, that the young cowherd exclaimed himself, with the most genuine and naïve voice: “You have such beautiful eyes, my lord! They have the colour of an iced river in which the winter sky reflect itself… But why are they so red and wet? Were you crying? Why?” Since the end of his tender age, no one had ever showed so much concern for him, it was almost overwhelming, and all of a sudden, Robert felt a strong need to pour his heart out to this stranger. 

“My father wanted to beat me with his whip and then to lock me in the kitchen with a fire in the hearth to punish me and to train me, so that I will finally learn to resist to the heat, but I’m such a coward, I got scared, so I jumped on my horse and escaped.” Memories were coming back into Robert’s mind and tears appeared in his eyes again. “He was so enraged after me, so disappointed by me. I have lost a training fight…again… but the sun was so strong, my legs were shivering, I was barely able to stand on my feet, I couldn’t breathe and my head… Oh my head was hurting so much… I’m such a bad son, so useless and so we…” 

A sob stopped him. The herdsman kindly took him in his arms and forgetting all sort of etiquette, he said: “Robert you’re not weak, you lasted during the all fight even if you were sick. You’re not a coward for escaping an unfair and dangerous punishment, you just have common sense. And you’re not a bad son, he is a bad father.” The young prince let these words filled his heart like the consoling heat of the other man was filling his body. After a moment, Robert clutch his arms around the cowherd to get the strength to continue his confession. “I’m so lonely. I haven’t been able to see nor to speak to my mother since I’m eight years old. I have no friends because I don’t know to speak with men of my age. All the other persons at the castle, either despise me or are afraid of me and I… I’m so scared of my father! No matter what I do, no matter how much I try, he is never satisfied, never content, never proud of me. I’m a permanent disappointment for him.”

His companion let him weep freely for some time, then he pulled back a little and with his thumb he wiped the tears that were rolling on Robert’s cheeks. “You’re not alone anymore, I am here, I am your friend, hum?” The young prince nodded. “Look!” said the cowherd while he pointing to their surrounding “Look at how beautiful is all this. The smallest flower is already a piece of art. Look at the trees, look at the sky, look at the grass, listen to the birds… All this is a testimony that the gods are good and that life is beautiful.” The lyrism, the enthusiasm, the conviction in the young man’s voice were contagious. 

Robert took a deep breath and looked around him, he looked at all this beauty -never had the world appeared so enchanting to him- he looked at his new friend, even more beautiful than the rest, his face was enlightened by a rapturous expression and his eyes- similar to nature itself with their mix blue, and green and brown- were shining with admiration. At that moment the young prince was hit by the nobleness of the other man’s feature. “Who are you?” asked-he, speaking almost unconsciously.

“My name is Thomas, and just Thomas. I don’t have a surname, I don’t know what is my family, my clan, nor do I don’t know where do I come from. The priest of Veles’ temple, found me one day in this wood when I was a baby, and since then I have worked for him in the sanctuary.”

“Are you happy?” Robert would have been unable to explain why he asked that, perhaps was it because of the different between Thomas’ attitude and the sad story he had just tell. 

The beautiful herdsman smiled, a complex smile that Robert didn’t fully understood and then he turned himself toward the young prince, he looked at him in the eyes and said: “Today? Yes I am.” At that moment, the wind made the foliage dance above their heads and an unexcepted sunray landed on Thomas, making his messy hair shine like gold, encircling his face in a halo of light. It was an epiphany for Robert, he had seen that person before on tapestries and sculptures, he had even seen him in his dreams, this young man was Jaryło, or a son of Jaryło, god of spring and summer.

Robert smiled back at Thomas and he agreed to his friend words with a nod, now he was happy too, he was happy because now he knew that their fates were intertwined together and that no matter what -despite his father, despite the distance between them- they were going to meet each other again. 

[katyspersonal]

Do you think Laurence genuinely felt bad about the stuff he did or was it last minute regret before he turned?

Hmmm, I think it is sort of both!

Starting out would be scary, of course! He was forewarned about the potential risks upon using the holy blood, and for sure Byrgenwerth figured similar plan to his already ruined at least one civilisation (Loran). He would be using people as guinea pigs, put them against something you need a lot of willpower to deal with- something most do not have, so he'd have to firmly control as much as their very thoughts and emotions, let alone various social structures. And that, in turn, demanded eliminating a lot of potential threats; ideological, openly hostile, simply people that would freak out upon learning too much even if on accident and blow everything up before he got real results by running their mouths... It could and did include not only various strangers, but also people he held dear.

I imagine he was building up the guilt and doubts, realising that the progress was being built on too many victims- Like, hey, he was supposed to help the humanity, not to throw them all into jail, have them burned or offer them for research of his not-very-mentally-sound doctors! But slowly, it was being repressed and he embraced the 'ends justify the means' mindset. He believed that Willem's gatekeeping and lack of daring to try something dangerous but more effective was a bigger of two evils..... and that "evil" Cainhurst's ways to use the holy blood was the third evil, even bigger than previous two. xD He started to feel less guilty and more machiavellian, arrogant, narcissistic and even... heroic, seeing himself as the only one brave enough to do all this, to take soooo many sins on his shoulders for the greater good... *rolls eyes*

Pppffffttt lol sorry yeah xD ^^^ Visually, I associate his 'still has doubts' stage with a different outfit, the more detailed one with the crown is past Cainhurst massacre! But... True, at some point it became apparent that he himself fell for irrevercible beasthood, that he built up way too much faith in his own moral and mental invincibility. He had a short window of time to think about how concerned people that tried to expose him but were assassinated by Brador did nothing wrong, how people afflicted by beasthood (or even suspected to be) murdered by Black Doctors and the Harrowed hunters were not guilty of anything but not being prepared for his ideal picture of the world where everyone is strong and pure enough to forever "hold back"- Heck, how everyone got caught in the cycle of the hunt nights too much to ever bother freeing Gehrman when he is gone! Realizing that even "holiness" and "being smarter" could not protect him really was insightful on how everyone he sacrificed were simply humans. They were good enough; maybe lacking both health and intellect ("eyes"), but they only had their humanity to still persist... And yet what he set to motion at the expence of so many innocent lives was inspiration to lose that humanity, be it 'hunt and beasthood' way or 'aliens' way.

So yeah. A lot of guilt, then a long guilt-less period, then a LOOOOT of guilt.

______________

P.S.: I mention that Laurence was considering himself 'courageous' unlike Willem a lot, and it can be confusing, so, clafirication; "Master Willem was right, evolution without courage will be man's downfall" is a mistranslation!

( x )

He sure had some courage sending Byrgenwerth('s hunters) to scout Fishing Hamlet for the eyes, but that was it. Otherwise, I think Laurence thought his methods were "toothless", willing to simply 'learn' from Great Ones without messing with the blood... or without spilling their blood, for that matter. Yet, that whole 'commit great atrocities and transcend the humanity' attitude ended up spreading even in the parts of the Church that avoided the blood ministration (Choir and Mensis), ironically. He poisoned the well THAT badly! (though I think with Micolash, there wasn't much to poison, but I digress)

[pokeberry5]

The way you draw faces, especially Tim’s, is such a gorgeous trademark I - GIVE IT TO ME

it's the years and years of doodling headshots in the margins of my notes

[the-composer]

since a lot of ppl left the rpc that were in joshua’s circle and his existing circle is now much smaller and things are slower/fandom lull etc i’m considering the prospect of wiping his memory. he’d still be in his usual thing with sanae and his main verse with him and @dandybarista remains unchanged, but i think a clean slate could make for fresh and more enjoyable interactions. that said, if you don’t want anything to change with joshua and your muse can you please like or reply?

[autistic-britta-perry]

like Shiv's mean sometimes and emotionally stunted and that's basically it She's a cheater but he was fine with possibly cheating and it was only when he thought she'd do it too that he was like no so like sorry I don't really feel bad about that part. And then there's the 'I don't love you' thing and that's it! she didn't send him to prison!!! he got himself into trouble, he could've exposed it and he did not and then he offered himself and she was like strategically that'd be good and then he was hurt that she didn't save him He keeps saying he loves her and that he cares throughout the first seasons and people just buy that fully and think Shiv doesn't when she's the one who shows it through actions! and like I get up until beginning of s4 Tom not knowing that but whenever I read people who watch the show saying she doesn't love her or that it was only Shiv hurting him until the betrayal I get so mad

[rotisseries]

yes I think mlvn sucks and they're both gay and in love with their best friends but also I think making an elmike playlist and putting sad breakup songs on it is hysterical

[cainite-bite]

no mattter how hard i try and how many tries i give I can never really get into skyrim.

coming off the heels of morrowind and oblivion it feels like a step down in quality in a lot of areas. Like in comparison to oblivion it feels like it took a hit to the writing, and with morrowind it feels like it took a hit to exploration and running around because while the world is def bigger it just doesn't feel like it because everything feels more quick to get to (and this excludes fast travels).

Too much of the quests in skyrim feels a lot more about chasing instant gratification and thats probably my biggest beef. Especially since it takes no effort to become a werewolf and its so instantly OP.

[swiftiephobe]

books read in 2024

royal assassin by robin hobb (02/01, epic fantasy) ★★★★★

assassin's quest by robin hobb (06/01, epic fantasy) ★★★★★

my sweet audrina by vc andrews (10/01, gothic horror) ★★★★★

this ragged grace by octavia bright (12/01, memoir) ★★★

nightbirds by kate j armstrong (14/01, historical fantasy) ★★★

the priory of the orange tree by samantha shannon (21/01, epic fantasy) ★★★★

a day of fallen night by samantha shannon (02/02, epic fantasy) ★★★★

nothing more to tell by karen m mcmanus (04/02, mystery thriller) ★★★

death in her hands by ottessa moshfegh (06/02, psychological fiction) ★★

a pale view of hills by kazuo ishiguro (07/02, psychological fiction) ★★★★★

before the coffee gets cold by toshikazu kawaguchi (11/02, magical realism) ★★★★

tales from the cafe by toshikazu kawaguchi (20/02, magical realism) ★★★★

before your memory fades by toshikazu kawaguchi (12/03, magical realism) ★★★

before we say goodbye by toshikazu kawaguchi (14/03, magical realism) ★★★★