#she is the ancient

[wehavekookies]

New body (and skeleton) references for Victoro.

There is stuff happening in our She Is The Ancient campaign with his hexblood transformation that i am exploring some visual ideas for - currently roots growing under his skin and over his skeleton (more on that some time later :))

edit: added the roots spread over the skeleton.

[eyeofthenewt1]

A Ritual Gone Wrong

[Petrichor, OC]

[tamvmat]

My warlock of the undead , Savos Nevermind, scaring the bejeezus out of a couple guards who came to investigate the apartment our party was currently searching (after breaking in...)

Decided to go full haunted house on them, and the rest of the party went along with it 😅👌💀

[battletailors]

Commission for @overabsolution on Twitter! A character of Countess Strahd from Beth The Bard's "She is the Ancient: A Genderbent Curse of Strahd"

[howthedungeondragons]

Can't believe (can totally believe) I'm thinking about running Curse of Strahd again!

Unsurprisingly the prewritten module about Vampires has a fucking chokehold on me, especially since I got the 'She is the Ancient' supplement that genderbends the shit out of the module.

Get ready for some deeply tragic and decidedly unhealthy vampire lesbianism

[mommabearchillsout]

Group conflicts means my Curse of Strahd campaign is leaning towards being entirely cancelled, which is unfortunate and pretty upsetting

But fuck it, mama didn't raise no quitter, and there's nothing that says you can't write an ending if a canonical one doesn't exist!

[thatpunnyperson]

According to NBC here in the US, the missing titanic sub has been found. As debris. Off the bow of the Titanic wreckage.

And it looks like the sub suffered what we all suspected, and what was undoubtedly the more merciful of the two options: a catastrophic implosion from the pressure.

Also, more info has come to light about the fishing trawler with the hundreds of migrants that sank cataclysmically off the coast of Greece, indicating that the greek coast guard knew about the vessel AND how much trouble the vessel was in, and were towing it at a speed that made it capsize, at which point they unhooked the tow line and watched the trawler sink without helping the passengers to safety. Despite a bunch of other ships trying to help as well throughout the whole ordeal.

So a lot of people are dead, all because of regulations (and the lack thereof) regarding sea-faring vessels and rescue protocols. People shouldnt be allowed to make a business charging a ton of money for a ride on an uncertified, unsafe, un-seaworthy ship going deep into the ocean with no distress beacon or tether to the mothership. People also shouldnt be allowed to enact laws that criminalize the ferrying of refugees, which then force the refugees to hitch rides on fishing trawlers, and which also prevent people from helping those fishing trawlers full of refugees due to fear of legal consequences.

Hopefully BOTH of these events spark changes on an international scale in terms of what is legally allowed to be sailed, who is legally allowed to be the passengers, and what the rescue protocols are in the event of disaster for any seafaring vessel, illegal or not. It shouldnt be just the global 1% who get 24/7 search parties and remote-operated submersibles helping rescue them.

[nonbinary-nomadism]

SHE'S SO NORMAL YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW NORMAL SHE IS

[bet-on-me-13]

Why are there so many gods here?

SO! One day, the Eternal Trio decided to Check if they had ant past lives using Magic.

They already knew that Tucker was the Reincarnation of some Pharoah, so maybe they were also some historical figures in a last life.

It does not go as expected.

Danny finds out that he was the Ancient of Space, and the reason Clockwork was so invested in keeping him from being erased from Time is because he's his Brother apparently.

Sam finds out that she was the Embodiment of The Green, and Undergrowths attempt at Adopting her was some scheme to become the Parent of his used-to-be Queen while she was in Mortal Form, therefore overthrowing her.

Tucker finds out that Duulaman was just one in a long line of the Reincarnations of the Sun God Ra, and that he had been quite a few more historical figures in the Past.

They were surprised to figure this out, but then they got curious.

They tested the Spell out on Jazz, and found that she used to be an Amazonian Goddess, alongside Pandora.

They test it on Dash, and find that he used to be Hermes, God of Travel and Speed.

Ellie was an Embodiment of something called the Speed Force, who was also a child of Space before their rebirth, apparently.

They slowly realize that almost every person of note in Amity Park is the Reincarnation of some kind of God or Spirit. And none of them seem to realize that.

Why are there so many reborn Gods in this town?

...

Constantine is actually asking himself the EXACT same question at that very moment, after a botched teleportation spell landed him in Amity Park.

[pierogish]

dude I hate this place *proceeds to draw it*

[akanemnon]

One sacrificial goat, coming right up!

FIRST - PREVIOUS - NEXT

MASTERPOST (for the full series / FAQ / reference sheets)

Heads up: By the time this comic is published I will be on a trip to visit my partner in the US. Asks will stay closed for the time being! I will officially be back on April 28.

[wehavekookies]

Sketching Lady Strahd from our She is the Ancient game (and going slightly feral ngl)

[sarafangirlart]

It’s odd how Athena is Zeus’s favorite but she doesn’t seem to like him back, not only did she participate in Hera’s coup against him but even in the Iliad she was upset with him.

[shadowed-dancer]

Characters that are younger than Xiao and it feels wrong

Over half the archons (Nahida, Focalors, Furina, probably the pyro archon and the Tsaritsa assuming they were born after the cataclysm. Idk I feel like we assume gods should be the oldest and they just... aren't)

Yae Miko

Dainsleif

NEUVILLETTE

Characters that are older than Xiao and it feels wrong

Ganyu

[spacedace]

Had a dc x dp brain worm, feel free to use as a prompt <3

Sidenote, I decided to get fancy with the Ancients titles because of course I did lol

Shifting Where = Space (Danny)

Eternal When = Time (Clockwork)

Ever Onward = Speedforce (Ellie)

---

Bruce watched the footage again.

And again.

Again.

It didn’t make sense.

A week ago every television, radio, computer, phone - even the LED billboards - had been taken over to deliver a message. Across the United States. In every territory it held. Every military base. Down in the depths of the oceans where American submarines tried to creep past Atlantian patrols. In the endless cold white of Antarctica. Even far above in the International Space Station. Any place the United States Government had control over, any place one of its citizens found themselves. There was the message.

The face of an entity, human in shape but not in form. Hair as gleaming white as starlight, eyes bright as the twisting dance of the Aurora Borealis, skin as cold and blue as the tail of a comet. The entity wore armor as black as the depths of space with a crown to match, the later glinting and shifting with the twisting birth and death of galaxies. A cloak of nebulae danced down his shoulders, eclipsing the world beyond the entity entirely.

He named himself, jaw tight, expression serious.

High King Phantom of the Infinite Realms.

The Shifting Where. Son of the Eternal When. Father of the Ever Onward. His Epitaphs many and ever growing. The True Balance. The Bridge Between. The Devourer of Dark. The Last Child of Between. The Great One.

King of the Dead. King of the Infinite Worlds. King of so much more than Bruce had ever even known was possible.

King who had declared war. Who marshaled his endless armies. Who spoke of warnings, of efforts to reach a peace, of trying again and again and again to find a way to not plunge into violence and bloodshed. All things living come to call him King in time, he had no want or need to go out and hurry that along. But there were no options left to him now. He had tried for peace. He had been denied.

He would not see his people suffer any longer. Would not see those he’d sworn to lead and protect imprisoned by fools who had sworn themselves enemies to all the afterlives. Would no longer permit the vicious cruelty to continue.

The message was a final warning.

A final offer.

Three days, Phantom said. The United States government would have three days to release their prisoners, to begin the process of dismantling the laws that made death itself an illegal act.

If they refused, he would lead his endless armies personally in the war to come.

It had not been an idle threat.

Three days after the message, after Bruce and the rest of the Justice League scrambled to try and figure out just what it was it was all about, after Justice League Dark’s members shakily took turns explaining just how powerful the being that had gave that message was and how much danger the world was in should he and his armies march upon their world, war came.

Of all places, it began in a town in Illinois.

The sky shattered like broken glass above, Lazarus Green beyond, and the Dead poured out.

It started in Illinois.

It did not end there.

Bruce watched the footage of it all, eyes burning as he watched every second of CCTV footage, every shaky phone camera video, every news broadcast.

Most of them looked human enough. Changed in death, but recognizably human once. A pair of glowing teenagers on a motorcycle, a writhing shadow twisting about at their command sweeping chaos upon the battlefield. A young woman dressed to perform with hair a literal flame, burning bright blue and snapping furiously as she played devastation upon her enemies with her guitar. A child with corpse gray skin and luminescent green hair, flickering in and out of Bruce’s ability to see as if fighting against a law of existence to be visible, screaming orders to a skeleton crew from his place on deck of a 1700s ship that sailed through the sky, disappearing into clouds before raining down attacks from above.

There was more. Glowing skeletons dressed in the fashions of war spanning every culture going back millennia. Robots with weapons far beyond the technology they had even in the League. Creatures of myth and legend. Things of nightmares.

Leading them all, as he had promised, was Phantom.

He looked younger, smaller. Just a boy, really, a gangly teenager that hadn’t quite finished growing into himself. One holding power beyond anything Bruce could ever imagine, but still just a child as far as he could see, no older than Tim who’d just graduated high school. Frantic research found Phantom appearing as far back as human history, but those sightings had to have been after his death. Bruce can’t help but wonder how young the boy had been when he died, how much of that youth still clung to him through all these eons.

It wasn’t something he’d let him self consider normally, not with something like this.

A dangerous unknown appearing without warning and attacking with unimaginable power and seemingly endless forces. It was something that would normally eclipse everything else. Something that would make Bruce put aside the ache at seeing a face so young twisted in rage.

But.

He watched all the footage.

Civilians were put in the crossfire. Were shot at and endangered. Were left terrified and scrambling for safety in buildings that were rapidly being torn away by stray artillery.

But never by Phantom or his armies.

The dead, in fact, went very far out of their way to ensure civilians weren’t harmed. Sweeping people up out of the way of falling debris. Shielding them from attacks that would have most certainly killed a normal human. Some dead even helped evacuate, ushering a frightened and panicked populous to safety as gently as they were capable of. Some of the less human creatures - giant bear-like beings with horns and fangs and ice edging their burly frames - even rushed forward to offer medical aid.

When the sky shattered open and the armies of the dead swept in, they ignored the town below. They focused instead on what was discovered later to be the base of a secretive government agency. The dead’s fight focused on those individuals in sharp white suits, bearing weapons capable of actually injuring King Phantom’s people.

It was these agents that brought the fight to the streets to Amity Park. That fired recklessly and without thought or care to the casualties they could inflict. That didn’t seem to care if they killed a hundred civilians if it meant hurting just one of Phantom’s soldiers.

Bruce watched all the footage.

And again.

Again.

Phantom had declared war.

Phantom spoke in his message of being out of options, of attempting peace. Phantom gave three days time for the release of captives. Phantom lead armies who fought viciously but never once willingly harmed civilians.

Phantom declared war, but he didn’t want it.

“Amanda Waller has reached out.”

Bruce didn’t turn his attention from the screens before him, eyes burning as he followed Phantom as the King dove away from the middle of locked combat to shield a child from a pulse of green energy from something like a grenade another agent in white had carelessly thrown. The child was crying but unharmed. The left pauldron of Phantom’s armor cracked and shattered from a direct shot from the enemy he’d just been fighting that he’d turned his back on, a glowing green liquid uncomfortably like Lazarus Water dripped down from a smoldering wound.

Clark stepped up to stand beside him as he watched, face worn and tired. The League had missed the first battle, but they’d been quick to appear at the rest. Phantom and his army ignored them unless they put themselves purposefully in the way of the fight. They were, as Justice League Dark had warned, vastly out powered by the entities fighting. A hulking giant knight made of shadow riding a nightmarish steed had driven Clark six feet down into the dirt when he’d attempted to make his way to Phantom directly to try and talk to the king.

The depth Clark had ended up felt like a warning of what would happen if he tried to get close to the king again.

It probably was.

“She said they have intel for us.” A faint twitch of fingers, jaw clenching, voice flat in that way that told Bruce his old friend was fighting back anger with everything he had. “That she has options for how to deal with the insurgence.”

Bruce shut off the monitors.

He’d seen enough.

Now was time to get answers to just what, exactly, Amanda Waller and the US government had done to cause the Dead to rise and rage.

---

Part Two Part Three Part Four

[thesilicontribesman]

The Wolf and Romulus and Remus Mosaic, Roman Aldborough, North Yorkshire, 300-400CE, Leeds City Museum.

This panel formed the centrepiece of a large mosaic floor constructed in the Roman town of Isurium Brigantum, now Aldborough in North Yorkshire. The mosaic depicts the legend of Romulus and Remus. They were abandoned in the River Tiber but washed ashore where they were fed by a she-wolf.