zappadoodlecat

[zappadoodlecat]

You are a Human. Tenacious, hardy firstborn of Sol. The earliest kind of creature to write histories of the Earth.

You have been taken.

Rest your feet. Turn your bare head to the sky. No more invaders will come from the black to raze your home, to steal your past and make your children live in fear.

Why have you not died out? What keeps you standing tall? 

This world is yours. Your ancestors’ ancestors’ bones mingle with every patch of earth you step upon. The invaders steal what you might have shared, if they had only asked. But they did not. Now, they will not leave. There are so many of them, and so few of you. There is so little you can do to protect that which you love.

If you cannot be feared singly, you need to be feared together.

There is a knife for you. It is shaped like [shoulder to shoulder].

Take up the knife. Seal it into your bones. Take your new shape.

(Human Taken lore card by @schniggles )

[zappadoodlecat]

You are Nixis. So-called Archon Priest of Wolves. Vassal of the Queen of the Reef. Progenitor and pastor, tending your flock on the edge of the Deep Black.

You have been taken.

Look up, Nixis. Fill your lungs free of guilt. Let your shoulders down. No dead-souled thing measures you for acquiescence, now.

What keeps you on your feet? What private lodestone holds the disparate parts of you together?

Your people are chained. Their future is not their own, but without one like you, they have no future at all. The queen suffers no rival crowns, so you wear your faithless nobility like a cloak of woven lead. Your mouth is full of empty words.

One gasp of defiance, and the cold took you prisoner. Do you remember a time when you did not feel hollow?

Your grim years of dedication deserve a more righteous cause.

There is a knife for you. It is shaped like [sovereignty].

Take up the knife. Fill your sunken heart. Take your new shape.

( Nixis, Hunger of Oryx by @schniggles )

[zappadoodlecat]

Follow-up piece to the quick Nixis redesign for @schniggles

Poor Archon Priest Nixis, devoured on the verge of freedom.

ETA ALERT: @schniggles is posting the fan taken cards!!! go read them because they're fuckin' RAD!

Bonus quick Taken human design keep everything together.

[zappadoodlecat]

started off as a quick redesign of poor Wolves Archon Nixis (whose in-game model is a Taken version of Archon Aksor who is Kings but the Wolves Archon? it was all very odd, although it gave us some fun fuel for the potential state of inter-house politics) and then it got a bit artsy.

there isn't much we know about Nixis in canon but what we do get kinda juicy. he was likely ascended into archonhood under Mara since Aksor was the Wolves archon during the Reef Wars. we speculate that this was a way for Mara to tame the chained Wolves's faith to better suit her rule.

there isn't much D1 lore on what Mara's rule over the conquered Wolves was like, but in the decades-long ordeal (between Reef Wars and Wolves Rebellion in HoW dlc), we know she never took the time to learn their language (Variks translates for her in a couple lore pieces) and the Wolves were described as chained (Variks and Skolas both describe it as such) and that the Wolves rebelled against her to follow Skolas, the Rabid (the epithet is a bit telling).

somehow during all of this kerfuffling, Nixis ended up in a stasis pod. did he try to join the rest of the Wolves during the Wolves Rebellion and get captured? or something else? either way, when Winters tried to spring him, Oryx ate him straight out of the pod. D1 was really good with using the Taken blights for horror.

for his design, i went with an unusually 'plain' (by eliksni nobility standards) appearance. he stands the same height as any other archon and kell, but his sparsely adorned helmet strips him of any sense of grandeur. i designed his ether mask to look vaguely like a muzzle although it's rather hard to convey it when a majority of eliksni designs already have masks. i pulled the pale 'U' on his helmet from screencaps of Mara's eliksni bodyguards.

(Nixis was also part of my initial speculation that kells and archons were baby makers of the houses. like, what the hell is Winters doing trying to spring a Wolves archon now that Skolas is dead? what secrets would an enslaved Wolves archon have that'd be worth trying to break him out? clearly the explanation is horny. also it would make his situation under Mara deliciously awful).

[zappadoodlecat]

furry jackalope people. no idea what for yet but i sure do have them.

[zappadoodlecat]

found this in the old art pile and realized i never uploaded it anywhere. Jack is really cute all tied up.

[zappadoodlecat]

A Warmind and an Iron Lord sitting in the Iron Tree...

Charlemagne and Saladin from the Warmind spite remix I really really want to do some day. also i love Saladin's helmet design.

[zappadoodlecat]

I really love your Destiny art. I first found it on pillowfort and it really influenced a lot of my headcanons about Eliksni. I don't like a lot of the more popular fanon about them and your stuff is so weird (positive). The way you headcanon their sex organs is basically how I write them because its just so neat. Like yeah two dongs are great... why do you need them? Well obviously to fuck yourself lol

the sex organ chart was a significant cooperation between @kaleidoramblings , @schniggles and i, although i didn't have the foresight to name them at the time as the post was actually mostly for our personal reference, lol. i didn't think a niche specbio anatomy exploration would actually gain much traction and i'm glad you enjoyed it!

does remind me, i should probably do an updated eliksni sex-ed at some point since we've moved onto the eliksni having a three gender system for a while now...

[zappadoodlecat]

birthday present for @schniggles ! love you dear!

[zappadoodlecat]

a tender hand to make a wolf into a lapdog.

[zappadoodlecat]

two minutes earlier

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do not talk to me or my childe ever again

[zappadoodlecat]

redesign of Winter Kell Draksis, who had the misfortune of being Riksis's reused asset in-game. i made him more wintery!

[zappadoodlecat]

Fusion of the Pure Vessel and the Lord of Shades, just for funsies. these monochromatic pieces are so fun on a braindead day.