It was nighttime when Mei finally found the emo monkey. It had been almost two months since Macaque had abruptly cancelled their usual training sessions, and not even a week after that, the shadow demon had gone completely silent. Occasionally bumping into one of MK’s friends, but never staying for more than a few minutes before disappearing once more. Now, Mei knew that the black demon was more than capable of taking care of himself; he didn’t make rash decisions like a certain friend of hers. However, the sudden silence and the constant disappearance of the dramatic monkey had put her on edge slightly. Coupled with the words coming from that inky manifestation that Bai He kept in a jar, Mei was starting to wonder if Macaque hadn’t actually gotten himself into something and was too prideful to admit that.
Admittedly, she had tried not to worry much at first, but Jin and Yin had spotted the demon acting strangely when they had tried to tail him (they had gotten worried much faster than Mei had, and despite knowing Macaque would have likely spotted them from miles away, they still tried to follow him around a few times). She wasn’t really intending on tracking down the shadow demon, she had just gone to where the chaos twins had last seen him. Besides, the two onis’ description of the yaoguai had made her cringe with worry. And now that she could see him for herself? She could tell Jin and Yin were not exaggerating. One perk of unlocking her full dragonblood-given-powers was that darkness wasn’t an issue anymore! Unfortunately, that meant that she could see Macaque’s sorry state as if it were daytime. Matted fur, deep bags under his eyes that could be barely seen on his deep dark markings, and a near constant twitch in his tail.
“Mac!?” she had shouted, with uncertainty. She wasn’t even sure that was the Six-Eared Monkey, but the flinch the demon did confirm that he was real and not her imagination, which did not help her worry, because the usual Macaque would have heard her coming and would have had a quip on the tip of his tongue to fire at her. But instead, he hackled his fur as he shouted back, with surprising indignation, “What are you doing here, brat?! Go away!”
“What? No! You’ve been away for weeks! You look like a mangy cat!!!” She had said that with more anger than she had intended. Honestly, him using ‘brat’ was probably what caused her to react like that. She hadn’t heard him use that in over a year, she thought she was on better terms with him now, but maybe there was some truth to the words of that creature of ink with MK’s face.
“Just go away! I... I’ll tell you later!” Mei prided herself on being really good at telling when someone lies, but that one was such a blatant one that anyone would have been able to spot it. Another thing to add to her growing concern.
“Hell no!” she shouted back as she started walking towards him, “Everyone thinks you died, or something, because you refuse to answer any of our messages and calls!” Admittedly, the majority of those messages and calls came from her, but MK had sent him a few messages too, so hers wasn’t a complete lie. Now that she was closer to him, she could actually see that he was holding something, a cylindrical container of some kind, like the ones that have maps or old documents. She was just about to open her mouth to ask what the deal with that thing was when heavy footsteps and a dozen large, bulky demons came out from the street that Macaque had emerged from not that long ago.
“There he is!” one of the larger demons shouted while pointing at Macaque, who flinched and swore under his breath. Again, the Six-Eared Demon should have heard them coming, but he was just as surprised as Mei. Had they done something to him? He clearly was not in good shape, that much was clear.
“Uh, Mac? Who-” her questioning was once again interrupted as she felt her jacket being forcefully yanked backwards, and her body soon followed, as Macaque pulled her away. “Shit! Shut up, just run!” She wasn’t sure why that was his first instinct. Usually, the emo monkey would make snarky remarks and resolve a fight as if it didn’t take him any effort at all. And these were ordinary demons, your classic mini-villain who are just loud but don’t really pose any threat. Mei alone could have probably disposed of them really easily. But being told to run from Macaque, while he looked minutes away from a mental breakdown, Mei could only follow after him. Even as she shouted back at him, “WHY ARE WE RUNNING INSTEAD OF FIGHTING!?” And she had every right to yell that, because if Macaque really wanted to avoid a fight and just get out of there as soon as possible, why not just dip into one of his shadow portals that he so eagerly used on any other occasion? Maybe if Mei knew just how sleep-deprived her reluctant mentor truly was, she would be more worried than frustrated. But that wasn’t something she could really entertain in the moment, so she ran after him. Through streets, between stalls that had been closed for the night, and into another alleyway. An alley that turned out to continue into a solid wall of bricks.
With no other option left, Mei unsheathed her sword, planning on venting her frustration on the demons pursuing them before asking the shadow monkey just what the hell was going on with him. However, Macaque once again did something rather shocking, as he reached for her shoulder and held on to it tightly, stopping her from advancing. Normally, the dragon hair would have teased him for the gesture, but this night had been anything but normal. When she turned around, she did find him looking worried, but that sentiment was not aimed at her. He was looking around them, specifically at the shadows, moving oddly. Maybe Macaque had finally decided to take care of the yaoguais, but then why was he so worried about his own magic? For the third time that night, Mei was about to ask what was going on, but she was again interrupted by one of the demons. They had moved up to her while she had been distracted. Instinctually, she had raised her sword to shield herself from the blow... but it never came. Instead, she heard the sound of another sword cutting into flesh, and the pained scream of the demon who had tried to attack her.
Looking over, she had expected to see Macaque’s shadows. But she had seen those shadows many times now, and she had learned to tell them apart from the black demon so easily. But the two in front of her were not his shadows, although she couldn’t deny that there was some resemblance here and there. No. What she found in front of her were two yaoguai she had honestly thought dead. The shadows that the bone demon had created to kill and torment her friend: Rumble and Savage.
It's never a dull moment at the noodleshop! Especially when you start getting goddesses for clients!
Although the goddess of creation Nüwa wasn't really there for the city's longest noodle, but to talk to the Harbringer of Chaos himself. Talk that was very quickly derailed as Pigsy tried to both fight the goddess and get her out of his establishment, almost giving Tang a heart attack in the process.
After some convincing, the pig demon allowed the immortal to speak, realizing that she might not have wanted to disrupt their lives as he had feared.
---
Lore talk aside, I think Nüwa is a rather interesting character, and I am kinda glad we don't get a lot of her in the show, because it lets me explore a bunch of possibilities.
Writing meaningful conversation is hard.
I'm happy to announce that THIS drawing of mine, which was based on one of my fanfics, which in turn was based on @fishymom-art "Fix A Beast"-AU, has now officially been turned into a standee! :D
This was my first time ordering a standee of one of my drawings, and I'm incredibly happy with how it turned out! :3
I will be selling these standees at conventions, the next time I get an artist table. (About time I try my luck again, considering my last time selling at a con was in 2017 xD)
A good one to two months had passed before Mei decided that Macaque had started acting a bit more weirdly than he usually does..
Not that MK realized that, he has his own distractions (which Wukong wasn't exactly the best help at, but he was trying his best). And it will take a while longer before he does, since he's about to have a new surprise pop up quite soon.
I'm doing my best to get back into making Cursed AU content (Silksong kinda got in the way of that), and I already wrote quite a lot of things I wanna draw. So have a lil sneak peek in the form of the names of three of those drawings
I come to you, humbly presenting a new fic installment of my Monkie Kid Au, which has been on an accidental break for waaayyy to long xD
MK's team is trying to get a new member. Though it certainly takes some convincing to get the shadow to be on board.
Read all about in:
"Finding Shadows"
Mk could use all the help he can get. One year of truce was hardly much time. What he needed right now, was someone who could teach him quickly, in case push came to shove. He just needed to find said "someone"...
Mk’s voice echoed in the empty room, and so did his steps as he went further into the seemingly abandoned dojo. He didn’t receive an answer, the air as still and unmoving as it had been when he entered. Brown eyes searched his surroundings in quiet attentiveness and weariness.
Sure, the building seemed abandoned. But Mk was pretty convinced that it wasn’t.
I promised I would make a SmokedBurningCheese animatic for the rarepair-crackship-showdown held by @fishytim-cookie , and I'll give you all the oportnity to decide what "genre" it's gona be!
I promised I would make a SmokedBurningCheese animatic for the rarepair-crackship-showdown held by @fishytim-cookie , and I'll give you all the oportnity to decide what "genre" it's gona be!
DazeCon: A drawing of Momo, pretty please! Maybe some angst? Since most people just draw her durring idol performances? (You can add me if you post it, too! I'm @aniflowers1998 on instagram, in case you post it there!)
I’m probably gonna do one post on insta on all of these so I’ll tag you there 😚
I call this one “A Falling Star” (manga spoilers!)
I went with the angst theme and included Shintaro—the Kisaragi sibling dynamic is very important to me
After MK re-distributed the magic of the pillar all around China, the day-to-day lives of our heroes didn't exactly get quieter. Now that some humans had acquired magic (as well as some demons) the amount of troublemakers and villains of the week had practically doubled, forcing MK and his friends to spend much more time outside fighting demons. Some form of routine still existed: MK still worked for Pigsy and had to deliver his noodles around town. The chaotic duo of Jin and Yin (now with more chaotic power) still got themselves in trouble from time to time. And Mei still had her training sessions with Macaque every weekend, much like MK had with the Monkey King.
This routine was once disturbed, however, when the young dragon received a message from her reluctant mentor, informing her that the training was canceled for that week. Mei didn't think much of it at the time, despite the progress she had made with him, Macaque was still pretty much the silent type when it came to what he did outside their training.
Unbeknownst to her, what the black monkey was doing was highly dangerous, to say the least. After the whole fight with that snake Xiangliu, Macaque couldn't stop thinking about that demon's reaction to his powers, not to mention the fact that his magic had started to change since then and act up. There weren't many places that he could investigate that were connected to his powers. One of them was the gates of chaos MK had mentioned when he was retelling everyone what had happened after he had thrown himself into the pillar. But Macaque had a really bad feeling about that place, outside of also not knowing how to exactly get there. That left Diyu to search.
He had expected that getting there would have proven complicated since it usually was a heavily guarded place. But with the ten kings gone, it seemed like the whole realm was in disarray, which let him slip in rather easily. Another hurdle that was surprisingly easy to surpass was where to look. Diyu is an incredibly large realm, and he didn't have a plan or even an idea of what exactly he was looking for. Thankfully, that was easily taken care of the moment he stepped foot in the underworld. His magic, much to his surprise, started pulling him towards something. As he carefully weaved through halls and avoided the few guards he came across, his magic pulled him toward the only two demons he never thought he'd see again.
made team cards for art fight :) entirely free to use, credit appreciated but not required. my username there is also canonkiller, I'm team fossil :3c fight me
(here's a toyhouse bookmarkable with download links and I also have a blank version here)
