basic horny witch (with plot)

archiveofourown.org/users/Laokoon I'm just here to yearn and drool. Sometimes I even write or draw pretty okay to pull you down with me. Welcome! Current fixation: A Plague Tale (especially Arnaud)

[laokojones]

Large, blue eyes looked up at him. They were almost as bright as Victor’s – only that they were not deadly cold, but kind. Even in this state, brows and temples drawn tight around them in gutting fear, even after everything he must have gone through to end up here, Arnaud saw the genuine, vulnerable warmth in his eyes. This wasn’t just fear for his own sake, of loss. He cared for her, deeply. Sad Lucas :( A sketch from Arnaud's perspective from a scene that might have happened right before the beginning of chapter 15 of Requiem - an illustration for my Arnaud fanfic "The Bad Part" (find it on AO3 if you like the excerpt, and remember comments are love <3).

[laokojones]

More Arnaud pics because I have too many. Whatever angle you need, I got.

Includes bonus pic of Hugo looking seasick and Arnaud looking casually perplexed.

[laokojones]

My fellow tumblrians, I have stumbled upon a perpetuum mobile of creativity and I cannot get off. Let me explain:

Late in the month of April of the year 2026 of our emotionally intelligent carpenter, I sat down to play a 4 year-old video game, a sequel, after having just finished the first game. The first game was fantastic - I was happy to continue the story. Playing this second game destroyed me, in stages, in iterations, thorougly and mercilessly.

I felt an urge to rectify some of this upset, so I wrote a small fluff-piece of barely 2.5k words, a wholesome, innocent insert fleshing out a relationship that I wish had gotten developed even more.

Over the next week or so, the little fluff piece grew into a full smut fic, because of course it did.

The smut fic, written with a 3rd person focalizer, made me want to write the other party's perspective.

I applied for an AO3 account, wondering why I had never done so before in 20 years of internetting. My 2 weeks waiting time were scheduled to end on May 5th. I started writing the sister piece for the smut fic.

Writing from said other character's perspective necessitated making decisions about his past, to make allusions to it here and there, as the game had done - it made me want to "find out" more. Two early and very nice comments on the smut fic(s) encouraged me. So I started writing a backstory.

It has been roughly 70 days since I finished A Plague Tale: Requiem.

My backstory for Arnaud Malpart, redeemable daddy, stands at about 30k words and counting; I have spent hours researching minute details noone will ever care about (so far, so writer's experience); drawn multiple illustrations, most of characters that do not feature in the game; I spent all afternoon and some of the night today composing a piece of soundtrack music that spawned in my head while workshopping a scene. It references Arnaud's/"The Wall"'s musical theme subtly and is very kitshy. I love this. I'm firing on all chaotically creative jack-of-all-trades cylinders just because I got too sad about a well-written game and I am still not burnt out. My original quest has failed - it is now MORE painful to play the game because of what I KNOW all happened before now - but I'll take the trade-off.

[laokojones]

Felt dynamic, so I stitched

[laokojones]

Less hairy/in some instances younger Arnaud. Before I get into trouble for beautifying a perfectly serviceable scruffy dad, let me explain: So with writing a backstory for a character you are obsessed with ("The Bad Part" by Laokoon on AO3 if you're interested c:) comes thinking about what they might have looked like before canon events. This is a few images I had Dumb Grabby Robots draw up (I think this is actually a valid use case for them, but that's musings for another time), then modified slightly in some cases. There are more (many more) but I like these best. His jawline remains somewhat of a wild card due to all the wild beardedness.

Idk, I love game Arnaud, but these do something for me, too. I have no idea if anyone will like this, but I do. I got lectured on Reddit and am now traumatized, so just to be clear: I am not suggesting Arnaud should be young and pretty in the game k. But he was young at *some* point, like, objectively.

[anexperimentallife]

Also applies to "AI" "artists" and "musicians."

[writingdose]

insane to me how, to some people, this is not a common sense

[laokojones]

listen, I get it, it's not okay. they also happen to make my heart melt, what can i do. this is an illustration for a fic, so in case you're like me, let me just add some self-promo while i'm down here in the shameless muck: https://archiveofourown.org/works/84343681/chapters/222463931

[moninils]

The only thing worse than my characters' past is their future...

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

I think ao3 is literally the only site where no censorship means no censorship. you can post the most vile things on there — things that will get taken down on any other platforms — and ao3 will protect you, your works, and your rights to create whatever you want, however you want.

and no, this isn’t me saying “write that messed up, disgusting thing” because while, yes, write it if it’s what you want (I myself enjoy writing dark fics, something I believe would be considered “vile” to a lot of people), this is me saying in a world of censorship and capitalism, ao3 really is a treasure.

everybody say thank you ao3

[moninils]

And all of this at once.

[allnerdythings]

I cant stop doing Photos of him ahhh

[laokojones]

no but really why is there not a whole trove of Arnaud-simps on here or anywhere? i am so broken over this man it's not even funny

[allnerdythings]

[allnerdythings]

I cant believe not more people go crazy over him. Im so deeply in love I mean

Bear daddy hot KNIGHT with a deep raspy voice and a heart of Gold on the inside and a thick emotional wall (also the wall being his Name amongst people) who lost so much and found some peace in the end.