Hello, this is ruthlesslistener's art blog. It's an archive of all my art, though it mostly consists of dragons and fandom stuff. Any character that is not mine is okay to tag as kin/me.
[ID: a sloppily painted piece of quirrel and hollow hanging out in a dark room on grey-blue blankets and pillows, lit by a single lumafly lantern. Quirrel is busy chatting, while Hollow, who is curled up around him, listens]
Objections to the Old Empire's creation of the alchemical warbeasts was hardly thought of at the dawn of their creation. Made to withstand the fury of dragons, the false beings were ideal for collecting the blood and bone that the royal alchemists so craved, and thus fund the coffers of the nobility with more than just the peasant's taxes. Very few saw the slaying of the dragons as a danger to their future, and those who did were swiftly put to death. Many more willingly volunteered their lives to fund the creation of more of the beasts, eager to shed the constraints of their human flesh to serve the empire that they loved so dear.
It was not until they were turned on the people that the true horrors of the Desolation began.
Buncha rough and messy vessel sketches done while waiting for the bus, plus a bonus Hornet cameo
My favorite is this one done of Hollow's mouth (mask removed), so you get another picture of that. It's basically a wyrm's mouth, but with the top two mandibles fused under their mask to form an 'upper jaw'
blacked out and woke up to a doodle page of my new alien species, whose name roughly translates to the Seawalkers in their language. If you ever wanted a super intelligent amphibious eel-reptile sea-land predator that stands 6-9 feet at the shoulder and would eat you in a heartbeat instant if you failed to impress it, then here you go!
*NOTE: THIS IS A CLOSED PERSONAL SPECIES THAT IS STILL IN DEVELOPMENT*
Some bio and worldbuilding notes under the cut:
-Lives in social groups comprised of one 'Alpha' male and multiple females. Beta males also live in the groups but generally stick to one female while the alpha gets to mate with everyone; called pods
-Has a marsupial-like pouch where eggs and hatchlings are carried. Hatchlings are born with their back legs fused to their tail, paddle-like forelimbs with usable middle limbs, and slowly metamorphose in the mother's pouch. Clutches of 5 or more or common, but the two largest hatchlings will usually eat their weaker siblings, so 1-3 offspring more common
-Pods go up to 15 in number, territorial but not terribly so. World is an ocean planet with a hot tropical-temperate climate and land composed mostly of islands covered in salt marshes, small rainforests, and surrounded by coral reefs, so food is always available, it's more defense of brooding spots that is essential. The deep ocean is considered to be a neutral place for all and is where all pods go to compile their knowledge and advance their learning
-Mostly carnivorous but has a specially adapted sharp tongue with bristles to help poke through tough-shelled fruits and drink/eat the flesh, holding it in place with tusks.
-Do not make clothes. Technologically advanced, but generally does so in ways that blends with their environment and/or is water based, so it goes unseen. Art and architecture are linked. Their planet is rich in magnetics and metals, so most of their technology revolves around power generated through electromagnetic interactions, as fire is almost always suffocated in the water-dense atmosphere
-Middle limbs are long with dextrous fingers and two opposable thumbs. Though they seem like they'd get in the way, they can be tucked flat against the body to avoid interference with the front and hind limbs. Most delicate work is done with these hands, as they were evolved to catch swift prey, gather fruit, and pry open shelled foods. They have an extremely high range of motion and were originally evolved from thick sensory tendrils- similar to gourami fish- that eventually evolved into grabbers
-Not actually the best swimmers, though they’re far more efficient than they look; they tuck their limbs in and swim like eels or crocodiles, but generally prefer to walk along the seafloor, hence their name ‘seawalkers’
-Do not have nostrils. The tendrils in place of nostrils gather chemical cues from both air and water, like a slug. Covered in a thin layer of mucus and are capable of being moved by the seawalker voluntarily
-Able to engage in intense bursts of speed on land to hunt the other creatures that live on their islands, however they cannot sustain this for long. Alpha and beta males/young unbred females are typically the hunters, with the alpha doing the brunt of the heavy work and the beta males/young females darting in for the kill. The matriarch, elders, and breeding females gather fruit for water and collect/crack open smaller prey items, which are sometimes wrapped in leaves and fermented with fruit in burrows to keep prey through the storm season
-Alpha males are basically walls of muscle and function to keep the beta males in check (preventing breeding when they can see it), keep other alphas off the land, and dig the brooding-wells that breeding females and neonates need. They also dig out underwater caves for the pod to rest in during hurricane season, and keep watch over the pod. They’re basically a wall of muscle constantly set to ‘is this guy bothering you queen’ mode
-Years are called season-cycles and are comprised of three total, each roughly 7 earth months long. There is the long-sun season, the swelling-storm season, and the long rains. The Long Rains are the closest to our winter, the long-sun is the closest to summer, and the swelling-storm are just nonstop hurricanes
-Modified gill slits work as lung entrances, however they are vulnerable to losing water through those holes, so they need to be in a very high-humidity environment. Spacefarers describe air on their planet as being 'basically water'
-Stands 6ft tall at the shoulder at the very least. Alpha males usually reach 9ft at the shoulder on average
-have found out how to access space via their deep underwater labs, but are not terribly interested in it- they're more concerned with evolving their knowledge of the planet, of medicine, and of more efficient biotech. Open to parley with alien species if the negotiation is respectful, will hunt and eat the rest
-While aloof, protective bonds around pods are strong and a 'life for a life' mentality is even stronger. If one member of the pod is killed, then the life of another from the perpetrators must be taken before the debt is considered to be fulfilled, a blood debt that is kept track of by the matriarch. The only exception to this is if the alpha is killed in ritual battle, as it is understood that an alpha’s life is given entirely for his pod, and becoming an alpha is typically voluntary (with the exception of some particularly ambitious matriarchs pushing their favored sons into the position when they are too young to contest)
-Communicates mostly through clicks, rumbles, and trills that cannot be replicated by human voices, as well as a lot of sign/body language. When replicating human languages, their voices have a buzzing tone and have eerie dips in frequency. Vocalizing is usually limited to water while sign reigns on land, as their calls can be strong enough to rupture eardrums and cause brain damage
-Tusks also used for fighting, goring, and spearing prey; do not inhibit eating bc the middle arms will tear pieces off of the meal to feed to the head. Both males and females have 4 tusks, but only alpha males have 4 long ones; in beta males and females, the two top tusks are usually much smaller
-Neck and head frills used for mating and dominance displays, and are usually bright blues and teals in colour. Alpha males have jowel spots not unlike that of iguanas
-They have 4 eyes and two eyespots, which is standard for many species on their planet. The two larger eyes judge distance, the two smaller judge depth, and the eyespots are located on the underside of the jaw, only useful for judging light and shadow. Eyes tend to be an iridescent blue or green, with a barely-noticeable pupil (or four)
-Primary diet consists of crustaceans, smaller fish, and the occasional large landdwelling grazer, hunted by the alpha and younger males/females. They are capable of quick bursts of speed, but cannot sustain these for long, much like cheetahs. In water, they will use their dextrous middle arms and eyespots to forage for small prey items. Hydration comes from mashing the liquid out of tropical fruits, dropping the pulp and the seeds, or by puncturing coconut-like fruits and drinking their water like mentioned. They pay very close attention to where they drop their pulp, and meticulously do so to ensure that waterbearing trees are always available year-round
-Their planet is smaller than Earth, mostly composed of water, and has high amounts of nitrogen and oxygen in it. Water density is significantly lower and more water is in the atmosphere, making humidity at a constant 100% (made worse by the fact that it is also a mostly tropical climate; one pole is temperate, and the other is iced over due to the planet's tilt). Seawalkers breathe oxygen and nitrogen in through modified gill-lungs that are dependant on this high water content to filter it out of the air; ‘lungs’ are basically pockets in the neck lined with many flesh-flaps on the inside that are rich in blood, and connected to a heart in the throat that pumps this blood directly to the brain, back to the lungs, and then down to the main heart in the center of the body. Their blood is blue and rich in copper
-Pods are ruled by a matriarch and an alpha male. The alpha male is always the matriarch's son, and his spot can be won by his mother fighting for him, which he then defends fiercely as she ages. The alpha male dying may not always displace the matriarch, but it removes her line of defense (as arthritis is an issue when they reach old age, which is around 150 earth years)
-Gender roles are strongly divided, but are not considered permanent. There are in essence 3 sexes- alpha male, beta male, and female- but these are fluid. Gender is all about behavior, not sex, as a beta male will always grow to obtain alpha traits in the absense of an alpha, and females can voluntarily shut off the female sex hormone to prevent estrus (done in cases where she does not approve of the males present)
-Skin is similar to that of a ball python, in that it is composed of a bunch of small, soft scales; however, these scales are constantly being shed on an individual level and do not come off in one piece. Peeling skin like a lizard's shed usually means that the seawalker is in a too-dry environment and is typically an itchy, miserable experience
-There is no monetary system, as trade does not exist between pods. The closest thing to it is the exchange of knowledge, if one pod finds itself at the mercy of another and does not want to fight; the seawalkers take honour and truth very seriously, and lying about valuable resources because you are a coward is considered a very serious offense that can result in death or total isolation from your pod (as fighting occurs between alphas and matriarchs, and the rest of the pod can leave if wished)
Everyone say hello again to quite possibly the only stannable god in Hallownest
Gave my Grimm design a minor reworking, because giving him more batlike features just made him cute (and I wanted him to look more like who I headcanon to be his sister, the Radiance). Now he’s a bit sharper, has eyeshadow, and is a bit closer to his primal god form, which I also doodled next to him to add more space, lol (all those red spots are eyes, except for the ones near the chest, which are vents for fire!)
Finally found the time to post the art that I've done for @banyanas's amazing Promare fic, Day One Dark! Painting this big boy was a huge divergence from my usual line-focused artstyle, I had a lot of fun drawing them :D (and psst if you haven't already, check out their fic too its GODTIER)
Commission done of dragon Snatcher for @banyanas's killer fic, In Word and In Deed! I had a ton of fun drawing this guy, he's probs one of my favorite dragon designs that I've worked on in a good long while, + he taught me how to draw/paint fire in a manner that I'm finally happy with!
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