Arhulian Venerable meditating; a commission for @skekdris
This alien creature, conceptualized and designed by skekdris, meditates at a dark, sandy seashore of his world, summoning a mass of energy between his hands while his halo aligns with the dark sun above, helping him channel and hold a point of pure energy; a tiny purple star suspended between his palms.
If you like this drawing, please drop a like and let me know your thoughts in comments- I'd love to hear your thoughts on it!
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I own the copyright to all art, images and posts submitted to my Tumblr profile.
This includes all past and future artwork, posts, videos and stories.
I DO NOT consent to Meta or ANY other companies using them to train generative AI platforms.
Artwork may be reblogged but not used or redistributed elsewhere without written consent.
The Iegumbra - a place beneath the fabric of the world as they know it. Most cannot even sense it, less can interact with it in any meaningful way, and even fewer still can traverse the boundaries of spacetime and enter this place that is both a dimension in of itself, and a reflection of it's umbranaut. It is a bubble in a vast ocean. For Arhulians, this place was the domain of their true power and truest self. A place disconnected from time and space in such a way one could interrogate themselves, hone discipline, and scour weakness. Provided, they can handle the isolation of their own presence.
Zel'Vultet rested his vessel. Unlike the tempestuous ripping tides of maelstrom, jagged mountains of flesh cutting rocks, or the fog smothered plane where nightmares and anxieties manifested physical forms, this vesicle universe was a reflection of it's master and the authority they commanded over their own domain. This Arhulian rested upon a great sphere of obsidian, painted in a glassy film of water. The air was still. Zel'Vultet cupped their hands in front of their body. The task was simple in concept, yet formidable in execution. Between their hands was a small, intense point of purple light. It shimmered as the stars in the clear sky did above, but not from the air. Zel'Vultet was channeling their psionic power at it's maximum, and concentrating it into the smallest point they could.
As a dam with the floodgates open, Zel'Vultet could feel the faint burning in their veins as their soul's luminescence scalded their vessel from within. It hurt. Although there was no physical need to breathe in the Iegumbra, they breathed in and out to give their vessel a rhythm to synchronize to. This point of light, as big as a marble, contained enough energy to break even the mightiest of steel-ships in half should it be manifested as raw destructive energy. In this state, it was naught but a harmless wisp.
Zul'Vultet could feel it. The pain was subsiding. Their control was growing. Their Thread - the umbilical of will that binds spirit to vessel - was acclimating to this power, and resisting the oncoming threadburn. It was arduous, meticulous work to channel psionic energy in such small increments, yet anything more could risk tearing their own thread from their vessel should they command too much power recklessly. Psionic training is as a exercise in patience as it is magnitude. What once was a raging tempest of seething energy was now a calm bead of light. The Arhulian felt the stinging pain be overcome by a surge of relief, and perhaps - a tinge of confidence. "Just a little more." They thought. As they did so, their words manifested into physical sounds in the amaranthine plane.
"The hill has been crested. Focus. Maintain. Endure. Soon, this power be yours and flow from within and without thought as blood does in your vessel." Many Non-Arhulian Psions pride themselves on channeling as much power as they can withstand in a single instant in a display of explosive power. But like an explosion, it always vanished with the moment. The innocuous miniature star that Zul'Vultet cradled was just that - a beacon of light that cascaded power pure and unending.
This alien creature, conceptualized and designed by skekSel, fit quite cleanly with the aesthetics of my Skeksis-inspired frame!
If you like this drawing, please drop a like and let me know your thoughts in comments- I'd love to hear your thoughts on it!
The frame surrounding this character portrait and another one (Gelfling-inspired) are available as a YCH commission! Feel free to ask me about them if you're interested!
*DISCLAIMER*
I own the copyright to all art, images and posts submitted to my Tumblr profile.
This includes all past and future artwork, posts, comments, videos and stories.
I DO NOT consent to Meta or ANY other companies using them to train generative AI platforms.
Artwork may be reblogged, but not used or redistributed elsewhere without written consent.
This time, it's an important piece of Arhulian Technology, their great living ships.
The vessel takes the form of a large spherical or ovoid core enshrined is a cage of semi-metallic material that looks like a cross between grown wood and sculpted bone. The ship moves with no apparent propulsion. Most Arhulian ship's have a dominant direction of travel, though they can generate secondary thrust in any direction. This particular specimen is a few hundred meters long for the exterior structure, and the core of the vessel is a few dozen meters in diameter. These ships can travel in space via several methods from direct spacial translation (normal movement), Faster than light directional travel, translocation to a known point of space/beacon, and can shift between real space, and umbral space - a shadowy dimension that's a reflection of real space, but can almost never interact with directly.
The core is the central habitation part of vessel with itself containing a pocket dimension. Inside this pocket dimension is an area of habitation directly suited for Arhulians - often resembling a portion of their home world. Exact dimensional translations are not known, but the pocket dimensions can be anywhere from ten, to well over a hundred times what it's real space dimensions would suggest. The core acts as a physical anchor between the the pocket dimension and real space. While the superstructure largely serves as a focus for the vessel's real space capabilities such as propulsion or energy projection. The ability to directly manifest and channel energy can be a deadly surprise to other space faring civilizations who assume the vessel is defenseless from it's wiry and streamlined appearance.
The core is extremely dense and resilient to to physical damage. Unlike a lot of attempts to create pocket spaces with magic or technological means, the pocket of umbral space the core houses is self stable - should the core be destroyed - the interior space is unharmed and the vessel simply loses it's ability to shift in between dimensions or move. Being stranded until a new anchor is produced is a comparatively minor problem to have versus your mass detonating like antimatter because physics no longer exist and you spontaneously decompose with unimaginable violence.
The ship's superstructure looking like sculpted wood or carved bone is no coincidence. 'Arhdrargyrum' is the "living metal" that make up Arhulian bones, and physical tree-like structures. A Vessel that has it's Anchor destroyed can grow a new anchor in real space given enough time. Meanwhile powerful Arhulian psions can individually shift in and out of real space to bridge the gap.
Eons ago, such a vessel came to the primordial rock that would then become known as earth. The original vessel has since "taken root" both in real space and in umbral space as a permanent Arhulian colony. Any other vessels in the region of this pale blue dot are seeds borne of this original arc.
Hey @skekla I adored your commission work. I still have a big lore post to to do to accompany the latest commission I got when I upload the image proper, but I want to tell you your art is beautiful! I had a friend of mine print me a huge 3x4 poster of it on metallic foil paper that makes those neon colors and silvers pop. I wish my camera were as good as what the eyes see!
You can even see that I stuck the poster to the wall via magnets and metal strips, as tape and pins would harm the paper, and a frame that big is not in my budget. So metal strips and magnets it is.
Lore Nugget: My Arhulian is basking in the perpetual twilight of their home world. Their "sun" has a dark purple-black photosphere, thus most of their worlds light comes from their sun's corona, moon, and starlight.
The venerable Arhulian in the focus of the piece radiates psionic energy to the point they manifest a corona of their own (A halo to the layman). As well as portions of their fur are beginning to turn white in a process known as "star bleaching".
Arhulians are not much ones for clothes due to their unusual anatomy, especially ornamental garments. So this one must be dressed for a special occasion!
Commission from Yivah of my Arhulian in a war morph. This came out amazingly!
Arhulians possess a 'living metal' inside of them called Arhdrargyrum. This material is able to be sculpted and manipulated by the Arhulian that created it. (This is "tamed" Arhdrargyrum where it's all but impossible to manipulate by anyone that is not the creator. Untamed Arhdrargyrum can be produced, but it is rare, and often used as a gift or ceremonial purposes.) This living metal can be used for a variety of dynamic morphs, blades, shields, reinforced bones, sub dermal armor, etc… how much Arhdrargyrum and Arhulian can control and how quickly they can morph it depends on their psionic ability and training. Blade morphs are regarded as the easiest combat morph due to their simple function and lack of reconfiguring more complicated parts of the vessel.
Down below is a vignette of a fully realized/mature Arhulian taking on a platoon of soldiers with roughly late 1800's level equipment. Although not explicitly a fan story, it draws a lot of inspiration from @chocodile's / @kwillow's Amaranthine setting. Perhaps it could exist in the same AU with Niadris.
It would have been simple to terminate their sentry and slay each soldier in their sleep. But optimal was not on this Arhulians mind. They had watched it all from the distance, They had a vow to observe theriantropes quietly from a distance to avoid undue panic and fear. A vow they now regret adhering to so strictly. Although Vorandrus had no formal connection to the hamlet in the tundra, the remnants of the hamlet and its inhabitants, filled the Arhulian with a maternal rage. What was this decimation for? If there was no language barrier, the truth would have done nothing to extinguish the Arhulian's anger, perhaps even inflaming it all the more. The villagers had been reporting of "monsters" yet these soldiers took such offense to the contradiction of their state sponsored truth, these people were put to death to silence their dangerous ideas. After all, if monsters were real, a missing hamlet would be perfectly ordinary.
Three. Those would be the allotted witnesses. The other twenty-seven would be slain, and they would be made sure to see their end coming for them. The assault had started slow and conspicuous at first, to ensure this collection of soldiers could bring their full might to bear - so they may be confronted at their zenith, and struck down for an ever louder statement. Rifle bolts clicked into place. The Arhulian could sense the spatial position of the bones in their arms as each shot was readied. For a fifteen foot long beast, the Arhulian were a damned hard shot as they dashed, leapt into the air, and even bounced in between the trees. A lavender halo shimmered behind their head. Vorandrus' veins tingled, - stung even - as power coursed though their body. Unlike magic, this power came from within. The soul. This power fed into the vessel to overcome the physical limits of the body and pushed it beyond. The comparatively few shots that would find their mark would be hollow victories, for Vorandrus had no vital organs to hit, each punctured vein pinched itself shut, the flesh itself defiant to damage as solid wood.
The Arhulian forelegs had been morphed into scythes that slice flesh and bone with cold indifference. Every slash would render its quarry cleaved in twain, and every thrust impaled as deep as the Arhulian could reach. The strikes were as precise as they were devastating - each felled soldier had their brain or heart destroyed with each attack, sometimes both. Their deaths having swiftness equal to their ferocity was the only mercy afforded to them.
The soldier's morale shattered completely once they were composed enough to recognise that half of their number was already dispatched in brutal fashion. They began to retreat on their snow mobiles, but those that were not quick enough found their means of egress tipped over or impaled through the engine with a mighty lance of tungsten. Others found the Arhulian's tail or a thrown object hurdling towards them at a deadly velocity. Eight managed to speed away on their snow machines.
There will be three, and only three that remain.
Vorandrus was fast and agile, unnaturally so even, but these noisy contraptions had the Arhulian beat in a straight line on deep snow while lacking the burden of stamina. Even with channeling psionic energy - power of the will and soul - into their vessel to draw upon impossible reserves of vigor, they still could only run down one target at a time. Wounding their pride somewhat, Vorandrus picked up the rifle of a dispatched soldier. The weapon seemed almost toy like in the Arhulians' large, three fingered hands. This particular rifle had been reloaded just before the skull of it's wielder had been pulped by a blunt strike. From how they counted shots in between reloads, this bolt action rifle had five shots with the assumption that it matched the others. The Arhulian operated the mechanism, and aimed. They hoped that this range and the steadiness of their large frame would compensate for any defects in the weapon. Fortunately the men had begun accelerating away in a straight line with little angular velocity. The first shot missed. Just a bit to the left of the windpane of the four seat vehicle. That was a close enough visual cue to compensate. The second shot found its mark in the back of the skull of the driver. Seven.
Without a second breath, the Arhulian turned to the other vehicle while the first one veered off its trajectory. The third shot missed. The Arhulian cursed in their mind as their hand was operating the mechanism, the brass flying through the air seemingly in slow motion. An Arhulians nervous system normally signaled and received information about ten times faster than that of a therianthrope, and hyperexertion pushed it even further beyond that. Unlike the Arhulian 'guns' that accelerated an inert projectile across a series of rails or coils, these weapons operated with comparatively unpredictable combustion. The fourth shot wounded the driver and their recoil of pain spelled doom for their transport and they collided with a tree. Before the tree even finished rattling and creaking, Vorandrus moved position and advanced to regain line of sight of the first vehicle. It had come to a stop, and it's three living passengers were just finished heaving the deceased driver. One shot left. They aimed for the center of mass of the group. Two of them were wounded. Lunging at full speed, the snow machine's cast iron engine casing was smashed open. No escape.
The two with wounds already were fully extinguished. Five. Vorandrus circled back to the crashed snowmachine as its occupants scrambled, leaving their wounded compatriot to die alone, as their mouth shouted shrill venomous sounds that could only be curses. The Arhulian's six eyes locked with his fearful two. Vorandrus could not admit to pity... but, this one has endured enough. The three dashing on foot shall only have one of their kin spared as a reward befitting their bravery. Three.
Although officially not acknowledged by the military, this incident has been declared the Massacre of West Pass. The accounts of the three men were written off as a vivid hallucination brought about by trauma, yet those in the field - those who saw the aftermath - knew deep down there was no state provided answer that could explain the situation with any satisfaction. Animal attack? The damage inflicted is consistent of an edged weapon. And what animal could take on thirty men with rifles? 'Self defense' from hostile locals? The idea that a hamlet with only hunting equipment to their name at best could inflict devastating nintey percent losses on trained soldiers would be a hideous emberassment. Militant hostiles? Nevermind the impossiblity of damage inflicted, there was nary a single casualty of the enemy or even a damned boot print at the site of the incident.
Perhaps most concerning of all, even if extremely hypothetically the military did entertain the idea of the culprit being "not of therian nor nature", the wounds were too targeted with a startling amount of decapitations and punctured hearts, along with the snow mobiles having their engines singled out. However, this refusal of the truth had a different undercurrent than incidents before. Those were simply not belived. This incident, did not want to be belived, for what it would mean. Either their idea of monsters - if they existed - was completely wrong... or more distressingly, there was something other out there that was beyond even the monsters.
A big commission from Yivah that I have been majorly excited for! I've been dying to get a visualization of one of an Arhulian's most important abilities. And an assistant in this depiction is @chocodile's Alex!
Ever since, That Day, there's very little that could ever get through Alex's stone tough exterior. What cracks there were happened to be more temporary affairs. But that changed when she met Niadris, the "Arhulian". Never before has she met a 'monster' that could think, let alone talk. The Arhulian seemed earnest in their desire to help, but one thing Alex couldn't shake was the very asset that made them invaluable help.
Niadris' "aura sense" was an extraordinary ability that allowed them to sense other living beings. The sense was omnidirectional, worked through solid materials, and had a purported range of hundreds of meters. Initially, it was likened to one's sense of hearing, as it too had all those qualities. Then Niadris dispelled any illusions about their sense - for better and worse. They knew when they were asleep, where they were looking, whether or not their armed from body language. Up close, Niadris could even see a person down to their nerves and veins. Hell, the only reason they probably can't lip read is that they are less socially experienced than Theo.
Niadris forced Alex to confront a question she'd never even considered; what if a 'monster' was intelligent? The sole equalizer against hulking supernatural oddities was their simple minded desire for consumption made them predictable. No matter the strength gap, predictable can be strategized around. Not with them. They can think. They know what guns are. Although they never expressed any desire for hostility, Niadris pretty much has given away that they could have killed them all in their sleep. Even recognizing Alex herself as the most combat capable one of the group - the first to be taken out.
Alex tried not to think too hard about it. That near-omniscience would be an indispensable asset on fighting the shadow, and even keeping tabs on those two mages... but still. As a soldier, hunter, and even beast slayer, she was intimately aware of the kind of damage a being with such a "toolkit" could wreak. They could pick off an entire platoon if they played their cards right... and not even leave witnesses. A kind of havoc that she would have no immediate counter for - if she's being honest with herself. Not at least without hundred pounds of dynamite, the spite, and the abandon to strike a match once they got close enough in a small room.
Weighing in at two tons and with the curiosity of a child, there was no getting rid of them. She might as well accept the help make sure they don't fall for any bullshit from those two along the way.
I've been hitting a slump with my writing, so I think my AU story is Niadris meeting the Amaranthine crew is on hiatus, at least in writing terms. But I still want to depict micro scenes of the major story beats I have plotted out in my head. And to think, in Arhulian terms, Niadris is but a young adult. Alex can only pray fully realized Arhulians are just as polite as Niadris, should they ever meet one.
"Hey uh, if Niadris can see our skin, veins, and organs 'n stuff... doesn't that mean they are staring at us naked all the time?"
Across the room, Theo loudly gurgled and choked on the tea he was sipping, splattering it all over his chest and face.
"Not remotely on my list of concerns right now, Ridge." Alex sighed, grasping her forehead. For however little it was worth, there could be worse people with that power.
