Quartz Crumbs of Wyrm's Teeth and First Among the Chickadees
Quartz and Chickadee, an Abyssal and a Lunar, fight about whether or not the world is worth saving almost every time they meet. Almost every time.
(Some more lore under the cut):
Quartz Crumbs of Wyrm's Teeth (he/him) is my Dusk Abyssal in servitude to a Deathlord. You may have seen him on my blog before. He's pretty much with the bad guys and is one of those himself.
First Among the Chickadees (she/her) is my Changing Moon Lunar. She is traveling with some Dragon-Blooded (loooooong story) trying to prevent Deathlords from another attempt to take over Creation. She is also tied to Quartz via the Solar-Lunar bond.
Their bond, as usual, means they have difficulty ignoring eachother; however their view on life is completely opposite. Usually this means that every time they meet a shouting contest begins, which looks roughly like this:
Quartz: you don't get it, the world is rotten and nothing but suffering is left!
Chickadee: no, YOU don't get it! That's how YOU perceive the world, but there's more to it than suffering! What about simple life pleasures? What about lying in grass? What about talking to friends? You're the one who is taking your own joy away!
And so on and so fourth. These two can go on and on. It's kinda funny, actually. While their companions seriously fight eachother with, y'know, weapons (while also exchanging pleasantries and having small-talk about the weather, because that's their way of doing things), these two are just standing there and arguing.
But as you may see, this time it was not a case. Something really messed up should have happened for Chickadee to accept consolation from her enemy – at least, that's what Quartz is worried about.
I continue my exaltedposting. Here is Hope for a Universal Summer, my Zenith Solar lady. She's from Whitewall, so I tried to include both asian and slavic elements in her design.
And something like Modern AU! Quartz, my Dusk Abyssal OC, whom you might've seen in my last, like, three posts. Only I have troubles designing modern characters in interesting ways, but oh well. I still like this pic :]
Quartz Crumbs of Wyrm's Teeth (a Dusk Abyssal OC of mine) and Demise's Elder Brother (a Deathlord OC of mine). I struggled with Demise's design so much. And now I finally can draw something akin to him yay
So, Demise is Quartz's Deathlord. And he's a bastard. He uses all of Quartz's weaknesses to make him loyal, and it's not like Quartz needs much – he led such a life that now even a glimpse of affection can win him over. And Demise wisely gives him so much more, treating Quartz as a younger sibling in need of care and guidance. Which also means that whenever Quartz fails, he has to face Demise's cold wrath, which is equal parts painful and terrifying. But hey! Who cares, if Demise takes care of Quartz's wounds and gives him a headpat afterwards? Definitely not Quartz.
Quartz (my Dusk Abyssal OC) gets a watermelon because I like him. My silly evil son. Not a single thought behind those beautiful eyes...
(Quartz has actually bought the watermelon. With actual money. Terrifying everyone in the local village by appearing there and peacefully making the purchase. I mean, more like throwing money at some poor farmer who was ready to give Quartz anything for free in exchange for mercy for themselves and their family, but still. Quartz didn't want the unfortunate person or their family, he wanted a watermelon and decided to be somewhat nice about it. And afterwards Quartz just left without really harming anyone but still refusing to elaborate.)
(The money he gave to the farmer was probably thrown out the second Quartz left, and the farmer is probably now getting a lot of side-eye glances (at best), but oh well. It's their problems, not Quartz's.)
His title is Quartz Crumbs of Wyrm's Teeth. Or Quartz for short. Or, if you're a meanie and a hater, Crumbs. Fun fact: "crumb" in my native language is also a slang for "babygirl". Do what you will with this information 😌
Quartz is that one anime character type who is just idiotic (/affectionate) and aggressive while also being a loser. It's not that he's a huge danger (to other Exalted, normal mortals have my condolences). It's just that his default settings are loud and screaming threats which he may or may not execute afterwards.
Honestly, he was an idiotic and loud creature when he was Solar as well, so personality-wise little changed after his Abyssal Exaltation. He didn't actually want to take the whole Abyssal deal, but Deathlord who laid his eyes on Quartz managed to, well, convince him. It wasn't a pleasurable process, but it happened. Now Quartz dutifully (yeah, very, he's the most dutiful servant to have (no)) serves his Deathlord, while quietly pondering whether he should try to get his freedom back or if the risk is not worth it.
Expect more pictures with this bastard sometime soon, he has my brain in a chokehold
I managed to get some blood and edginess into my flufftober. Yay.
These guys are my OCs for Exalted ttrpg, but in modern spy (and/or mafia) AU, as prompt required. (You could have seen two of these characters in my previous exaltedposting)
Quartz Crumbs of Wyrm's Teeth, or Quartz for short, a gentleman with white hair – Dusk Abyssal. Aggressive and idiotic loser (/affectionate) with sad backstory™. Is currently in servitude to my Deathlord OC, who uses Quartz's yearning for affection and praise to manipulate him into unhealthy devotion. In this AU Quartz is a mafia underling who is just trying to get through his life and is completely ignorant of the fact that both of his best friends are secretly government agents.
First Among the Chickadees, or Chickadee for short, a lady in black dress – Changing Moon Lunar. Free spirit in love with simple life, she absolutely didn't want Luna's blessing (despite living in Lunar settlement outside of Realm her whole life), but fate (me) said otherwise. She is Quartz's Lunar mate, but their dynamic is devoid of romance and is something more about being frenemies, with strong emphasis on "enemies" – they usually don't get along too well, even if though they don't actively try to harm eachother. In this AU Chickadee is a government assassin, though general public sees her as a vigilante punishing bastards among high society (read: Dragon-Blooded)
Winter That Has Frozen the Heart, or Heart for short, a gentleman with black hair – Midnight Abyssal. Weak and ill in childhood, he got fed up with his inability to protect his sister, Chickadee, pretty quickly. So when Dragon-Blooded attacked their settlement, he tried to play the hero. Got killed, then got better when Lover Clad in the Raiment of Tears came to him with Abyssal deal. Heart is a powerful necromancer, incredibly cynical and just as incredibly caring about Chickadee and Quartz, whom he kinda sees as a younger brother. Which doesn't save any of them from his messed up sense of humour. In this AU Heart is a government spy in the mafia, trying to get as close to destroying it as possible, while also keeping Quartz and Chickadee out of harm's way.
Close-ups + bonus under the cut
Bonus: Heart in his canon variant (and some random OC in the first picture, ignore him)
Text from last sketch: "Serving a Deathlord is painful, unpleasant and so on..." → "But if you refuse..." → "I'll break all of your bones and will make your corpse my marionette :)"
Heart's ways of recruiting captive Dragon-Blooded to his Deathlord's side are pretty mean, yeah.
The cipher on the right translates to "these swords still carry the warmth of your hands"
This picture was meant to be about touch starvation and trying to get softness where you can, even from things which harm you. To give your own meaning to things in order to feel just a little bit more loved, even if it doesn't make any sense in actuality. I don't feel like I did the idea justice. But whatever.
This is Quartz Crumbs of Wyrm's Teeth, my Abyssal Exalted OC, whom you might've seen in my previous posts. Of course I gave tragic backstory even to my aggressive and idiotic bastard (/affectionate). No character is safe from my desire to cry 😎
A bit of process and additional picture under the cut:
Process. I really like the lineart, especially my attempt at making Quartz's hands kinda relaxed and gentle in this piece. Nothing shows what I wanted to show better then gentleness to something that's killing you.
And additional picture. I don't know whose hand that is, by the way. I don't have an OC who would get this close to Quartz to show affection to him yet. I don't know if I ever will. I'm making myself sad thinking about it, mission accomplished, yay :'D
