Rotten

 ===> B/c 

I had...a very interesting dream several nights back. As usual. And as usual, I wanted to use it as a jumping off point for a plot. Thought maybe for once I'd share the rough dreamy concept before trying to refine it. It'll be a little vague, since once you awaken from a dream the memories of it tend to become more blurred, but I'll tell you what I remember.

Generations ago, there was a vile and corrupt man whose one desire was to blacken the heart of everyone he met. He would do so using the terrible power locked away in his own rotted heart; his memories of pain, hatred, and horror.

(Also for some reason his powers took on the form of lack luster 'dust' as he called it? I have no idea how that related to anything, but my subconscious really wanted me to take that away from the dream. That was super important to it for some reason.)

It was difficult to stop someone who could romance the darkest thoughts and emotions of even the most pure of beings and twist them into someone full of hate, fear, or emotion anguish. 

But as time went by, so too did the youth of the man. Eventually he become too weak to continue his dark work as effectively, and this bothered him. In desperation, he began to look for ways to cheat time's crippling touch on his body, and came to a solution...

<memories are fuzzy throughout this part>

Many many years later, the world had almost forgotten about that sinister being. In this time, a young boy was born. There was nothing particularly special about him; he went to school, had a few friends, lived with his mother...a very standard child with an average childhood. 

<memories are fuzzy throughout this part>

But the man was determined to make a grand return. And that young boy held the key. Having survived the years by feeding off the dregs of his youth's work, he had been biding his time...waiting for this moment... 

<memories are fuzzy throughout this part>

The rest of it doesn't translate well into story talk, since it sort of jumped and skipped around. But I can tell you this:

The man ended up confronting the boy, explaining to him that the boy was of his lineage and was destined to take the man's black heart and continue his dark work. Then the man ripped his own heart from this chest (it was black and green in places, and made of some sort of crystal?), grabbed the boy, and attempted to force it into the child's chest. The boy ended up kicking the heart away, which shattered into four distinct parts. For some odd reason, three of the pieces warped away(?), but one stayed behind. In a rage, the man vanished to retrieve the other pieces to his heart, but left that other chunk there. (I guess it wasn't that important to him?) The boy picked that fragment up, seeming to be ready to try to destroy it, but ended up being seduced by its power very quickly and inserting it into his chest instead.

I remember him getting this very twisted grin, saying how he 'remembered how it felt to have all this power and youth'...or something to that effect. But when someone came unto the scene and was frightened of his behavior, he snapped out of it and seemed ashamed.

The rest of the dream was him fighting this shard of darkness in his chest while looking for the other pieces of the heart, though whether he planned to destroy them or reunite them in his body...I was never sure.

That was the basic premise of the dream. And the best way to try to explain this little picture, I think. Having a bit more time to play around with this than I've had in a while, I Even animated the heart. Because...why not?


Now you may notice that the man, who should be old and weak looking, is looking fairly youngish. His physical appearance does not always reflect his age, as some of his talents include illusions and shape shifting.

Also don't ask me that animals they're supposed to be; your guess is as good as mine on that one. And their names? No clue. I'll figure that out as I go. I'll figure out more of their story later, too, so we'll see how their story counterparts and their dream origins end up mixing.

Next thing Ima try to work on should be commissions.