Comic:Darkness Descending
From CGWiki
| Darkness Descending | |
|---|---|
| Artist: | Courtney Keene |
| Writer: | Courtney Keene |
| Characters: | |
| Updates: | M F |
| Began: | May 12, 2006 |
| Ended: | |
| Art style: | |
| Rating: | Web-MA |
| Website | Website |
Contents |
Plot
Actual text coming soon.
Chapters
Intro : 1, 2, 3, 4 - ?
Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Ch. 1 : "Less Than Strangers" coming soon -
What do you really know about those you depend on...?
Characters
Major characters
| Character | Age | Appearance | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Valinar | x | xx | coming soon |
| Kaomi | x | xx | coming soon |
| Kayula | x | xx | coming soon |
Minor characters
Background
There will be enough information represented in the comic through flashbacks to get the jist of what's going on, but just in case you want a more in-depth look at what you're getting yourself into...
Valinar was not always known as such. In fact, for the last 28 years, he’s been known as Corrin. Once a boy scraping by on the streets of Freeport, he got his ‘break’ when an older boy named Thadrius took him in and taught him the ropes of proper cunning and thievery. He made his life as a pickpocket and conman, mostly, though Thadrius was always better at it. Thadrius, in fact, began to acquire everything Corrin wanted, including a bored young noble named Lyandra.
Jealous and spiteful, Corrin concocted a plan to ‘teach Thadrius a lesson’. The intent was to get him caught, let him spend a night in jail, and then laugh about it the next day. Unfortunately, things did not pan out in that manner. Betraying his best friend and the man who was like a brother to him, Corrin drove Thadrius away and was left alone with his own guilt and resentment.
It wasn’t very long after that Corrin was ‘discovered’ by an attractive dark elf enchantress calling herself Malavasith. She told him everything he wanted to hear. That Thadrius was the one in the wrong and had betrayed him and left him alone. That he could be strong, without that extra weight pulling him down. She poisoned his mind with her coercions until he became little more than a dutiful pet. She bade he train as an assassin, and train he did. After some time, she gifted her favorite little lackey with dual curved blades of immense power, as well as the rank of Commander.
Corrin grew increasingly arrogant and careless. Something in the blades seemed to empower him toward absolute hatred. Indeed, Malavasith had concocted a rather ingenious plan. The blades were the collected shards from the blade of an ancient Teir’Dal shadowknight named Xervitis, a man of such caliber that he challenged Cazic Thule himself and refused to die, binding his own tainted soul to his blade. Her intent was always to have the shadowknight’s power manifested in some being with a strong destiny, the likes of which she felt in Corrin.
When she sent him on mission to assault Qeynos, she knew it would be his ‘last’. His arrogance only aided in his downfall as he gave tirade through the Commonlands, outraged that his company was not allowed to freely pass on the roads. Their plundering of a small fishing village served to push back their supplies by a few days, and Corrin had to tow his troops to a re-supply spot; a small island off of Antonica. There they were ambushed by a Qeynosian force. Corrin was enraged, but it became pointedly clear that his army was outnumbered and overpowered. He resolved instead to take out as many poor souls as possible, if he was going to meet his end.
His bloody conquest directed him toward a lone priestess, weakened from healing fallen comrades, guarded by a froglok paladin. It was as good an end as any, he reasoned, and prepared to fight, showing them a duelist’s courtesy. But they never matched blows. As the tower collapsed about them, Corrin was struck on the back of the head by falling mortar, the life beginning to seep out of him.
Necromantic energy from his blade began to consume him, claiming him in Xervitis’ name just as Malavasith always wanted. But there was one thing she did not expect. The templar, Amirie Starguide, put herself inbetween the ritual, using her own life force to delay and push back the spread of the toxic spells. She brought the man back to the temples of Qeynos, where the priests discovered his mind had been badly damaged either from the head trauma, or the ritual itself. They decided to learn as much as they could from him, and gave him a new identity under the harmless name of Valinar. Amirie would be assigned to keep close vigil over him in the name of Qeynos and the hope of finally besting Malavasith once and for all by using her former Commander against her.
Of course, it is all proving to be more than she or the Temple can handle alone. Through some untold wonder, Amirie managed to get herself caught in Malavasith’s plan, binding herself between Corrin and the spirit of Xervitis. So strongly that every night she shares the man called Valinar’s dreams – dreams that are very obviously his memories slowly crawling back.
She made noble attempt at hiding him from himself, but the questions of the confused man played to her sense of guilt. He was beginning to feel things that seemed strange to him. Intense bouts of hatred and surges of power. Surges that would lead him to engage in a nearly lethal battle with the froglok paladin Frontanletus in a duel meant only at first to recover his own tarnished honor. Amirie was not shocked by his admission that he had felt… different; murderous, even. Confronted with an internal battle, she slowly told him about himself and the measures she and the Temple had taken to give him a second chance.
Valinar was no longer, however, only Amirie’s problem. In bringing him back into the world, she had introduced him to her sister, who from the beginning seemed to take a profound interest in the mysterious man who reminded her so much of their human father, a treasure hunting ranger of Tunare. While Valinar at first seemed to act playfully flirtatious around Amirie, she did everything in her power to nearly push him toward Kaomi, after first saying he should stay away from her. Though nothing more than a physical attraction (and Kaomi’s underlying plan to get close to the man to find out exactly how he was involved with her sister), their ‘relationship’ and Valinar’s life came to a wreck one morning in Eldarr Grove when Xervitis possessively took over, hoping to use Kaomi’s fear and overpower her, making Valinar nearly strike her.
It was a catalyst, and one Amirie seemed to be waiting for. Though Valinar managed to stop his own actions, she had him arrested. But in shaking off Xervitis, Valinar had unwittingly helped the presence jump from himself to Amirie through the nature of their bond. She regarded her sister with a cold, heartless warning, telling her not to meddle in the affairs of adults. Shortly after, Valinar was ‘escorted’ to the dungeons and Amirie set off with Frontanletus in search of Malavasith.
One week later, Frontanletus returned, severely wounded, with word of Amirie’s capture. Knowing Valinar would be her only source for answers, Kaomi secured the writ for his release, making him tell her everything he knows about what’s happened to Amirie.
The Making Of
Acknowledgements
The inspiration for this comic came from a DnD game inspired by the roleplayed interactions and contributed stories of characters priginally designed for EQ2. That's a lot of inspiration. As of May 2006, the DnD game is still in progress and being run as many as three times a week - the story is far from over, and even I haven't the feintest idea of how it will end.
In speaking of inspiration, I have to give credit and profound thanks to three extraordinary friends, without whom this comic would not exist. In the campaign, the characters listed here as 'major characters', Valinar, Kaomi, and Kayula, are the PCs. The majority of the 'minor characters', and all NPCs, are controlled by the DM, as is the game itself. So quite literally, none of this would or even could exist.
But there is more to it than that. They have been a source of inspiration and encouragement all on their own. So to the three of you - yeah, you know who you are - thanks. Really.
Technical Stuff
The comic, with the exception of the first page (for now), is generally sketched with mechanical pencil on smooth Bristol, scanned, and inked in Photoshop with a caligraphy nib brush. From there, all post-work is done in Photoshop and sometimes Painter.
With any luck, the comic updates every Monday and Friday.
Because the DnD game retains references to trademarks and lore in the game Everquest, from our original RP there, I feel it necessary to state that such items are (c) Sony Online Entertainment, not me.
