#the concept of zul and lia came during a dream then i built the world aroujd them and made additional characters

[chatonyant]

Womp womp new story new ocs

Top two: Zul and Lia(working name) respectively

Middle: Metis and Ponchik

Bottom: Mercury (Soo-Eun)

(Once again trying a readmore on mobile but if it doesn't work then woe, lore rambles be upon ye I guess)

Sketch pages notes read:

Metis: prosthetic leg (uses cane)

Library studies — also learning coding to create organizational systems

Ponchik:

Contacts

Works at a climbing gym or skating rink

Dropped out of college?

Also does woodworking

Dialogue below:

Metis: just steal school snacks! We pay them too much ~anyways~ ♡

Ponchik, thinking: you can do that?!

CW: child experimentation, abuse

The setting is a world in which spirits live on a separate plane of existence but there are places of overlap with the physical world. These spirits are not quite a secret from the world but still rare enough that most people don't know much about them but have accepted them as a part of daily life on Earth. However, due to existence of overlapping areas, there are moments where spirits can partially leak into the physical plane and cause chaos. Therefore there exists a community of people who keep these spirits at bay. They are called spirits guards, and have throughout history and separately across all cultures been a selective group trained to negotiate or fight spirits that have crossed into the in-between. Deals must be made with more sentient spirits in order to receive power or create items that utilize the power of the spiritual realm in order to fight these spirits. In essence, these humans are given permission to interact with the spiritual world in a way that surpasses their natural abilities. This permission is limited to the person receiving it, so every person aiming to join the guard must receive permission from a spirit.

Zul and Lia were children that were forced into accepting spirit power due to an experiment done by the government. A scientist and a mysterious spirit joined hands in order to convince the government to fund their project, claiming to research spirit power and how it could be used as an energy source. However, both want power over each others realms and are experimenting on children to see how much spirit power a human could handle and plan to use these children as personal soldiers/tools.

A handful of orphans were bought and brought deep into the spirit plane, taking them deeper and deeper into the plane to absorb denser and more powerful spirit power until they reached their limit. The deeper into the spirit plane the more abstract and powerful the spirits get. Humans rarely go into the spirit plane, and any that do never go deep due to the inherent danger of too much power settling into their body.

Most of the children died. Only two lived by some miracle: Zul and Lia. Zul, older, showed great potential, awakening the power of small pocket dimensions and the ability to morph power into nearly any shape. Lia, on the other hand, only awakened a weak lie detection skill. Rather than a pinpoint understanding on if the person was lying, they only received a dull sense of wrongness that intensified the more the person believes what they're saying is a lie.

For years Zul and Lia underwent training and experimentation, with Zul doing his utmost to protect Lia, emphasizing their lack of ability to offset training onto himself. In return, Lia offered as much comfort as they could give. Though they wouldn't fully understand the horrors Zul went through, at least they could be a listening ear.

Zul was being trained to become a soldier, a personal spirit guard for the scientist. He began to go on missions to clear the city of spirits— and spirit guards. Soon the city was hauntingly empty of spiritual activity, and those sent to investigate all went missing.

However the project began losing support from the government, disappointed in the lack of results. Unwilling to lose any resource, they released Lia to live in the city, saving money but also keeping them within arms reach. With the understanding that they would be constantly under surveillance, they began to build a life in the city, slowly cobbling together a plan to free their brother still stuck within the project, who had been threatened with Lia (who wasn't aware) to follow orders.

Metis and Ponchik are college friends. Lia ends up working at the same place as Ponchik and somehow become friends, and Mercury, someone who half-lives in the library buried in books, somehow befriends Metis. Then they all end up meeting each other and becoming a group with one braincell (Mercury begrudgingly has it).

Mercury and Lia are the two newcomers to the city while Metis and Ponchik have lived there for a majority of their lives. Mercury lived in the city for longer than Lia, so after learning that Lia was new, was able to give some pointers to help them get adjusted to the city.

However, Lia feels uneasy around Mercury. While kind and gentle, they seemed to be full of lies, even lying about things that don't need to be lied about. This, along with the similarity with Zul's gentleness, makes Lia distance themself from Mercury, who seems to understand and give them space, which confuses Lia and makes them feel guilty for rejecting a seemingly harmless person.

Ponchik is a gentle person, opposed to their general aesthetic. Earnest and passionate about whatever new interest they have, they seem to cruise their way through life without really settling on one thing in particular. They named themself after their favourite food and would eat it breakfast lunch and dinner if they could. Types how they speak, elongating words and misspelling them for emphasis or to convey an accent or funny way of speaking ("eeeediot")

Metis is silent chaos, more willing to take risks and break rules. They love to make really bad puns and dad jokes, and teases Ponchik about being a rule follower. Metis has their own set of rules she follows, though what those rules are is confusing to anyone who hasn't know her long enough. Texts with typos for days because "i spend most of my day painstakingly scouring my code for typos don't make me do it on my off time too"

Mercury is .... well my notes say "so it's like spiderman. Who then got stuck with Deadpool. And is now appalled at being the responsible one." They're smiley and teasing and throws flirty remarks around willy nilly. They're silly and bit pathetic and has absolutely been caught with their arm stuck in a vending machine because their snack wouldn't come out. They are Delighted by Metis's bad jokes and joins in every chance they get to Ponchik's chagrin. They look cool at first glance until they open their mouth and dumb shit falls out. Every other text they send has :) :3 :] they have a Nokia. Good because they drop it too often and forget it too easily

Lia is very deliberate in their actions, taking time to think before talking and quietly watching the people around them before acting. What is awkwardness appears to be quiet and intimidating on the outside. Embarrassed by their lack of knowledge and how awkward they can be. But once they warm up, they can be very playful, absolutely willing to do some stupid shit. They're not particularly impulsive, but does do things that seem so. However they have extensively thought about said action before doing so, so it's planned impulsiveness?? Due to their fashion and jewelry, everyone assumes the hair and eyes are fake. Types very formally but slowly learning texting mannerisms. Particularly Mercury's emotes, so there are academic/Formal texts with the occasional ( ・∇・)

#art #alp art #alp ocs #drawing #doodle #oc #sketch #art on tumblr #original art #digital art #alp lia #i have a working title but idk how likely i am to keep it... #alp divinity of their making #hmm #the concept of zul and lia came during a dream then i built the world aroujd them and made additional characters #they r all rotating in my brain #i will draw more. it will take time but i will. #aough. #i should just call this dumbasses: a story #mercury was absolutely prepared to be the dumb bitch. #and then they had to stop Metis and Lia from seeing how strong of a flamethrower they could make in ten minutes #common sense vs academic intelligence #mercury has two names. as a treat. #and because ive not made a character with an eng and krn name and that is a crime #you can have two names!! you can have *multiple* names!!!! #metis likes to look put together #but they are also a mess #their appearance is the only thing thats visibly neat #that and her organization work #her notes and room are a mess