I'm Going To Work On This Character's Reference Sheet More Today

I'm going to work on this character's reference sheet more today ☺️

-points threateningly at my mirror-

YES. TODAY. 🫵😠

Kazimier (pronounced Cazjh-meer, similar to Cashmere) is a shapeshifter-Incubus hybrid who lives in the trashy city of Du'Preve. He lives like a rockstar, owning a salacious club where he has his pick of lust-filled party-goers. But he works in the underground like a paranoid chess player; careful, distrustful, and always calculating several moves ahead under numerous aliases. That is, until he was arrested and sent to serve the full-blooded demons of the capitol..

(One of 7 Circles main characters, feel free to comment or ask questions! I own none of the pics, I simply arranged and edited them.)

I love you, and I am so tired of hearing you.

You've been sick, I know, and it's heartless of me to feel burdened by that but here I am, heartlessly thinking of leaving the house- running off somewhere the rattle of your lungs can't reach, where I can't feel your coughing as sure as the vibration of a phone constantly receiving notifications. It reaches me in my dreams, where monsters of the plague claw their way out of your mouth and rouse me from my sleep to find you trembling beside me. It's been a sleepless week and I know you're more tired than I am but I can feel my teeth going slightly out of alignment from the way I clench my jaw.

I can't talk over people, I've never been able to do so without feeling like I'm inflicting harm on myself. Maybe it's the autism or maybe it's an excerpt from the dark chapters I wrote before loving you but each cough of yours silences me completely. I sit frozen as your stuttered breath turns into doubled-over barks of pain, waiting as 13 of them wrack your body before I can finish telling you about my day. It hurts me the way a slammed door does, the way clapping hands near my sensitive ears hurts me, and the way the sounds of my mother hurt me. Maybe that's it. Maybe it's because of her, again.

It's always seemed to me that my mother could not exist without sounds. A sigh as she came home each day, puffing and stomping up the stairs. The grunts of exasperation as she would labor around the house in this hateful, exaggerated way that I knew meant she wanted me to help without her asking. Her asthma, and allergies, and constant colds could be heard from anywhere in the house. And her loud southern way of talking. Every golden silence, every pocket of quiet in which I stowed my daydreams would be filled with her sounds that I could do nothing about.

I grew up in my room, desperate for reprieve but feeling frozen. I started saving money to buy my way to sanctuary as a teenager, and got it last year- moving in with you.

But darling, when I hear a sound like ripping in your chest I'm not in our little reprieve from the world. I'm in my childhood bedroom, tired and wide awake at 3am as my mother hacks sickness into a sink and I feel just as helpless. Forgive me, love, for being just as unwell as you are right now. Ignore my flinches, my tortured glances, my tightened jaw.

Get well soon.

Wishing you a good morning from my very naked makeshift kotatsu 😊

So much of my creative process relies on having a nice space to create in, somewhere that has little distractions without feeling sterile. And when I'm feeling a bit stuck, I can clean some things to bring freshness to my perspective (which is currently the case).

I love cozying up here with a cup of coffee and my laptop or sketchbook, Playlist for that character humming in the background while the sunlight warms my Addams family pink limewash walls ☺️ I love how easy it is to slump onto the table, or lay on the floor in defeat when the art isn't doing The Thing. I love how easy it is for someone to sit across from me for a spell, asking me how it's coming along and enjoying the energy of my little parlor.

I hope all creatives get the chance to make a spot that suits them like my kotatsu suits me 💕

What's your creative space like? What do you wish it was like? No really, Idgaf if I get any notes but I want to see pictures or get descriptions of creative spaces ✨️

My asexual sex demon

Thinking about how Kazimier falls under the Asexual spectrum, which is surprising to some since the character has a lot of sex in my story/is a sex demon.

For most of the book, he's not getting intimate because he wants to, necessarily. It's not exactly noncon, either. It's just.. food. Incubi in my world aren't able to consume regular food once they come into their powers, they survive on lust. He's gone through periods of his life cursing his heritage, angry at that persistent hunger, ignoring it in ways that only a neurodivergant can understand (here's your reminder to drink or eat something, dear reader). He'd rather be untouched, untangled, left to his thoughts. But instead of pain in his stomach it's the strain in his pants that tears him away. When he finally feeds he does so ravenously, with indulgence and intensity that would make anyone believe that he revels in being a sexual demon. Once it's over, so is his interest in it, sexual relief bringing a mental relief that he's got several days until he has to entangle himself in someone else's pleasure once more.

I guess I'm saying that sexuality is multifaceted, and there's a lot of nuance to it. Hypersexuality and asexuality can be found in the same person without cheapening the experiences of those who only identify with one or the other or neither. And like, it's as ok to have ace characters have sex and be gritty self-proclaimed sluts (like Kazimier) as it is to write ace characters who never have sex or sexual urges (which I also have in my story).

Eeeeverything is a 3d spectrum, yall.

Who says a story structure should only have one climax? 🔥

So there I was. Asking myself, "Does it serve the plot to have a hand job scene and then full-on rawdogging three chapters later?"

Sometimes I throw myself softball questions just to give myself a break.

"Don't feel the need to write gratuitous sex to make your writing interesting!"

Ahah. I assure you Messere, the sex is entirely self indulgent.