Tsuname - Tumblr Posts

Day 23 - Horror

When you're confronted with the very thing you've fought so hard to deny...

This shouldn't count as an ink. It really shouldn't XD I took a 2 or 3 month old drawing and splatted some ink on it e3e this should not count... XD But I'm desperate to get caught up, so whatever... eAe

DRAW TSUNAME

Behold, my masterpiece.for those of you who are unfamiliar with this character, this is a bad MS paint version of: http://kazeharuhime.deviantart.com/art/Don-t-Go-448504378ugh that’s old too but for those of you that have been unfortunately introduced to him via this bad MS paint drawing, I wanted you to see what he’s supposed to look like somewhat… XD I need to redraw his ref that’s the only nice one I have… there are others but they’re not as nice-looking EAE anyways uh. Thanks for the request @enjoliquej! It was an interesting challenge to see how bad I could make it XD; while somehow also being as nitpicky and metaculous as I usually am (didn’t leave any white spaces! …except for the eyepatch kinda but there were a lot of fine little places I filled instead of leaving white!!)But yes um… was there anything else I needed to say… I guess not. I guess I could leave it at this. I wanted to explain a bit about the character but I really don’t think this is the post to do that in… maybe another time. XD anyways thanks for the request again, EJ~ I’m surprised this challenge really took off! I got like 3 requests and this was one of them! XD This is a pretty entertaining challenge so far, I’ll see how far it goes…

WHO is Tsuname and WHAT is his QUEST?

WOW that was quick! Okay Tsuname…Well Tsuname is from my Aliens series. He’s the younger brother of Tsunne (guy on right), another character from the series. He lives peacefully on an island on the planet of Gaede with his family and friends and has a massive one-sided crush on his childhood friend, Sh’zkai, who is also his arranged fiance, or tan-tawe as they are referred to in his culture. It is believed there that the first friend a child meets of the opposite gender is fated to be married to them, so female friends of that culture will sometimes create what is called the mitawe-yun, or female friend pact, so that if they get married and produce children of the opposite genders, those children will be tan-tawe, and as such introduced to each other as soon as they are ready to be up and about as toddlers or walking infants. They are usually left in a pen of some kind to play with each other while the parents watch. If the children get along it is said to be good luck, and perhaps a sign they will learn to like each other when they are older.

Islandic superstitions aside, though, his tan-tawe Sh’zkai grows up to loathe him. They were good friends as children, but when Tsuname grew up to be a teenager and fell in love with her, believing the tales his parents and surrounding culture had always told him, Sh’zkai came to find him absolutely loathsome.The worst part about it? Tsuname is convinced that her loathing of him is either some sort of ‘phase’ she is passing through or smothered affection. Even when she is very openly blunt about not liking him, sometimes to the point of violence, Tsuname still does not believe her. Even times when he is discouraged by his behavior, his parents and culture continue to teach him that Sh’zkai is only going through a phase, and perhaps needs space before she can come to realize her feelings for him.Tsuname then goes to his father’s grandparents’ island by his parents’ instructions to do just that. For the next three years, that’s how Tsuname spends his summers. He goes for a few weeks to a few months each year to build up muscle and also give Sh’zkai space. However, despite his parents’ advice that leaving her alone and packing on more muscle will make her more attracted at him, Sh’zkai doesn’t even give him the time of day. If anything, she is more disgusted at him when he returns (probably because she knows his motives behind these trips).Tsuname is 18 (15 three years ago) when a rumor begins to spread around about something strange appearing in the sky now and then. The islanders had been unaware of it because they’re so low to sea level they don’t see much aside from the stars, but the Stellyrs, or star Gaediens who live closer to the sky, have been noticing a strange flying contraption floating around the planet. His brother Tsunne who is next-to-chief of the island is often gone to talk with the other leaders of Gaede to discuss what should be done in the case of an invasion, which is what they believe is soon to take place.His island goes into preparing for the invasion. The men are taught what to do and at Tsunne’s insistence, even some of the women are allowed to fight, since it is known they probably need every available fighter they can spare.

And then the invasion comes. The men charge out to meet their attackers, but are quickly overwhelmed.Left and right his people are falling, some of them getting captured and taken away into metal saucers by the tall reptilian figures.Tsuname is among those captured.One of the reptilian creatures gouges out Tsuname’s right eye, a symbol that he is now his slave, and eats it (yeah I know he’s gross).Tsuname then spends the next three years enslaved, meeting many different kinds of people and almost escaping several times, meeting many different perils along the way on his quest to return to Gaede, and, (he thinks) the loving embrace of his tan-tawe, Sh’zkai.

And that’s Tsuname’s quest! could have skipped a lot of the details in the beginning and gotten right to the quest, but I thought a few things needed to be explained, even if they’re partially unnecessary and probably a wee bit spoiler XD; I don’t think I said anything that’s too spoilerish though, aside from describing the beginning his story to you XD;; I might’ve gone a bit overboard there on the details but oh well… Anyways uh. If you ever wanted to read his story (even if I partially spoiled most of the beginning for you XD; ) I could probably give you the link. The only issue is a lot of it might be revamped and not canon anymore. Probably why I thought it was safe to tell you the beginning, even though the beginning is probably the least likely to undergo any major overhauls XD; but yeah if you wanted I could probably still share it with you, though it isn’t finished and is on an indefinite hiatus because I feel like I started it too soon. It was a NaNoWriMo for 2014 and a lot of it is rushed and rife with inconsistencies, and eventually I lost steam with it because the plot wasn’t going the way I’d envisioned and a lot of things happened in the story that made me uncomfortable with it. But all the same if you want to know more I might just share it with you! As long as you keep in mind that half the story may not even be canon anymore aside from what I just told you earlier. All of that is /probably/ staying, it’s the parts of the story I didn’t tell you about that are still under construction, so XD anyways… I’m really longwinded. Thanks for the ask, though, I hope this (more than) answered your question about Tsuname! XD;; 

More old art. Some art requests I did for my friends three months ago XD Tiger for @diamondfusionempress, having his cat tails braided by her Ruby, Myriam and my old character Fuuma XD I forget who requested I draw my character Ril’siiya actually. I think that might’ve been... oh right. I drew her before the requests so she was just kinda there first. XD And @jessmkarts requested I draw her character Ulrich. @niwawings15 requested I draw her cabaturtle Andy, and of course @enjoliquej wanted me to draw my character Tsuname, her painful favorite. XD Was looking through my artfolder and realized I never uploaded these, so here they are!

Mermay #22 - Tsuname as a Mer Finally, all caught up! Well, here’s a crowd favorite XD Tsuname, as a mer! I know his species is technically mermaid-like, but I thought I’d draw him as a traditional mer for fun. I would have colored, but I reaaaally wanted to get caught up. XD; So I left is as is in pencil sketch form!

Tags continued here and here. (I have way too many OCs XD; )

Reblog and Tag with your ocs' Names

13, 35, 29, 33, 22, 11, 44, 47

Oh gosh where am I there’s so many questions what’s going on okay UMMM… *after actually reading the questions* 

 13. Do you have any troublemaker OCs?

Troublemakers… Well, there’s Sleepi’s sister Penelope/Obbie (in the middle of a name crisis so all of them kind of have two names. XD; ), who is infamous for her troublemaking, and her older sister Chiffie who is even more infamous for making trouble…  Also Daniel from the same story, he’s an annoying knight who can be a bit of a troublemaker, more so when he was younger but still enough now to annoy his superior. XD; On a whole different story note Sh’zkai was a troublemaker when she was little. Advanced beyond mere troublemaking as she grew older, but. XD; And those are all I can think of that sometimes purposefully cause trouble. Anyone else I can think of more accidentally cause trouble… No, scratch that, Ron from Guardians can definitely cause trouble on purpose if he wants to XD; Again he kinda grew out of it later, but especially as a kid… 

 35. Any sibling characters?

Gosh. Any sibling characters you ask. My stories are filled with siblings. Where do I even begin?? XD; There’s all the sisters of TA, with Sleepi, Angri, and all her other sisters. Sh’zkai and Sz’nami from Aliens, a number of other siblings. Isura and Hiyura the mains of Twin Scars are sisters… In Myth, Illumi and Aqua are sisters… I’d be hard pressed to find a story of mine that doesn’t include siblings! They’re everywhere! Some alive and some not, but I digress. XD; 

 29. Which one of your OCs would go investigate an abandoned house at night without telling anyone they’re going?

Probably Nola. She’s too curious for her own good. XD; 

 33. Your shyest OC?

That…. would be a particular OC I have yet to introduce publicly from Guardians. I might introduce her initial form when I finish those color asks (haven’t forgotten about you!! just really busy between work and school!!), but until then… that OC will remain the shyest OC I have and no one will know why until waaay later. XD; 

 22. Is there any OC of yours people tend to mischaracterize? If yes, how?

Hmmmm… I think at any given moment people have mischaracterized any number of my major characters, yes. XD; One being another non-publically introduced OC from Aliens, who is often misunderstood because of his development. Though even people who have seen him beyond that point can sometimes misunderstand his actions to be a lot crueler or harsher than this OC is trying to do. XD; Or see this OC as a lot nastier in personality than they actually are. Which… is understandable, but… Then there’s Kenith who is a fan char sorta type of thing for the asker of this post’s story Zenith (for the first time in my life I realize Kenith’s name rhymes with and is almost spelled identically to Zenith my life is a lie), who’s been mischaracterized at least once but then he was also fairly new at the time, so some misunderstandings are understandable. XD; Similar to the first one, his personality came off way worse than I intended, and though he is sort of an ex-antagonist, I guess I didn’t want him to look totally awful… or maybe I did, well, either way, he came off way nastier than intended. XD; Bardwyn from Torn Apart is also often misunderstood, but then I guess I’m the one who really knows him. XD; This one is a little harder to describe, since it was a misunderstanding with the co-writer of TA, CC (offsite). From what I remember, the mischaracterization had to do with how he handled a certain part of the story, but my explaining made it seem like he only had a lot of little flaws, which… maybe he does, but it wasn’t what I was trying to get across at the time I guess. XD; After multiple tries to characterize and re-explain him, that edit meeting did not end well. XDD; Sleepi can also be misunderstood at times. I find my co-writer getting confused sometimes why she acts one way, but then, I think Sleepi used to be a lot more bold and extroverted, so a transition to a slightly more introverted Sleepi as the story goes on can be understandably confusing and cause some issues with mischaracterization. XD; So, those three plus another who I also can’t mention yet are some of the ones that stand out to me as having been mischaracterized before. 

 11. Is there any OC of yours you could describe as a “sunshine”? 

Well… Tsuname sort of used to be a sunshine. He still is in my mind. But… now, I think his sunshine is often fake. I think it was genuine at one point, a long time ago, but… Megan from Twin Scars also has a very sunny disposition, though I don’t typically think of her as a sunshine, even though she might be. XD; Haruna is kind of sunny, but maybe not really full on sunshine, I don’t know. She might be perceived that way by others though. XD; Nola from Guardians is definitely a sunshine, though again, I feel like that part of her has been dimmed some from story events. All the same though, there’s a reason I strongly associate her with sunflowers. XD; Ron kinda almost has the exact same thing. He’s generally pretty sunny, in spite of being a snow Guardian, but lately he’s gotten angstier and hasn’t been as sunny… (is it the Washington winter that I now live in??? no XD; ) Oh! Crang is definitely an undefiled sunshine pretty much. From Aliens. XD; Pretty rare for that series. In TA there’s Sleepi’s sister Joy… the very definition of a sunshine. XD; But ummm… I think that’s it for sunshines. Crang and Joy I think are two of the only true sunshines. XD; All the others I can think of are close but don’t fit the bill, or are sunshines with deep shadows. XD; Or dim or whatever metaphor I’m using here haha. 

 44. Something you like about your OCs in general 

Uh…. gosh, you mean everyone? That’s way too much ground to cover. XD; Ummm. Gosh um… I might have to do this by story group or char group at least… XD; There’s way too much ground to cover. Ummm… I was thinking about something earlier today. I think over all a lot of my chars tend to have a certain patience that I’ve noticed other people don’t have irl and I’m just like ‘huh I guess that’s a good trait I passed down to some of them.’ Not all of them had it, but it kinda fascinates me to see what kind of things I take for granted as traits that people have that are really actually specific to me, and then I realize almost all my chars have it because I took that trait for granted as something people have. XD; I think almost every char has something about them that I can look at them and go ‘huh that’s like me.’ Whether it’s a physical trait, or preferences that I like, a personality trait, nose shape, build, character’s own preference or likes/dislikes. I also like finding differences that feel quirky or silly to me in some way? Like sometimes a character feels too different and I can’t relate. But sometimes chars go out of their way to be my opposite in some cases and for some reason I find this funny. XD; Like oh wow, I really like this thing but this char HATES it! Wow! XD; Things like that. I guess I like that I have an ability to create a pretty diverse cast across the board. Maybe some are less in some cases but I guess I like looking at my OCs and thinking about the range I have. From weird aliens to Pillsbury doughboy children to humans and among humans there being slice of life, sci-fi, fantasy, all these different genres of chars and stories that come together and I guess I like how they interact sometimes? IT’s just… interesting to me XD; I guess… 

 47. Has anyone ever (friendly) claimed any of your OCs as their child? 

*stares directly into camera* Um… yes… *looks pointedly at asker of this ask* Many times… Not to say that I haven’t rapid spammed calling MY friends’ OCs my children. XD; Probably where I get it from, but y’know. I think a lot of people I’ve RPed with have claimed my OCs as their children so… yes. XD; It’s become kind of a habit honestly sometimes I have to make a conscious effort not to say child all the time but XD;

17!!

17. Any OC OTPs?…Anyone that knows me knows I’m the queen of OTPs… XD; but ummm. Maybe I’ll start with favorites. Let’s see two of my favorites at least one character is spoiler. But uuum… Other than those two, or three, (later: or four…) I kinda like Tsuname and Ril’siiya’s relationship. They’re both bubbly people who go through a lot of trouble and I think they can both relate to being the annoying one most people don’t like, so when they’re together it’s almost like they have a safe spot to just be themselves around each other, because they can’t annoy each other with the things that normally annoy other people. XD;

Also from Aliens there’s Crang and Kitch. They’re kind of childish and may not fully understand what’s going on, but they’re pure and cute and have helped each other before in the past I think. XD;

One that developed somewhat recently is Kenneth (long-necked blue/purple reptile alien, not to be confused with an angsty blonde ice boy from Zenith named Kenith… still not over how I accidentally made his name mirror Zenith’s name XDDD; ) and Lyna. Lyna is a short but tough cat-ish alien and has none of Kenneth’s playing the tough guy, telling him to rest when he’s injured. I find their dynamic interesting because he’s super tall plus his long neck and she’s this short thing that has the power to boss him around. XD

But ummm… a lot of my other OTPs are characters that mature later and get together. Like Angri and Aidren from Torn Apart are a disaster at first, but especially when Angri matures and comes to accept herself, they work a lot better. XD;

Or APG and Lily from Knights & Lilies. At first it’s a one-sided crush on APG’s end, but eventually when Lily is older, she comes to understand what she did to him by not understanding his premature feelings, and feels bad about it. So yeah they’re cute when they’re older, too.

The pairings in Twin Scars also don’t really happen until later. Tetsuya and Hiyura’s relationship isn’t really explored until the very end, possibly to be continued if the sequel ever gets off the ground. I think Tetsuya may have tried to interact with her in the past, but Hiyura was always quick to shut him down before the end of the story.

Romance isn’t really a part of the main story of TS, it’s mostly about the sisters and Isura’s friends and Hiyura’s turnaround. In general most of the romance arcs happen post-story in sequels. Like Isura may have met Kirk in the main story briefly, but it’s only when they’re older that they meet again and the relationship is explored more in Kirk’s story. I think Kirk’s story would be fourth in the series if it ever finishes, but it’s one of the ones I’m most excited to write/draw. XD I already have part of it comic-boarded out elsewhere, that’s fun… based off the snippet I wrote for him a long time ago. I haven’t really had the change to explore either of the TS pairings as an OTP much though, so it’s hard to say they’re anywhere close to a favorite actually. Though their stories definitely intrigue me, especially Kirk’s. XD;

As far as other OTPs… I have a number of parent couples that are/were cute, or tragic pairings…  One totally light pairing from KnL are Lily’s parents. They still act like teens around one another even though they’re 40 or almost 40 respectively. XDThe parents of Sleepi and her sisters from TA were also fairly cute, though that one’s a bit sad.And of course from Aliens Tsunne (Tsuname’s older brother) and Sz’nami were cute. Though that one is also sad.. XD; Tsunne helped Sz’nami become more bold and to stand up to opposition instead of just taking it. He taught her how to use her wave abilities stronger and helped her gain confidence. She in turn supported him when the pressures of being the son of the village chieftain got to be too much. They were good for each other while they lasted, I think. XD

Oh! One last pairing I almost forgot about (I’m sorry this post is so long I was only gonna list favorites then I got carried away) XDD;; Is Trunt and Flint from Lands of Seven. Flint is an angsty thing and Trunt is more steady. They kind of start out like a fighting couple where Trunt figures out Flint’s secret and kind of holds it against her, but Flint ends up liking him and I think it’s mutual. XD; And Trunt keeps her secret (even though it’s one of those secrets that probably everyone actually knows), and I’m not even 100% sure how they get from weird argumentative couple to more than that, but I kind of find them cute. XD;

Well, there’s plenty more, but either don’t rise to the level of favorite or I’m not really on them right now so development is hard to come by. But yeah, I have a lot of pairings. XD;

(Tried breaking this up into smaller paragraphs to make it more readable. Did it work? You decide. XD; Thanks for the question! Again I apologize for the length. I really should have kept it shorter but apparently I have no ability for shortness when I’m talking about ships I guess XD; Some of this might have been spoiler not sure, I tried to keep it as spoiler-content free as possible, but oh well. XD; )

Some doodles from last night. Nothing like a streaming call to kick my artistic behind into action XD; The instant feedback is kinda nice.

First one: @chrystallink‘s character Tiger as a Herr, one of my aliens species XD;

Second: Ya boi Tsuname

Third: Aidren, from Torn Apart

I forgot to post this. A WIP from a while back of my character Tsuname.

Tsuname thinks he is a mer

I forgot to post this on tumblr... This was something I did towards the end of May for “Mermay” though Tsuname isn’t exactly a mer, he’s close enough to one I guess. XD; This was an overhaul of an old picture I did for Mermay in 2016, now with new and improved art. XD;

(The emoji is "🙃 - Someone to share their suffering with." Since it's just a box on my end I thought I'd make that clear. XD; )

Being forced at gunpoint (affectionately) to post this. Thanks Tooth. 😂 Blank under the cut.

Made a thing and decided maybe it's decent enough to post. Links to refs, the blank, and rambles under the cut.

Flora: Flos adonis. "Painful recollections" in flower language according to Catharine Harbeson Waterman's Flora's Lexicon (1840).

Fauna: Flying fish. I use these as symbols for Wotrens in general, but Tsuname in particular has a scene where he glides over the ocean and enjoys a moment of freedom, so I think he best exemplifies the whimsy that is the flying fish.

Object: Marble. In hindsight though I should have picked suncatcher, that would have been a lot more symbolic, especially considering I have an old picture of him trying to catch the last rays of the sun. Well, marble will do in a pinch I guess. My thinking was a silly pun involving losing his marbles, also it being a lone marble to imply "where did the others go?" Also chose a clear one as part of the symbolism too. I went through a number of objects for him before settling on marble. Originally I was going to do "window" but couldn't find a ref I liked for it. Then I thought of "tide pool" but that's more a place than an object. Then I thought maybe one of those epoxy resin arts, but there's something really artistic and delicate about those that felt a little bit off to represent Tsuname. But yeah. He's transparent but also shallow some ways. So that's why it has to be a marble or something not that deep. Shallow in the sense that you don't have to reach very far to see what's going on inside. That's why I was thinking glass at first. Window because you can easily peer inside and see what's going on. Tide pool for a similar reason. It's not that deep, you can scoop up some crustacean crawling around in there and look at it. Also sea-theming is very important for him.

You know what I just remembered... 'bracelet' is an object that has more significance in-story. I guess it less represents him though and more his devotion to Sh'zkai...

Song: The Name of Anger by Rurutia. I also could have picked Meltdown by Lollia, but decided they both exemplify Tsuname in different ways, so I didn't need to swap it out. For the one I chose though, it's chock full of symbolism that I think really fits Tsuname well. I think of it typically in the broader context of the invasion he experienced, so in some ways, Meltdown feels a bit more personal than The Name of Anger does for Tsuname. Meltdown I associate more with his ongoing mental battle, whereas The Name of Anger deals far more with the past and how it contextualizes the present. The opening line translates to something like "The ladder of light collapses." This 'ladder of light' I think of representative of hope, but also with like a tractor beam. The light is 'collapsing' which means the beam is disappearing, and with it, any hope of getting back those that were taken by it. "Innocent live sink to the mud." . . . "Overflowing from the ark are the tears of lost children." That last one I associate with the Gaediens who were taken. "My hands transform into swords; my ventless anger continues to spiral" Feels like a fast-forward to present day Tsuname, who has become a weapon against his will and his hands are now swords, and his pent up anger from the horrors he endured spills out everywhere. Lastly I love the picture painted by this line: "The jet-black sea winds whirlpools." There's not many good translations of the song online but you can find the original lyrics here: (x) I am for sure taking some creative liberties in my associations but XD that's the rub.

Feeling: Kuebiko. I abridged the definition quite a bit on the picture to get the text to play nice.

And yes, I did ref the Ocarina of Time scarecrow because it was simpler to draw than trying to figure out how to abstract a proper photo of a scarecrow. XD;

There's a lot of interesting gems in the etymology of kuebiko as well that fit Tsuname:

Kuebiko comes from kueru (崩える), an archaic verb meaning "to break down; to become shabby and disordered", plus hiko (彦), an old epithet for "boy, young man", in turn from hi ko (日子), literally "sun child".[1][2][3] The meaning could be translated as something like "shabby young man".

Yamada no sohodo is formed like an old-fashioned formal name, from surname or literal noun Yamada (山田, lit. 'mountain + paddy'), genitive or possessive particle no (の), and sohodo (案山子),[4] in turn from soho ("sopping wet") + -do, a contraction from -bito, the compounding form of hito (人).[5] The meaning of this name could be construed as "soaked person of the mountain paddies", a euphemism for "scarecrow".

As for the kami aspect of the etymology, at first I thought he had nothing to do with folk wisdom, knowledge and agriculture, but if you think on it, maybe a little. For one thing, when he returns to the island he has a lot of knowledge of how things work out in space that no one else has, so in one sense he is sort of this oddity. Folk wisdom could be turned on its head because his devotion to what he grew up believing is a big part of his character, but he lacked the proper nuance about the belief, so this "folk wisdom" doesn't exactly pan out when he doesn't understand how it applies to the real world (or doesn't). Agriculture was the one that I thought... no, not at all, but thinking on like... the connotations of agriculture, like "living on the land" -> "devotion to the land" -> "devotion to one's home and native land" could be something.

But anyways, the TDoOS definition definitely pulls more from the latter half of that opening sentence from the wiki:

"Kuebiko (久延毘古) is ... represented in Japanese mythology as a scarecrow who cannot walk but has comprehensive awareness."

Going back to the literal meaning, "shabby boy/sun child" really fits Tsuname well. Broken down, made shabby and disordered by his past. I often associate Tsuname with the sun in a lot of ways too. His original sunny disposition, overshadowed now by the horizon, making "sunset" another potent symbol for Tsuname's present psyche.

The second name for Kuebiko in Yamada no sohodo I also thought was kind of interesting, since being a fish boy he often does drag himself out of the ocean sopping wet, but also the connotation of sopping wet with "pathetic" feels of portent. XD

Hmm. Knowing what I know now it feels kinda weird to associate him with this word, but, I guess TDoOS is useful for describing feelings!

Anyways here's the link to the blank: (x)

Thank you if you've read this far. XD