Pactforging, a relationship based magic system. A diagram shows two different individuals of different species standing next to each other. There is an icon of a container on each of their chests that is filled with liquid. The caption reads "you agree to share magic with someone. You share power and knowledge, and you can share more as you develop your relationship level." The next diagram shows a red line connecting the two individuals, and a drawing in the background shows two hands clasped together with "pact forge" written under it. There is also another diagram in the background that shows a container of liquid with larger dotted lines around it showing that it can expand with each level. Text next to it says "Increased shared well when level up relationship. No downsides?!"

A caption at the top reads "You can pactforge for various reasons. The level of your pact can only be raised by consensually fostering relationships." Next to it is a diagram of someone enthusiastically reaching out their hand to someone else, but the other person looks disinterested. Above them is a little bar showing how a the pact can increase by level, and the relationship can be one of business, friendship, family, etcetera. The next caption reads, "Pactmates develop an additional magical ability. Researchers theorize that the ability you get is built to overcome a weakness in the relationship. For example, it is common for long distance pactmates to develop a magical ability that allows them to meet in a space that exists in between dreams." Next to this caption is a diagram that shows two individuals linking over long distance and meeting in an alternative space.

A caption reads "Borrowing magic from a pactmates feels like pulling on an invisible string. Your pactmate must consciously allow for the exchange to happen." Next to this caption is a diagram of a fist pulling on a red string, which symbolizes the connection of a pact. The next caption underneath it says, "breaking pacts is a physically painful experience. The common practice is to mutually agree to let the pact relationship fall back to level 1 before breaking it. Otherwise, you can get very sick." The diagram accompanying this caption shows two people who look distressed and sick. Above them is a broken red string.

Some diagrams that describe how pactforging works in the world of my webseries
#interconnections #intcn_concept

The title of this drawing is "Tsuktsu Fashion. Set 1". Three outfits are displayed in the center of the page. The one to the left is a warm brown tone. A square of texture is displayed near it to show that it has an texture similar to Khaki. It is a puffy sleeved top cinched with a short corset, and shin-high pants. The corset is a cream color with salmon colored accents. The top has a very wide collar that resembles a shoulder cape, with two long pointed wings coming down the front like the wings of a dress shirt collar. The cape is salmon with a cream border, and it has a floral tie attached to the front that is cream with salmon flowers on it. Next to this outfit is a few reference photos of real life ties made by Remulia that have gorgeous sewn textures of flowers and foxes on them. A caption under it describes how these references tie into the Tsuktsu fashion. It reads, "Heavily textured ties are popular. Often features nature motifs". Moving onto the outfit in the center, it has a texture square next to it that shows that the fabric is soft and opalescent. The outfit has a puffy sleeved top, except the cuffs are tall, pleated, and end in large wavy frills. The top ends right above the breast area and it is covered in fabric flowers and ribbons. On the sides of the page is a references of a similar top by Me+Em Select. The caption reads "Most species here don't have boobs, so it's not uncommon for clothes to expose some chest - especially since this is a hot, tropical climate." Going back to the outfit, there is a short band around the waist, like an opalescent obi sash, and attached to it is basically a cape for the legs. The third outfit has a texture square that shows that the color is sea blue color with a reflective finish. It is a baggy halter top that has a tight band around the waist. The shoulders are exposed, and the sleeves are baggy and pinched into a pleat that runs from shoulder down to wrist. A reference shirt by Tayfun Kaba is shown next to it.

Fashion page for my webseries, #interconnections

#intcn_concept

I introduce to you some of my favorite food items in Interconnections. First of all, the coffee stick. It would be like a longer edible cigarette that is caffeinated. It also comes in harder variants that are more like pocky sticks. Next up, my second favorite dish is the fries in savory stew! It's a bowl of stew with a chili-like consistency, and fries are sticking out of it. The fries are fried twice for that extra crunch, which is what they do to korean fried chicken. And similarly to korean fried chicken, some stores season their fries with spicy sweet flavors, creamy flavors, etc. Another food item from this collection that I would love to talk about is the pocket jelly! Similar to how a lot of candies in our world are modeled after cute characters, this magical food item takes it on step further and has animated expressions. The jelly depicted here is tear-dropped shaped, blobby, and has a wide watery-eyed expression. They're not sentient at all, no worries!

more fantasy food items from my webseries #interconnections #intcn_concept

#interconnections #intcn_concept

Preliminary vehicle, airboard, and underwater city explorations.

#interconnections #intcn_concept

Extra thanks to Zii for the help with brainstorming these food items, and contributing some ideas! Koji is a warm red iuian root vegetable! The flower looking script to the left of the Koji root is how "koji" is written in the iuian language. Koji dishes and desserts are pretty popular, and people like to garnish the dishes with its red leaves. Taba's is a big fan of koji pie! The little "savory meal" bar at the bottom is like... if chocolate snicker bars were savory. HEAR ME OUT! What if instead of those rice crispy or cookie bases it was something like fried rice? but with chickpeas so there's protein? And instead of those caramel insides, it's some kinda spicy sauce. But the sauce is not too liquidy! It's crucial that no part of this bar is too crumbly or too liquidy, we don't want to create a mess. The exoskeleton is crucial for structure, and will be replaced by some kinda spicy thin cracker substance. Have you had those asian neutral tasting thin cracker bases that they sometimes put a sweet sticky goo in between? Imagine that cracker base but maybe kinda spicy? Now, what you've all been waiting for. What are the Juicy Bugs on teh upper right corner? They're little magical bugs that like to suck up fruit juice and nectar, and store them in these large containers on their butt. Their magic gives the combined juice an extra oomph. They can detach from these large containers like a lizard popping off its tail. They have a symbiotic relationship with the semi-invisible cats because the cats will protect these bugs in exchange for endless supply of sweet juice. If you are raising these guys on a farm or something, BE CAREFUL OF NEARBY FLORA. Make sure there are no plants growing nearby whose nectar or fruits might be toxic to you or your semi invisible house cat.

The Mush chips are depicted on the upper left, and are particularly inspired and an incredible concept by the aforementioned Zii. Mushrooms in our world contain so so much water so I imagine they might be hard to fry into tasty chips, but this particular mushroom? It's just perfect for chips, ok? Trust. The wrapper is biodegradable! Mushrooms will start sprouting from it and can be made into more chips. On the upper right, three fried ramen balls are skewered on a stick with some sauce on top, As someone who has eaten crispy fried ramen, I know it hurts my gums and my teeth to eat these things. Please imagine a version of this savory treat where the ramen actually isn't thick enough to hurt when you crunch on them. Instead, they're a little more like those korean turtle chips. Multilayered, but still crunch-friendly. The lower right has a white and pink fruit that is shaped like a peach, but maybe also a bit more like... boobs. Text states that it is called the "bibble fruit", but is unfortunately nicknamed the "boob fruit". It tastes creamy and milky. I also gotta confess that if I lived in the world of interconnections, my favorite fruit would probably be the boob fruit. I know, I'm sorry. I just think a fruit that wasn't tangy at all, but instead sweet, creamy, milky, and juicy would be incredible. The lower left has some blue citrus fruits. They were teal hundreds of years ago, and much smaller. They have since been cultivated to be a larger size and their color has gotten more cerulean.

food concepts!🍜 #interconnections #intcn_concept

Sketches of Suma Temple. Suma is a local diety of the night, and a two-story tall stone statue of them is placed at the center of the courtyard. The architecture is inspired by bower bird nests, and like a bird nest, there is a courtyard altar shaped like two eggs at the foot of the Suma statue. People feed shrine birds here. The pattern on the ground looks woven in a way that is like a basket. It makes the courtyard look like a nest, and some of the pieces on the ground have gem dust finishes to make it look like the treasures that a bower bird would use to decorate its nests. More info: Suma is often depicted as a very tall jet black bird that is known to shape shift. They draw power from the night, work with illusion magic, and bring security to their followers who consider themselves part of Suma's flock. Suma sounds like a chime when they sing, so there are numerous bells that decorate the temple. More info on Tsuktsu's "bird religions": In Tsuktsu, a common religious belief is that ascended deities govern over territory, and use their bird familiars to observe and communicate with people. Their followers believe that they partake with their diety when they interact with the bird flocks that nest at a god's temple, so they center many celebrations around these birds and also use the birds to tell fortunes. For instance, fortune tellers will observe the flock's flight patterns and use it to determine if today is a day of good fortune or not.

Exterior design explorations of Shoori and Taba's home. The architecture is made of stone, with a rounded slope on the roof, and extruded windows. There is also a roofed balcony with two floors of windows underneath the balcony (almost giving it the shape of an icecream on a cone). Taba and Shoori live in a refurbished building that is attached to the archives that Shoori works at. The building used to be one of the living spaces of a long line of wealthy merchants. While these archives are still owned by this merchant family, they no longer need the housing, so it has since been divided up into a coliving space for employees of the archive. I felt like this building was a great opportunity to explore traditional elaborate tsuktsu architecture of this region, so I really went all out with its design. This building is located in a subtropical climate, so its windows and balconies have little roofed buffer zones that extend out and prevent heavy rainfall from spilling into the house. These extended roofed zones also keep sunlight from shining into the house, and encourages you to leave windows open for natural air circulation. To help with the temperature, the pointed chimney that sticks up from the middle of the building serves as both an entrance for visitors that can fly (very useful to open up during parties), as well as a place for hot air to gather and escape. Also! These buildings are made of stone! And they've got little bird gargoyles perched on the corners of the roof! The third image shows that one side of the building has tall and large stain glass designs built into it, and the diamond shapes on the top are windows that can be opened into entrances. If you would like to see some similar windows in our world, look up Rajasthani architecture, extruded Rawashin, and Bhutan balconies. If you want to look at some cool stone sub tropical architecture, check out Ellora Caves and Angkor Wat.

A very rough 3d blender mockup of Taba and Shoori's home.

Very rough 3d model of Taba and Shoori's home. This angle shows that one wall of the building has tall stain glass windows on it.

Building concept art for Suma temple and also Taba's childhood home. #interconnections #intcn_concept

Here are two plants you would see fairly often in Tsuktsu, which is the region that Taba and their family currently lives in! The first plant looks like a mushroom if the cap was a fuzzy little grass carpet. And atop the carpet are two flowers where the petals are flopped very far back, and their stamens are round in a way that looks like an insect head. Altogether, the flowers look like they mimic their pollenator, which is a multicolored moth. This is a desert plant that imitates its pollinator in order to attract them. (Note: Only the colored in drawings are finished designs! The sketches are old versions.) If you would like more references for this type of plant, you can take a peek at the Bee Orchid of our world. While this plant is NOT native to Tsuktsu, it is very popular to own, similar to how it's currently trendy for us to own succulents or small cacti. The second plant is a very common native weed of Tsuktsu. It looks like a cluster of green ovals coming out of the ground. This plant tends to form one large leaf per stem, and the leaves have hollow insides. This plant is magical, and it uses its magic to trap and reflect light inside of its hollow chamber. At night it lets out a dim glow. This weed is becoming commonly used as padding for flower bouquets, and similar to our clover plant, people are planting it in their lawns.

Starting from the upper left going clockwise: First plant has flowers that look like red birds diving towards its stem. Text reads: Popular flower. Naturally bird shaped flowers. Second plant looks like hanging ivy, but the leaves are round, and the flowers are white and look like hummingbirds. Text reads: bred to have flowers that look like birds. Third plant has large leaves that look like fern leaves, but they are shaped like hands. Text reads: Claps in the wind. Fourth plant has very wavy ruffled edges, almost like dress ruffles. Text reads: Very popular indoor plant! Their society equivalent of a fern. Here are some more popular plants in the Tsuktsu region. You can really see that people are big fans of birds here, huh? Shoori and their housemates owns all of these plants except for the third plant (the one on the lower right). If you look back at childhood montage in the first update, the first plants are planted in a flowerbox outside of a window.

🍃 #interconnections #intcn_concept

Concept art of Nala and Shoori, who are parents of the main character, Taba. Nala has an orange-red skintone, and it fades into transparent tentacle-dog hair. They have bioluminescent dots along their medusa-like hair tentacles. Nala is inspired by deep sea octopus! Shoori has light brown skin, with dark blue feathery hair that transitions into turquoise. They have a splash of yellow hairs on their forehead. Their coloring is based off of tropical birds.

sketches of hiev and preliminary designs of a new robot-looking character. There are also preliminary designs of hiev's pactforging outfit, which looks like a fluffy cape that is decorated with many jewels.

scrapped kid character designs. There is a mermaid looking character, and the text reads "i used to have a species design that was just... mermaids. (but with more bells and whistles)". There are clothing designs that look like a dress, and another that looks like a long tunic cinched around the waist. There are also character designs that look like a round little fish.

Character designs from my webseries

#oc #ocsky #interconnections #intcn_concept #intcn_shoori #intcn_nala #intcn_hiev #intcn_kowen

Taba as a toddler eating a blue popsicle and wearing a clothing set known as a "flower set"

Diagrams of the evolution of the "flower set". A flower set is the combination of a mantlepiece over the shoulders that looks like an open flower, and a cape that looks like two long leaves. The flower set is often simplified so that it resembles more of the geometric styling of a flower and leaves rather than depicting them in realistic detail. Text reads: Flower Mantles were first created in 9876 by the famous fashion designer Rumir. It was intially pitched as an elegant and formal accessory, and was met with a mixed reception but didn't really catch on. 54 years later, mantels and capes were getting more popular, as were flower themed clothing. Rumir took the opportunity to bring back the flower mantle, but this time as a simple casual accessory set. This more casual version really took off, and now Flower Sets are considered its own type of clothing (like how a trenchcoat, hoodie, or waistcoat is a type of clothing in our world).

fashion concept art for #interconnections #intcn_concept #intcn_taba #intcn_fashion