Made a fan book cover of shadow slave
Sunny descending into the sky below
Some notes:
I know he doesn’t see the puppeteer’s shroud at the end of his descent, but I really like his tattered rags look when he emerged from the crimson spire. So since he just got off a fight with a demon I made it similarly rag-like.
Modeled the fabric part of the puppeteer’s shroud after Joseon dynasty funeral shrouds which often have bloodstains. Felt fitting since there is a lot of Chinese/Korean references in the text
I gave him arm and leg greaves and carapace-like shoulder guards (pauldrons)
Was gonna make his hair longer but I have found out that long hair for guys is short compared to a girl’s idea of long hair lol
Made dark wing actual locust wings for the cool look
Even though he doesn’t swing on prowling thorn at this juncture thought it would look cool as a line element. Compositionally he is supposed to be like a helix swirling along a powerful diagonal. Very baroque.
All in all, is it perfectly accurate to the actual scene? No. But it's a combination of equipment/armor that looks cool and would invite the reader to want to open the book. I similarly didn’t include some elements like the covetous coffer for simplicity. I wanted sunny to be the main focus.
I know he could make him look younger but I leaned into the gaunt and sharp-featured part more than the young part. He’s supposed to be starving for weeks by this point.