Hello folks!! Up for a short story? Well, got one for you with some Art. The Art was created first and later on I came up with the story. I don't know how I started on developing this story but it turned out to be a decent one.
Let me clear this right off the bat, I am not very confident about my writing. From writing I mean, vocabulary, sentence construction and other things that make writing interesting. It is not something I am good at but I really can think of some amazing stories.
So, my point is that story is decent but writing could have been better. Well, I am gonna leave it to you to decide.
Let's first start with the Art and How I made it. It is not going to be a 'step by step' process since, I haven't recorded or strategically saved my files. These images are just a little peek into how I went about creating the finished Art. :))
So, it starts with a random drawing session in which I draw anything without focusing on creating a complete Art but I save them with an intention to revisit them later or sculpting them in 3d.
So, During those drawing sessions, I ended up getting this male character and thought I should paint it.
I enjoy sculpting more than painting but during that time I came across an app that simulates life like colors so painting something was totally making sense to me at that time.
While I was painting this, I was seeing this as a person who was trapped somewhere and looking for a door to open. The situation I just mentioned was not supposed to be taken literally.
The theme I was working on was not so joyous so, I started with a cool palette and tried to establish some dark and light spots on the sketch.
Now, along with painting the face, I kept on refining and adjusting the forms too. Notice, this version looks more 'correct' than the previous one.
Cheeks have been adjusted and the left eye's placement was corrected by pushing it out to the side to avoid the sinking effect.
At this point, more details were added to the sketch and eyes, lips, nose and hair are more defined. A major change done was the pose.
Previously, He was looking over his shoulder but now, He is just standing and looking. Twist of the neck is gone. However, I realized now that previous one was looking much better :'D No worries though as I can always play with my old concepts.
| NOTE: | ||
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| This was after a while coz I stopped working on it for some reasons and then continued working on it after a few weeks. I felt that the previous theme was dissolved and I was moving in some other direction. |
It was looking a bit monotonous to me so, I considered experimenting with it. Influenced by this thought I tried to introduce another color, pretty close to blue but not as cooler.
I then used that color on the bright areas of the face and for the background. The hair and neck area also got some major changes.
This is the final artwork with background. So at this point, the old theme I had in my mind was completely dissolved because of the gap and the a theme emerged and which ultimately was the reason why I placed him on this background.
| For the readers: | ||
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| • This is just my imagination, not a personal experience and the guy in the picture is not my self-portrait. • Images I am using here are not the accurate representation/depiction of characters and places I have in my mind |
It was about 5-6 years from now, me and a few more people (around 6-7) were invited by a friend to a tribal ceremony. Although, his family no longer had a typical tribal life style, there were a few tribal rituals and ceremonies they would perform every year.
The ceremony was almost over and people were moving to the feast now. Being a nature lover, I was more interested in nature, so I was out in the woods walking and enjoying the beauty.
It was around 7:42 PM in the evening and the sun was going down the horizon. It wasn't a very good time to go hiking in nature but it was started to get crowdy and dance celebration was about to start.
I was trying to dodge that part of the function and all the awkwardness it would've brought as I am not a very good dancer.
Anyways, I was trying not to go deep into the jungle since it was getting dark and I didn't want to lose my way back to the venue.
Moving back and forth, I was waiting for the function to end, noticed another person standing nearby enjoying the drink from the feast.
I was strolling there for about one and a half hours in a hope that someone would come and drop us back to our homes or maybe to a nearby bus station.
At that point, I was regretting my decision of accepting the invitation to attend the ceremony as I didn't want to stay all night with that many people around.
I was quite frustrated as I was not enjoying being there anymore. I wasn't expecting the function to be this huge. I turned my head to the other side and shifted my attention to the song of the crickets.
Suddenly, I saw something shining through the bush almost 5 yards away from me. Using my phone's light, I tried to navigate towards the "shiny object" to find out what it is. It was an old chest; covered with mud but very shiny.
Since it was on the tribal land, I deduced it must be their's, and decided to inform the natives. That guy I saw earlier was still there but he was not eating or drinking anything anymore.
I walked to him and said -
"Hey brother, Looks like I found something that might belong to you guys"
He turned and looked at me with no expressions on his face. And next moment, I almost jumped out of my skin 'cause he looked just like me. It felt like I was looking into a mirror. I stared at him in disbelief for 2-3 seconds.
Feeling of confusion and fear took over me. I forgot about the chest and started running towards the establishment as I suspected something was not right there.
After reaching a "safe" distance I turned around and witnessed him fading into thin air. All I saw was a white-grey cloudy figure dissolving gradually.
I could barely see his face now. I kept on running and finally stopped after reaching the venue. I was sweating like a pig and trying to catch my breath. A friend of mine shouted -
"-There he is!!"
I looked at him but said nothing. Everyone was there waiting for me by the same jeep we were arrived in.
"-Ae, whats up, man!! Chased by a coyote or something, haha"
"Lets go!! we are going."
I was relieved to hear that we were finally leaving for our homes.
5 Days went by and I was still shook by that incident as I knew for certain it was not a dream or a figment of my imagination.
It was Sunday, and I was watching a movie while sipping on some tea. My mother came upstairs and told me that Dah'jor (My friend from the ceremony) is here with some traditional sweets from the ceremony.
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I was pretty happy that he visited as he was the perfect person that could lead me in the right direction. After talking to him I came to know about an old Shaman of the tribe that could divulge the mystery of the incident to some extent.
What amazed me was that Dah'jor listened to me seriously and didn't say things that any other person would say, like — "Maybe you were too tired" or "I had hallucinations before. Don't worry about them just take this vitamin and yada yada."
Perhaps, he heard of similar incidences from the old tribal people.
Next day, I went to the village to meet the shaman. After reaching there, I started getting those strange vibes of the same night. That feeling was so unpleasant that I started thinking about leaving at once, yet a part of me convinced me to stay and Look for Hanuki, The Shaman.
After around 20 minutes of talking to some locals, I finally found his Hut. It was made up of Logs and tribal Patterns were painted all over them. It was a beautiful place.
There was a girl who was in her mid twenties, stopped me from entering the Hut.
"What do you want?" — She asked.
"I am looking for Mr. Hanuki" — I responded.
"Hes not home, come tomorrow or day after" — She said rather impolitely.
"—It is urgent, please"
After a few minutes of futile efforts of convincing her, I finally had enough and decided to leave.
"Will he be home tomorrow?" — I asked the girl.
Before she could say anything, an old man came out of the Hut. He was a well dressed old man with long white hair and a happy-calm face. He seemed very active for his age.
"Are you... Are you Mr. Hanuki? coz I really need your advice, Please" — I said.
"Come on in" — He responded With a slight smile on his face.
I thanked Mr. Hanuki for letting me in and started telling him about what happened on the night of the ceremony. After listening to the whole incidence, Mr. Hanuki stayed silent for a minute or two like he was thinking about something very serious.
Then He looked at me and said — "Are you sure this really happened?" followed by a brief laugh.
"— It REEALLY happened, I was not in the jungle, on my back, dreaming."
annoyance was visible in my voice, as I had a feeling by his initial reaction that I am not gonna get anything and I just wasted my time.
"Well, I had to make sure, I have seen one too" — He added further.
"— Ohh?? You...You too? so you knew what I was talking about all along."
"Yes" — He said with a smile on his face.
"They are — Ronhtoras.
You may refer to them as...umm.. Phantoms. other worldly entities who are harmless and sometimes manifest themselves in this reality.
You are lucky you saw one. They are a rare sight and don't stick around once they reveal themselves to you. We call them Messengers"
"— Messengers?
**"Yeah, Messengers with a message, most likely a positive one. he he! ** /slurp!/" — He said while sipping his drink.
— "I don't understand...why.. why he had my face?" — I asked.
"I don't have a perfect answer for your question but they tend to morph into someone they set their focus on."
"I don't know why..." — he continued. "Even the old Shamans had no idea as ronhtoras are very rare sight and they don't interact. In the documented history of the shamans of our tribe, we found only 6 mentions of the encounters with them. You are the 7th."
"Hmm, it is getting interesting. You said you have seen one. Can you share your experience?" — I said.
He calmly looked at me at started — "I was 15 old boy, out in the woods looking to collect some honey and a handful of berries."
"I was unwillingly searching for those things as in my thoughts was my mother... who passed away few months ago from an unknown illness." — He said in rather serious tone.
"I was walking aimlessly, deep into the jungle and was feeling tired as I was on my feet for so long. I decided to stop and settled down on a rock."
"Almost 2 hours went by. Memories of my deceased mother started visiting me. My eyes were full of tears and heart with sadness. I was so angry and cursing God for taking my mother away.
In this process of missing my mother and hating the God, Something caught my attention."
"It was a bird, a very beautiful and colorful bird with vibrant glowing feathers.
I got up and walked towards the bird slowly and quietly in a hope to take a closer look but the bird made me and flew away."
Image by markaharper1 (Wikimedia Commons)
"I never saw a bird that beautiful before and I didn't want to lose it from my sight so I tried running after it but I had to stopped shortly after as It was too fast for me, heh heh." — He Chuckled.
"I was hungry and tired, so I decided to go back. Now, this is where it happened. As soon as I made a turn, I saw my mother standing at around roughly 20 or 30 steps away from me. I got scared at first but started walking slowly towards my mother and she started dissolving just like as you mentioned in your experience..."
"...How do you know that it was a Rontah..." — I brazenly cut him off.
"Ronhtora!" — He corrected me.
"Yes!! and why didn't it morphed into you but your mother?"
"For what I have understood, They are more sensitive to the spirits than to humans..." — Said Mr. Hanuki
"...and I found out that, at that time I was accompanied by my mother's spirit. During the encounter, The Ronhtora being sensitive to the spirits, saw my mother's spirit first and transformed into my mother which made me feel that my mother was standing before me."
After a short pause, Mr. Hanuki continued - "After this incident, I ran back to my village and told my grandfather everything I saw. He was the head Shaman of that time and I was training under him.
That day, I learned about the Ronhtoras through my grandfather and the message for me was, that, 'death' doesn't really exist, my mother is still alive and still with me. so I had absolutely no reason to be sad and cry."
"It all makes sense now" — I said "But what message it has for me?"
"Figure it out yourself. Analyze what you saw, the chest, everything you see him eating or drinking and try to make sense of it." — Mr. Hanuki replied.
"I hope I answered some of your questions." — He added with a gentle smile on his face.
He indeed answered a lot of questions for me. I thanked him for his valuable time and all the help, before I left. A phantom came with a message for me. This is Unbelievable!!
I tried to decipher this incident to discover the hidden message and came up with some messages that made some sense considering every scenario of my life but still, this incident remained an enigma for me and I am still looking for an answer to this day.
The End
Thats it, my friends!! Thanks if you have read the story to the end. I hope you liked the story. I am determined to rewrite a more detailed and elaborated version in the future and who knows an animated short.
The story, characters and names are completely my creations. I might draw the basic sketches of the main characters to provide you a better view of how I see them.
If you have any thoughts about the art and the story, please share in you comments guys.
