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vlad (he/they)
what i draw in (program) / what i draw with (brushes)
old art blog: @ffc1cb
i would appreciate it if you didn't follow me exclusively for fanart. i draw whatever i want whenever i want, and i don't like people who feel entitled to art. that being said, i have no way (or desire) to monitor my followers, so you are free to do as you please. i wouldn't know either way
I love mikhail just as much as the next guy AND I adore vampire and "scientist"'s dynamic so much. I NEEEeeD to know how they come to be. I especially love how the scientist can talk back to the vampire despite being the lady's servant
i love how you said the part about mikhail as if there are fans of him, lol. thank you for this ask though because i’ve been meaning to sit down and structure my thoughts about their relationship for a while now (assuming that’s what you’re asking about; if you’re wondering about how i came up with the characters in the first place, i’ve been pretty open about them being knock-offs).
to start off, the doctor (viktor) was heavily based on daniil dankovsky and his research of death, but aside from that, as a character he is also inspired by victor frankenstein and viktor from arcane (hence the name), and their united strife to overcome the shortcoming of humanity and reach beyond what is possible. so before becoming the vampire's (olga) lifelong companion, he (late 30s at the time) was similarly overtaken by a desire to study the nature of human life; specifically ways of prolonging it. his research eventually led him to study and be fascinated by vampirism as a phenomenon (much like his other inspiration, edgar swansea from vampyr), which in turn resulted in him becoming a subject of interest not only for the witch-hunting order (inquisition, basically) but also for olga, who is a powerful vampire. she saw great potential in his research and believed it could benefit greatly from her own knowledge of the undeath, so she approached him with an offer of patronage and protection from the order (like how dracula offers the same to frankenstein in the movie van helsing). viktor readily agreed so olga set him up with a lab in the basement of her hidden residence.
viktor is a very direct person; he doesn’t take kindly to being ordered around and talks to people like they are his equals, regardless of whether they have power over him or not. he was obviously very grateful for olga’s patronage but he immediately made it very clear that he considers their arrangement a partnership rather than ownership, and this audacity was precisely the reason olga liked him so much. being a vampire lord, she was used to people and supernatural beings alike groveling at her feet; it was useful to be feared, but it was also incredibly boring. having viktor around not only satisfied her scientific curiosity but also her longing for companionship.
she grew very attached to him (and him to her) in the time that they spent living together, which is why seeing him age with time disturbed her greatly. eventually she offered for him to be turned, but despite his interest in the undeath, viktor refused. instead he proposed for him to feed on her blood in order to become her ghoul (like in vtm). this action inextricably linked them together and made them dependent on each other; according to vampire traditions it also "officially" made viktor olga’s “servant”, but after a decade of being partners neither of them pay heed to the implied power imbalance. hence why they joke around about it.
"came back wrong" what about Came Back Afraid. You used to be brave. Too brave maybe, defying the odds at every turn, a fighter, cocky, playing with fire, first to throw yourself at the enemy. Until one day it all caught up to you. You came back, somehow, but now you know all too intimately how it feels to lose, to die, to be destroyed. Now you flinch and freeze and cower at the slightest provocation. Who even are you now if you can't be brave? The grave may have let you go, but the mortal fear still grips you tighter than ever.
Thirsty traveler in the desert always chooses to see Hunter-on-Kotya action instead of crawling over to some oasis
this is such a funny ask you should've added alexander block pathologic into this mix so i'd have to draw 3 people with identical faces going down on each other lmao. also now that i think about it i'm not sure mikhail and kotya would like each other, at least not until mikhail is done going through his whole thing (i.e developing as a person). kotya would probably pity him (non-judgementally because she understands his plight more or less) and he'd find it irritating but also be jealous of how (seemingly) easily she figured herself out.
actually if you don't mind i'll use this ask as an opportunity to kind of ramble a bit about the difference in their individual development because recently i've been thinking a lot about the hunter (and in the process uncovering his personality) and i find the contrast between them very interesting. you may or may not know this but both of them were mitosis-ed from block, with the only difference being that kotya had one other character mixed in but mikhail *was* all block. in fact his entire story (and the vampire's, and the doctor's) was initially a pathologic au, which ended up evolving so out of character and unrelated to the original that i decided it would be far more interesting to me to explore it as an original story. with that being said, i think it's very curious how both kotya and mikhail each diverged from their original "dough" in diametrically opposite ways.
for me it was always true that a character will write themselves as opposed to you writing them a specific way, and sometimes what they want to be is wildly different from what you had for them in mind initially. kotya grew into what she is now (heavily cat coded awkward but sweet and whimsical trans woman) because she just decided to, meanwhile mikhail so far is shaping up to be kind of a cunt LOL. with emotional maturity of an infant... i'm genuinely very curious as to where his journey will lead because personally i have no idea i'm just waiting for him to walk me through it. oh the growing pains of becoming a fleshed out character...
i also kind of wonder sometimes if maybe when people (who have played patho) learn that i based the hunter/kotya on block they think that the way i write either of them is indicative of how i perceive block's character and while it is true for some traits (like "religiousness" and the overall aura of like. a man in despair) it's very untrue for a lot of others. for example, kotya has girlish whimsy. mikhail has something much more sinister going on. you know that post that's like, "just make an oc"? doing so actually helped me a lot to revert to my original interpretation of block. but also it wouldn't be possible without me gradually bastardizing him first. really this post puts it very well:
no final point to this post just felt like sharing my thoughts. gives you a glass of water
and now back to the usual tomfoolery
oh good lord / where have you gone? / why have you left me?
hi !! i just wanted to tell you that i really love your art !! every time i scroll through your blog i leave really inspired :] i love the dynamism of your line work, the vibrancy of your colors, and your stylisation of character’s features. you’re truly an inspiration. i hope you’re having a wonderful day
hi! thank you very much... it's really hard for me to internalize the thought that i have a presence in this world so the fact that my art can affect people in positive ways is always very surprising to me, even after more than a decade of posting art online. messages like this help to remind me of that. i'm happy you enjoy my work :)
Great news for Lichen enjoyers! I made a zine 😊 It contains 90% of all my works with her, divided by topic. A bit of lore, some pictures that I have not posted anywhere.
Warning for nudity and of course blood
You can check it on my Boosty for a bit over 2$ or if you are a "bib's beer" subscriber
5 years of art. 62 pages. 100% danblock. all yours just for a shmowder 3 dollars
get it here