#& out of dracula's curse. )

[draculadrawalong]

May 2 - Prelude

Dracula Daily starts tomorrow, but in the meantime our dear friend jonathan harker is dealing with some train delays. 🕒🚂 Hopefully everything's gonna work out once he gets to the Count's castle

[wyverncult]

JUST NOTICED I NEVER POSTED THIS ISAAC? i'm so sorry for keeping him from you

[chibishortdeath]

Random doodles, a rare Richter moment too lol

Explanations and such:

Simon gaming and Richter is watching :). The text says “(Richter) Whatcha playin :3”, “(Simon) FUCK”, “(he got a Safe in Project Diva)”, “(Richter) Oh, I see.”. He was playing the song Gothic and Loneliness btw. On one of the harder modes. Almost perfected it 😔.

The top doodle is just Simon with sharp teeth, idk maybe they’re like left over from the curse or something lol. Bottom drawing is an attempt at drawing their Smash Bros outfits by memory since I haven’t in a long time.

Slime scooping videos will be the death of me I keep getting stuck watching like a ton of them and I don’t even know why 💀💀💀. So I drew Simon doing that cause uh yeah XD.

Text says “both overwhelmed”. Just imagine this is both of them after some long social event lol.

Rare Richter section of a page! It’s also a Mesmerizer reference 💀💀💀. I was gonna draw Alucard to compliment this, but I completely forgot and had already put other things on the page next to it so eeeehhhh. Richter’s hair is very fun, but I draw it differently every time. Then again I feel like it’s probably a texture where it kinda curls at a certain length and goes everywhere, so it works. I like to think that he’d always had it short enough that it didn’t curl before SotN and was surprised lol.

Yay drawing characters you like doing things you do part 2, Simon is drawing :3. He’d probably draw like some of the most violent and concerning but technically impressive imagery and then follow that up immediately with a page of cute animals and some character (idk I’ve already made him play Project Diva in this post let’s say Rin or Miku as an example lmao)

Text says “love this guy, the Richard”. Haha yeah, the Richer, Mr Richter Scale Belmont.

Random doodle of Simon wearing clothes cause I was listening to music and got the vibes. I don’t remember what song tho unfortunately (TwT).

[goblins-riddles-or-frocks]

give me Vanessa and Hecate interacting as foils!!!!! I don’t CARE about Ethan 😭😭😭

[see-arcane]

Wait the actual word fuck existed in Victorian times?

It sure fucking did!

That era got a lot of today's popular swears rolling, it seems.

Fast forward to 5:30 here, and you'll see--surprise!--it was the Victorian English who were more classically foul-mouthed than the Americans of the time. Victorians were using bodily curses (Fuck you!) while Americans were focused on literally profane (Goddamn it!) terms due to what each side considered more taboo. Victorians got their hackles up more over bodily/sexual repression versus Americans who were uptight about religion. Our swears focus on what we're most finicky about and use it for vulgar impact.

...Which is a long way of saying that, historically speaking, and without Stoker's literary muzzling of the dialogue, Quincey Morris would have the canonically least-effective cursing ability out of all his Victorian buddies. I truly believe that even with all the period accurate 'God damn its,' and 'Go to Hells,' our favorite cowboy would not last one blue streak minute with Jonathan's...less than censored thoughts post-October 3rd.

Which is an even longer way of saying I think Jack was being very, very delicate about what all Jonathan actually had to say about the Count after that eventful night.

If not, he'd have to take up another wax cylinder for all the extra colorful words.

[heredis-sanguinis]

//Last week @piltover-sharpshooter made me aware that a new remastered bundle was coming out of Castlevania Portrait of Ruin, Order of Ecclesia and Dawn of Sorrow.

My wallet wept, because I already got Visions of Mana and Tales of Arise mere days priot to that.

Fast foward a couple of days and I cleared Dawn of Sorrow with almost 100% completion of the map AND all souls collected. And now on another run on hard mode Julius Mode, for the last achievement.

[ariaofsorrows]

alucard being a pisces-aries cusp… i get him now

[nemojti]

Netflix Castlevania but it's their original sprite designs from Dracula's Curse lol

[the-crow-binary]

A little guide for me, and a bit for @beevean ❤️ The differences between Hector and Joachim, at least in my style.

In short: Hector is more square-shaped, while Joachim is softer-looking ❤️

[schlock-luster-video]

Remembering horror film icon Christopher Lee on the anniversary of his death.

R.I.P. (1922 - 2015)

[mewkwota]

For those who have sat through this wild thing, I swear we were going to round back to the source of all this evil (Dracula aside). And so ends the story of the flippin’ Richter Doll. Don’t worry, it’s in very good hands-- as we had learned from the previous part.

[chibishortdeath]

This is based off of an audio clip from Silent Hill, a game I sadly have not gotten to play yet :(, but I saw someone else’s animation of the clip and got really inspired by it. Idk if I’ll ever actually animate this scene or anything, but it got me to draw Hector and Julia so it was worth it lol

[beevean]

Having Thought again about Hector (and this time I'm talking about the real Hector) being called a child, or implicitly called naive - and how this is an important trait of his character.

Under cut because it's image heavy. Because I cannot and will not shut up :P

The laundry hanging scene is mostly there for fluff after the harrowing Hector vs. Isaac fight, but you can infer a lot from it.

Hector? Oh, you're in the shade again. It's not healthy. Come on! I need your help with something. The clothesline has broken, and I need a man's help. Ahh, you're pulling too hard, Hector! The branch will break!

Rosaly asks for a "man's help", but discovers that Hector can't do so much as hang laundry. He pulls too hard: Hector is a former fighter, so his first instinct is to use a lot of his strength (and he may even be superhumanly strong due to his powers). He probably never had to calibrate it in his life.

Rosaly: You’ve never done laundry before, have you? Well, this should be fine, thank you. Hector: Let me help you… Rosaly: No! Stop! That’s my…!

Then he takes Rosaly's clothes without permission: he really wants to help after that first embarrassment, but he doesn't seem to think that maybe it's a bit rude to rummage through a woman's underwear :P

It's all played for laughs, but it's also sad. Hector didn't have the chance to live a normal life. No one taught him how to live in human society, and then he wasted half of his life under Dracula's service. It's all new to him.

Haha, you’re so funny, Hector. With such pretty silver hair and such a pretty face…

But Rosaly doesn't judge him, doesn't think he's weird: she's honestly endeared by his clumsiness. (get yourself a so that doesn't make you feel bad for being different in common things 🥺) As I said in an older post:

He's not naive in the "easily trusting" sense: he hasn't lived in the human world enough to learn about it, except for hatred and rejection, and even simple things like hanging laundry don't come easy to him. But he wants to learn and he wants to help, much like a child would. And well. Rosaly knows how to take care of children without a home :) Where Hector sees nothing but a curse and sin, Rosaly sees innocence. She's idealistic, perhaps to a fault, but perhaps believing in the inherent goodness of others can pay off.

Rosaly: You’re just like a child… Hector: Where are my armor and sword? Rosaly: No. You've been bedridden for a week and only woke up yesterday. Hector: But I can't stay here.

Yet, interesting that this is when Hector asks for his sword and armor. He explains that he's afraid of attracting monsters again like the werewolf, but I also read shame in his expression. Rosaly means well, but I can imagine Hector doesn't like being compared to a child (especially if he associated childhood with being weak and hated). Maybe part of him even resents that she is right, and his instinct is to wanting to go back, to hide, to fight.

(or maybe he's just hella embarrassed that he was called "pretty" out of nowhere lol rosaly has excellent tastes)

It's also worth mentioning that, while Rosaly is never explicitly called a "womanchild" or naive, she seems to be considered as such by the others. She is called "too nice", because she overworks herself for little, and most importantly because she is allowing a complete stranger inside her home without knowing anything about him, ignoring the danger.

(in fact, Ted here calls Rosaly ���人好し, which means "good-natured person" but with connotations of being a fool. This is after she brushed off Ted's concerns about Hector because "he has pretty eyes and birds seem to like him" :P)

Even Hector is unnerved by her attitude.

Rosaly: You were worried about us. Thank you, you are such a kind person. Hector: You take everything as a good thing... No, I'm sorry. Why don't you ask me? Haven't you heard anything from that kid? What did I do, what did I escape from? How did I kill that werewolf? …Who am I and where did I come from?

Rosaly's lack of curiosity and tendency to always assume the best of Hector is terrifying for him. He's waiting for the other shoe to drop, so that she'll know him and then hate him like everyone else. Who does this? Who just allows anyone to help with chores, and then finds cute when they can't do it? Who just welcomes someone in their home without caring about where they came from? It's weird. Rosaly is weird. Just as weird as Hector, a grown man who can't stay with other people and hasn't learned basic matters.

Being in touch with the blessings of the earth, feeling the seasons in the cold water... Seeing everyone’s smiles, having a meal with someone, going to bed grateful that the day has ended safely... All of these are wonderful things that are hard to come by. I have received everything I want from everyone.

Of course, the difference is that Rosaly is not naive due to lack of experience. She chooses to be stubbornly optimistic. She will love everyone to death. You have no choice.

And her relentless optimism is what allows her to see past Hector's barriers and mistery. He's just a good person to her, nothing more and nothing less.

Your name is Hector, you have beautiful silver hair, you were injured, you never did laundry, and you helped me and Ted. That's enough for me.

Another thing is that, Rosaly doesn't need Hector for household chores. She seems to be living alone just fine, and in fact she is the one who always helps others. So this is not really for her benefit: it's for Hector's. It's to give him something to do instead of drowning in his own thoughts. It's to make him feel less alone. There is symbolism in how Hector is still standing in the shadow, not hiding but still not ready to face the human world, and Rosaly says it's not healthy and drags him out to enjoy the sunlight, which he eventually accepts.

Hector is a proud, competent, intelligent man and warrior, but he's also a stunted child who has cowered from the world for years. Rosaly, without knowing anything about him and his upbringing, but sensing that something is different about him, is happy to show him the world and let him grow. Not because Hector is needed, but because he is wanted and welcomed.

My adoptive parents died a long time ago, so now I'm the only one here. So yeah, I would really love it if you stayed here.

Rosaly is used to live alone... but what if two lonely people lived together and helped each other?

In case it wasn't clear, the parallels between the beloveds fill me with warmth and joy :)

PtR gives us a similar concept, but with different characterizations:

"The unspent ferry fare for the Nether Rivers... to make up for it…"

"Worn-out and shiny? Thank you for the thought, but they'll think I stole it... I wonder if you don't know the world..."

Interestingly, here Hector's naiveté is painted in a more traditional manner. Sure, there's the heartbreaking part of him paying Rosaly for her basic kindness, because he is that foreign to the idea that he can be cared for without giving anything in return; and there's the symbolic part where he refers to the belt as pretty much the Charon's obol he had failed to pay, because he had planned to die but Rosaly saved his life so she is the one who gets to be paid. But Rosaly can't accept the gift for sensible reasons: it's too ostentatious, and she can't go around with it without drawing unwanted attention. Remember that this is also a time of witch hunts, and people are growing angrier and more suspicious, secretly due to the Curse.

Hector wouldn't know it. He lived isolated in the castle for years, so isolated that he couldn't hear the scream inside the stone walls. So for him it's a very straightforward reasoning: this woman is showing kindness to me, so I'll pay her with the most precious thing I own. (and even then I have my own ideas about that belt and why he has it)

Btw, this naiveté is not completely gone by CoD. He's surprisingly earnest with Julia when he meets her, revealing his background to a stranger. Thankfully nothing bad comes from it, but she seems to be much more guarded than him. I like to see this as a sign that he mellowed out after Rosaly :) or maybe he's just a gentleman lol.

Anyway I love Hector so much and I find it a more complex, vulnerable and relatable character than most assume 💖

[theheadlessgroom]

@beatingheart-bride

Randall's breath hitched at the touch of her Cupid's-bow lips against his bony hands, to say nothing of his heart fluttering at the notion that his presence made his bride's life, topsy-turvy though it was now, a little easier. It was all he could hope for; that after everything she'd been through (then and now), he could be a light for her, just as she'd been one for him.

Wanting to lighten the mood, to move away from this topic (even though she'd reassured him that she wasn't upset, he still didn't want to press it), he instead chose to ask her, "Tell me, darling, tell me about some of your happier memories from...the future. You've told me about all the parties Dorian threw, but what did we do together?"

Although the idea of living in an attic, the very place their lives came to an end, sounded a bit morbid to him (though, perhaps, ghosts had a different perspective on that sort of thing?), he loved what Emily had told him so far, how cozy they made their little home together, turning it from a mere storeroom to a place all their own, adding their own personal touches to it. It was an unusual place to call home, sure, but it was theirs, and all she'd told him about it, it sounded really quite lovely-it sounded like they made some wonderful memories there.

[nostromo130]

[Image ID: a lineup of 4 non-player characters from my D&D campaign. from left to right. first is a tiefling with orange-red skin, short brown hair, and grey eyes. their left horn is broken. they wear a black cloak, brown leather armour, striped pants and are holding a hunting knife. next is a half-elf man with dark brown skin. his dark brown hair has a grey streak and he is holding a cane. He has two designs. the first wears a black coat, grey pants, white gloves, and little round glasses. the second is a ringmaster-style costume: green tailcoat with silver embroidery, white pants, and he's also wearing some pale blue eyeshadow. In both his shoes are splattered with blood. Next is a white human man with white hair and red eyes. He wears a black suit with red lapels and a grey waistcoat. He is holding a wooden stake. Lastly, a human woman with brown skin and hair. Her eyes are red and she wears a white collared shirt with poofy sleeves and a long grey skirt. She has a chatelaine. They are all standing in a row against a grey background. End ID]

lineup for a dnd campaign heavily based off of curse of strahd. left to right: ezra d'avenir, dr. rudolph van richten, rictavio, lon godfrey, moira godfrey

[deadinarussianelevator]

Listen I'm not saying that Harry Potter was modeled after Mina Harker but...

scar on forehead

a part of the villain lives within them

reverse mind reading

being excluded from conversations and planning because of the mind reading thing