#(if anyone even made it this far jxcnbkjkjxbnkcb)

[angeart]

Could totally do au rambles you say?? Tell me about this forest curse au? 🤲🤲🤲❤️

CURSED FOREST AU!!! yesss <3

i will warn, this might be a long ramble. (edit: it is a VERY long ramble) this is the au me and @stiffyck are insane about. i will also say, this idea was thrown out as a horror au. aaand as such, the most important content warnings are body horror and animal death. please be aware.

it's set in a fantasy setting, and the forest isn't actually cursed. it's the people who come there, each bearing their own unique curse, then choosing to stay there with the others (found family boatem <3)

i'll put the au ramble under the cut here.

It all starts with Scar, who is a necromancer. Now, necromancy is scorned upon, it's a forbidden magic and people hate it. Which then means they hate Scar.

Necromancy works in two ways: one is raising human corpses/skeletons, in which case, Scar would need to focus and consciously manipulate them, like a pupeteer. They do not move on their own. However, animals are a different story. Resurrected animals continue behaving as if they were alive, independent of Scar. They are technically not alive, though. If they get hurt, their bodies will not heal. (Jellie is a resurrected cat. Yes, there's a whole story behind this.)

So, Scar is hated and he has nowhere to go and maybe he raises dead just because he's lonely and desperate to understand himself. Down the line, he gets cursed by someone, and his curse is one of shapeshifting, which might sound cool, but here's the thing: Scar doesn't know. He doesn't know he could willingly change shapes, he doesn't know how to control it, and even if he knew how, it'd be an incredibly painful process. But not shifting isn't an option—the curse, when idle, lashes out. What this means is Scar's bones just randomly snap and break. They do heal quickly enough, but it doesn't take away from the pain of it.

In the end, Scar finds himself settling in a forest. Away from everyone. There's nobody who'd care about him and he's so tired of being hated. So he settles in an isolated forest. And he raises dead animals for company.

Now, enter Grian.

Grian, unlike Scar, has a nature magic. He used to be an animal healer. One day, someone's pet died in his care. Not to the lack of trying—he did everything he could. Still, it wasn't enough, and it didn't matter. On top of his own guilt and grief, Grian got cursed by the pet owner.

The curse causes Grian to randomly pass out/fall asleep. When this happens, his mind gets transferred into a body of a random nearby animal. He gets to be the animal for a bit, but once he wakes up, that animal dies. Every time. There's no way around it. He can't stop himself from passing out, he can't stop himself from controlling the animal, he can't stop them from dying.

Needless to say, he's not having a great time.

He doesn't stay as an animal healer. He can't handle the possibility of hurting the animals he's supposed to take care of on the off chance that he passes out near them. He goes away, but it doesn't matter how far he goes, the curse follows.

That's when he finds Scar's forest.

He stumbles upon Scar reviving an animal, and it startles both of them in different ways. Scar is used to be hated. To be judged. To be hurt. He feels like he needs to hide. Like there'll be backlash, any second now. But... it doesn't come. Instead, Grian looks relieved. He watches Scar do his magic, watches the animal start to move again, and for the first time in a very long time, he feels something akin to hope.

So he stays. He lingers.

This surprises Scar, because nobody ever stays around in this forest. He doesn't even know where Grian is sleeping. There's no place for him to sleep, no other houses, no bed. Does he just, sleep outside?

Scar doesn't know Grian avoids sleep like a plague (he has nightmares), and his "naps" always happen inconveniently (passing out), so yes, at this point, Grian sleeps outside in random places.

One day, Scar comes across Grian sleeping in a meadow in the middle of the day. Oddly, he can't seem to be able to wake him up. Later on, Grian comes to him, holding a bundle of something furry in his hands. He looks wretched.

He presents Scar with the dead animal, asking if he can "fix it".

This is when things properly start. Because even though Scar is confused—why is Grian so upset about this random dead animal, if it doesn't belong to him? What is he even doing here, why has Grian nowhere to go back to?—he's impossibly, desperately drawn to the idea of having someone around. Someone who doesn't hate him.

So he invites Grian to stay.

There's only one house at this point, so they make Grian a bed and they sleep in the same room.

Well, sleep. Grian avoids sleep. (At some point Scar catches on.)

And when Grian does sleep, he has nightmares.

Scar sometimes wakes up screaming too. In pain. When his bones break in the middle of the night.

They're both a mess, okay? But now they have each other there. For tentative comfort. For attempts at softness and safety, even though they still don't know about each other's curse.

They learn eventually, of course. At some point, when Grian feels like maybe Scar won't send him away (he kills animals after all, he's so so scared to admit it), they talk.

Scar doesn't send him away. Grian keeps bringing dead animals to him, and Scar does his best to revive all of them that he can. (This means, over the time, the forest fills with undead animals—random travellers who stumble upon this give the forest its name, the cursed forest, and attach a warning to it.)

Sometimes, Scar can't save Grian's animals. As they don't heal once they're dead—for example, if a bird falls when Grian wakes up, and it breaks its wings? It's more merciful to leave it be. They have a collection of graves like these. Scar carves skulls of the animals into the stone to mark them. Grian sometimes sits there, heart full of apologies and guilt and grief.

I'm going to move on to Mumbo now. And Stiff's idea here is so very interesting! Mumbo is a potion maker. He loves to try things, to tinker, to improve. He likes his craft. But. People don't.

People don't like potion makers. It's seen as a last option. Because the transaction involves trust. Because it's something they don't understand and they can't confirm. They have no way of knowing if the purchased potion actually does what the potion maker claims it does. Does it really heal? Is it a poison? Is it a truth potion? Is it just an overpriced drink that does nothing? Is it something harmful that will force them to come back and buy another potion to fix it?

So people are distrustful of potions. There's no real way to know if what you're getting is what you need. But Mumbo finds them intriguing and it's the one thing he's good at, and he doesn't want to give it up.

Mumbo's curse is hypnotising people, taking control of them in a way where they'll do what he says. It happens when he looks them in the eye. It makes him dizzy.

When Mumbo stumbles upon the forest, he's nervous. He's a travelling potion maker, never welcome anywhere for too long, and there's this scary forest with a terrifying reputation and Mumbo has to pass through.

He's so anxious about it—only to find that two animal-loving idiots live there. And Mumbo pulls himself together and goes to check if they need potions. Fully expecting to be turned away.

They don't turn him away. Scar's bones keep breaking and they could definitely use some potions for easier healing.

It's Grian who begs Mumbo to stay. He begs him to stay for Scar.

And Mumbo stammers an agreement, caught off guard. For the first time in his life, he feels wanted and useful. Appreciated. Trusted, even, on top of that.

They also find use for his hypnotising curse—when Scar's in too much pain, he asks Mumbo to hypnotise him, because it helps numb the pain.

So Mumbo makes his home in a forest that is a little bit weird, a little bit spooky (Scar has a strange sense of humour and leans into the rumours; he decorates the trees with skeletones and bones). But Mumbo figures, he's a little bit weird, too. So maybe that just means he finally fits in somewhere.

Then we have Pearl. Pearl used to be a healer. She helped people when they were hurt or sick, but sometimes she also recognised when people were beyond saving, suggesting "letting them pass on peacefully" (or in other words, "putting them to sleep"). Similar to what happened with Grian, this made some grieving people very unhappy, and led to Pear getting cursed.

Pearl's curse makes her extremely tired, in a way where she can only gain energy from other people. But it causes the other people crash from exhaustion—so she literally puts them to sleep.

She doesn't know how to fix herself or where to go with this. She's aimless, a little bit lost. Alone. Tired. So, so tired from being driven away from everywhere.

Until she reaches the cursed forest. She doesn't expect much. Maybe she'll just pass through. But she is so weary, and she finds houses, and maybe she could rest for a bit?

They find out what she does, and she expects yelling and threats, she expects them to be mad, to tell her to go away and never come back, but— They don't. They don't do any of that.

They look at her, take it in, and they don't send her away.

Instead, Scar begs her to stay. Because Grian needs sleep. Grian needs help sleeping safely. He's been avoiding it, due to the nightmares, but it's edging a limit and Scar is worried about him, and this could help.

So Pearl stays. And she's bewildered and it takes her a while for it all to sink in: that they want her here. That she can maybe help them.

That first nigtht when Scar and Grian spontaneously come over to her, asking if they can take a nap there? She's so startled, because usually people hate that she puts them under, that she can control them and make them pass out like that. But these two just came willingly to her doorstep asking her to do it to them.

She doesn't know what to think that first time.

But they keep coming back.

Later, they make sleepover parties at her house. It's all of them curled up around her, and she's still flabbergasted by the trust, by the way they let her do this.

The fog of exhaustion hanging over her finally starts to relent. And she thinks maybe she can be herself after all. Maybe it's okay to be who she is. Maybe it doesn't actually have to hurt or scare anyone. Maybe she can actually help and be a proper part of this little community they're building here.

Then we have Impulse! Impulse is a devil spawn or a half demon or something like that. He has horns, which gives him away. He's never done anything bad, never intentionally hurt anybody, but being good is not good enough, because people take one look at him and expect him to be evil. So he didn't do anything bad, but he got cursed anyway.

The idea of the curse is to warn people away from him. To "show his true nature" before people have a chance to get tricked. Basically, it distorts the perception of people around him—sort of like hallucinations (auditory, visual, the whole package).

It happens more often than not when Impulse feels strong emotions. It just unfolds in an area around him, and anyone who's near enough gets to experience something personally tailored to their own fears. It's disturbing. It's terrifying. Impulse can't control it.

When he comes to the forest, he doesn't get sent away for what he is (which is the first for him), and he's so scared that they'll send him away because of his curse instead. And it's this building anxiety that actually makes the curse flare out for the first time in the forest.

Impulse scrambles to soothe them, to calm them down, hurriedly explaining through his (and theirs) panic what's happening.

They still don't send him away. They know how it feels to be relentlessly followed by a curse and by hate. They promise him they'll figure it out.

Over time, they mostly learn to recognise where the hallucinations start and end—so that they don't have to always be afraid around him. They also recognise that they happen the most when Impulse is distressed, so whenever things start looking scary, they go and find Impulse to check up on him and make sure that he is okay.

(This is from the discord rambles: imagine them being enveloped in a very dark, disturbing hallucination. and instead of cowering or running away or panicking, they'd search through it, find impulse, and beeline straight to him. gently take hold of him and ask if he is okay. and how can they help)

The hallucinations add a nice flavour to things, because they can trigger other curses—think Scar panicking and breaking a bone, or seeing something and raising a dead creature to defend himself. Think Grian with waking nightmares thrown into the mix. Or him passed out, transformed into a small animal, already defenceless and vulnerable, when everything around him starts distorting into terrifying things.

Also, it's harder to know it's a hallucination when they don't know that Impulse is nearby.

They're still trying to work though it. To be there for each other.

Now, Boatem, right? And this is silly, but listen.

One evening, Impulse tells the others a story about a boat. It's a random silly story. His voice is fond when he says it. Everyone listens intently. (They all like stories.)

Both Grian and Scar like crafting items, and once when they have a sleepless night, they decide to distract themselves with crafting. They think of their new friend, and boom, suddenly a bunch of boats have been made.

They wonder how tall the boats would be if they stacked them on top of each other.

"Would they be taller than Mumbo?"

"Bet."

Others joke that maybe Scar and Grian need a different hobby, because making a pile of boats in the middle of a forest where nobody needds boats is a bit bonkers. (They don't care and make another boat.)

Impulse loves it, because it means they all remembered his story. It's very nice.

Then they all come together to decorate the boats. Grian uses nature magic—flowers and vines and moss. Scar decorates with bones. Mumbo uses his potion skills to stain the wood and make it colourful. Pearl carves into the wood and Impulse draws on it, creating little stories. (Jellie pitches in with her claws and mice offerings.)

====

Now, we do have a lot of different little scenes and ideas for this au. I think one of my favourite ones are the dancing scenes.

Scar used to dance with skeletons when he wanted some comfort. A gentle sway, being held. That kind of thing. But he's also good at dancing overall.

Grian doesn't know how to dance. So Scar teaches him—using a skeleton puppet. Think Grian huffing "When can I dance with you?" and Scar laughing under his breath: "When you stop stepping on the skeleton's feet."

Think of the first time Grian gets his steps right. He beams at Scar and bounces over, all excited, "Now will you dance with me?"

Think of Scar not used to actual soft warm hands on him. Not used to the firmness of human touch, the way it sends sparks across his skin. He's not used to this. It's making his head spin. It's making his knees weak.

Scar, who is expert at dancing, stumbles through his first dance with Grian, helplessly distracted by Grian's touch, by the body under his own hands, by the actual warmth of a living person. By the way it feels to dance with someone who looks back at him, who grins at him, wide and toothy and overjoyed. The way Grian wants to dance with him, not because Scar made him want it. He just does.

Scar has to stop midway through the dance. He feels so overwhelmed.

Grian teases him for stumbling when Scar's the one who's supposed to know how to dance. And Scar admits he doesn't remember the last time he danced with someone actually living.

Grian smiles at him fondly—so gentle and soft—and he suggest they take it down a notch. They can just slow dance.

And that's something Scar used to do with skeletons to self-soothe—he used it for comfort for so long. And now he's being held by Grian. He's no longer alone. There's someone who doesn't shy away from him. Someone willing to hold him gently.

Scar sways with him and he buries in face in Grian's shoulder and sobs as they dance.

===

ANYWAY, that all being said. Art!!

You've probably seen my art of the cursed forest au - with Grian being upset over a dead animal, and Scar coming over to cheer him up. There's little details there—the flowers in Scar's hair were gifted to him by Grian, and they're kept fresh by nature magic. They're made to last. The bone necklace Grian wears is a gift from Scar. He was nervous to give it to him, but death and bones are the only things he knows, so he did it anyway. And Grian wears it happily, and it makes Scar's heart ache—he feels accepted.

Stiffy also made art for this au!! It's Scar dancing with a skeleton and IT'S ABSOLUTELY AMAZING PLEASE GO LOOK AT IT but also before you do, cw bright colours, eye strain. HERE IS THE LINK.

I think that's. Uh. Enough from me for now.

@stiffyck if you want to add anything go ahead <3