#i want to draw the other female MCs in my repertoire

[alteredphoenix]

A collage of some of the leading ladies in a few of my stories I’ve drawn throughout the years. From left to right, earliest to newest:

- Ladio, a husky/shepherd mix, who is apprenticing under her adopted mother to be a field medic and eventually accrues an internship at a neighboring country’s military base. She is friends with Shadow Fox. She is one of the few husky anthros that lives in her community, and a rarity as one who is also of mixed heritage. Although she is still a teenager and she is still figuring out what she wants out of life, she enjoys her studies and hopes that one day it will lead her to finding out who her birth parents were and if the fabled Deep Six City, a community comprised solely of huskies, actually exists.

(Notes: Notably the first anthro I’ve made. She’s kind of flip-flopped between being influenced from Star Fox Adventures, Sonic, and - even I’m shocked when I look back on it - Dragon Ball Z (to be fair, it was one of my first anime, back in the day. But since Ladio’s universe is a hot pot of anthros, reptilians, humans, robots and cyborgs, fairies, and aliens and all manner of creatures, I shouldn’t be so surprised.)

- Jinkei Haotome, a high school student who can wield phoenix fire in an urban fantasy world that leans hard into the concept of Guardians of the Four Directions from Asian mythology. Her favorite subject is mathematical topology. Is not Japanese; it’s just a cool name I came up with in middle school, so it’s stuck with her ever since. 

(Notes: She’s pretty much a more hot-blooded, foul-mouthed Kusanagi Kyo from King of Fighters but she takes her academic studies more seriously...somewhat. AFAIK I never made a K’ or Iori expy to compliment her; a shame, really. She did start out as a KoF/SNK OC mentoring under the Sakazaki Team, though.)

- Rita Lusaloff, a girl trained in the swordsmanship and born with a left-handed astrolabe, a rare birthright that is only found in left-handed people that are able to use all magical elements. When she was nine her parents gave her up to be fostered by an elf to be cared for and trained in astral arts due to prejudice to those that bear the mark of the astrolabe.

(Notes: She has some heavy Tales of series influence, mainly Abyss...but between her and Luke, she’s much more grounded and is her age (19). There is also some Code Geass inspiration, but I don’t see Rita as someone who would ever be as morally grey as Lelouch is. If I had to describe what Rita’s personality is most like among the Tales of protagonists, I would say Lloyd - but with more education, but both share the same level of idealism.)

- Maaya Lawson (biologically born Maaya Endomere), the leading military commander, or Lord-General, in the country she trained and served - but not of her own will; prior to this, she was a law enforcement officer. She is the youngest person to hold the title, with the misfortune - or, as some would say, good fortune - of being the first human lycan to sit in office; because of ongoing hostilities between humans and non-humans, she is regarded with hostility by most of the public and as a result has only very few friends. She loves wolfdogs and has a pack that is bred for psychic attunement, all of whom serve as emotional support and jogging partners. The white-blue portion of her hair and sharp blue eyes indicates her lycanthropic nature.

(Notes: She surprisingly has origins rooted in Shakespearean tragedy, of all things, but I wanted to try my own take on the tried-and-true anime harems but with an absolutely gay as fuck, romantic as fuck, and eventually down to fuck protagonist who’s buff as fuck and surrounded by hot as fuck women, so I ditched the Shakespeare concept because yuri is better.)

-  Airi Lacard (transliterated surname), a young woman who lives alongside wind elementals in her region who take on the form of bald eagles. She has an interest in demonology, cultural history, and theatrical arts. Her destiny is somehow tied to that of the Demon King, Lord Tel Ossei Al-Sharaad, even though he is regarded as a being that is not real and only exists in fiction. As a member born into the animistic culture of the Houses of the Wylde, everyone is given both a true name and a use-name. However, ‘Airi’ is usually reserved as a true-name, and only for those women in positions of power. Airi was born with this name and she would later accept it as her use-name, so technically it is both her true-name and use-name; however, it is said she has a true-name she gave herself, but no one knows what it is, much to the chagrin of her elders, clanmates, and even siblings. For all her love and fondness of birds, she has a wary distrust of great horned owls, the bald eagle’s greatest rival.

(Notes: Airi’s origins have an interesting development. She started out as an Eleanor Hume expy for a Tales of Berseria/Zestiria fanfic that never took off, described as someone who was a ‘hero who would eventually be forgotten by history and known only in folklore’. Then she became her own person but her story was going to be my attempt at a children’s tale...until I made the stunning realization that I needed Airi to suffer immensely, preferably with existential angst, in order to grow, so that idea got quickly nixed. Then the previous iteration ended up making her either die and have paradise eternal throughout all realities, become forgotten by time again or a much happier Highlander expy who would evoke the Ascended To A Higher Plane of Existence, and I hated all of those for depressing me even if the four of the six endings I wrote for her were mostly bittersweet. Thus began my journey to give Airi a much better, fulfilling outcome, which began with watching bald eagle cams back in 2019, which is where I got the idea of attributing them to her. At the same time, I was obsessively putting the entirety of Kikuchi Momoko’s discography on repeat as I dabbled with the worldbuilding in notebooks, so Airi has quite a distinct mid-1980′s to early 1990′s feel that emulates the women of that time period: elegant and mature and kind with a hint of mischievous mirth lurking underneath. Magic Knight Rayearth should also be thanked for inspiration regarding the development of Airi’s family, which is where the idea of her having three older brothers comes from. Hikaru herself also helped flesh Airi out, but whereas Hikaru is very energetic Airi is ten years older and is more composed - at least until there are bald eagles in the picture. Sadly the mecha portions of MKR didn’t carry over to Airi’s story, although I do wish to find a way to include them in some capacity even if the story itself is not mecha. Although the angst stays; you must understand that I can’t just make things a cakewalk for my girls. That’s too easy!)