#im torn between stuck in her hometown and never getting out or a wandering traveler with no roof to call home

[fantastic-mr-corvid]

i can feel another oc being slowly created in my head... ilu Celia n co but i need an insane rural bitch who is wildly offputting in her knowledge of animal butchery and the great outdoors...

[blackcatbard]

please ignore how... awful this design is. i’m not good at... living. or making cool designs.

this is for a puzzleshipping au! one that i’m probably gonna work on once im done with fabricated world. i’m just calling it the “poisoned prince” au, and i’ just... gonna post the small drabble that’s pretty much the beginning of a chapter, it’s easier than trying to summarize. hnnnnnnnnnnn i get the feeling the writing is better than the drawings here i apologise. i just wanted to have an au where atem is Creepy and Weird. this design is definitely not final.

check out the read more for a Thing >:3

Stories tell of a prince...

A boy, kissed by the mother goddess, blessed with the radiance of the sun, and a soul just as warm. He shone bright, and his heart was for his people. He never strayed for want and darkness.

One day, history- or rather, legend- tells of a traveler who came to the prince's castle, their origin unknown and their identity surrounded in mystery. All that is recorded is after the traveler left, the prince began to behave strangely. He became angry, unkind, selfish. His people believe that over time, poison covered his heart and seeped into his veins.

The stories go on to speak of a horrible storm. A gale of corruption. Of tar and poison and wickedness, brought on by the prince himself from the heart of his kingdom. Destroying his land, ravaging his people until they were no more. The tempest resulted in the prince's transformation into a horror, a monster, doomed to cause corruption and chaos wherever he may roam.

Over time, a bog came to exist around the decimated kingdom, sinking homes torn asunder beneath it's sucking surface. Trees with branches like reaching claws curl from the rotting ground, a dark forest growing as a wall around the damaged land.

In the heart of the wood rests the felled castle, walls dripping with tar, where the monstrous prince is said to still wander the halls, waiting to corrupt the soul of any traveler who may be unfortunate enough to wander into his poisoned home.

Yuugi grew up hearing these stories, as all the children did in his hometown. It was a myth, a fable told to ward the children off a dark path for uncounted generations. As a youth, the story shook Yuugi to the core, and on nights where the moon was absent in an inky sky, he would eye the shadowed forest with a pit of anxiety settled in his stomach. Was the monster there, lurking just in the underbrush of the treeline? Waiting... waiting to corrupt his heart and drag him into hell.

Years passed, and the shadows stretched across Yuugi's bedroom walls started to look less like monsters. Fear of the poisoned prince had been flushed from his system, replaced by a sort of... stubborn skepticism.

New children now ran about the town, a new generation the local elders could instill the lurking fear of their beloved tale into.

Nearing adulthood, Yuugi was amazed to find that even within the older circles of his home, that fear still lingered. Shopkeepers would close their stores before the final tendrils of darkness overtook the skyline. Parents would shoo their children back into their homes long before dusk, glancing back towards the forest with a flicker of fright flashing over their face.

It was bewildering, really, to watch all these grown ass adults jump at the sound of a twig breaking as soon as the sun started to set.

“Do you think anyone really knows what's even out there?” Yuugi asked one night, staring out the window of his bedroom.

“What's out where?” replied Joey, Yuugi's childhood friend who was currently strewn out on Yuugi's bed, tossing a wooden ball into the air and catching it before throwing it up once again in a repetitive need to keep himself occupied.

“In the woods,” Yuugi said, turning in his desk chair to look over to Joey.

He watched as Joey glanced at him, his focus slipping at precisely the worst possible moment and the ball just missing him palm, falling to land sharply on his nose. Gasping in pain, Joey sat up, grasping at the bridge of his nose and glaring when Yuugi's laughter slipped out despite his attempts to stop it.

“Well, sure they do,” Joey said when Yuugi's laughter subsided into soft giggles, gingerly rubbing at this nose. “That prince is out there, isn't he?”

Yuugi's giggles turned into a snort of disbelief. When he saw the incredulous look on Joey's face, his brow furrowed. “Come on, Joey,” Yuugi scoffed, propping his elbow on his desk and leaning his cheek against the palm of his hand. “You don't really believe that old fairytale, do you?”

Joey's mouth slanted into a frown. “Well... I guess not,” He leaned forward to glance out the window, watching as the treetops rustled gently in the nightly breeze. “But... y'know, a lot of fairytales have some kind of... sprinkle of reality in 'em, yeah?”

Yuugi raised an eyebrow. “So, you do think there's a monster in the woods?”

“Not necessarily a monster,” Joey huffed, leaning back on Yuugi's bed. “But something dangerous, probably. Maybe that bog's really out there, and the person who wrote the story wrote it to make the village kids too scared to go out and explore so they wouldn't get stuck in the muck.”

Pulling his bottom lip between his teeth in thought, Yuugi contemplated this, glancing back out into the trees.

“I... guess that makes sense.” he conceded, “But I can't help but feel like we're... missing out on something. Like there's something really interesting out there we can't get to because we're all to scared of our own shadow.”

“Well, if there is something interesting out there, it can stay out there.” Joey claimed. “No way you'll catch me out there to be a prince snack.”

Yuugi rolled his eyes. “I thought you said you didn't believe in the prince.”

“On the off chance he is real, I don't wanna take any risks.” Joey replied with finality, pulling himself to his feet and stretching. “Well, I better get back home before Serenity thinks I've died.”

Yuugi chuckled. “Wouldn't want her to think your soul’s been dragged to hell, huh?”

“Exactly,” Crossing Yuugi's room, Joey pulled open Yuugi's door and turned around, smiling. “Don't let me wake up to find you've wandered into the woods and become a snack for the prince yourself.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Yuugi said, waving his hand in a gesture of farewell.

When he heard his door shut, Yuugi turned to look out the window one final time. He scanned along the roots of the trees, trying to see past the barrier of darkness that limited his view. He recalled when he would be kept up late at night, believing with all his heart that the flickering shadow of a bush was the lurking silhouette of a monster, or the shine of the moon between the leaves was a fanged maw, dripping with tar and malice.

If he squinted hard enough, he imagined he could still manage to catch a glimpse of the beasts of fantasy that used to haunt his nightmares.

Sighing heavily, Yuugi dimmed his lamp, the only light in his room now from the moon, thin as a Cheshire cat's grin in the sky. His blankets called to him, wrapping him in warmth as he settled into his bed.

He wasn't quite sure how long he lay awake, his mind wandering from chores needed doing in the morning, to wondering if Joey made it home safely. His eyes suddenly felt heavy, and he felt sleep starting to win over his mind. He didn't even bother wondering over the thing that blocked the light of the moon for just a moment, just before his eyes closed.