#lives in a post apocolyptic world where the world has started to heal and over grow

[nolassolace]

Another oc drop!

This is my lil homebrew tiefling dryad forest guardian.

He's a cocktail of wall•e and the avatar from atla.

He collects enchanted items and what not that he finds on his little patrols, he doesn't realize they're important so he'll pocket them and just toss them in a pile when he gets back to his shelter. He doesn't care about those trinkets as much as he cares about the literally garbage and rocks he finds which he puts on shelves and spends maybe a bit too long admiring them.

He does have speak with animals but he doesn't realize that the animals can understand him so he usually leaves or changes topic before the creature can respond.

He named himself twig and his leaves/ hair change color with the seasons

Thanks for coming to my Ted talk.

[spotaus]

YAYAYA!!!!! (On pc so I'm not screenshotting it but permission to infodump has been granted and I am GOING!!!!)

Okay, so, gonna give an EXTREMELY brief overview of Ec-4o.verse because I'm not sure how much you've seen if anything, or how much I've posted about the worldbuilding- If you want you can skip this! I'll add in like a red word when I start talking specifically about Cross I think, haha!

So, Ec-4o.verse isn't a multiverse in the average sense, mainly because it's all set in one world (kinda like New Age is, no multiverse shenanigans). It's set far, far, far into the future of a normal Undertale timeline, where Monsters were able to escape True Pacifist style and re-integrate into the above world with Humans. Where it changes, is that a few hundred years later, with the use of magic, technology made a HUGE upward tik. Like, you think the industrial revolution went hard? Think that times like. 200. And it was because they started syphoning natural magic out of the environment. This, eventually, leads to the environment dying, so in order to save it, monsters all across the world agree to basically jumpstart nature by broadcasting their magic, everything they don't need to live, back into the world, and everyone would slow down on using nature magic to power things. Monsters, at this point, no longer have magic to spare for bullet patterns or summoned weapons or fancy tricks like teleportation or fire magic. Everyone turns to alternative sources, tech slows for a while, then ramps back up when nature has healed a good 50-ish years later.

By this point, people, both monsters and humans, have begun to feel the kickback from releasing the magic to the environment those years ago. Magic comes back, better and more versatile. Like a gift for choosing to do better. Only to certain people, though. So, these people work hard to find ways to better life for everyone, again through technology, without sapping all the resources and such. Yadda yadda, time skip, Ectos are one of manynew investions meant to be sustainable and logical! Ectos are basically a fancy name for robots, androids, mechanical servants, workers, performers, etc. Ectos are a big game changer, and allow an almost utopian future for monster and humans alike. (Ectos provide the niche of the oppressed, as well. Most Ectos are non-sentient, mass-produced and sharing the same basic objectives. Others were created, modified, or upgraded by Techies, monster and humans who have a higher degree of control over magic and have been trained to infuse it with technology to make things more efficient, longer lasting, or, with some luck, sentient. Alive. But no matter if they're sentient or not, Ectos are on the bottom of the food chain.)

Something, something, years pass and the continent the story takes place on begins to become overpopulated. That utopia is looking like it's in grave danger due to lack of resources and a bunch of other factors. So, the power in charge? the Unnamed Government? They decide they have a solution. The long and short of it is, bomb the big cities, bio-weapon the smaller ones, and send in Ectos to do the clean-up work. They recall any and all ectos for a 'mass update', modify them, overwrite their primary objectives and instead give them a single command. The need to hit a group quota. Once they cull a certain amount of living beings (humans/monsters), they are to shut down and wipe their data. Basically, giant massacre that leaves the government in tact (they plan to play it off as a malicious hacker infiltrating them mid-update) and only so many citizens left to deal with and rule over when it's done.

The attack... halfway happens. Most of the bombs and bioweapons get out, and the troops are deployed, and it lasts years. But. Not *enough* years to make the culling protocol. At some point? Every single piece of tech in the country powers down, completely dead, including Ectos. By this point it's an apocolyptic setting where new generations have to rise up out of the rubble and rebuild and learn to live without technology they so relied on, and with the natural world struggling to recover as well. About 5 years after the war is stopped? In comes Blue, the protagonist, and a Techie. He's trying to start up a repair shop with his brother, and can't seem to stop accidentally uncovering big mysteries and meeting all these people who survived the war who want to see him succeed in his goals. (<- In this time, Tech has started to naturally start to recover too, as the 'electricity' relies on natural magic, and natural magic is slowly powering back up too, so things like screens, cars/trucks, and Ecto are reawakening.)

Okay. Now, Cross in this au is an Ecto, so a robot! A lot of ectos like him are very realistic, with only screens or bolts to tell them apart from other monsters. Back before the war, Cross worked as a security guard style bot. I'm not sure *where* exactly, maybe some high-profile government office, but he had it pretty good. He was loyal, and was a lot more focused on neuralizing threats for his design, but because he was an internal bot, no one ever made it far enough to require his intervention.

During the process of Ectos being recalled and remodeled, Cross was one of the last to be sent, and as a sentient bot, he was given more specific commands (usually sentient Ectos were given more complex orders, most often they were told to hunt down specific targets, or lead other non-sentient ectos to make sure none of them were damaged or in disrepair and unable to work). Cross was given a specific job by the programmer who modified him: Protect The Files. Cross was kept in a government building, away from the combat and the chaos. instead, he was a stationary guard bot for a very particular room. (Cross' story intersects a lot with Error's here so I gotta get into Error a bit to explain Cross, haha!)

In that room, was Error. Cross never knew him as anything beyond 'The Files', but Error was another sentient Ecto. one with a LOT of storage space in his frame. Error used to be a library ecto, one who worked in the catacombs and the shelves, documenting history for the fun of it, and so customers could ask him about topics and where to find files rather than looking on their own. He had an irregular amount of storage space, and so when he was brought in, he was designated one of several ectos who would act as a server for. Well. Literally any human knowledge the government wanted saved after the destruction of the mainframes in big cities. Error's movement modules were disconnected and he was flooded with information. (Unlike the others, he was allowed to keep his sentience, as his processing mainframe survived the transfer and he could still communicate with the people who asked him questions and needed information.) Ofc as more and more flowed in, Error had a hard time keeping his own memories from before, and accessing the files degraded pretty much all of his software, like the vocal synthesizer and the processing units.

All of that said? Cross was the one guarding that room. he let people in who needed in, stopped anyone who wasn't allowed, and silenced people with force if they were persistant enough. At this time, because his objective was rewired, he thought nothing of it aside it being his job. Though, there was one person who he could never quite remember, who would pass through. They were on the database, but hidden away, not in plain sight . they were allowed, though, so he let them through.

Now, when everything went down, that includes Cross. He malfunctioned and powered down right infront of the door to The Files, his blade wedged into the lock, basically sautering the door closed. (His protocols reacted to some unseen command, he doesn't know why he did that.) He's like that for several years.

Until, of course, Blue stumbles across him. By the time Blue finds Cross (and Error in turn), he's already caught up in whatever the hell is going on with this government conspiracy, but he's also just a friendly fellow. He's excited to take Cross and Error back to his shop and get them all fixed up and running, just like he'd done for Nightmare and Dream. But, he hauls Cross back first. Error is hooked up to a lot of wires, and Blue isn't sure if taking him out of them would be good for his set-up. When he repairs Cross, Cross is in a panic. His protocol to protect The Files is still there, just not in the lead anymore. He's confused, he barely remembers what he was doing for the past however many years, he doesn't know who these people are, and his internal gps is saying he's miles and miles from his secondary objective (the first one has been set back to 'Live'). It takes some effort to calm him down, and even more effort to get him to speak. Essentially, Nightmare has to pin him to sit on the workbench and actually listen to Blue explain the situation before they all get hurt.

It's only when Blue mentions wanting to repair 'the ecto all wrapped in wires' that something in Cross' protocols give him the greenlight to relax. These people align with his objectives. From there on out he has a bit of a struggle to beat the compulsions from his tampered orders, but Dream and Nightmare have experience working past those commands of their own, so they're able to help him. At least until Error is back with them at the workshop. (Cross is like the voice that Error loses sometimes. Error hates when people repair him, tamper with his files, try to access files, etc. The programmer who visited him often would tell him things then lock the information away from him, and sometimes boot out bits of his own personality files or memories to make undetected space. Error can't express it, goes nonverbal on occassions, but Cross has a weird link to him to show when he's in distress (same programmer, both of them are uncomfortable to realize they have that link initially) and Cross is able to act for him or speak to defend him.)

Now, for other silly fun facts!

Cross is small. Like, small-small. Nightmare is like 1 1/2 Cross' tall, and can lift him up like a medium-sized dog if he so desired. (Cross and Night have a good friendship in Ec-4o. Mainly because Night siphons energy from tech, and Cross finds that, ever since the mainframe alterations, he has issues regulating his energy levels. Night is willing to help him, they spend time in close proximity, find out they actually like hanging out. Also, Cross and Night are both extremely protective, like, without command protocols, so they bond over caring about their friends.

His blades are stylistic choices made by those who commissioned him initially! Most Ectos are designed with long-range fighting in mind, so lazers, guns, aoe blasts, etc. Because Cross would only encounter people inside a facility, in close quarters, he was given more effective weapons! Blades! For people, he can just stab and kill. For bots, the blades tend to install a virus (like, airdropping it) into any bot it can slice down to the wires on. The virus slowly but surely corrupts a processing system into seeing Cross (or his benefactors) as the target master rather than whoever is registered to the bot, effectively neutralizing it. This can be undone, but not often, and Cross doesn't know how.

Cross' fit is a weird amalgamation of his old uniform when he worked in the government building, and neww scraps. Error made it, I think, as a theraputic hobby. Cross rarely lets it out of his sight.

Andddd I think that's where I'll stop for now. Unlike Ichor and Pretender and a lot of other ocs, I don't have a set like... brain filifng cabinet for this guy yet (more aesthetic than story rn since I never got around to doing much writing for Ec-4o) but I hope you liked this little infodump!! If there's aything else ur curious about lemmee know? (And this is in general, most of my other blorbos have lore as well!)

after two weeks, 8 hours of work AND AN HOUR OF EXPORTING A SPEEDPAINT THE FUCK IS THIS

@spotaus he's here

461736 different versions and speedpaint below