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Our lovely leading lady Dream Angel!

Dream Angel is today’s star. She’s a fascinating character with a fair variety of interesting undiscovered powers, but there are some really cool things you don’t know about her.

dream angel

Dream Angel’s original name was Destiny. She was based much more closely on Sailor Moon, too. Initially, when I first started drawing her I set the time period to right after she graduated high school – the day after.

If you’ve read the Sailor Moon manga, you know that in the first book Bunny goes racing around getting ready for school and quite clumsily. She does similar in the anime, but it was the manga I was going from. Destiny also goes racing around getting ready for school but as she darts past the calendar, she remembers she graduated.

Breezer, Katrilina and Hanaji have changed some too since then. Hanaji retained his name from this earlier story. There’s more to this early story line, but it won’t be discussed here. Actually, there have been several early stories and one even won second place at the county fair.

Her powers are largely unknown, even to Breezer and Ryu who’ve been her best advisers and mentors. So, any new abilities discovered tend to be a surprise for everyone, hero and villain alike. These moments of surprise have caused both sides to stop fighting long enough to try and understand what happened and one side or the other takes advantage of the moment of hesitation.

So, what do you think? Is she an interesting character? Dream Angel makes her comic book debut in (of course) Dream Angel #1, which can be found in the shop. Also found in the shop are 3 Dream Angel outfits for Arora Arum.

Tragic victim: vampire cockroach

cockroach vampireVampire cockroaches are unfortunate creatures. I know, the first thought for a cockroach is usually “EWWWW!!” Here’s some food for thought, though: roaches’re excellent survivors. Which would make them more difficult than ever to kill if they were undead vampires.

These roaches are roaches through unfortunate circumstances, too. They’re the victims of Jerigel SwampFang’s third bite. Unlike most vampires, it takes three bites for him to completely control his victims. As a result, they become cockroaches. The only thing these victims keep of their humanity is their height.
If anything, these unfortunate creatures should be pitied. There’s no known cure for their condition and killing them is far more difficult than if they were normal roaches.

The one thing these roaches fear above all is spiders. If they should see one, they become uncontrollable. The larger the spider, the harder they are to control.
One important ability besides turning their own victims into roaches for an hour, is being able to change form. They’re able to temporarily resume their human form during the day, but only if Jerigel allows it.

Over the years, these victims are those who tried to rebel against Nyxus. Some got in Jerigel’s way, and others Nyxus wanted to just make disappear. Since Nyxus controls Jerigel and he controls roaches, rebels are then made to do her bidding.

Once Jerigel controls a victim as a roach, they have no free will of their own. In fact, they cannot do anything without him knowing about it. The control is complete and permanent as far as anyone knows. Even Ryu doesn’t know of a cure to change these unfortunate victims human again.

These roaches are today’s daily deal. Aren’t they interesting characters? Won’t you take pity on them? They just want your love! they make their comic book debut in Dream Angel #7, which is available in the shop. It’s a good idea to get the books that came before it so the story makes sense! Also found in the shop is the plush action figure of these creatures.

Spotted beauty: Cristiane Jewel

Cristiane Jewel is a leopardess. She’s got quite a problem, however. She’s in love with a tiger.

cristiane jewel

She’s expected to marry a leopard, of course, but her love for Virgo FireKeeper is so strong it often gets them both in a lot of trouble.

Her intended mate is Kumo Hanahadashii, who’s deeply in love with her to the point of being blind to dangerous situations. It also leaves him terribly jealous of Virgo, whom she showers her affection on.

Virgo doesn’t want her affection in the slightest and would prefer she leave him alone. Of course, this causes friction with Kumo, who all but worships Cristiane, who doesn’t want his affection any more than Virgo wants hers. Virgo, instead is in love with Athalia, but hasn’t shown it openly because of Cristiane. Athalia knows of his affection and waits patiently in hope he can chase the overly affectionate leopardess away eventually.

Cristiane’s skilled with a quarter staff and will often jump into a fight if she thinks Virgo’s in trouble. This has more than once caused trouble for the heroes as they have struggled to compensate for her fighting even them off at times.

Everyone prefers she fight with them instead of against them, so they’ve decided to simply give her room when she shows up. The exception to that being Torakatai, Keru and Athalia. They understand why everyone else gives Cristiane room – they don’t want to get caught up in the quarrel.

The tigers on the other hand have managed to group up and chase the leopardess off more than once, sometimes with the help of the others. Keru in particular wishes she’d go away so his brother could marry Athalia, as it’s obvious to everyone how much he loves her.

Her comic book debut is Dream Angel #7, which can be found in the shop. It’s recommended to get the books that came before it so the story makes sense! Also found in the shop is her plush action figure that loves to be hugged. Will you give her a hug?

Patient older brother: Virgo FireKeeper

virgoVirgo FireKeeper is a dedicated older brother. Dedicated to avenging his parents’ murders, that is. Of course, today’s question is where did this tiger man come from and what makes him so special in the Dream Angel universe?

I have a decent respect for a number of interesting subjects. Mythology, fantasy, the occult, religion, just to name a few. Astrology is another that’s come around in my various readings. The interest in that one can be traced to Sailor Moon. Not many know that I have a very firm love of Sailor Moon. Fewer know that I didn’t fully get involved in the series as a whole until high school – long after the manga and anime had come out initially.

Before discovering a strong love of Sailors Uranus and Neptune (the latter of whom I’m quite a bit like), I held a healthy respect for Sailor Mercury as I could readily relate to the bookish genius girl and her inability to effectively socialize with others. It’s fair to say I’m not a genius in the same sense as she is with her IQ of 300, but being bookish and unable to effectively socialize with others fits me quite well. What’s this got to do with the tiger man Virgo? Well, I’m getting to that, if you’ll bear with me a moment.

For those that might not know, the characters of the Sailor Moon universe are heavily based on Greek and Roman mythology, but also astrology. My relating to Sailor Mercury translates over to Virgo. According to astrology, Sailor Mercury’s sign is Virgo. See where he gets his name? The source of his character design comes from a strong love and respect of tigers mixed with a love of manga/anime cat-people.

In the real world, tigers are endangered, in the Dream Angel universe, tiger people are even closer to extinction. With his parents’ murders, Virgo finds his reason to fight against Nyxus and begins to fight for his species’ survival as well. Along the way, Dream Angel becomes a friend and valuable ally.

What do you think? Is Virgo an interesting character? Virgo makes his comic book debut in Dream Angel #6, which is available in the shop. Getting the books that came before it is highly recommended, so the story makes sense. Also available in the shop is his plush action figure.

Mercenary sense of humor: Lauren

laurenLauren is a mercenary, but what you don’t know about her is that she doesn’t always join the conflict for personal gain or money. Sometimes she’ll join the conflict just to laugh. As the conflicting parties wind up in a state of complete confusion as a result of something she said or did.

She doesn’t often admit it, but she doesn’t approve of what Nyxus and the Keres do. To keep her neutrality, she’ll betray both sides and laugh at them.

Ah, but all that’s common knowledge, you say. Well, here’s the uncommon knowledge: her outfit idea came from an ice skating outfit. Why do you need to know that? Well, it’s a nice bit of background trivia. It’s like asking why you’d need to know that a fly on a drawing table inspired Spider-man.

Lauren’s the mercenary with a heart and a conscience, as well. If she feels responsible for the destruction between hero and villain, she’ll find ways to help the victims. She and Teikou no Senshi are the ones found sifting through rubble, searching for victims in spite of a rocky relationship.

She’s also known to be a sort of referee between the heroes and villains. Though she has no power of her own, besides intelligence, she does sometimes get between battling pairs and break the fight up.

I could go on and on, so I’ll speed things up and summarize with a list:
Lauren:
1. is a mercenary
2. is intelligent
3. goes searching for victims
4. sometimes feels responsible for the victims
5. has no power of her own
6. loves a good joke
7. plays pranks on both hero and villain
8. doesn’t approve what the villains do
9. gets the job done
10. her outfit idea came from a skating outfit

Still pretty common knowledge, but then I didn’t promise anything you might not already know. Just stuff you need to know about her.

So, what do you think of Lauren? Is she an interesting character? Lauren makes her comic book debut in Dream Angel #7, which is available in the shop. It’s a good idea to consider getting the books that came before it so the story makes sense! Also available in the shop is her plush action figure.

Police Lieutenant Larissa Arum

Larissa Arum is a tough one by nature, but still a loving mother. They say opposites attract and that is the case with Larissa and her husband Jake. She’s always straight and doesn’t crack jokes. If she does, it’s rare. Jake tells jokes all the time to lighten the mood and get people laughing. Most of all, he loves making Larissa laugh.

larissaHer daughter is more precious to her than even her own life at times. When she found out her daughter’s secret, she vowed to keep it and help her any way she could. She’s kept that vow in many ways. She started by getting Arora some small, lightweight communication equipment. So when she’s out flying around she can even help the police force by reporting problems.

Larissa often makes sure she’s first on the scene to help with crowd control. Also preventing fellow officers from shooting at the wrong target. She has a get-it-done attitude and there aren’t many who’d argue with her.

In practice fights, Jake and Larissa are an even match. Both are masters of self-defense and hand-to-hand fighting in various forms. Between the two, Arora is well trained in the defensive arts. Larissa stepped up her daughter’s training when she learned her secret. She explained to Jake that it was time she learned the more advanced techniques. Having mastered the ones Arora had been learning from Larissa all along. Jake accepted that and also stepped up his daughter’s training.

If there’s one thing Larissa hates, it’s repeat offenders. She’s stern with the first timers, but if she catches a repeat offender, they get a much tougher attitude. Nothing that could be “police brutality,” just enough to discourage another repeat offense. A good amount of the time, the repeat offender doesn’t repeat again after meeting her.

What do you think? Is she an interesting character? She makes her debut comic book appearance in Dream Angel #1, which is available in the shop. Also available in the shop is her plush action figure.

High-flying Harpies

Harpies are nasty creatures especially in mythology. The mythological name translates to “that which snatches” and it holds true for these Harpies. Yet another type of nasty creature from Tartarus mythologically, the Dream Angel Harpies make excellent warriors for Nyxus.

harpie

Luckily for Dream Angel, the Harpies don’t often show up to cause trouble. More often, they’re away doing some other task for their wicked mistress simply because they won’t attack Dream Angel or any of the female heroes. Much like their mythical counterparts, they prefer men. Of course, that depends on the legends you find on them. In some versions, they torture victims they snatch on the way to Tartarus, in other versions, they snatch men to mate with then kill them.

The Harpies Dream Angel has to deal with still snatch men, but instead of big, broad wings, they’re much more streamlined in flight. This makes them fast, dangerous and difficult to follow. Even Akasha with her very fast flight speed can only keep up a short time unless she follows from a full dive from several thousand feet up. Dream Angel has good flight speed, but she can’t keep up at all.

These Harpies were inspired by the ones from the She-Ra movie, The Secret of the Sword. Near the end of the movie, He-Man and She-Ra encounter Hunga, the leader of the Harpies, who’s captured Queen Angella. The idea intrigued me, so I started researching the mythology and found several different designs based on the mythology.

One of note is from the Disney movie Fantasia during the Night on Bald Mountain sequence near the end. Another is from the Xena: Warrior Princess series. Although I didn’t really mix up the designs from these too much – I really stuck closer to the Disney design – I did mix up elements of mythology and even at times, personality when there was one to take note of.

Eventually, I settled on the dark violet coloration and thought they’d be opponents most effective at night when they’re especially difficult to see. On top of that, like a cat, they can see in the dark, but they cannot talk.

What do you think? Are Harpies interesting characters? These creatures make their comic book debut in Dream Angel #22. It’s highly recommended you get the books that came before so the story makes sense! You’ll find collection books available in the shop so it’s easy to catch up fast! Also available in the shop is the Harpie plush action figure.

Playful but dangerous Daybright

Daybright is today’s special feature. This even-tempered stallion might seem boring to some since it takes quite a bit to really upset his calm demeanor. Just like his twin, however, he only allows one rider: Red Nite Soldier.

daybright

According to mythology, (depending on the story you find) Daybright was one of the two horses that drew the Sun God Apollo’s chariot across the sky each day and was cared for by Apollo’s sister Aurora, Goddess of the Dawn.

So, he’s not especially interesting mythologically, he’s not especially interesting unless he’s angered in my story, why should you care? Hmmmm…. He’s cute? Just a little chuckle there. He’s more than just cute and he does get interesting in battle. Very interesting at times.

His interest lies in the most dangerous and desperate situations, though. His special ability is to become water. It doesn’t happen often and only when all other options are exhausted, but he has gotten our heroes out of a couple very tight scrapes.

I bet you’re wondering why a horse that in mythology would draw the sun chariot across the sky would be able to turn into water. Well, that’s a good question… I’ll leave that up to your imagination.

What do you think? Is Daybright an interesting character? Daybright makes his comic book debut in Dream Angel #2, which can be found in the shop. Also found in the shop is his soft, cuddly plush action figure. Who, like his human counterparts, has a full wire armature that makes him able to stand on his own and hold a pose.

 

One-of-a-kind vampire: Jerigel SwampFang

jerigelJerigel SwampFang’s origin is a complete mystery. Not even Nyxus knows how he came to be. In reality, his origin is as simple as a ten-stripe June beetle.

At the time I came up with Jerigel SwampFang, I was enjoying the Sera Muun Musical Last Drakul Jyokoku. It’s part of a trilogy centered around the vampire Dracula – as Sailor Moon encounters him.

I will formally admit I found both the actor and the character fascinating. I developed an interest in vampires and found that the mythology does not include insects. This I found funny because nature is full of insect vampires, starting with the mosquito and flea.

When I found the June beetle, I thought it was a beetle whose nickname is “Hell insect.” Well, what better for a vampire? They’re considered creatures from Hell and on top of it all, they’re undead. So, I read up on vampires, scrounged up every vampire movie I could find and studied up a bit.

Sure, there’s a good many ways to kill a vampire, but how do you kill an insect vampire? A wooden stake wouldn’t necessarily penetrate the exoskeleton, holy water and a cross is mostly superstition (look it up, if you don’t believe me). Fire only works when the vampire becomes ash and that takes time – how long do you really think an insect vampire would be contained? Probably not long enough, I think.

Superhuman strength comes with being a vampire, so it’s like containing Superman. A sock in a river? Bugs don’t wear socks, so why would he care? Sunlight is another that’s superstition.

Admittedly, I haven’t figured out how to kill the insect vampire, but his power is most intriguing. Aside from speaking in mirror speech – meaning you need a mirror to understand what he says in the comics – his third bite is what finalizes his control over his victim. On top of the control his third bite gives, it also transforms the unfortunate person into a cockroach leaving nothing of their humanity except their height.

What do you think? Is Jerigel an interesting character? He makes his comic book debut in Dream Angle #4. Getting the books that came before it is highly recommended so the story makes sense. Also available in the shop is his plush action figure.

Most dangerous of all: Nyxus

nyxusVillains like Nyxus are usually the ones you love to hate, right?

I doubt anyone likes Lex Luthor or the Joker in the same way they like Batman and Superman, right? The villain always gets a thorough pounding, too, don’t they? Even in the movies lately, they either get pummeled all the way to prison or killed off. An exception might be Megamind. If you think about it, the villain is usually the one that takes one whale of a beating and keeps coming back for more!

Nyxus has the whole Horde Prime/Hordak meets Hitler thing going on. Last I checked, pretty much everyone hates a dictator. She’s not just a dictator, she’s a tyrant. Anything she doesn’t like she destroys. Anyone who dares stand against her, she kills or at least makes it so nobody believes them.

Well, what’s a hero without a villain to fight? Bored, right? Nyxus is Dream Angel’s villain and like Dream Angel herself, she has a bit of an interesting history.

A friend caught me doodling in the college cafeteria and asked me to draw comics for the school paper. I decided I needed to work on Dream Angel once again, but she needed a better villain. Well, my next class that day was a website class. I was already a couple weeks ahead having figured out the needed code and fiddled with a lot of it at home.

Also, the site I was building was for my characters, so it was fitting that I do some research for their background. Arora was to be the Dawn, so I needed her opposite and that turned out to be Night, although I wanted a God/Goddess of Twilight. Nyx is the Goddess of the Night. So, Nyxus was born from that.

So, what do you think of Nyxus? Is she an interesting character? She makes her comic book debut in Dream Angel #1, which can be found in the shop. Also found in the shop is her plush action figure.