::::::::

NEVERLAND GRAPHIC WAR by Xerophthalmia

- ROUND 3 ENTRY -

Yes I'm yet again back with my new entry for the new round of Xero's graphic war. But this one...is definitely not upto the mark. This is basically my last minute idea that somehow worked and ended being presentable fortunately. So yeah, keep your expectations aside and continue with the chapter.

Even though my entry is last minute, my storyline isn't but yes my concept is kinda uhm weird and I literally wrote it while working on my notes- sounds impossible ik but my brain just tends to diverts back and forth and I can barely do one thing at a time. 

Anyways- so the main thing I gotta warn about is that, my story excerpt is damn long so skip it if you want. I had to write it bcuz that's the only thing that helped me in making my edit in the last hours of 2023. And without it, my OC's weapon creation wouldn't make any sense. So I needed to write it here.

TITLE: Blades of Nova

GRAPHIC TYPE: Poster (Landscape)

DESIGN TYPE: Object based typography

GENRE: Fantasy and Sci-fi

BRUSHES: Mine and Default

APPS USED: Ibispaint X, Polarr, PSX and Photoshop CS6 (free ver.)

:::: P R E V I E W ::::

--- STORY CONTINUATION ---

Even when Aesira could manage to tame the Sea Monster and bring it back to its natural form, she lost a part of her powers. While breaking the curse by breaking the black pearls with one slash of her sword, she broke it into half.

All the powers from the sword might have put a heavy blow that caused the curse to break but the sword practically died too that day after completing its duty one last time.

It was already an old sword (as mentioned in my 1st Entry) and by no means Aesira could make it new again, not even with her powers. She definitely had elemental powers but to what extent is still unknown to her other than her Water and Fire powers, still she tried to fix it. But what she didn't know that along with her powers she still needed another elemental power that she didn't have...the Metal Power.

Having Bubble lying dead and now the only weapon she brought with herself is broken too, created a worst situation for her. She felt helpless for the first time, knowing that she might never get the chance to go back and also not being able to fulfill the duty in this mission well till the end.

That's when the news of new mission came in and she joined the rest of the warriors in it while carrying her broken sword with her. Nervousness kept on triggering her mind until she heard the Oracle and the King.

She's supposed to create a weapon for herself! As if God really heard her and gave her an opportunity to create a weapon by herself!

She waited and watched the warriors making their own unique and beautiful weapons until her chance came...

Confused and nervous, Aesira pulled out the 2 pieces of her broken sword from her sword holder at the back under her cape. And went near the flaming pit.

"I need a weapon that can be a medium for my powers and to any extent my Aura energy should be transmissible through it." She put forth her broken sword pieces in front of the flame and said, "This was the only weapon that could do that. Therefore, I want a new weapon out of its remaining pieces only."

The King understood what she said and gave a nod to it.

Aesira threw the pieces of the sword into the fire, which engulfed it in no time and started to burn with more blaze than before. As if it understood its task and started its work on making a new weapon for Aesira.

"Other than my powers, I don't know honestly what kind of weapon I'm looking for or how it should look. But it would be great if it has good durability and looks cool like in those video games that those characters owns- I mean- uh- kinda cool machine style weapons maybe but is also a sword like...?"

The fire started to give a greater blazing effect now as if it's roaring. Aesira genuinely got concerned and thought that she might've either confused or offended it and ended up stepping back by a few steps in fear.

Slowly the facade of bright flame revealed an object in the middle, still not visible enough, bright flaming colours and a bit of dark Ashes covering it in some regions...as if it's a part of the flame only.

Even if the weapon was right in front of her eyes, the only thing that concerned her is- will it be able to connect with her like her previous sword? It was said that the sword chose its owner, which's why her powers could flow through it. But what if this weapon can't, what will she do with it then?

As if God again heard her and ringed her ears with her adopted father's words that she last heard from him- "You, yourself are your own weapon. Everything you need is within yourself."

The realisation crept in. She came forward near the fire again, pulled open her two ear studs and started to bring out her Aura.

Slowly her aura surrounded the entire pit and started to mix in with the flames. Aesira thought it might be hard for her powers to blend in with the flames and reach the weapon bcuz its a different elemental power than hers, but it wasn't. Yet she took it slow and patiently tried to connect with the weapon.

Which finally worked!

Soon the Aura blast occurred and outpoured from her body and then successfully went through the weapon, making her be able to move the way she wanted it to, exactly like she could do with her previous weapon.

As the weapon started to come into view more from the mixed ball of fire and aura, everyone could see how unique it looks. She slowly decreased her power surge and let the sword rise high for display, making everyone awe for its uniqueness.

It then landed in her hands.

She felt it to be similar in weight as her previous sword somehow, even when this one's apparently bigger in size. Aesira caressed the blades, stunned by how vividly her imagination was captured and brought to existence.

"I name it as...Blades of Nova, and my last sword became a Supernova."

She tightened her grip on it and her aura started to surge back through the weapon from her body.

Thus, Aesira now has her own weapon back again!

:::: D E T A I L S ::::

--- WEAPON STRUCTURE & FUNCTIONS ---

1] Originally the entire structural design of the weapon is designed after 4 kinds of weapon, a two headed or bladed sword, a bow, a chakram and a knuckle claw.

2] The sword is 3 bladed and each of which has its own function and structure. Among the three blades, the first two are more pointy with small teeth like structures in one and knuckle claw blades like structures in another. On the other hand, the second blade is a split blade with a unique shape. They've their own way of slayering.

3] The first two blades are situated in the longer region or the front part of the sword and the third one is situated in the shorter or back part of the sword. When Aesira's old sword got broken, she was left with two broken pieces as it broke into half but a longer version consisting of only a portion of the metal blade and a shorter version consisting the handle with a small portion of the blade. Thus, this new sword ended up with a structure of one longer blade head and one shorter blade head.

4] This is a mechanical type of twin headed or bladed sword. The sword has three blades as stated above but as it has two blade ends visually so it can be categorized into those type. The blades are attached to a bow like structure that's attached with the gripper or handle and can move in and out of the structure.

5] The mechanized part of the sword works with the energy of her Aura or by just her spiritual powers. The three blades can be used both together and alternatively by her choice, and this function is as well connected with her powers along with another special one.

6] The special part of the sword is its crystalline form. The blades can turn into beautiful turquoise coloured crystals if she uses her maximum amount of aura during an Aura blast on the sword. But that still wouldn't let the blades break, even with the strongest blow or stroke with it and it will also come back to its original form of metallic blades.
Which in turn also made her give the name- Blades of Nova, which means the blades are a form of Nova, which in turn means a star that suddenly becomes thousands of times brighter and then gradually fades to its original intensity.

7] Other than that, the Metal blades itself are also tough and unbreakable as well, fulfilling the wish of Aesira that she wanted in her weapon.

8] The main part of the sword is the small round circular cage like structure near its gripper. This contains a Diamond inside it, which's apparently the main element which absorbs her aura and lets it flow through the entire weapon. However, it's always transparent white in colour but glows in turquoise colour whenever her aura is flowing through the weapon. This structure is called the 'Heart of the Weapon'.

9] Other than that one, there're 4 more small diamonds studded near the other side of the gripper (2 in each sides) as a part of decoration. Since it has both Sci-fi and fantasy vibes, depicting both Aesira's roots and where the sword is made, it has quite a minimalistic design yet with a touch of fantasy based working mechanism.

10] Other than the blades, there's also a small horn like structure attached with a ring in a hole at the back head of the sword. That's the knuckle claw part of the design I thought of. Also this is a kind of cool design that Aesira thought of but is also useful as it's also a small weapon that work like a claw or a drill head. The claw part can come out with a long thorny chain tail attached with the ring and can be used however the owner wants to. It can be just used alone even when the sword isn't in move. It's mechanism also works with the help of Aesira's powers.

11] The chakram part of the sword is actually about the using method. Though it can be used as a sword but it can also be used in chakram art of usage bcuz of its bow style and double headed sword structure.

--- CONNECTION WITH OC ---

1] Blades of Nova- the name itself depicts Aesira's Spiritual Powers, mainly the Aura Blast part of her power. Nova, which means a sudden increase in brightness and then it's gradual decrease in intensity and coming back to normalcy. This depicts her aura, which during her aura blasts becomes the brightest and strongest but gradually decreases and comes back to normalcy by her own will.

2] The structural design of the sword is almost entirely based on Dystopian Sci-fi vibes, which in turn is a symbolism of Aesira's roots. The design is thought or done by her here, which heavily depicts her thoughts and ideas as a being from a Sci-fi Era.

3] On the other hand, when we see the functionality, it depicts mostly fantasy with a slightest bit of mechanism that has Sci-fi vibes. Even with its fantasy way of functionality, still it doesn't fail to connect with my OC. It's entirely connected with her Spiritual Powers like her previous sword.

4] The weapon here is one of the toughest weapons to ever exist, a weapon which can fight every war with her and slay everything under her command as bravely as Aesira herself can. Which actually depicts and connects with Aesira's tough character and strong will power, bcuz of which she gained the title 'Titanium' of the team.

5] The Diamond is called the main part or the 'Heart of the Weapon' just like Aesira, who was the leading lady of her team or the Heart of the Team.

6] The colour scheme that I've used here depicts few of her character traits. Her bravery and strong will power depicts the flaming colours in the middle, which also shows the eternal burning pit where the warriors got their weapons made. Her calm and protective nature is depicted using the turquoise colour, which symbolizes tranquil energy and a profound power to protect. The turquoise part is shown here as her Aura colour basically, that surrounded the burning pit and surged into her weapon as mentioned above in the storyline.

(Due to the Aura blast, which's called as Nova effect here and the burning flame, I used strong and bright colours, which may not be similar as my introductory entry, even when I used almost similar colour scheme. Another reason is the genre, scifi dystopian vibes tend to be dull and dusty while fantasy are based on dark and bright mostly. Which's why the colour vibrancy varies here.)

7] The fire here in the middle depicts the part of the name Nova, a sudden brightness phase of a star, which itself is a ball of fire as we all know. This also depicts her Fire Elemental power here. The rest dark part of turquoise and blue depicts both her Aura and Water Elemental power. The floating weapon in the middle of these actually also is a symbolism of her Levitation power.

All these are a part of my OC Aesira Mintz as previously mentioned in my Introductory Entry. And all these together resembles her Spiritual Power itself, which's the main part of her identity as well. So, here I tried to portray all of these since the weapon and the entire edit is supposed to depict and connect with herself.

8] Another point that I think I need to add even though its not about the connection with OC but with me as a participant in the gw. Here my strengths are Manipulation (Fire) and Typography (Water), and I used both the design type in the making of this. But obviously its mostly typography that I focused on here, as the prompt asked me to and thus we've both warm and cool colours depicting the elements, but more focused on cool colours percentage wise.

--- SIDE QUEST ---

So, my side quest answer is Diamonds, which I've added as an important stone that is the main medium between Aesira's powers and the weapon, along with as a part of decoration of the weapon.

The big diamond here is the 'Heart of the Weapon', that absorbs her powers and makes it possible to flow through the weapon and can connect with her. It stimulates the main functionality of the entire weapon and glows in turquoise colour when it connects with her power. Otherwise it has a normal white crystalline form just like the other ones which are a part of decoration.

There're 4 extra small diamonds studded on the opposite side of the handle or gripper (2 on each side), which adds some beauty to the minimalistic design of the weapon.

:::: R E S O U R C E S ::::

Okay somehow my this Resources Board looks quite clean...nice! XD

Also special credits to @/bejeweledmary and @/drvanc (on Instagram) for the light reflections and fire particles overlays from their giveaways.

_____

People would say I flunked this time instead of creating this edit but only ik how busy the last days of 2023 went for me and how much I suffered due to my sinus and ear pains. 

Not to mention, not a single idea of mine worked well and I had to constantly look for ideas everyday. And to think that I kept Typography as my strength and handed out an entry like that...its probably one of the most embarrassing thing I've ever done to me T_T

Anyways-

Happy New Year guys! Let's welcome 2024 with warm hugs and good wishes for each other- even though I almost broke a leg right on the 1st day of new year :') May god bless yall and your families with good health, and good news shall keep coming all year round 💜

I gotta go now, my hands are freezing here. Bye! Take care!