I had been thinking about this for a while now, ever since Secrets of the Silver Kingdom update. The reason for this was after hearing the backstory of the Beasts, it made me wonder what would happen, even in their purest forms, the Soul Jams were still able to corrupt the Ancient Heroes? What happen if Truth, Passion, Resolution, Abundance, and Freedom were not the purest forms at all? Or, if the Cookies let the power get to their head anyway and fell down the same path as the Beasts did? Giving the Soul Jam to 5 Cookies was a bad idea after all, and Clotted Cream kinda ha a point
Despite this, I only had bare-bone ideas for these Corrupted Ancients, with some cases being just seeing a random picture I'm not even very sure of the origins of, my general bad habits when it comes to making my own ocs, and trying my best to not go down the obvious routes.
So this post is meant to be my general brain dump to have easy access to for me to look back on while sketching out the clothes at least. And my general excitement for it now that I got a few more ideas for these designs as well. And due to general life stuff during early 2024, it was hard for me to even want to draw anyway. This has ignited something in me. I also don't want to go into too much details so I'm not giving too much of their design ideas away
So thank you @CorruptedData42 for letting me use a couple of your ideas for this. Maybe I'll do this for the Beasts once all of them have been released
Pure Vanilla - Truth/Knowledge/Deceit
This is definitely the easiest one for me to do when it comes to ideas, especially when out of each of the Lights of the Ancients and Beasts, Truth and Deceit are two sides of the same coin, in fact, it can be used for the same idea, like what I'm planning here.
Its clear to me at least that he already has religious inspiration and if anyone knows me more personally, people also knows my track record with ocs, especially if they have religious power over people. I always think back to my leader of a cult who is also a philosopher so he was easily able to brainwash people and called it the "truth" to keep people in.
I also can't help but think about something Baumkuchen said in day 2, when everyone was interviewing the Elders about the Cookies in the white masks, how he said he's jealous of the Ancients for being able to wield such power, for being able to stay "fresh and crispy" despite how old they all actually are, how is treatments can only go so far and how much further it could go if he even had a fraction of that power, especially when he was always generally frail and that he was severely injured when a Light Fragment was found in the city.
Considering that Pure Vanilla is also a healer, and most likely who Baumkuchen was referring to anyway, I want to add imperfections to his design as well, though he mostly keeps it covered so he's not showing any weaknesses himself, though still pretends he's a martyr and seems rather gullible as a result of how generous and kind he comes off. But this is just a way to manipulate others further, because why would someone like that be a bad person? Another reason is so they would let their guard down around him, before getting sucked into his deceit and by the time they notice, it's too late and they already last grip of reality.
A good amount of references I found of martyrs has them wearing cloaks with hoods on them, looks like they wear rags and is rather humble despite the admiration they have of others around them. Though another reference I was looking at really recently actually was the Altar of Destiny. That design is possibly one of my favorite boss designs ever, and I kinda want to take some design aspects from it for Pure Vanilla. There's a lot here, but that's probably because he's my favorite of the Ancients and there's just a lot to talk about when it comes to the truth and deceit, especially since out of all the Ancients and Beasts, these are he closest relations to each other.
All of these ideas still make sense for what Corrupted called False Vanilla Cookie in their swap au, the "false angel."
Hollyberry - Passion/Happiness/Sloth
My friends and I pretty much agreed that out of all the Ancients, Hollyberry definitely has the least amount of trauma, and if she does, she doesn't really think about it too much. There is no thoughts up there. Because of this, she's probably going to be the shortest for the concepts for the time being. The main inspiration here is the story we get from Might of the Ancients pt. 1 and Legend of the Red Dragon, where it feels Hollyberry was always an adventurer before she even got the Soul Jam, even able to defeat a dragon. Corrupted also added that she was an adventurer that loves going to unexplored areas of the world in their swap au.
Seeing the backstory for Infernoberry Cookie from Corrupted made me remember that the first time Beast-Yeast was ever mentioned was as early as September 2nd, 2021, the same year as the game's release. To top it off, the first time she mentioned it is because she got some rare monster parts to sell to the monster shop merchant, so I wanted to go down a more barbaric route for her.
Of course, this doesn't exactly scream "sloth." But then I remember, the sin of sloth isn't just being lazy. Wikipedia even says that its the most difficult sin to define, since "it refers to an assortment of ideas, dating from antiquity and including mental, spiritual, pathological, and conditional states." It's also being apathetic (ironic) and indolence. They become indifferent to their duties and obligations, there's a lack of any feelings about themselves and others, a mind-state that gives rise to boredom, rancor and apathy. Or in other words, sloth can be seen as an inadequate amount of love.
Now with that out of the way, I was thinking of taking the more vague definition for sloth rather than the more popular definition. But instead of emotionless since I don't want to do what Mystic Flour did (and corrupted Dark Cacao later), this apathy is more feral, more reckless, no care for what happens to her or her so-called allies. All she wants to do what she wants and not listen to what others has to say about it. She has so many wounds on her body as a result, and once she's back to her kingdom, she has a giant feast, and is then dead to the world. She's not seen again until she finds another hide to add to her collection, more scales to make into armor, bones to make into weapons. Hunting monsters is the only way she feels anything anymore
Dark Cacao - Resolution/Volition/Apathy
This is probably one of the easiest ones and can be summed up as "he isolates himself even further, that is the natural progression of things." But also, ever since I found a king isolated in the snowy mountain, on a throne of what looks like metal but was probably ice, I couldn't stop thinking about how much it kinda reminded me of Dark Cacao. I wish I could find the image, but I'll have to deal with other references that are close enough. Though I never got to the reason why he isolated himself further. Corrupted added to their swap au that this was caused by the death of his son, so he closed himself off due to grief, and I kinda..actually adore that-
Another part of the image I vaguely remember are the branches around the king's body and how cool it looked with frost around it. And I couldn't help but think about chocolate branches, where the chocolate is so thin that you can scratch it off easily.
And the frost all over Dark Cacao, in his hair, in his cloak, on his face, could should physically his heart turning "cold" and growing truly apathetic. Freezing over in the cold, harsh, and isolating land his kingdom is a part of
Golden Cheese - Abundance/Change/Destruction
I know I said that out of all of these, truth and deceit goes hand in hand with each other, more so than the other, but so these change and destruction. Change is definitely a more vague term though so its why I think truth and deceit is the better "two sides of the same coin". Change is the neutral party, while destruction is seen as more negative and abundance is seen as more positive.
But the main inspiration is what I've seen in Golden Cheese's wiki page itself, where it said that she was intended to be more greedy and was changed so she was seen as more sympathetic.
Her destruction is going to be either something doing with Midas Touch, or she took so much from others that she caused the destruction of multiple kingdoms and villages as a result. But since Burning Spice was based off of Shiva The Destroyer, I wanted to see if I can find inspiration in gods in Hinduism as well. And I chose Kali for this, the goddess of time, death and destruction. She is stated to destroy evil and defend the innocent, and is worshipped as the Divine Mother, but if Shiva can be inspiration for villainous characters, so can Kali (and I'm sure there are examples of that in media but I live under a rock unfortunately). Since she is worshipped as a Divine Mother, this will have an influence on how I'll draw Golden Cheese in general. A more "seductive" (is this the world I want to use?) and mature woman. One that gives a motherly vibe, but also the greedy businesswoman that uses her beauty to get what she wants, I'll have to read up on Kali more, but I feel this is what I want, even though Golden Cheese and her entire kingdom are definitely based off of Egypt
And also I definitely see Golden Cheese using a scimitar similar t Gerudo does in Legend of Zelda.
White Lily - Freedom/Solidarity/Silence
I mean....I could go down the obvious route. But I won't. My main stump was that I couldn't get away from just going down the Dark Enchantress route with her design. But Corrupted's post about "Twilight Lily" made me think, oh wait, there's Asiatic lilies. I can use those as inspiration. In the flower language, the blacklist asiatic lilies symbolizing mystery, intrigue, power, and a sense of hidden depth.
I also saw in her wiki page that she seems to also have some religious inspiration, her Korean name translated being "Saint Lily Cookie" which was changed to appeal to a wider audience.
I also remembered that there were moth symbolism in religions. The first result said "destruction, frailty, or the love between a lover and their beloved (a moth to a flame)." In Psalm, a moth was described as a creature that consumes everything a person values. This is further bolstered in the Book of Matthews, where it represents the temporary nature of life. Jesus even warns his followers not to store up earthly wealth because moths and rust can destroy these treasures. And in Job 37, it is a lament of the good person at the misfortunes of life. And then when it comes to witchcraft, moths and black butterflies represent ancestors visiting you, guiding you or sending you a message of urgence.
All of this because I kinda want her to resemble the faeries more, so I want flowers to be a bigger part of the design like how the Cookies in the Faerie Kingdom are also flower looking (with the Silver Knights being based off of metals because they threw away their scent to become a Silver Tree Knight). Sure White Lily is already based off of multiple lilies, but they're quite subtle to her design, with a bulb of a lily being the tip of her braid, another lily being her staff, a lily being in her hair, and her Soul Jam taking the shape of a fleur-de-lis. But I want to do something more with the flower theming of the faeries. And Asiatic lilies are very pretty and mysterious. I couldn't just ignore it. I know she isn't a faerie, but its clear she's admired greatly by them and her costume clearly makes her one anyway both in the main story (though that was temporary) and the description of the costume, along with the costume set story. I will also probably take some design inspiration from the costume too
With everything I learned about my light research, I didn't really get a good grasp of what I want her personality to be yet. This is all really just design ideas. I didn't think too much about her personality, unlike with the other 4 Cookies (and I think it might be because she's my least favorite, or maybe because there's not a lot you can do with "Silence" as a concept....Or both)
(Also...kinda....thinking of using specific Disney characters as references to get what I want in the appearance too, but overall will have nothing to do with her personality)
Credit goes to cuppajj on Tumblr! More details at the bottom
Anyway, if you read this far, here's a light sketch of at least? Since its a very similar idea and I might get some clothes design ideas from them for Golden Cheese specifically. Its more of a...trying to get back into drawing again because its nearly been a wear since I've drawn anything. I also am aware that I'm not good with adding a lot of details to the facial area of full-body drawings, which for the finished drawings, I'll add what the eye looks like if I cover them up or have them closed their eyes in my finished product
As this is just trying o get back to form, this was heavily copied (yes copied, not referenced) from cuppajj on Tumblr. I am going to do stuff differently due to Corrupted ideas, but since they did a Corrupted Ancients thing too, I figured copying one of their pictures would help me a lot too. Also, Cookie eye practice. So check out their Corrupted Ancients, They're not contained by Deceit, Sloth, Apathy, Destruction and Silence
