Gooday everyone,
Welcome to the Deacon Corner. If you’re new here, this space dives into the inspirations behind the images you’ll find throughout the books on these pages. What began as a place to share commission breakdowns has grown into something more. In addition to detailing how each piece came to life, you’ll now find expanded chapter notes, lore entries, and my own black-and-white concept illustrations which are raw glimpses into the ideas that shaped this world before they fully took form.
Before we begin, it’s important to say that none of the beautiful stylized images found in the hard and soft copies of these books would exist without the incredible talent of Sickjoe who is quite literally the heart and soul of this visual world. If you appreciate his work as much as I do, I highly encourage you to visit his gallery and explore more of his creations.
Now, without further ado, let’s take a look at the featured image and learn a bit more about the lore hidden in this chapter.
At the outset of a Pallid War, most engineers mistake the Tonsil for a moon, an ominous, low-hanging sphere suspended from the vaulted flesh of Kath’le Kal’s hard palate. But this is no celestial body. The Tonsil is the Pallid Throne, entombed and dormant, tethered to the ceiling by a thick fleshy stalk that sways with unsettling rhythm like the pendulum of a grandfather clock counting down to calamity.
Structurally, it resembles a vast, inverted teardrop, a weight of soft tissue that pulses faintly with some internal rhythm. Its surface is sealed by overlapping petals, slick and pale, as if some Lovecraftian rose were budding from the throat of a god.
Furthermore, the Tonsil is not passive. It responds to death.
With each fallen engineer, the weight of the Tonsil grows. It descends, slowly, inevitably, sagging toward the dunes below. When only a single engineer remains, and the bloodletting ceases, the stalk breaks and It ruptures.
That is when the petals unfurl.
The opening of the Pallid Throne is not an event but a revelation; a grotesque flowering, heralding the end of one era and the birth of another. Whatever secrets emerge from within are only for the reigning monarch of Kath'le Kal.