Gooday everyone,
Welcome to the Deacon Corner. If you’re new here, these galleries dive into the inspirations behind the images you’ll find throughout the books posted on these pages. In these issues, I also like to share the commission details for each project, so readers can follow along with how these images came to life.
If there’s a particular piece you’re curious about, you can find all previous issues under my journal entries or linked directly beneath the images within each chapter.
Now before we begin, none of these beautiful art pieces would exist without the incredible talent of Sickjoe who is the creative force behind all the artwork in these books. Quite literally the heart and soul of this visual world. If you appreciate his work as much as I do, I encourage you to visit his gallery and explore more of his stunning creations.
Now, without further ado, let's take a look at the featured image and the commission details below.
The final battle between the Rat King and the Leech Sultan unfolds not on a battlefield, but within the pulsing corridors of Icarus’s own body, his Vibriatus.
Velbrava dives into the bloodstream, becoming a vicious pathogen. Inside the roiling, vascular labyrinth, he constructs a makeshift kiln behind the lens of Icarus’s eye, fashioning a swarm of locusts bred for destruction. These chittering machines burrow through soft tissue, devouring sinew and muscle.
The war reaches its end not with a clash of swords, but with a silent, suffocating sabotage. Deep within the chambers of Icarus’s heart, Velbrava delivers the final blow—killing the Rat King from the inside out.
It is a grotesque and poetic reversal: Icarus, the shaper of shapers, becomes a husk, undone by the a parasite he raised, but he is not disappointed... How proud the old rat must be.