Prey on the Weak. Feast on the Strong.

𝐖𝐄 𝐎𝐅𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐈𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐘 𝐇𝐀𝐕𝐄 𝐀 𝐃𝐀𝐓𝐄!

https://www.prismhauscomics.com/

With Volume II of Step-Monster around the corner, I felt a little truncated recap of the previous Volume would be in order, complete in the updated style and quality of the upcoming Volume! Enjoy!

It's coming...

So it's been quite a little while hasn't it?

Five whole years to be exact.

A stretch of time that anyone would rightfully call more than "a little while" if we're being honest. And for that I don't really have anyone to blame but myself. For the longest time I have struggled with maintaining active presences across multiple websites and platforms, at least in an organic way that doesn't involve services like Postybirb. I want to get better at that, and right now there's no better motivation for that than the start of this year, considering what I've got in store!

While the past five years have seen me doing everything from commissions, to adopts, ask answers, and illustrations on platforms like Tumblr, then Twitter, and now Twitter + Bluesky, I've pivoted to making the push I should have done a while ago: full length comics. What does this mean? Well quite a number of things!

As I stated in the first post on here I've uploaded since 2021, I've been working on constructing a website for the second half of last year and save for a few final finishing touches, I'm slated to go live with it during the first quarter of this year! This site is mainly going to be a hub for hosting all the comics I'm going to have going forward! From one-shots, to long-form narratives, it's all gonna be at this easy to find domain instead of trying to hunt me down across infinite platforms. I'm still going to be doing my best to maintain a renewed presence here and other sites, but that's going to be the "headquarters" so to speak!

And we won't be starting out things empty handed on a barren site mind you, oh no. To kick things off the first comic to be uploaded in full on there is going to be: Step-Monster! And not just the first volume that started it all folks, the long awaited Volume II is going to drop to wrap things up. 5 full new chapters to conclude the story of Matilda, the Millers, Roy, and their tale of circumstance, parenthood, trust, and love. Hard dates for these chapter's release will be coming soon, and teasers will drop as well so keep your ears to the ground! As the deviation that went up was titled: "Big Things" are indeed coming! I can't wait to finally bring you folks along for the ride on the stories and ideas I've been sharing pictures of online for so long. The time is here! It's time for comics! Time for stories!

Comics are coming next year.

A website is coming next year.

A new name is coming next year.

I knew it was only a matter of time before I got this question haha. 

Maps are one of the best ways to lay out a world to someone in a single image without mountains of exposition within the story. I personally love seeing the maps for fictional stories and pouring over the geography, towns, cities, bodies of water, landmarks, and everything else in them. 

Unfortunately I’m not nearly as far in having gotten Kashmir’s world map fleshed out as I am with it’s plot, major characters, history, and socio-politics. I’m still having trouble positioning nations, determining their roles/level of international influence, their geological advantages and disadvantages, and other complex factors to make this world hold up well enough. I run into walls a lot and sometimes it gets frustrating because I’m finding out this doesn’t come as naturally to me as constructing narratives ahaha. 

I think the key lies in me accepting that I can get away with a lot more than I’m letting myself because this is a fictional made-up world with giant talking dragon people already in it. 

T-Thank you Anon!

This is answered in my FAQ [here]. 

But just for the record, yes that’s perfectly fine by me. 

So I’ve been pretty quiet across nearly all my platforms for the greater majority of last year and I wanted to sorta compile a nice and (mostly) concise article to link across all of them to keep people abreast of what’s going on on the “War Front” as it were with my artistic endeavors!

TL:DR Version for those not interested in reading the whole thing:

Fernanda Cortez is a former Spanish staffer who was an assistant to Spain’s ambassador to the UN. She resigned from her position when said ambassador was replaced with one who’s political views she didn’t agree with. She came to work with the Strangewatchers as part of the new UN initiative that funded and provided oversight for them. 

Though she’s one of the individuals in the department that posses no powers or abilities whatsoever, she’s extremely good at organizing, planning, and delegating tasks and is one of the assistant administrators under Director Lao.

Ackermann is an individual who probably poses the largest threat to the dream realm ruled by Duchamp in my story of “Rem”.

The form you see above is one of the many of hundreds they take, and is by no means their real one but appears to be their default on many occasions. Their real identity is unknown and thus, the name is just an adopted pseudonym. 

The main villain of Rem, Ackermann is believed to be an unidentified serial killer who has managed to gather enough power to manipulate the dreamscape to kill individuals who encounter them while in it. They despise the goofy, whimsical and irreverent logic of the realm as governed by Duchamp and wish to try and make it more sensible. 

There are several martial disciplines in the world of Kashmir but within the country of Kashmir itself and the Orsi as a race the most widely taught and practiced martial art is called “Yanra-Vaat” (or “Troubled Way” in Orsi tounge). 

Unique to Orsi due to the use of tails, biting, and other maneuvers difficult or impossible for humans, Yanra-Vaat consists of two sub-styles of engagement, with one predominantly serving as simply a precursor to the second:

The first sub-style is known as “Tevaa” (or “Motion”) and is the match state two fighters naturally begin in which is standing upright on their feet. This style is mainly focused on foot-work, strikes, and finding a favorable angle to engage your opponent. Two Orsi engaging in Tevaa would look very similar to the early openings of a human MMA match in our world, albeit much more kick/knee heavy and the use of tails in attempts to sweep an opponent or strike their legs to weaken them. Hand strikes exist but due to Orsi body proportions and longer necks, they are trickier to land. There are a few Tevaa-focused specialists who can win matches on points alone or knockout while staying on their feet completely and continuing to foil an opponent’s attempts to drag the fight into the Singat phase. 

The second sub-style is known as “Singat” (or “Grounded”) and is the match state in which the two fighters after weakening each other by exchanging blows in Tevaa, attempt to take down, throw, or submit their opponent. In this phase the fighters stop attempting to keep distance between each other and directly engage in grappling and holds, using their lower bodies and tails to leverage an favorable throw with them landing on top to hold the advantage. Some Singat specialists are skilled at spectacular mid-air throw reversals which are exiting to see, letting their foes think they have the upper hand only to completely surprise them. Once on the ground the referee usually moves in much closer (usually crouched on all 4′s and crawling around) to watch as they struggle for a dominant position. 

Amateur matches last for 10 minutes, while imperial-sanctioned matches last for 20 minutes. There are no rests or breaks and so even though Orsi naturally have high stamina, Yanra-Vaat demands peak conditioning and a keen sense of when to attack and when not to to conserve energy. 

A judge’s panel of 3 (for amateur) and 5 (for imperial-sanctioned) observes the fight from different seats at the edge of the fight floor and award points based on strikes, reversals, holds, and defensive elusiveness. If the fight goes the full length and no knockout or submission is achieved by either fighter they rule in favor of one to award a win based on points scored. Draws are extremely rare but possible.

Victory is achieved in the following ways: 

A fighter immobilizes an opponent in Singat for longer than 10 seconds.

A fighter secures a clean neck bite in Singat and holds it for 3 seconds.

A fighter knocks out an opponent via a strike.

The match time concludes and a fighter is rewarded a judge’s decision.

A fighter’s opponent is disqualified (hair pulling, eye gouging, or biting unapproved areas other than the neck).

A fighter’s opponent surrenders or quits at any point in the fight.

I have several races and characters from dozens of stories that I haven’t even hammered out the designs for by putting pen to paper. I’ WILL toss you a few bust doodles I did of an as of yet nameless alien lady a few days ago as a consolation prize. I’m gonna use her in something, I just don’t know what… 

You know I don’t think I really have a legal copyright on absurdly large hips as a bodily shape last time I checked?

All joking aside though there are hundreds upon hundreds of artists out there who share unifying traits like the one you’re addressing between you and me. And it’s a trait that while it’s nothing that someone would accuse you of hard plagiarism over, I still can understand how it’s making you feel like you’re not being original. 

I think the important thing here to remember is the fact that our styles are nothing more than artistic shorthand or elements that we lift from media we see around us and integrate into our own work. Plenty of other artists have witnessed me draw hips the size of armchairs, but only a tiny minority have probably adopted that in their work just because they like seeing it but don’t care for it enough to start drawing it themselves. All your experiencing is a strong influence in your work from something you enjoy doing that you picked up from me years ago.

In due time just like all stylistic influences it’ll change and shift with your and become more and more “yours” in that sense. But I would not stress yourself out over feeling like a “copy-cat”, we as artists all draw from each other constantly. That’s the natural creative ecosystem that we’re always swimming around in.