‼️ TW: Su!c!de attempt, potential emotional manipulation, dark themes, ascended Astarion, toxic relationship, lil bit of blo0d, vampires being vampires, etc.
Summary: Several years after Astarion ascended and Baulder's Gate was saved, Freya finds herself lost in a place of regret after her relationship with Astarion becomes strained. The Vampire Lord lets himself fall into a place of utter darkness.
She loves him dearly and believes deep down somewhere, he still loves her in his own way...but the ascension robbed him of ever overcoming the pain that haunts him, and with every day of their eternal life together- he slips further into better mirroring the vampiric cruelty Cazador once inflicted upon him.
Freya is my OC, Astarion belongs to BG3/D&D
This is how I imagine after the events of the game, if this is the route that is chosen...this is a possible outcome. This is not the ending I imagine is canon, but is a theme I wanted to explore.
Caption: Okay so this comic took me literally ages to make. I started it around February before I got a little busy and had to make progress with this slower than I'd originally intended. (49 hours of working canvas time haha)
I've learned a lot since the start of making this comic- so my style changes quite a few times from the beginning to the end as I grow more comfortable with the process of drawing in this style. There are still some things I'd do differently if I were doing it all over again, and perhaps I'd change some of the writing as well...but I'm happy to take the experience learned from a bigger project like this and apply it to something new. (Like my upcoming webcomic for instance ~shameless plug~ 👀 )
I wanted to explore some of the relationship dynamics that I believe would start coming into play post-game if Astarion has been ascended. I believe he would be very dismissive of how Tav feels if they begin to question him, leading to a very strained relationship.
I also feel that if Tav were showing signs of depression- feeling as though they made a mistake in helping him ascend, he would simply try to cover up the emotion behind it by playing a particularly manipulative savior and dismiss Tav's feelings, leading to a perpetual cycle of sorrow and then pretending that sadness never exists; because in his mind...what is there to grieve? Being all powerful means there is no reason to allow weakness to flourish.
Anyways, all of that long rant to say I had a lot of fun making this, and I hope you enjoy reading through it!
