It stemmed from the fact that Cabaro, even while feeling fear, kept convincing both others and himself that he would easily defeat Gerathon. But the result spoke for itself.
Additional arts:
And their references:
P.S.
Finding even basic cobra anatomy lessons for art is practically impossible (not to mention references), so knowing where, how, and why to draw certain things is a real challenge. Sometimes the result turns out decent purely by accident, which means next time you have no idea how to recreate it. I tried to capture Gerathon's emotions from the previous comic, but something entirely new came out instead. And the failed attempts where the eyes go kept being erased so many times that I nearly rubbed through the paper, making it harder and harder to draw in that spot each time.
