#lhotlan

Lhotlan Graves??👀

I've been dragged into League of Legends recently, and after finally delving into the character design and stories on offer, I began to love it proper.

I wanted to make a Vastayan OC, because of the colourful nature and interesting possibilities. And Riot doesn't have enough of them, anyway. So, this is Venri the brother of Rakan (according to him) who only recently was found wandering close to the towns of Ionia, observing the people and asking questions to those who are patient and kind. As for his full story ... you may have to check out @turquoise-vastayan if you want to meet him yourself.

Please click on the image to see it in full detail. I actually put a lot of work into these.

So, dance being among the most important parts of Lhotlan culture, I wanted to share some ideas / headcanons.

Being such a major part of their culture while them being a tribal people, I imagine circle-dances to be very common. (Something in which all members of the tribe can participate, as well as something that requires minimal knowledge of dance moves and thus can be very easily improvised or learned on the spot.) I imagine that quite very often there are 3 or more impressively good couples in the middle, who keep changing dance partners between each other and perform a dance way higher in quality and “show-off-ness” than what the circle of people around them does. (Avica and her love were among these couples often, though Avica was the better dancer.)

Keeping Lhotlan anatomy in mind, I would say grand leaps are a fairly common “show off move”, where in human dances you would stomp, in Lhotlan dances you would claw at the ground with your talons, and or course, wing movement is incredibly important! They often sway it around with great care, continuing and accentuating their bodies’ movements with it, other times the wing itself is the main focus of their body movement. Hitting someone with your wing on accident is the same as stepping on their feet, while stepping on their wing is far worse. In personal couple dance, it is an intimate move to wrap your wing around your partner for a moment (and of course, it is supposed to be a mutual move, and it often ends with a kiss).

Keeping Lhotlan temperament in mind, I would say their dances are generally fast, full of opportunities to show off your skill, and of course, very passionate in couples. Also there is much more emphasis on having an absolutely great time and being in tune with each other, with nature and with the wild magic around them, than there is on pulling off “the right steps for the right parts”. What I mean by this is their dances tend to be very close to improvising, rather than to having certain moves memorized and tied to certain parts of the music. The best dancers won’t necessarily know what their next moves are until their bodies start making them.

And now my favorite part: Lhotlan Magic in dance! We see that both Xayah and Rakan can throw feathers and return them, thus it is safe to say that all Lhotlans have this ability. So obviously this flashy trick must be shown in their dance! Now, certainly not everyone is gonna do it, it isn’t a perfectly safe thing after all, but those more skilled will likely try it with a few feathers. And those truly skilled may do it with a whole lot! Remember the circle dance thing with the amazing couples in the middle? Yes, well, those are the truly skilled Lhotlans, and they will send a flurry of colorful feathers into the sky, make them swirl in a wonderful sight and finally recall them, each their own. They will also jump high up, suspend themselves in the air and send their feathers outward to above the circle of people, making them fly in one of many wonderful trajectories and recall them before landing again. Again, this is quite a dangerous thing if tried by someone inexperienced, but these few are the best of the tribe, and they know exactly how to do it and what their own limits are. In couple dance, it also happens that the two dancers jump high and descend slowly in a swirling motion, or even suspend in the air for a moment. Also, then the partners circle each other with jump-like moves, it often happens that they shoot a few feathers into the ground around themselves as the beat of the song dictates, and latter recall them as an additional part of a move.

I am not sure who make the music for this, as what Lhotlan could keep himself from dancing while all the others are doing just that, but I am currently convinced the musicians also dance, just more moderately in order to actually be able to play music / sing. (Of course, they do “hear” the magic and can just dance to that, but I do believe they make some really great music that accompanies that. Of course, their music has to be in tune with the “song of magic”, and seeing how ever changing that is, I imagine most (if not all) Lhotlan songs are actually incredibly flexible and would sound like they are being winged on the spot to human ears. (That said, they do also just wing it on the spot a lot.))

Many people are under the impression that Xayah’s ears are a latent fox or feline trait.  While she may have some of these distant attributes in her bloodline, they are actually more reminiscent of the ear tufts or ‘horns’ displayed by many species of owls.  

This is why her ears are so much higher on her head than Rakan’s.  It’s much more apparent if you were to look at her mom, who was a lot more owl-like than she is.  In addition, she also shares the same judgmental stare of an owl.

Quicl ref pic of my LoL oc, I was inspired by gynandromorphism bird.

They are from a vastaya tribe from the south of Ionia and is currently lost in Runeterra. They can summon a sword made out of their own quills.