#pharis

I made small transparent icons with the adorable Souls pixel-style NPCs designed by this fellow. This is Part V of Dark Souls.

GRAVE DOGS!

the first two are old concept sketches, the third one is a bust i drew today, more on her later.

grave dogs are skittish, docile wild dogs that roam in large packs in the wilds outside of cities in Graces verse. they are scavengers, carrion-eating and a major source of their diet consists on the recently dead. they are bald faced down to the neck or chest, sometimes with bald feet. their coats are shades of white to black, often dappled or lightly striped. the bare skin of their neck is thick and wrinkled.

when i say carion, i mean *people*. in-universe the body of a dead person isn't seen as *that person* and is not kept for any reason, nor is it celebrated or put on display. instead mass graves exist far outside of populated cities, and the newly dead are appropriately prepared and placed in shallow graves in forests, grasslands...anywhere the soil is suitable. the gravelands are rotated every now and then, allowing for nature to take its course and "digest" the remains left there.

grave dog packs are quiet. they can't bark and communicate amongst themselves with whines and yipping. they will follow working grave wardens, the people who place the bodies and dig graves, at a good distance, often disrupting their recent work. it is expected, and wardens don't interfere with nature.

rarely, a grave dog will find itself in the companionship of a warden, especially a lone one. not the most social animals, they usually end up being raised from a young age in order to bond to their person.

the final picture up there is a bust of a companion grave dog. Heidi, who belongs to Grave Warden Pharis (formerly a surana for DAO). heidi isn't pretty but she's extremely mild mannered and extremely obedient. she was hand-raised by Pharis as a young puppy. the tag in her ear dictates that she is a *tame pet*, and not a wild animal, should she be separated from pharis.