Oh god so sorry for not uploading in a while again… But uhhhhh here is this huge AU art dump as tribute! This is my personal take on the concept of swapping Shadow Milk Cookie and Pure Vanilla Cookie’s roles of Ancient and Beast
I have major imposter syndrome when it comes to interpreting CRK (because I’m a new gen and have not played beast yeast yet) so I kept this concept to myself for a while until I had all the designs and plot details loosely hammered out
The info about the AU and MUCH more art is further down for whoever is interested!
Above are the three stages Shadow Milk goes through after meeting his beast, just like OG PV he has his base form, his “truthless” form and his awakened form!
I went with a bug/snake motif for this design, I know bug might be more mystic flour coded but I have a different idea in mind for her and I like the sharp, slightly dangerous vibe the bug inspired bits add to his design
In this AU Smilk didn’t become corrupted, instead when he reached his breaking point he ran away from his duties as the fount of knowledge and became a wanderer instead.
He left everything behind, including his academy, and decided that he would go into hiding and keep to himself. Though he can’t help himself from giving advice and helpful knowledge to others he meets even if he’s deathly afraid of being rejected by them when he does
A lot of people theorize that Smilks name was originally Blueberry Milk Cookie before his corruption, I’m not sure if that is cannon or not but that name feels a bit basic and I didn’t really like it that much so I decided to rename him Spinosa Milk Cookie for this AU. It gives this AU more identity anyway and I like it so that’s what I’m sticking with!
You can tell I did these designs first because the art looks way worse than Smilks art… I eventually got a hang of blending the CRK style with my own Chibi style at least
Above again is beast Pure Vanilla Cookie! Lots of people like leaning into the lamb symbolism he has associated with him and I agree that I like it but only to a certain extent, the sheep imagery is present but very toned down. He has a form he uses when traveling and has a true form for when he drops the friendly facade (and ofc a beast form, though I’m already at the image limit)
In this AU Pure Vanilla goes from a truth seeker and teller to a knowledge hoarder. He loves to pry into others secrets and can even read their minds to an extent, but he always keeps information about himself incredibly close to his chest. He will trick you into thinking you know him when you really don’t know anything at all
The first sketch I made was just Spinosa and PV talking as they traveled. The two got very close after meeting by coincidence, Spinosa had never met anybody that could understand him in the way Pure Vanilla could
PV also never judged or hated him for being honest and telling the truth, he even encouraged him to be blunt sometimes since he’d gained a habit of people pleasing and not speaking his mind after having so many others turn on him
In the next sketch PV is in a special room in Spinosas spire, he eventually convinces him to return to his life as the fount of knowledge and gave him the advice to spread his knowledge through a more palatable method. (A.K.A educational performances at his academy) Spinosa listened and his academy turned into more of a theater as many gathered to listen to his performances
Afterwards there would always be a party hosted by Pure Vanilla with the intent of gathering information on the attendees. Pure Vanilla’s goal is to eventually have a library full of knowledge about every cookie in Crispia, and of course only him and Spinosa will have access to it. His current collection resides in an empty room in Spinosas spire
Spinosa Milk Cookie becomes increasingly exhausted and sleep deprived when his educational performances became more popular. In a way he is falling to deceit, he is knowingly deceiving his audience by luring them to his performances and after parties.
He knows that PV is collecting information on them, and though deep down he’s aware PV’s intentions seem off he’s turning a blind eye and convincing himself archiving people’s lives and personal information is useful
He’s also deceiving himself by putting on a smile and pretending being in such positive limelight makes him happy, when really he is miserable and is growing resentful of not only himself and his audience, but is also becoming resentful of Pure Vanilla for constantly pushing him to keep going, insisting that he just needs to get used to his position again
Spinosa gains a bit more of that classic Shadow Milk Cookie personality as well, losing more of that fount of knowledge purity and integrity the more disillusioned he becomes
Last but not least we have Pure Vanilla’s legendary beef with Wizard Cookie. Technically he dislikes Black Sapphire and Candy Apple and equal amount but that doesn’t happen until he realizes they were working with Wizard Cookie to convince Spinosa Milk that he’s secretly a dangerous person that’s just using him (even though that’s not true he is doing some wrong that must be stopped)
I want all five OG main characters from CRK to be assigned to a different ancient and become their helper or minion or whatever, they also don’t know each other in this world and instead make friends with the OG beasts minions.
Wizard Cookie is assigned to Spinosa obviously, Black Sapphire, and Candy Apple kind of replace Ginger Brave and Strawberry Cookie as the heroic trio, but Wizard Cookie gets the most main character treatment out of the tree
I will make AU designs for Spinosas trio of silly’s at some point, I don’t know if I’ll do the other swapped ancients and beasts but uhhhhh if enough people comment then sure ✨✨
