u/Boss_of_the_govno

Can anyone help me draw my creatures? I'm looking for volunteers who are skilled at drawing – is there anyone willing to lend a hand? Yeah, I know it sounds a bit strange, but I'd really appreciate some assistance. Unfortunately, I don't have any money to offer as payment, so this is purely a favour. I'm not very good at drawing myself – my skills are quite basic – which is why I'm reaching out to the community for help.

Beyond just the creature designs, I would also like to request anatomical sketches. I can provide all my rough drafts, diagrams, blueprints, and detailed written descriptions – everything you might need to understand the forms and structures. All I ask is that you help me bring these ideas to life on paper. If someone agrees to take this on, I will be genuinely, deeply grateful – it would mean a lot to me.

You don't have to colour the illustrations at all. Actually, I'm looking for a specific aesthetic – those kinds of drawings you see in the style of the illustrations from "All Tomorrows": muted, grimy, almost colourless, with a gritty and somewhat bleak atmosphere. That raw, sketchy feel is exactly what I'm after. I'll share all my reference materials and answer any questions you might have. Even if you can only do a few quick pencil studies, that would already be a huge help. Thank you for even reading this far.

I think three chapters will be enough for now, considering the project is still a work in progress. I'll be posting a few a day.

Chapter 1

"The Beginning of All Beginnings"

The Milky Way galaxy is home to an incredible variety of star systems. Let us focus on one of them and discuss the planets within the "Olympus-1" system. What makes this system remarkable is not merely the presence of inhabitants, but their uniqueness. Our planet, "Zeus-2," was formed from the collision of two ancient planets; sharing the same orbit, they had drawn closer to one another over billions of years until they finally collided, merging into a single, white-hot sphere. It spent hundreds of millions of years cooling down before an atmosphere began to form. The atmosphere consists of carbon dioxide (65%), nitrogen (12%), sulfur dioxide (10%), argon, xenon, and krypton (6%), methane (4%), and silicon tetrafluoride (3%). The first inhabitants of this world were simple single-celled organisms—autotrophs, or rather, organisms resembling autotrophs. They derived energy from continuous chemical reactions between hydrogen sulfide and silicon tetrafluoride, leaving behind a residue of microscopic silicon crystals. Forms resembling prokaryotes, eukaryotes, amoebas, and bacteria began to appear. While they resembled Earth's single-celled organisms, these life forms contained no water—unlike our own cells. Microscopic life began to emerge and teem across the planet, even under such conditions.

Chapter 2

"New Life"

Millions of years later, our silicon-based unicellular organisms began to unite into colonies – the first multicellular organisms. Our creatures are now called "silicabionts". The first simple multicellular organisms looked like small dark crystals, mostly rusty or black in colour, growing in length and reaching 15–20 cm in height.

When the crystal reaches its maximum height, it falls and crumbles into fragments, which are now separate organisms. This method of reproduction was used by the first silicabionts and was quite successful. It is something like mitosis, only in multicellular organisms. In addition to crystal silicabionts, other organisms also formed – silicabionts living in sulfur lakes. They descended from the "crystals", due to their frequent formation in sulfur springs, and because of different conditions they acquired a ribbed shell and grew organs that synthesise sulfur silt into organic substances. They reached up to 30 cm in length and resembled ancient Earth dwellers – trilobites.

Millions of years passed on the lonely, almost uninhabited planet, giving rise to the first complex organisms. Let's start with the land. Our first creatures look like huge boulders, but in fact they are complex multicellular life that formed by the fusion of several crystal silicabionts at once, reaching 2–3 metres. Such "boulders" most often form near hydrothermal vents and extract organic substances from sulfur fumes by processing vapours using a special organ that collects condensate and absorbs it into the body, while the remaining hydrogen fluoride after processing is released through microscopic pores located all over the body, most often in gaseous form. There are many varieties of these creatures – some "feed" on methane, others on carbon dioxide, but the most common species processes hydrogen sulfide, which is abundant on the planet's surface. These creatures do not move, do not see and do not hear. They just live. Their behaviour resembles that of single-celled organisms, but very large.

Now let us discuss another, equally interesting life form. The planet's surface is covered with many sulfur lakes and basins. Life in the sulfur springs boiled and flourished. Along the bottom walk amazing creatures, white, translucent in colour, which shimmer with their habitat so that they are not immediately visible. These huge creatures, ranging from 5 to 8 metres, move so slowly that they seem to stand still. They are sulfur-water silicabionts, descendants of the earliest lake silicabionts mentioned earlier. They crawl on their six thick legs along the bottom of the lake, collecting sulfur silt, from which they extract silicon. They have soft, tender skin, like that of Earth's jellyfish, but on their back there is a hard transparent shell that protects the creature from fluid pressure. They have no eyes, no hearing organs and no sense of smell. Sometimes they come ashore out of curiosity, but freeze and dry up because the temperature of the lake is significantly higher. But they do not die. They harden and stand like statues until something returns them – wind, relatives, etc. There they "thaw" and calmly continue to live. Their average age is 200–250 years, since there is no competition or threat. Thus two evolutionary branches were formed, proving that for life to arise on a planet, familiar conditions are not necessary.

Chapter 3

"Closer and Closer"

We have discussed the current inhabitants of the planet. Now let us examine the anatomy of one of them. The sulfur-water silicabiont, or lake silicabiont, is one of the most common inhabitants of the planet. Let us begin with the external structure. The creature is 5 to 8 metres long, 3–4 metres wide and 3–5 metres high. Very large organisms. The skin is soft, translucent, rich in silicates and gels that protect the delicate skin from the corrosive liquid. The skin is permeable to gases and small molecules, but does not allow salts to pass through. On the back there is a thick, translucent silicon plate – a shell that protects the creature from pressure. The shell is not smooth, it has a ribbed structure, which provides much better protection for the silicabiont. The limbs – 6 thick, strong legs, with cross‑shaped "feet" that prevent sinking into the sulfur silt.

Eyes are absent; the silicabiont orientates itself by vibration. The creature also has a mouth organ – it is located on the underside of the head. It is a wide funnel that sticks like a sucker to the surface and sucks in silt, extracting silicon from it using small flagella inside that filter food. After eating, all organic substances together with silicon particles enter a cavity with enzymes and hydrogen fluoride – this is the stomach, which, after digesting all substances, absorbs them directly into the body through the inner walls, which are also equipped with flagella, like in the oral cavity. This allows complete filtering of food from remaining unnecessary trace elements, and occasionally remaining waste is expelled through the mouth. Hydrogen fluoride appears in the stomach during digestion. If there is too much of it, the creature will expel it from the body in a strong, powerful and sharp burst through microscopic pores located on the belly and back. This would be an ideal defence against predators – a shot of hot gas that both repels and fights back when attacked. But there is no competition, so as a defence it is not yet needed. The brain of the silicabiont is well developed, but because of its metabolism, thinking is incredibly slow. Nerve endings are located only in the legs and shell – in other areas the animal feels nothing. Instead of blood, the silicabiont has a fluid resembling sulfur, rich in silicates and minerals. It is pumped by six pulsating chambers – hearts – located in the shell area. The creature has no skeleton – the body is held in shape by its "blood circulation" and fluid pressure.

As mentioned, lake silicabionts are among the most abundant animals on the planet, and all because they are hermaphrodites, fertilise quickly and independently. The female lays 8–12 eggs with larvae that develop on their own, and, for example, out of 10 only 5–6 will survive. The larvae grow quickly, in 2–3 years they are already adults. That is how the lake silicabiont is organised – the main inhabitant of the planet's sulfur lakes.