PROLOGUE

It is said . . . that a time will come when the heavens will no longer bear the weight of our souls–as we have forsaken them. What was built beforehand will mean nothing, as all that there was to know will be forever-lost. The lineage of those who came before us will be broken, and neglected by our own twisted-delusions of life. The richness of the ground will no longer complete us, but only serve to fill our emptiness. Because in our attempts of progress, we will have moved far-away from our true selves, and our true origins.

There, we will force isolation on ourselves, just to prove our own power and greatness above nature, and relentlessness to change. But no matter how far we will have strayed, the truth, the harsh truth will leave a painful mark on us. Our children and their children will grow up unknowingly, and live a life of confusion and turmoil. They will never know peace, nor ever understand their place and the meaning of life. They will question not just their, but other's existence, as they will have become lost on their own.

All that was once good will slowly fade away, as love and friendship will no longer have meaning at all. Thus the essence of kinship will fall apart–in the eyes of many–and will lose all of its purpose. Anger, hate and the lust for practicality will take over, and cloud the judgment of many. This will be the time where we will have left our humanity behind, and we will no longer be relatives to those who came before us. Our sole existence will boil down to become mere vessels of flesh and blood. Driven by volatile instincts and impulses, rather than thoughts and deep emotions.

Life will be taken granted, not appreciated nor understood. And without that knowledge, all will be lost. Because we will no longer be able to recognize our own image. And by doing so, we will turn against each other, and break the most sacred vows of our existence. Then, we will turn our backs on everything there was to be known, and live in ignorance.

And the World will not be the place that it once was. It will become hostile and alien, just like our future selves. It will never know peace, and will always look for answers where it cannot. In our foolishness, we will have transformed our children into mindless machines of abandoned reason. By that time, their heart will be filled with hate, anger and frustration, and they will fight over what little we have left. And we will no longer be able to tell the difference between friend or foe, nor notice the flames of our own demise.

EPILOGUE

Had no idea that it would take me almost 2 months to get to this point! It's not that I lost focus–quite the opposite–as the original design took a rather sharp turn, right when I was about to start making this knife . . .

[Would also note that initially, I had the idea to post this and the spear together, but the scope of the production quickly chipped away that illusion.]

OF USE

This knife will be your tertiary weapon of choice–sort of a last resort if you will. It will have the lowest of stats, but not completely useless, alongside your sword, shield and spear. For some reason or another, I've this idea to make the knife to have a limited number of use; just to make it clear that this isn't a replacement for your mighty blade!

OF PRODUCTION

Initially, the blade was much-much simpler. So basic in fact that I started to hate it with passion. LOL. It had no purpose, no soul . . . nothing at all. Was just an empty shell of a tool!

See for yourself:

Of course, it goes without saying that EOTH aims to be more on the realistic side of things (historical fiction)–exclude the fanciness for now. Which translates to the fact that some/most of my design decisions had to adhere to the basic rules of the outer world (aka. real life). Which is fine, as it has been my mojo as far as I can remember! However, I had no idea how difficult this seemingly easy (knife) project will turn out.

First, I though to add some character, by adding an antler handle (procedurally generated, ditched the varnished wood idea beforehand), and replace the metal blade with an obsidian one (flint knapped). However, after some testing I threw the idea (of using a pre-made texture) out the window, and thought to sculpt the entire thing in "one" go–just like the good ol' days.

However, I wasn't satisfied with the results (even though I had a ton of fun coming up with the processes). Plus there was a lot of IRL frustration going on . . . So instead, I put this project on hold, just to start up a new one ?: Decided to make a more fantasy-esk knife from scratch! Eventually, that only made it to the design phase (high poly) as I realized how it clashed with the rest of the design. For those who haven't seen my last post, here's a quick refresher:

The scales alone took a long time to create, which pushed further and further the completion of the original project. But I had to create this piece, as it was itching to come out!

Hindsight: Making two projects, back-to-back with dragon scales, leveled up my dragonology by 2.

Then, right after new years, a new design started to surface:

As you can see, I've added new curves and new art, and so forth . . . basically I've completely remade the entire thing. But-but-but. It wasn't quite the thing I was looking for. Wanted something more epic, something more groundbreaking that was much closer to our character's heritage (dragon theme).

[Times like these I wish I could draw better ?]

Luckily, I found a solution, and turned it into the final product you saw at the beginning of my post. Below you'll see some of the immense detail I've put into this monster:

And last but not least, I had quite the difficulty coming up with a “backstory” for this knife. Almost drove me crazy that I made something that had no purpose what-so-ever. I know, I know . . . I'm crazy!