“An encounter with a dark seductress named Riel starts Charlie, a molecular geneticist, on a downward spiral towards his own destruction.” LITTLE DEATHS is created by Matt Krizan and Jason Moser.

Also available at asylumink.net are the ELLIUM stories DIAMOND MINE and BLOOD RED SNOW all available for free or as a convenient PDF download.

So why waste time?  It’s free and it’s available today!

www.ASYLUMINK.net

ABOUT ASYLUM INK:

“Where does one go from a world of insanity? Somewhere on the other
side of despair.”
– T.S. Eliot
ASYLUM INK was founded on May of 2006 by Jason Moser. Formed with the stated goal of quality entertainment at an affordable price, Asylum Ink is working with some of the finest creators in the entertainment industry and continues to strive for excellence with its flagship creation, Ellium. For additional information, Jason Moser and Asylum Ink can be reached via email at contact@asylumink.net.

ELLIUM tells the story of a secret society determined to save the world, whether we want them to or not! Prepare to enter a futuristic world of espionage and the occult, where the true powers behind puppet governments are fighting for control of humanity with only the members of ELLIUM to stand in their way!

In other words, it’s the X-files if Jack Bauer was in charge!

Derrexi Tzelan, protagonist of Nahast: Lands of Strife

Derrexi Tzelan, an accomplished swordsmistress with a past she’s not very proud of, is tasked by the Empress of Solerne to open a branch of the order of the Hawk Maidens in the city of Beldatz, training a cadre of girl warriors to serve as the city’s defenders when the beleaguered City Watch is away. She will soon find herself in the middle of a shadow war between the city’s political and supernatural factions that might threaten the fabric of the Empire itself.

Nahast is based in a fusion of Asian and Mesoamerican myths and cultures rather than the more common European legendry. It is a world where spirits can coexist with mortals, and gods are in a constant state of celestial war. The world is undergoing its Fifth Age, after all previous ones ended in a great cataclysm as the dominant race of each failed the Time of Testing, a period during which the greater forces of the universe present an existential dilemma. The mortal races of the Fifth Age are just beginning their Time of Testing, and whether they are even able to recognize what the test is -let alone succeed in it- will determine whether the world continues, or it ends to begin anew.

Nahast is not only a webcomic, but a grand work in progress that includes original fiction that fleshes out the world and the characters, and also a fully-developed fantasy world for use in role-playing games. These two other parts of the project are represented in the sister sites:

• Nahast: Chronicles of the Fifth Age: Free web-based fiction in the world of Nahast.
• Nahast: Legends and Heroes: Setting and role-playing information detailing Nahast, its people, organizations, magic and mysteries.

About the Author

Alejandro “Al-X” Melchor is a freelance writer from (and currently in) Mexico, moonlighting as a translator to pay the bills. Although experienced in a variety of fields, his favorite professional activity is writing for role-playing games, and he has worked for Mongoose Publishing (several d20 sourcebooks), White Wolf (Trinity, Mage, Exalted), Green Ronin (Blue Rose, Mutants & Masterminds: Mecha & Manga), Fantasy Flight Games (Grimm: the Role-playing Game), and the defunct Guardians of Order.

He’s a self-taught artist who keeps trying new things and refining his methods and is an avid reader of tutorials on several things artistic.

Sample Page

Nahast: Lands of Strife - page 244 - "The Scales Tip"

Visit the Sunset Grill.

Excessively bright students have an amazing ability to outsmart themselves, and the kids of 4th and 5th grade combined class at the Poppinstock Academy for Gifted Children are wonderfully warped. They aren’t exactly your usual innocent, starry-eyed youths. Being normal and nice is far too boring! These kids are not content unless they’ve escalated things out of control.

It’s fearsomely cute!

“Because Knowledge is a Weapon!”

Talon quickly finds himself on the run, hunted by a mythical race of half-human, half-beasts called the “Ayenroki,” who claim guardianship of what he took. Can Talon find an ally and save himself before time—and fate—catches up with him?

Here is an example page:

Chapter 7 Page 22

More as a footnote than a celebration, the Chronicles of the 5th Age site now features a short story called “Deeta’s Lament“, which gives a look at the motives and epilogue of the chapter’s main antagonist, Deeta, who is none other than Niriko’s elven mother.

Now, with no time to lose, Nahast posts its 250th page with the beginning of Chapter 9: Voices from the Darkness! The night is not over for the heroes, as Behari, who was wounded by a poisoned arrow during Chapter 8, is now fighting for her life.

Several secrets hinted at in previous chapter will receive additional clues, and the major players of the shadow war that threatens the city will be revealed! Glimpes of the future and insights into the past! Secrets of the spirit world and the dread Region of the Dead! In Chapter 9, the main plot of the entire comic will truly start unraveling so, keep reading!

1) What is your comic about?

Precocious is about a group of 9- and 10-year-old geniuses who are too smart for their own good. The main four kids – Bud, Autumn, Jacob and Tiffany – live in the Sapphire Lake section of the Gemstone Estates neighborhood and attend the Poppinstock Academy, a school for the gifted. It takes a special brand of genius (and zero common sense) to cause their special brand of destruction. They’re competitive, capable and combative – and none are content unless they’ve built whatever situation they’re in into something epic. Which is usually a war. Think you’re more evil than me? War! Don’t like my dessert choice? War! There’s a bake sale? EPIC WAR! To these kids, this is perfectly normal and healthy behavior. This is what they do for fun.

Stepping back a bit, Precocious is a silly interpretation of the pitfalls of intellectualism. These kids work on a different level than the others in their age group, so they’ve naturally decided the others aren’t even worth acknowledging. Solidly locked in their ivory tower, the group is so insular they even ignore the existence of others in their own class. They’re horribly (and hilariously) elitist. Their mindset is so clearly healthy, after all. My kinds are in no way role models – but role models are BORING. It’s *fun* to watch deliciously flawed people flail around!

2) How did you get started making webcomics?

Oooh, this is going to be a long one.

I’ve wanted to do cartooning even since a neighbor let me borrow a Peanuts collection. They never got it back. I read the comics in the Washington Post every day as a kid, enjoying the modern cartooning heyday when Calvin and Hobbes, The Far Side and Bloom County were going strong.

My first attempt at cartooning came in 1990, when I created a strip called Brats. Brats was about… a group of 9- and 10-year-old geniuses who were too smart for their own good! The main four kids – Autumn, Jacob, Tiffany and the main character whose name I forgot – lived in the Sapphire Lake section of the Gemstone Estates neighborhood and attended a school for the gifted. Hmm.

Brats was a failure. I simply could not draw cartoon figures at all! This was especially frustrating for THE CLASS ARTIST! I’m awesome at drawing, capable of working in several styles with high proficiency, but it turns out cartooning requires a completely different set of skills. Embarrassed at my poor drawing skills, I gave up on Brats in 1991. I couldn’t let cartooning go, though. The next year I tried again, this time making cartoons about my classmates. Once again, they were terrible. One time a classmate, who was not artistic in the slightest, grabbed my sketchbook and drew his own cartoon about the class. Every time people looked through the book, it was the clear favorite. I was so bad at cartooning, I had NEGATIVE skill! Someone with NO skill was better! That was enough of a soul crusher to keep me from cartooning for years. I tried again in high school, making comics for the school newspaper. One cartoon ran before I quit due to embarrassment. Here I was, the COVER ARTIST for the county art fair, and I couldn’t draw a cartoon figure to save my life.

When I went to art school, I gave up on cartooning as the unreachable dream. Having internet for the first time, my daily comic reading shifted to webcomics. People no longer needed to fight for syndication – the meritocracy that is the internet would elevate those who were skilled no matter where or who they were! The door was open! IF ONLY I HAD CARTOONING SKILL! Oh well. I settled on being a passionate admirer of webcomics and a kickass fine artist.

And then my life fell apart. Everything went wrong at once and I somehow washed out of school with straight A’s. Twice. Something was wrong with me. I *wanted* to work, but I just couldn’t do anything. I went over two years without doing any art whatsoever. I got help, and was completely shocked when I was diagnosed with ADHD. Turns out I’m a textbook case and I had NO idea. After some experimentation, I was given good old fashioned Ritalin. The next week I went out and bought my first sketchbook in years, and I haven’t stopped drawing since. For the first time in my life, I could THINK without it being a grand effort, and I could WORK without spending hours or days psyching myself up for it! I had a new lease on life.

With that motivation, I set a long-term goal for myself: I was going to learn cartooning. If I could pull off a long-term project – something that would be unheard of for the old me – not only would I be fulfilling a lifelong dream, but I’d prove that I was in control of my life. It took over four years of drawing for hours and hours every day, but I could see the progress I was making! I could launch a strip! Brats was resurrected, renamed Precocious, and on January 1, 2009 my dream of being a cartoonist came true. Ritalin may still get credit for saving my life, but cartooning is why my life was worth saving!

3) Five years from now, what do you see your comic becoming? Will it be over? Will it have grown larger?

By my estimation, it takes about five years before a comic truly gels. At that point, the writing is disciplined, the timing is perfect and drawing is tight and confident. (For the record: Malcolm Gladwell’s new book, Outliers, has a section with scientific backing for this idea.) In five years Precocious should be clicking on every level, and I can’t wait. I work my butt off every day to get the hours of practice in that I need to achieve the five-year glory. I want to see my character designs evolve and becomes streamlined. I want the things I worry over now in execution to become second nature. Seeing such a bright future ahead of me keeps me motivated.

I certainly hope my readership will continue to grow. Like every cartoonist, I would love to have my passion also pay the bills. Between cartooning, illustration and my fine art, I think I can cobble together a decent life over that time. I may have to starve a bit before I get there, though.

4) Tell us about your main character. What are his/her motivations? How did he/she join up with your other characters and why?

I’ll start with Bud, since he’s the central character of the strip. Bud is the one responsible for the main group being what it is, good and bad. Since he began as an avatar for a 10-year-old me, it’s only natural he shares some of my tendencies. My bliss is to have a small group of extremely close friends who energetically bounce off each other, and that’s what Bud created. He also shares my bad habits, such as my insular nature and smart mouth.

Autumn is the co-lead, and she’s taken one the more central role in these introductory stages due to her being the new girl. She may be new, but it’s very clear she was meant to be in Sapphire Lake. She fits in almost too easily. Spoiled by always being far smarter than everyone in public school, Autumn must reconcile being in a group of equals with her love of brutally dominating others.

Overall, the dynamics between Bud and Autumn continue to amuse me. They both feed off the other and soon things are blown out of proportion in spectacular ways!

5) Who is your favorite secondary character and why?

From the regular supporting characters, I’ll go with the devious pageant girl, Dionne. My main kids may like to talk a big game and pretend they’re evil supervillains, but they’re still good at heart – if horribly warped. They’re no match for Dionne’s gleeful villainy. It’s really fun to write for Dionne, and it’s nice to have one character who can get the better of my kids. Without Dionne, Bud and Autumn would spin out of control.

6) What is your favorite comic page?

“YOU DON”T LIKE CHOCOLATE!?!” That whole dessert violence week is full of favorites. It’s showing all my kids at their best – which may be their worst.

7) Is there a storyline you’re really looking forward to? What is it about? Give us a spoiler warning if necessary!

Precocious was originally going to launch in the summer (which is why all the intro arcs take place then) – but I ended up bumping its launch date to 2009. In doing so, I missed out of my chance to tell the story about electing a class president – a battle between Roddy and Dionne. I refuse to let it go, and it’ll run this October. With a year of experience under my belt, I bet I can make it even more awesome this time!

Can you give us a short explanation on how you make your pages? If you have a tutorial or anything, please link it.

The first thing I do is write up the script. When I get an idea, I mentally toss my characters at them and see where they take me. Whatever works gets written down in outline form. I come back to the outlines later (fresh eyes) and begin to flesh out strips and cut the weaker ideas. Once I have scripts I like, I print them out. I like to work on strips in bunches, so I try to have at least a week’s worth before I move to the next stage.

I use pre-printed templates for my strips. That may be lame, but it’s the only way I can guarantee scanning it with straight lines. The daily format is too big for my scanner, so I have to scan it in two parts. Hand-drawn panels adds one more way to throw things off in the process. When lettering, I use a light box and a page I designed with text lines. This ensures my letting will be straight and the same size on the strip. I first write in the dialog with no-copy blue pencil to see how it fits, often changing the script as I go to tighten things up or save space.

The next step is drawing the figures in the no-copy blue. I use a mechanical pencil with uni-ball soft blue lead for this. This part takes the longest, as I try to sketch everything. I’m not confident enough yet in my inking to improvise too much.

I next ink the borders and dialog balloons, using a dip pen with a Speedball #513EF Globe Nib. Dialog is handwritten with a .08 tech pen. Figures and backgrounds are done in a combination of dip pen (same nib – it’s the only one I’ve ever used so I’m set in my ways now!) and tech pens for the smaller figures and details. For corrections, I can’t recommend the Uni-ball Signo white gel pen enough. The white is nicely opaque and the line is fine enough to give one excellent control.

With the strip complete, I scan it (two waves to get it all) into Photoshop. Once the two halves are lined up and merged, I use the contrast tool set at 50 to bring the blacks out and knock back the whites. Then, since my scanner doesn’t filter out all of the no-copy blue, use the select>color range tool. I set my color to #aaaaaa and select a range of 135, deleting most of the gray artifacts. Then, just to be sure, I set the foreground color to black and select the same range. I select inverse and delete, leaving only the full black lines. I can then color it, or drop the strip onto the white background of my saved template. Ta-dah!

9) Be your own critic! When it comes to your comic, what are you looking to improve upon?

There’s a constant effort to tighten up the execution in general. Character proportions still shift from panel to panel, and it bugs me. I’m still brutal with perspective for some reason, considering I spent YEARS learning all about it. I’d like to put in more backgrounds than I do, but time is also a concern when doing a daily strip. For the writing, it can always be snappier. Going back to the five-year plan, these are things that only practice can fix – so I try not to fret over it too much. That’s a mighty tall order for a perfectionist, however.

10) Here’s one I’m sure everyone reading this is asking: Can you please stop writing novels all about yourself?

The answer is NO! I find myself far too interesting! I tell long rambling stories in the comic, so no one should be surprised it’s a part of who I am! I’m a Vonnegut disciple, so I thrive in the heartfelt stringing together of tangents. Still, I do take breaks between the ramblings, so you’re all off the hook.

1. What is your comic about?

Alex: Here’s what we tell people: “Rocket Llama is the world’s longest-running comic book hero. Established in 1916, The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama helped shape the face of popular culture world-wide. We rediscovered these classics deep underground in an archaic vault — the scripts, designs, ashcan copies, and more. As both the series’ current production team and appreciators of such groundbreaking literature, we have taken it upon ourselves to restore these classic issues to a glory more befitting a modern, digital age.” Allegedly.

To put it succinctly, Rocket Llama is an adventure comic in the vein of the Walt Disney Comics and Stories comic books that Ducktales was based on, Johnny Quest cartoons, and old action adventure comic strips, but it’s also a broad parody of common storytelling elements that have been used in comics, movies, and all forms of media throughout the 20th and 21st centuries.

2. How did you get started making webcomics?

Alex: Nick and I have always had an interest in telling stories, primarily through the venue of comics. And seeing as how the internet presents us with a nigh infinite audience at a nil production cost, webcomics were the venue of entertainment that we happily settled upon.

3. Five years from now, what do you see your comic becoming? Will it be over? Will it have grown larger?

Nick: Five years from now, I hope Rocket Llama will be the best looking webcomic out there on the internet.

Alex: Five years from now, I would love to see The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama presented as a Pixar animated film. I think our comic will have expanded to have a large fan base, and I think we will have enough stories to draw from that drawing from the source material to create a film will be a paltry task.

4. Tell us about your main character. What are his/her motivations? How did he/she join up with your other characters and why?

Alex: Rocket Llama is an adventurer, explorer, gangbuster, and spy. In terms of his personal history, his globetrotting escapades are motivated by his desire to find his father, who disappeared right as he perfected the Rocket technology that RL uses today. In terms of his personality, RL has a strong sense of justice and a keen analytical mind, and uses his critical thinking skills to unravel the tangled web of injustice wherever he may find it.

5. Who is your favorite secondary character and why?

Nick: I don’t think my favorite character has actually shown up yet. The character is a villain. In fact, most of my favorite characters are villains. Evil is just more fun to draw.

Alex: Well, if I were to state a favorite secondary character, I’d have to say Bowser Von Uberdog, a villain introduced in the first comic we published, The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama #112. He’s a parody of old school villains like Dr. Doom and Blofeld, not to mention the fact that he’s a cute, fat li’l bulldog.

6. What is your favorite comic page?

Alex: My favorite page is from 112, showing the Super Robot Dog Walker destroying a volcano. Nick’s art on the destruction of that volcano is just fantastic, I mean, you really feel the force of that laser beam blowing up that noble land mass.

Nick: I’m glad you like it so much. For me, there’s an establishing shot from issue 136 that I’m still in love with even though I completed it months ago. It was the first time I really got to get fancy with the comic. Crafting it was a great learning experience.

7. Is there a storyline you’re really looking forward to? What is it about? Give us a spoiler warning if necessary!

Alex: Hee hee, welll, sometime in the future… Bowser Von Uberdog gets a girlfriend. I have to leave it at that, though. You’ll just have to see the rest as it unfolds.

Nick: Actually the story after our current one is what I’m really looking forward to. I’m writing it as well as doing the art. It’ll be an incredibly demanding exercise but I think it’ll be a good chance to explore new grounds with the comic.

8. Can you give us a short explanation on how you make your pages? If you have a tutorial or anything, please link it.

Alex: Well, I write the script and scribble the storyboard, so I don’t have much interesting to say about my creative process. These days I type in Microsoft Word, and I draw using a pencil and computer paper. Nick’s the one with the technical know-how.

Nick: First I draw the page on a 17 x 11 Blueline Pro sheet. Then I scan it and trace over my work in Adobe Illustrator, making some tweaks to proportions and the background that I might have made mistakes on with the drawing. I color it a little in Illustrator, but I then load up the file into Photoshop and color it there. Once I get done there, I put it back into Illustrator, add the dialogue, and finally the pageviewer. That’s the most typical way I do a page, but it does vary from time to time.

9. Be your own critic! When it comes to your comic, what are you looking to improve upon?

Nick: Coloring. I really want to add more gradients and depth without making the page look too digital. I’m trying to retain that classic comic book look.

Alex: I am always looking for ways to make Rocket Llama funnier and more exciting. I want people to read Rocket Llama and be laughing or pumped the entire time, and I’m constantly trying to sharpen my writing so that people are as entertained as possible when reading.

10. How did you create Rocket Llama?

Alex: The story of the progenesis of Rocket Llama is one of much intrigue. Pull up a chair and a cup of mead to listen to the epic tale.

I created Rocket Llama as a random doodle I scribbled in my notebook during a particularly dreary lecture in college. I gave no thought to the llama for quite some time until Nick organized an event known as The Workday Comic, a spin-off of Scott McCloud’s 24-Hour comics which Nick can tell you about in much finer detail, wherein a collection of local artists and writers collaborated in teams to each individually create 8-page comics in 8 hours.

I decided to act as my own writer and artist for the event, and the subject I chose? None other than the fuzzy flier himself, Rocket Llama. “The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama #112, Trouble in Paradise” was the full title of the comic I wrote in that timespan, and on our website you can find both my graphite and paper version and Nick’s artistically enhanced version.

Rule number one when creating any of these characters is to have fun. And that is absolutely what we are doing.

11. Is there anyone you’d like to give a shout out to?

Nick: Mark, Josh, and Tommy from Reddie Steady. Check out their stuff at www.reddiesteady.com.