The Countdown and the Magic Frog

And a brief rundown of villains...

Hello Friends, and Happy New Year!

As we all stand in a circle, holding hands and chanting while 2023 burns to the ground like a giant Wicker Man, the temptation to write some long end-of-year speech is strong… but I’m going to resist. Let’s keep this short and villainous.

In the last month, I’ve told you about Quiet, the Narrator Worm, and the Tree of Worlds. This triumvirate of goodness has powered my decision-making for much of this year, so much so that I’ve decided to hang my professional future on their success.

But there are difficulties ahead; relentless, seemingly insurmountable difficulties. And in this first 80-page super-issue, we will be introduced to three of them: Thread-Cutter, Galahorn and the Greed.

Thread-Cutter, Galahorn, and the Greed

Allow me to summarize the nature of these villains, while saving their true in-depth introductions for January.

• Galahorn - A warrior who is, for all intents and purposes, unstoppable. Dogmatic, humorless, and incredibly dangerous, Galahorn is still a person, and his character arc will compose a large part of Quiet: Level One.

• The Greed - A Level 1 monster, the Greed is a slow-moving black slime with essentially no intellect and no real desires other than to consume. Just because it’s a Level 1 creature, however, doesn’t mean it can’t grow in power…

• Thread-Cutter - The Sauron of my world, Thread-Cutter wants nothing less than the destruction and perversion of every aspect of the Tree of Worlds. He is cruel, petty, and manipulative… and by himself, completely ineffectual. A black knife with an eye in it, Thread-Cutter has no physical ability whatsoever, and must rely on words alone. Unfortunately for him, 3,000 years in confinement has done nothing for his social skills…

The reason I’m introducing these villains today is because I’m currently facing my own nemesis: time. I’m aiming to Kickstart this super-issue in April, but of course I have no idea how it’s going to go. And my workload between now and then is prodigious. Here’s a list of things I have to do before then:

1. Finish Quiet: Level One.

2. Finish the cover - see my progress below!

3. Create all the Kickstarter rewards, including pins/stickers/bookmarks/figurines.

4. Create 4 YouTube videos (two QLO videos, one Marvel Anatomy video, and one Fallout video, with the purpose of the latter two to “jump-start” interest in QLO).

5. Create the Kickstarter itself, including the pitch video.

6. Maintain this Substack (which, I must say, has been an absolute pleasure).

7. Be a functional spouse, parent, and friend.

These are just the high-level points, of course; each item here can spawn dozens of unique tasks all their own. It’s a lot - honestly, it’s a mountain of work - but I recall a very similar situation exactly 2 years ago, when NYE 2021 loomed and I knew that, as soon as the ball dropped, I would have exactly 4 months to color 150 pages of Marvel Anatomy… and I would say that went pretty well.

So how am I holding up, emotionally?

Well, as a big believer in dreams, allow me a [very brief] Jungian self-analysis. I should say, I think dreams are mostly just your brain’s way of playing with its food - stuffing your hopes, dreams, and anxieties into its mouth and going “blah blah blah” like a messy third-grader.  Dreams feel so real, so vivid, so important to us, of course, because the food it’s stuffing into its mouth and dribbling out the side is nothing less than your very soul.

They’re a mess, yes, but I also believe that dreams are the sort of mess you can actually learn something from, like a hunter sifting through the feces of a large prey animal:

“Judging by this Excel-green coloring, I appear to be worried about my job.  And this piece of Timothée Chalemet suggests that I don’t know what I’m Dune with my life? Hm.  The dream is still warm.  I must be nearby…”

Here are three (very brief) dreams I had last week, whilst in the throes of Covid 19:

Dream #1:

I’ve signed up to perform a series of original songs in front of an audience in less than an hour, but I’m unable to even access the lyrics to these songs, as they are on my Google Drive. The audience is milling around - eating what I believe to be coffee cake? - and muttering with impatience as I try, with mounting panic, to decipher the shifting hieroglyphics on my phone. I can’t do it, of course, because reading is a function of the right side of the brain, and dreams originate on the left.  You literally cannot read in your sleep.

Dream #2:

I’m in an underground facility, there’s a countdown blaring, so I’m running as fast as I can down the metal steps to the origin point, practically leaping from floor to floor, trying to reach the bottom… aka Level One.

Dream #3:

I have discovered a fat, pale frog in a pot in my kitchen, but when I actually pick it up, it transforms into a magical shape-changing salamander, long-bodied and beautiful.  It changes color from sapphire blue to glassy black and finally to a pearl white… and it looks almost exactly like this:

The salamander’s name is “Tunnel-Winder”

My Jungian analysis?

1. I’m stressed, trying to do the impossible.

2. I’m excited, moving as fast as I can.

3. I’m cooking up something magical.

So that’s me! How are you?

Before I go, I wanted to give you a brief look at the work-in-progress cover:

Bonus points for spotting the Narrator Worm!

Wherever you are, I hope 2023 wasn’t too bad for you, and I’m wishing you only the very best in this coming year of 2024. You know what I’ll be up to, and I hope you know how grateful I am to have you with me on this journey.

Until next year!

Cheers,

Jonah