Industrious Illustrating #9: Fantasy (1/?)

For this week’s Industrious Illustrating, I want to share a painting I did as concept art for a fantasy visual novel idea I had. The painting itself isn’t done yet, but it’s in a finished enough state that I can show it to others . This is the Palace of Spades, which is a magical fusion of a Huaxia palace and an Albion castle. It floats above a deep pit in the middle of the capital city of Longjing/Sigillum — the two names given to the city by different populations of inhabitants.

The regions of Huaxia and Albion are loosely inspired by Ancient China and by medieval England, though the story takes place when the world is on the cusp of technological and societal change. After all, it’s almost been a thousand years since the Kingdom of Spades was founded by four heroes from Huaxia and Albion uniting their people to seal away the Great Leviathan, and the magical seal on the Great Leviathan is about to break. It’s now up to the current generation of Spades Royals to defeat Spades’s greatest threat once again…

To create this painting, I heavily referenced real-life pavilions, castles, and buildings for the architecture of the Palace of Spades. I’m still making more concept art and illustrations for this storyline, so I may end up sharing more of it when they’re finished!