2023 Resolution

Opening the file, a few notes scatter on your table. Something seems... Odd about the note. Like they are not from here. They don't belong where you are, not really.
A sense of dizziness passes through you, yet you read the pages.

Hello all,
A new year arises. I hope your end of year was pleasant and resting, or festive and intense, whichever you prefer. I also hope the coming year will be a good one, filled with creativity and whimsical projects.
On my side, this year is a fairly important one. My last year of PhD is starting, which implies a lot of work, especially writing in itself. It also means I have to think about what I plan to do over the foreseeable future, which is a bit of a hard thing to think about. Over the time of this PhD, working on personal artistic projects was mostly compromized: no time to work, and very little mental energy when the day is over. Still, I feel like I need to get back to art, maybe to feel more... Balanced?
In any case, here are a series of personal objectives for the coming year. I found that vague resolutions don't work so well for me, so instead, here go a few clear and simple things.

Specific/routine 2023 goals

• Read/comment 1 or 2 articles from the community every week
• Produce 1 artwork every week
• Write one short story (1000 words) every month.
• Follow two digital art courses to improve my use of the tablet

Less specifics, blurrier 2023 goals

• Progress in the general reshaping of the Cylinder's Library
• Get better at CSS to make these articles shine
• Introduce some specific character arcs
• Generally improve my drawing.

The following note relates to a wide array of other documents.

Worldember 2022 reading reviews

Although I didn't participate in the WorldEmber challenge this year myself, here are some articles that I read and enjoyed throughout the season.

Stormbril

Cathedris is one of my favourite settings in this community. The concept of the god-husks is fascinating, and very-well fleshed out and described by Stormbril; Besides, the styling of his articles is always on point, with some very clever and original CSS uses. I wish I'll manage to take the time to do great work like that one day! Stormbril worked on 4 god-husk articles for Worldember, all of which are great. My favourite would probably be Xiuthan, for how tragic its current cycle of Creation/destruction is.

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Kriltch

Kriltch spent most of the later time working on his manuscript Seeking the Unknown. In that first of several parts of a long novel, we follow the intertwined arcs of three main characters: Ellis the human, Hehlio the drake, and Yaro whose species is fairly unknown. It was great reading Kriltch's progress on this project!
In addition to the manuscript, I suggest reading on his city of Thaul, which should be of importance in the coming chapters.

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AmélieIS

AmélieIS is one of the most prolific and best writers I regularly read in this community. The number of projects she actively works while actively taking part in the community on is impressive to me.
This picture book explains a particularly dark aspect of the Divine Tyranny setting to children: the need to regularly sacrifice people to the Eldritch Horror at the center of the Earth. I really like the difference between the child-like, fairly happy tone of the tale and the darker aspects of the actual ritual it describes. I also really appreciate how thoroughly illustrated the book is, something always great in my opinion.

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Dylonisphere123

While the introduction to Dread Romantic was written a while ago, I only discovered the article recently. Using a well-organized CSS and a sweet style, it guides you through an apocalypse starting only a few years from now. As magic starts to spread into the world in the late 2020s, animals and plants mutate horribly and turn sapient.
Click on this link to learn about this setting!

by Pouaseuille

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Mutterwolf

Mutterwolf is a pretty active member of the Bowels of the Forge chapter. He regularly makes pretty massive articles for his world of Charron, and the Empire of Kuan is one of those. There is a great and massive description of the administrative structure of this empire, as well as a great deal of details about its dominant culture.
Of course, I'd always suggest a bit more visuals and "in world" perspectives, but this is still a nice and large bit of worldbuilding!

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Timepool

Timepool is a pretty prolific artist on WorldAnvil. I particularly like the visual identity of all of his works.
While I'm slightly more familiar with the setting of Qet, this entry was from the many dreams of Ca'eam, a fairly surreal setting about dreams. Ca'eam is a city that thinks, and more importantly a city that dreams. It dreams of you as much as you dream of it.
In this article, Ca'eam is known as Nelphildos, and seems to exclusively works as a touristic city. Any who visits the city sees it from the eyes of their inner child. Since none would leave of their own accord, the city itself decides when a visitor should leave.

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From Worldember - favourite Condition

This is one of the first entries I discovered while aimlessly wandering in the WorldEmber homepage. As it is described, the Mindblot is a condition that springs from the overindulgence in a mentally stimulating drug. While the first part of the article shows it as a "simple" addictive drug with dangerous psychological effects, the end of the symptoms gives it a supernatural twist. I liked the discussion on addiction associated with the article, as well as the art and CSS that was on point! i'm a visual person, after all.

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From Worldember - favourite species

I hadn't heard of the world Chaotic Potential before I stumble upon this species of sapient beetles in WorldEmber. They are described as a slow-moving, reserved and deeply emotionnal species, and I don't know they melted something in me!
The choices of visuals are pretty nice as well, I liked this cover with a portrait on the side.

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From Worldember - favourite place/location

This entry described a hidden valley, entirely surrounded by mountains and uninhabited save from a single, extremely powerful fairy. The place is populated by unique wildlife such as giant rabbits and magical sheep herds.
In addition to the general feeling of whimsy the description of this place gave me, the visual presentation of the article wasreally on point. There also are some well-placed visuals, and some nice-yet mysterious animations!

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From worldember - favourite prose

The Tethers of the Leashed is a song written in the Garden that Burned: a world where gods use Eden, the realm of the mortals, to fight each others. The song is about oppression, and was written as an enslave humanity rose up against their oppressors. It is a dark, violent hymn that remains beautiful and efficient.