[HD Sketch + Concept] Maid Squad - Dolorin Gray The Killer Painter (OC) (Patreon)

A short note in advance: It has gotten a bit silent around the end of the month, since I was pretty exhausted and at the same time so wrapped up in private family matters and appointments at that time that it was really hard to find some calm moments to contribute to this page. In addition, and I know it sounds a bit like a lame excuse but made me actually feel very anxious and frustrated, the heat in August took a serious toll on my mentality and body and I eventually felt that it was also a sign of burnout after such a long time again. I feel much better now and will look forward to show you a bunch of new art content I was working on the last weeks. That was kinda lenghty, but I feel like I had to address it.

Anyway... Let's move on! Another character from the notorious demonic Maid Squad.

Dolorin Gray is also one of my oldest characters, although not many drawings of her from my past exist as much as of other characters, but the concepts for her exist since my old school days when I developed a keen interest for the premise of the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray which my best friend of mine recommended to me back then. I was not able to read through the whole novel at that times though. It was around the years of my late studies when I eventually started to reread it and find new appreciation for all kind of fictional aspects in it, I was pondering about for a while.

Dorian Gray was a clear inspiration for Dolorin, however apart from the premise that the paintings of themselves bear some supernatural power the one has barely something in common with the other.

Dolorin is an assassin under the direct command of the Grand General, who eliminates political enemies or key witnesses who can be dangerous to his regime.

Before she was recruited to the Maid Squad, she was a serial killer in some big cities and was eventually caught by a master detective and should have been sentenced to death. However, the Grand General pardoned her as part of a secret large-scale espionage mission and promoted her to a high-ranking leadership member of the Maid Squad, where from then on she could indulge her morbid passions to her heart's content, such as torturing and punishing disgraced subordinate household members and using their blood for her own paintings. In her eyes, the color and smell of blood gives her paintings the final touch to make them seem more vivid.

One of her ultimas is the ability to teleport between paintings. Her obulus includes the sacrifice of her own blood, similar to Winrow's obolus, which she has to use as a painting color for the canvas (It may be already a pretty specific note at this point, but it doesn't have to be necessarily a painting that was solely drawn by herself but can be also an already existing painting from other persons). In addition, the paintings must contain an image of herself. However, it does not have to be a full depiction of her body, as long as she does not want to teleport her entire body to the destination.

I was (or maybe it's more of I am occasionally) working on two stories that set focus on her past where she was exposed and caught by the detective the first time and a later "arc" of my overarching short story series, where she also became the prime suspect of a murder case revolving Winrow's and Taya's quest. I want to slowly bring these stories to life, and developing some artworks of Dolorin is kind of a cornerstone to set a step into this direction.