Hello folks here is my entry for this week. The Animated Corpse is a rotting body pulled from the grave and forced back into motion. It carries no thoughts, no emotions, only the faint trace of life that refuses to die. The flesh hangs loose, pale, and wet, with torn skin stitched across broken bones. Every step it takes drags the smell of decay and damp soil.
Its body is slow but strong. When called to battle, it doesn’t hesitate or fear. It attacks in a straight line, crushing anything in its way. The strikes are heavy, not graceful. Each movement looks clumsy but hits with brutal force. Blades sink in without reaction. Arrows stay lodged in its body. It doesn’t bleed much, only oozes dark fluid that smells older than death.
The Animated Corpse doesn’t feel pain. It doesn’t understand commands, yet it obeys instinctively. It is a perfect servant for necromancers who need soldiers that never question, never retreat, never rest. Once summoned, it fights until the magic holding it fades or until the body falls apart completely.
Its eyes are dim and hollow. There is no soul inside, just a faint spark that keeps it moving. Some believe that spark comes from the last emotion it felt before dying—rage, sorrow, or fear. Whatever it is, it burns just enough to make the corpse rise and obey.
Below are my progress work from start to finish.
- Materials used are:
Charcoal
Crayon
Graphite pencil
On A4 paper
In Splinterlands, the Animated Corpse is known for endurance. It absorbs punishment meant for others. It takes hits, keeps standing, and buys time for stronger allies to strike. It’s not fast or clever, but it’s reliable. Its presence alone unsettles enemies, spreading dread across the field.
The body’s movement is rough. The joints creak. The bones grind. Sometimes, parts fall off mid-fight, yet the Corpse keeps moving like nothing happened. It doesn’t notice what’s missing. The magic that drives it fills the gaps, forcing the body to continue until the energy fades.
It carries no weapon most times. Its own limbs are enough. Fists that strike like stones, arms that grab and crush. The skin splits with every hit, but it never stops. It doesn’t understand exhaustion. It only stops when the battle ends or when the summoner’s control breaks.
Even in silence, it’s disturbing. The air grows heavy around it. Animals stay away. The ground seems colder where it walks. Some claim the soil dies under its feet, leaving black marks that never heal.
There are stories about what it once was—a soldier, a farmer, a victim of war but those stories don’t matter now. The person is gone. What remains is only a shell. A vessel turned into a weapon.
The Animated Corpse is not good or evil. It is an accident of dark power, a reminder of what happens when the line between life and death is crossed. It doesn’t seek purpose. It doesn’t understand mercy. It is simply there, existing between worlds, doing what it was forced to do.
When it falls in battle, it doesn’t die the way the living do. It collapses into stillness, waiting. When the right spell is cast again, it rises once more same body, same emptiness, same obedience.
progress work
Final Rendering
The animated Corpse is a feared character in Splinterlands. Not its strength, not its smell, but the fact that it never truly ends. It always comes back. The Animated Corpse is the body that refuses rest, the quiet servant of decay, forever walking through the Splinterlands as a reminder that death is not always final.
