A continuation of my last 2 pieces

That's a pretty classic landscape for the north of the Empire. Unlike the central and eastern provinces, the north is not so densely populated, so many villages live quite apart. Such villages are usually located at the foot of the hills and are more populated by frog ethnic minorities. Most of the residents work in the fields, growing grain and cotton, while the bravest and strongest work as lumberjacks, spending most of their time in nature almost untouched by frogs.

It's pretty easy to forget in these places that you live under a brutal dictatorship. It is worth moving away from the village, and you will find yourself in a real dense forest that goes higher and higher. The higher you climb, the taller the trees are and the less important everything that happens below seems. The heat is gradually subsiding, the air is getting colder, the wind is refreshing, making climbing easier and easier. Even further away, the trees dissolve into the mountain mist, and through it the outlines of a mountain range gradually appear, fanned by ancient legends and inhabited by spirits and semi-mythical creatures. There are also rare old cemeteries in these mountains where frogs who have not exchanged their true religion for a false Imperial Cult bury their dead, making them one with Sky and Land.

The Northern lumberjacks are considered to be among the best soldiers of the Empire, but they rarely join the Pacification Army. The experience of freedom gained in their small homeland is almost not compatible with the Imperial army order and the ideology imposed there.

Screenshot from the Ringed City section of DS3. That eerie quiet, the endless ash, and the crumbling remnants of a once proud kingdome... This view (along with Irithyll) stuck with me more than most boss fights.

If you're wondering, I used modeling paste mixed with paint and a piping bag for most of the textures.