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The Source — Episode 1: The Eclipse

Grinvich's mother dies three hours before dawn. For twenty years she walked the road to the Source beyond the mountains, the only one who always came back, and with her last breath she pressed the wanderer's map into her son's hands. Old Anselm, who promised her to keep the boy at home, tells him how she kept returning, older than she should have been, and knows he will go anyway. Past the last ink line a stranger's hand has written one word: "The Second". Under an eclipsed moon Grinvich walks into the forest of giant trees, where the path splits, the map stops matching the ground, and something watches him from the dark.

Published: 19 October 2026 · 4 pages · 17 panels · 6 characters · Anime, full colour

The comic itself is in Russian.

The pages

The Source, episode 1, page 1
1. Three hours before dawn the mother dies. Before her last breath she gives her son the map the wanderer left; he packs a knife and a flask.
The Source, episode 1, page 2
2. At the gate old Anselm: "Don't go." She went into the mountains so many times and always came back, older than she should have been. She asked him to keep her son at home.
The Source, episode 1, page 3
3. "If she wanted to stop me, why give me the map?" Some say the place grants any wish, others that a man stops being a man. On the map, one word in a stranger's hand: "The Second". The eclipse: someone leaves.
The Source, episode 1, page 4
4. The path splits, and neither way is straight. He takes the one that climbs. Something moves at the edge of sight, a new word appears on the map — "Shadow" — and he walks on without looking back.

The cast

Grinvich
GrinvichSon of the only woman who always came back from the road to the Source. Stubborn, not reckless; he would rather stay silent than lie.
His mother
His motherWalked the road to the Source for twenty years and never once spoke of it at dinner.
Anselm
AnselmThe old neighbour she asked to keep her son at home.
The Hermit
The HermitSits at the cliff between the forest and the mountains. His one rule: do not answer at once.
The Guardian
The GuardianStands at the border and never goes further. Knows names and things, not what binds one person to another.
The Creature
The CreatureFaceless, patient, and always already there.

How it was made

  1. 1. The cast, drawn first

    Before the first panel, every character got an anime reference sheet in the author's own project: the full figure and a portrait, built from the appearance the author wrote. The faceless beings got sheets too, so the Guardian stays tall and narrow and the Creature low and wide from panel to panel.

    The cast, drawn first

  2. 2. From chapter to pages

    Each episode is one chapter of the book. The scenes stay exactly as the author wrote them: the captions and lines are the author's own sentences, shortened only to fit the panels, and every panel is drawn at the exact shape of its frame.

    From chapter to pages

Written and directed by the author, drafted and drawn with the AI tools in Boost Your Imagination.

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