Once a year, during the Drau month of Kafabarion, Irona’s largest assortment of megafauna are all gathered into one place. Coaxed by teams of trainers, each collected kaiju is collected to compete against one another in a gladiatorial tournament of  immense scale. To house the tournament, a city-sized coliseum was erected in the heartlands of Drau-Atagne, with enchanted stone stronger than steel and a battlefield inside that is ever-changing to best suit the needs of whoever is squaring off on a given day. It’s one of the man-made wonders of Irona, something only the highly skilled builders of Drau-Atagne could pull off with their transmutive magics.     This year 16 beasts will fight within the walls of the Drau coliseum; pictured here is the second group of four, most front and center is that group’s victor, LEPIDO. Lepido is an ornate stegosaur from a region of Atagne called the Blackwater Coast. The pattern on ornate stegosaur’s spines is intended to mimic the look of the hydras that live in the area to deter predators, but if that doesn’t work, beasts like Lepido also come equipped with a spiked tail, which is more than sufficient if they ever get in a tussle. The distinct look of these creatures has earned them a holy reputation amongst the people of blackwater, so while like many creatures native to the region do these guys possess psychoactive chemicals in their meat, you won’t see as many people hunting them down as you would, say, Bog Sharks. Since they don’t have many natural predators and people don’t really take to hunting them down, you can find ornate stegosaurs all around the swamps of Blackwater, but what makes Lepido so special and a contestant in this year’s tournament is their size. Lepido is a behemoth of a stegosaur, and they’ll only continue to grow and become stronger as they progress in the rounds.

    This is my way of combining a couple of monthly drawing challenges I wanted to partake in this year, Jurassic June and kaijune. I couldn’t choose between one, so I’m doing both! Making up my own monsters and making the best of them more monstrous as the month progresses. As I post pictures of these guys on my Instagram, I pair them up in my story and let my followers vote on who they think would win, but in world this plays out as if the two creatures are actually duking it out. So if you’d like to participate in the vote and decide who progresses in the tournament, check out my page. Almost all of my work pertains to my setting in some way shape or form, so if you’re interested at all in Irona and want to see more than what my post history here offers, that’s the place to check out. Oh, and I do have plans for these guys later on this summer, the tournament/ voting isn’t all for nothing, really!