Name: The Sentinel’s Slumber
Medium: Digital 2D
Software(s): Photoshop
Date: November 2024

Story:

In the heart of the forgotten jungle, where sunlight pierced the dense canopy in fractured beams, stood the Sentinel—a towering relic of a bygone age. Moss and vines draped its immense frame like ceremonial robes, and trees grew from crevices in its rusted armor. Long ago, the Sentinel had been a harbinger of destruction, a machine of war sent to end a conflict so vast that its name was lost to history. But the war ended. The humans were gone, their cities reclaimed by nature. The Sentinel, no longer receiving commands, had ceased its march and rooted itself in the earth, becoming one with the land it was once tasked to conquer.

Legends among the forest's inhabitants, creatures who had never known the world of men, spoke of the "Sleeping God." They whispered that the jungle thrived because of the Sentinel's silent vigil, its once-destructive energy now feeding the life around it. One day, as the sun began to set, a soft hum broke the silence. Deep within the Sentinel’s core, something stirred. A single eye flickered to life, its glow faint and hesitant, like a fading memory. The jungle seemed to hold its breath. It did not rise or move. Instead, it released a sound—a low, resonant tone that echoed through the forest. It was neither a call to arms nor a warning but something simpler, almost sorrowful.

A lament for what was lost and an acknowledgment of what now thrived. The light in its eye dimmed once more, and the Sentinel returned to its slumber. The jungle exhaled, and life carried on, cradled by the relic of an ancient war that had found peace in stillness.