WIP - Eight Handled Sword Divergent Sila Divine General Mahoraga

In the manga "Jujutsu Kaisen" from Gege Akutami, a work with a host of gorgeous creature and character design work somewhat in the vein of a Togashi, Fujimoto or any of their own respective influences, one specific design stood out to me to such a degree that I immediately knew I was going to have to get hands-on with it in some capacity, and i've been finding little moments between my client pieces and before work proper starts every morning to noodle at it. The design is, of course, Eight Handled Sword Divergent Sila Divine General Mahoraga, an ostentatiously named invoked spirit whose context in the story I won't spoil, but whose debut left an enormous impression on me.

 Incorporating several motifs invoking a Buddhist Dharmapala such as the hakama with bound armored tasset, the obvious hovering Dharmacakra halo and the heavily carved musculature adorned with jewellery, Mahoraga takes his name in addition from a melange of Mahayana/esoteric traditional elements, invoking the rank of the Four Heavenly Generals but appending it to a "Divergent Sila", implying  one who has elected to divorce themselves from the core tenets of Dharma. A kind of rebel wrathful god, with Gege's favourite design motif for his (and my!) most treasured creature designs, the eyeless toothy rictus inherited perhaps from either Fujimoto's "Chainsaw Man" or more likely from their mutual inspiration, Nihei's Abara, but adorned in addition with a coiling "tail" emerging from the head, crowned by four pseudo-angelic wings that lend a touch of Abrahamic flavour in conjunction with the horizontally aligned wheel, echoing a halo in the Western tradition. 

I don't normally paint a given design more than once en route to a finished piece - I tend to just hone in on one specific interpretation and just relish committing to it, with occasional tweaks. With Mahoraga, I have more elaborate plans - I truly want to do justice to the design, which I consider an all-time triumph in the field, and I want to see how a more measured and carefully prepared approach to a final interpretation can benefit me, even if it takes that much longer. I also have some loose ideas about collaborating with my wife (A 3D sculptor/printer) to produce a small scale garage kit run of my finished version, so I want to lavish it with as much attention as I can muster.

These then, aren't necessarily Wips that lead to a finished piece in their own right, but rather represent a continued exploration of the design. I fancy i'll go through more of these before I settle on a personal favourite iteration, pose, composition and design all included.

As an aside... I love typing out his full title lol.