Image: Tarnished vs. Ulcered Tree Colossus

This anime-inspired dark fantasy illustration captures a charged moment of combat between a lone warrior and a colossal, rotting tree-beast deep within an underground catacomb. The image is framed in a wide landscape format, allowing the viewer to see both combatants and the cavernous stone hall around them.

In the left foreground stands the Tarnished-like warrior, seen from behind in a dynamic, forward-leaning pose. He wears a dark hooded cloak that obscures his face and shoulders, its fabric whipping slightly backward as he surges toward the enemy. Under the cloak, layered leather and cloth armor cling close to his frame, suggested through carefully drawn folds and subtle highlights. His legs are bent and braced, boots gripping the cracked stone tiles, giving an immediate sense of motion and determination.

The warrior holds a straight sword firmly in his right hand, the blade angled diagonally upward toward the towering monster. The weapon catches the warm light of the creature’s glow, giving the steel a faint golden edge. His left arm stretches backward for balance, fingers clawed as if he is either about to lunge further or twist into a strike. From this perspective, the viewer feels almost shoulder-to-shoulder with the Tarnished, sharing his rush into danger.

Dominating the right side of the image is the monstrous tree entity, a grotesque fusion of lumbering beast and twisted, diseased trunk. Its upper body is burly and hunched, with massive front limbs that resemble gnarled roots hardened into claws. The creature rears up on these root-arms, one limb smashing down into the stone floor and kicking up shards of rock and dust. Each finger is forked and splintered like broken branches, adding to the sense that this thing is as much an enraged forest as it is a single monster.

The torso and shoulders are bulky, layered with thick, bark-like plates that twist and knot around swollen growths. Glowing ulcers bulge from its chest, shoulders, and upper arms, each one a pulsing orb of molten orange light embedded in decaying wood. Smaller clusters of these sores trail farther down its body, leading into a long, heavy trunk that drags behind it along the floor. This tail-like lower body is thick and segmented, like a fallen log that never stopped growing, studded with glowing wounds and jagged outgrowths. It extends backward into the dimness, emphasizing the creature’s sheer scale.

The head is the most terrifying feature: a skeletal, dragon-like visage sculpted from twisted branches and cracked bark. Spindly antler-like branches flare out from the crown, clawing at the air and giving the impression of a dead, uprooted tree animated by rage. Its eyes burn with a vivid orange fire, set deep into wooden sockets that look carved rather than grown. The creature’s mouth is open in a roar, revealing fangs made of torn, shard-like wood and an interior that glows with the same hellish light as its ulcers. Flecks of ember-like debris scatter from its maw and the wounds on its body, drifting across the air between it and the warrior.

The setting reinforces the oppressive, haunted mood. Massive stone columns and archways recede into the background, their surfaces worn and cracked by age. The high, vaulted ceiling disappears into shadow, and the far walls are obscured by a cool blue-green haze. The floor is an uneven tapestry of ancient flagstones, some dislodged and broken, others covered in a thin layer of dust and rubble. The only strong warm light in the scene comes from the monster itself—its glowing sores and the scattering sparks that spray outward where its claws rake the ground.

This contrast between the cold, desaturated blues of the catacomb and the fiery oranges of the creature’s corruption creates a dramatic visual tension. The composition places the warrior and monster on a diagonal collision course: the Tarnished drives forward from the left, sword extended, while the beast leans in from the right, jaws wide and claws outstretched. Everything in the scene—the flowing cloak, the shower of sparks, the fractured stone—serves to emphasize that this is the decisive moment of a desperate clash between a fragile human and a towering ulcerated tree colossus.

The image is related to: Elden Ring: Ulcerated Tree Spirit (Giants' Mountaintop Catacombs) Boss Fight