i have not known peace since august 2025 and the stress and pressure helps me come up with some interesting ideas
OK now the real answer: the community! it's very inspiring to read people's ideas and see their artworks, the community is full of very talented and creative individuals. i often see someone else's work and it inspires me to come up with my own ideas!
Sometimes it ends up being a problem because i make artworks with the mindset that the average person that sees it has seen all the works i used as inspiration or will have a base knowledge not only about the mikes but also specific community headcanons, which is often not the case. that is to say sometimes my art ends up catering to the very dedicated mike fans like myself lol
if you're referring to aesthetic inspirations i have 2 answers talking about it in here! last one was pretty recent so i don't have much to add haha
https://revospring.net/@jobrepeller/a/116203390812770839
https://revospring.net/@jobrepeller/a/116674334253771409

i'm about to lose my job at the friendpins factory so thank you for asking!
if we're working with the assumption that friend IS mike, and with the assumption that it IS aware of battat's antics, then it wouldn't be far fetched to think that it would find battat's obsession with mike (and by extension, friend) endearing. it would be so flattered to have someone so keen on finding it, a humble little device. it didn't even have to offer battat a deal, he's just doing that on his own volition! and that's fascinating to it.
also, keeping in mind noelle's cat petterz entries and assuming friend was taught that if it loved someone it would get punished, then it would have some twisted ways of showing how fond it is of battat.
i enjoy the parasitic dynamic because i think it'd love battat in the only way it was taught: hurting him. it all happens in battat's mind though. as if every display of affection needs an equally strong display of hurt. i know battat looks like he’s having the worst time of his life but i assure you it’s very enriching for both of them, otherwise he wouldn’t keep coming back looking for it!
sometimes romance is having a vague entity lodge itself in your organs (do darkners even have them? did they ever look like ribbons? he forgot.) and leech off his nutrients. or have it bursting out of his chest and pull his innards out of his body. then he remembers it’s all play pretend. he doesn’t have innards. darkners don’t have those. so it doesn’t hurt anymore. and he thinks it was more fun when he thought he did.
when it comes to friend’s personality and design i never invested too much thought into it because i know it will be inevitably contradicted by new information in upcoming chapters, so i try to keep it vague and still following the dynamic i have for them :-P i'll greet all new information with open arms even if it ends up crushing the ship entirely, at least i got to draw some cool stuff in the meantime LOL