Yes I used a reference image from a Minecraft magic mod.

Ref image; and yes I used the original stone as a base model, and yes I'm serious about showing ALL my reference images (when I'm not lazy / forget where I got something)

The reason why it looks so different is because I wanted something that screamed earthly, and at one point in my life I wanted to make a texture pack for said mods and possibly try to get people to hire me for pixel art, that being said the earth shard I made took me a LONG time, not because I was being lazy but because I was stressing on the fact one person was calling me an art thief; that being said, I'm glad I took the more ambitious approach instead, forcing me to turn a fat shard into a very unique shard from the original.

The color depth isn't as good as I wanted it to be if I'm honest, the placement isn't as wonderous as I could've hoped for, and it's details are lacking in some areas such as the fact it's very generic in how it's lower part of the body is formed, granted I can't expect myself to make something perfect, just close enough.