Ultraviolet Grasslands Episode 11: Vitreous Orange

The survivors take stock of the aftermath of the apocalyptic battle. The Porcelain Princes have retreated, but in good order, taking most of their riches with them but leaving a smattering of displaced polybodies and slaves behind. The gnomes and rebels declare victory, and declare their new citadel the Obsidian Serai. Jeshek, warrior poet, is declared first citizen and heads up the revolutionary council. But he is strangely peaceful - he seems to be unwilling to make any preparations for a counterattack or to prepare his people for further war.

Dante Thunderstone, meanwhile, is different - he has taken on a brutish, warlike demeanor, and insists on being called Orca Malificent, warlord of the fifth age. He says he existed as an Ultra for millennia, charged with protecting the seekers of the sky keys, in preparation of the end of days. His soul seems to have merged with Dante's. The group try to work out if Dante is still in there somewhere, and Orca snarls that he is, and perhaps someday he will not be so afraid to come out.

Sissy, punctured as a colander, is declared DOA, but in gratitude for his services to the revolution, the gnomes transfer his consciousness to a rogue polybody (a clone that had no emerged consciousness of it's own) and Sissy wakes up in a kind of weak and shaky body. The gnomes were not fully competent in the machinery, so Sissy is a little unsure of himself, but he at least is alive. His porcelain mask is a reflective silver. He decides to invest in a second body while he's at it - and is now Sissy-1 and Sissy-2. The polybody experience is strange to him, as is inhabiting a completely new body, but he vows to adapt.

Lisciac is well and truly dead, and is buried in a mass grave with the other fallen of the revolution.

Renko had stepped back into the mirror world at the first sign of trouble, and lived to fight another day. The Obsidian Gnomes, out of gratitude for his assistance in creating the mirror door, gift him with some necromantic rituals and equipment they located at the Serai - some sort of proto-porcelain resurrection equipment, including a pendant that seems to transfer souls and coptic jars useful in moving consciousnesses from one body to another.

They decide they need some muscle and find Vitreous Orangewear, a loose conglomeration of three polybodies, left behind in the evacuation - two of them based off an emergent long suppressed original personality, and the third a half-joined semi emergent personality in a dwarven body. They advance them enough cash to buy all their bodies armour.

Meanwhile, Renko reminds the rebels of their promise to provide them with the sky key. The gnomes gladly oblige - showing Renko and Sissy the moves to the second part of the sky key dance. Of course this confirms their suspicion that the sky key they were sold previously was a fake, but since Ish and Lisciac are both dead, there didn't seem any real recompense they could claim.

Renko works on activating the magical kitchen appliances and manages to get the breakfast setting working - he can produce any breakfast on demand, enough to keep one person fed continually. Sissy tries to learn from travellers what rumours there are. The place is rife with spies and ambassadors, and there are strong rumours the the Porcelain Princes are preparing for a counter attack.

They decide to leave the Obsidian Serai as soon as possible, before any more violence occurs. They provision up and head westward as quickly as they can, traversing the Rust Storm to the Way Stone. The tents are long gone, Laszlo having long packed up and left, so they shelter as best they can and push westwards to Fallen Umber.

This is the ruins of once great civilization, ground almost flat by time and covered by drab mushrooms and fungi. The very air is steeped in dullness and ennui. 

They arrive at Fallen Umber, and look for any sources of food as they are almost out. There do not seem to be any travellers or local villages. They search the ruins and then hear a sound - a lone, huge hulking shambling humanoid mound approaches, it has a human like form but no apparent head. It is covered in sprouting mushroom, toadstools and puffballs. It looks like it is readying to attack, but Sissy steps forward and tries to communicate with it. He explains they want food and supplies. For a moment it seems torn, and then points to their ponies and holds up two fingers. Sissy manages to negotiate down to one pony. The creature falls on the terrified creature and kills it, and then gestures for them to follow it - it leads them to a very well apportioned farm of fungi, and then it rends the creature into bits and throws the blood bone and viscera all over the field, before washing itself in the same. 

The trade is done - the creature allows them to fill up with mushrooms as supplies. They try to ask it if there are any places around here of interest - archeological sites for example - the creature thinks for a moment and then leads them to a large flat plinth where it clears off the covering mold to reveal a map of the area - it shows several sites but they hone in on what looks like a large valley where a city seems to reside, two days out from the trail. They decide to check it out.

That night they set camp and Renko loses a childhood memory to the drab sadness of a lost civilization.

The next day they set off and within two days they arrive at the Hall of the Umber King. This seems to be a valley of ruins covered in rainbow covered fungal spores. They see people wearing face masks gathering spores in large sacks. Others seem to be wandering around, in varying states of dessication, in a daze. Various dessicated corpses lie around, covered in multicolored fungus and spores.

They hail the spore gatherers, who explain they are gathering the spores to sell - they think they might sell them westward at the Near Moon, as they have heard of trouble at the last Serai. Sissy asks if it is a drug, and they say yes - they offer him some and he tries it - he experiences a profound sense of sweet sadness, a powerful longing and sweet regret for times lost that can never be regained. He names it 'Madeleine'. It is highly addictive.

They negotiate to buy a sack for $1000. The gatherers are chatty and helpful and one of them, Hanuman, strikes up a friendship with Sissy and shares with him the location of a tunnel where some particularly great spores can be gathered.

The group debate whether to capture spores but decide instead to press on - the map showed them there was a place called the Azure garden a few days away, and they decide to head there.

The Azure Garden turns out to be an enormous Geodesic dome greenhouse, long since shattered with only the livingstone frame remaining, filled with a forest of blue fungi. There are rodents of unusual size lounging around on flat rocks in the sun, but they flee as the travellers approach. Sissy is an expert on plants and botany, and is able to identify the blue fungus as a delicacy - he reckons they could gather it and sell it at their next destination.

They spend two days scraping out the edible parts of the blue fungi and come away with fours sacks of the stuff. They decide to leave at this point, and head back to Fallen Umber. They stay the night there, avoiding the shambling creature (Garry Shambling), and then leave for Behemoth Shell, where they are hoping there is a settlement they can acquire supplies at. The mushroom wastelands give way to low hills and scattered pine forests. On the way they encounter a large herd of grazing gastropods - at least cow sized. They wonder if they should slaughter one to eat, but they decide against it and push on to Behemoth Shell. There is still no grazing for their animals, but they reach the shell in good time. True to name, it is a mountain sized gastropod shell with a small settlement and encampment scattered over it, and in tunnels inside it.

They are welcomed by a local of the Great Folk, the local snail farmers. His name is Nen, and he finds them a small cave to shelter in, for a small fee. 

They explore local trade goods and buy supplies. Nen shows them where they can buy clockwork brain worms - Sissy and Renko both buy one (for $1000 apiece) and insert them int heir ears. The worms burrow in and cause brief but aginizing pain before Sissy feels an increase to his charm and confidence, and Renko feels smarter. They wonder whether to buy more but their funds are dwindling - they have less than $5k left of the $14k they left the Porcelain Citadel with.

They ask Nen about any Sky Keys, but he is unaware of any here. He does mention a local curiosity - the Ideal Island, a floating island on which there are rumoured to be fabulous treasures deep inside the dark pine forests to the north. Renko is skeptical - he wants to know if anyone has returned alive from this amazing sounding island, but they decide to explore it anyway.

They set out the next day, their walkers navigating the pine trees nimbly. Renko is disgusted that Sissy doesn't seem to be carrying his fair share of cargo and after a brief argument they reorganise the carrying of supplies. 

Deep in the forest they are awakened by a snuffling noise and find that some small dingo like creatures have been eating their money - they eat $66 worth of treasure and then flee into the night. They redouble the watch and push on the next day.

They see the island from afar - it rises above the earth as a flat disk of earth, tethered by strands of marble, rock, and strange vines. They camp near it and that evening as they sit around the fire, the air grows unnaturally cold and from the darkness ride five figures - shrouded in mists, feathers and rags, twisting and distorted as if they were reflections in a swirling mirror. The first rider introduces itself as Malakite.

King Elre the Dreaming steps forward - and calls out to Malakite - "It is I, Elre - do you not remember me?"

Malakite greets Elre as the King of Alphaville, and says it has been many millennia since they last spoke. Malakite says that they must pay the tribute - the soul of a servant. They try to offer up a polybody but Malakite says that will not do. Sissy shows them the captured soul of a hero they were gifted by the Shamen of their tribe before they set out on their quest. Malakite licks his lips at the sight of it and says that it will do admirably as tribute. 

But Sissy and Renko, remembering it is something of a relic, rescind the deal. Malakite is disappointed, his appetite for the soul of a hero is palpable. But out of his old friendship for Elre, he says that they can leave unmolested, but they cannot pass this way again. They withdraw, confer with Elre about how tough these guys are (fairly tough) and decide they will go around the forest and approach the pyramid from another direction.

They withdraw and spend two days and approach the floating island from the east. They do not encounter the void riders again. They set aside the porcelain walkers and clamber up the marble tethers. Vitreous' first polybody falls - the others grab him and help pull him back to the surface, They soon reach the floating island - it seems to be covered with some sort of living skin, and covered in fruit bearing trees. Sissy quickly identifies the fruit as poisonous and warns the others not to eat it. In fact, there seem to be many toxic fumes and clouds on the island.

They carefully pick their way inland toward the blue pyramid - it is like an aztec pyramid made out of a slightly translucent blue material. The group touch it - it tingles slightly to the touch. Vitrious Orange finds a secret door - a block slides open and a passageway inside the pyramid opens up...