The First Land Herald/448-05-05

Article Number: 83

Dateline: 448-05-05

NASCENT UNKNOWN LAUNCHES ORBITAL ATTACK, ADVENTURERS ASCEND TO DISMANTLE WEAPON The phenomenon once called the Nascent Unknown settled in its orbit some weeks ago, revealing itself to be a rocky asteroid cradling a speck of churning crystal at its center. Three andaen ago, Moon Mages and those watching the skies noted new, major activity from it. As reported to me by Astronomer Miskton, the Unknown flashed dark blue several times, each time dislodging one or more crystals, which burned with different colors as they fell to Elanthia and appeared to perform different functions. First, a shimmering flicker broke away, slowly drifting downward, apparently a single crystal. After a long moment, it began to glow red hot, streaking a blue and green flame as it fell. Splintering into several pieces, the pieces slammed into the eastern horizon with a flash of light, followed long moments later by a tearing sound that crescendoed into a loud but distant explosion. Next, several flickers broke away, only this time they glowed blue and green, a tail of flame streaking behind them. These crystals suddenly shifted as they fell, changing their trajectory wildly, zigzagging during their fall. They wove a strange pattern in the sky before exploding into expanding rings that battered the clouds. Once again, a long moment later he heard the tearing explosion. Third, a long mass broke away, lengthening as it fell. After a long moment, the tip of the mass began to glow yellow, trailing expanding rings of disturbed air. The crystal suddenly sprouted several long masses and began to spin, slowing its fall. Then the mass stopped in the sky, hovering a moment as it shed crystalline slag, and suddenly exploded into nothingness! Again, the display was followed a long moment later by a tearing sound, this time one that crescendoed into a deafening *WHOOMP*, followed by a roaring explosion. Finally, a cloud of flickering crystal broke away, spiraling outward as radiant blue lines flickered between the masses. Swirling as they fell, the expanding net of energy pulsed along the formation, distorting and occluding the starfield behind. After a long moment, the formation erupted with flashing purple energy and vanished into nothingness, the distorted space slowly relaxing back to normal. A moment later there was a stuttering roar that crescendoed into a dull but bone-rattling *THUMP*. What these crystal bombardments accomplished is still unclear, however the Unknown was seen afterward to be without its speck of crystal at its center. Next, the Nascent Unknown oddly flickered back and forth in the sky. For a while it appeared several hands-breadths from its origin, vibrating and hard to track. It slowed, and settled, holding a new position further to the west. For the following andaen, scholars pored over the possibilities, until Moon Mages felt the undeniable pull of their eyes to the skies. Prophetic senses rattling uncomfortably, they could tell something culminated, and they felt a great nexus of event outcomes tightly winding together. Buried fury seemed to come to the surface, arranged in a crystalline mosaic, and they felt the crauyarin scuttlers stir. Not long after, the Unknown erupted with dark blue light and a slender starbeam lanced upward, creating a clean line dividing the horizon. The iridescent, dark blue starbeam seemed to originate from the Dragonspine Mountains -- so, of course, that is where we went. An adventurer is always drawn to danger. In the area typically home to the crauyarin scuttlers, we found a massive mosaic of glowing trabe crystals, nested and overlapping geometric forms strung along a fractal spiral, light pulsing from the center of the mosaic and radiating outward along the diagrams in a mesmerizing sequence. At the exact center, we found the starbeam: a perfectly circular column of light extending directly above to the Nascent Unknown. A precise line of scuttlers rapidly scurried up the starbeam, their pointed appendages rippling the surface despite bearing their weight. The scuttlers climbed upward, spiraling around the column of light, the line of movement disappearing high above. Miskton would later tell me that, as he observed the Unknown, he heard something, or someone -- no longer at the periphery, no longer whispering. They were scared, and so very angry. Yet, he got the distinct impression that they were once angry at him, and he was no longer the target of their rage. At first I was flabbergasted. This light appeared not only to bear weight, but to be a path leading directly to an asteroid, far above where any known adventurer has traveled before! I probed it gently with my senses but caught nothing of its past or making. I was shocked by what happened next. While I had been stunned into quiet, other adventurers leapt into action. Father Harsh was the first to try walking directly into the light -- amazingly, the scuttlers moved aside, and he was enveloped in the dark blue light, disappearing without a trace! As I watched in awe, I noticed something else that chilled my blood. The Unknown dislodged another crystal that exhibited that red-hot glow, streaking a blue and green flame. It splintered into several pieces, and then the pieces slammed into the Dragonspine Mountains around us with a massive explostion! This asteroid was not just behaving strangely and shedding crystals, it was actively firing upon Elanthia below! What could I do, dear reader, but follow upward? I heard the slightest crackle as the crystal sheared around me, and I found myself encased in a small ovoid cocoon of melting and reforming crystalline light. Though the walls were toward the opaque side of translucence, I could barely make out other, similar cocoons shifting in space around mine. Without any feeling of movement, I began rising upward, the cocoon affording an obscured though complete view of the landscape. Mountains stretched below, and before long, the curvature of the planet became visible. Still, I continued upward. Elanthia spread below me, falling away into an increasingly distant landscape. The range of the familiar became a small portion of the total visible surface, though the crystalline walls were too thick to afford a clear view of the uncharted lands. At one point, I was able to make out the outline of a looming Katamba, swirling with dark clouds and black craters. The cocoon darkened in the oppressive shadow-light of the nearby moon. [A sketch is included, a breathtaking view of Elanthia from above drawn in stark black ink. The cratered face of a malevolent Katamba overshadows one side of the image, its darkness expertly rendered with increasingly dense crosshatching and pools of unadulterated ink.] A pulsing dark blue circle became increasingly visible above, and I felt the crystal shifting, tumbling over and reorienting the destination between my feet. The dark blue circle flashed, and the crystal dissolved, setting me atop a sort of strange, rocky plinth, also decorated with an expansive, glowing crystal mosaic, as complex, geometric, and fractal as the one on Elanthia below, though I got the impression they were not identical. Dust swirled around my feet, though I noticed no breeze. I had no time to get my bearings, though. Suddenly, a pulse of light raced along the ground. Though keeping their distance, a swarm of crauyarin and avtalia scuttlers nearby contorted and twisted, their bodies and patterning warping almost grotesquely. They raised their appendages and began to fight with the other scuttlers! I noticed as well an imposing structure stretching upward from the asteroid's surface, forking into two tines, each pointed towards the distant planet above. (Yes, above!) The structure was intricately shot through with crystal, its surface adorned with translucent patterns extending upward from the ever-present mosaic stretching along the ground. Glowing streams of energy wove along the structure's contours, flowing upward. Thanks to the quick eyes of Qetu, we realized that by climbing the spiraling branches encircling it, we came to an area of relative safety, the swarms of scuttlers mainly fighting each other elsewhere -- until, that is, the starburned ones beat back the unaffected ones, leaving an opening to come after us. At the top was only what I could describe now as some kind of crystal ammunition. Dense patterns of energy flowed upward, creating a mesmerizing spectacle of dancing light. Directly above, suspended between the tines, a growing chunk of spiked crystal took form. As each surge of light emanated upward from the tines, the object alternated between being violently crushed inward and rapidly growing new facets and protrusions. The spikes jutted out with an almost chaotic precision. Crackles of dark blue energy arced between the tines and the crystal boulder, bending along strained field lines. Disoriented, stranded on an alien asteroid surrounded by a chaotic battle and the loud churning of energies, I pulled Saragos close and shouted into his ear. What were we to do? These scuttlers were our enemies even back home, and yet it seemed we had the opportunity to choose a side here. If we chose against the Nascent Unknown, we would be ending our chance to peacefully learn from what may be a totally new civilization or life form. Kethrai overheard me, and he rightfully pointed out that we had no choice -- this thing was firing upon us. We must help the unaffected scuttlers, and we must dismantle the weapon. Saragos and I gave each other a long, hard look of understanding. Without even discussing it, he leapt toward the unaffected scuttlers to aid them, and I moved toward the node, an incomprehensible cluster of equations written in dancing light that was clearly affecting the crystal chunk. I joined Qetu, Kethrai, Dame Elurora, Miskton, Ezerak, and Nyrhin by the node, quickly discovering that we could affect it. Though the equations were far too many and varied for me to piece them together, even with my mathematical training, I saw that I could manipulate things to either add an exponent, reduce the upper limit of an integral, take the inverse of a function, or simply doodle on it my own symbols. As I worked, I tried not to notice Saragos's arm being cut to ribbons as he reached in to shove back the starburned scuttlers again and again, ropes of muscle constantly rent and then rebuilt by the stalwart Empath Allye. Brave adventurers were fighting all around us, most rallying to shove back the starburned or rescue an unaffected scuttler here or there, with healers behind them transferring wounds at a rapid pace. A few more joined us in gathering around the node to fiddle with it. When the battle raged too hard, our hands were skewered by the enemy scuttlers and we were dragged away, only to limp our way back up the Focusing Root, as we called it. Occasionally, I could swear I heard the unaffected scuttlers repeatedly screaming something, all slurred together, which I eventually pieced together was, "IT DOES NOT HAVE PERMISSION." I began to take note of the effects of manipulating the node. Scribing appeared useless, as we could only guess at symbols, and these quickly faded. Reducing the upper limit of an integral seemed to cut out some sort of containment field about the chunk, causing it to expand violently -- this seemed no good. We wanted to destroy the weapon, not deploy it. I considered the exponent, as this caused the chunk to shrink briefly to a pinpoint, however after one such exponent added by Kethrai, the weapon fired again on Elanthia! Perhaps it was coincidence, but it was not one I liked. I settled on turning the node to invert the functions, which caused the chunk to split along several axes. I hoped it would eventually break it entirely. Suddenly, I felt an intense humming reverberating from the Nascent Unknown, swelling as a pressure manifested inside my skull -- first benign, but building to an intense pain that throbbed in time with the oscillating sound. I collapsed to my knees, clutching my head in anguish, until I could take no more. Just as suddenly, it was gone. I felt I had experienced something of great import, but I had no idea what it might mean. As the battle raged back into focus for me, I had the thought: Perhaps it doesn't like what we're doing. Slowly, I began turning the node more and more, and I encouraged others to do the same. In the background I noticed Father Harsh working on raising a pile of bodies. I saw several unaffected scuttlers work together to focus a series of light pulses towards the tines and node. The scuttlers rapidly cycled through a complicated pattern, and loud screeching sound could be heard from the Focusing Root. I wondered if they were working to disable it too, or perhaps communicating with us? They seemed also to like to draw our attention to the node. I could not be certain if my encouragement affected anyone else, or if the others had simply come to the same conclusion I had, but in time we all seemed to be turning the node. The scuttler battles raged on. Suddenly, and with a thunderous explosion, the field lines around the chunk collapsed! The node dimmed, its various symbols scattering, and the crystal chunk fell to the ground, hissing and cracking. The general feeling was one of elation, as we believed we succeeded in stopping the weapon! We set to spelling up to eradicate the remaining starburned. They began to turn on us with an attack of blindingly bright, icy starlight, which burned and blistered. I'll never forget the sight of Sir Madigan then, as he drew himself to full height, rallying all of us with righteous confidence and charging into battle like a star blazing through a midnight sky. With his leadership, we rose as one to the challenge, slaying those remaining. The unaffected scuttlers tore away at the crystalline barrier that prevented us from leaving, until the way was clear. We moved deeper into the asteroid. The wide corridor was increasingly made of a translucent crystal, shot through with ever-shifting patterns and strange pictographs. Long lines of glistening, dark blue energy wound and pulsated along the corridor walls, and as the patterns seemed to almost breathe in a rhythmic thrum, waves of clarity revealed the starfield outside -- the sun, Elanthia, nearby moons, and pinpoints of distant light. Further down the corridor, the pulsations converged towards a circular portal. The area bore a strange lightness, as if each step carried me just a little too far, and familiar distances slightly shifted. As we descended, spatial norms began to increasingly unravel. The space opened massively into an open conical bulb, the corridor walls stretching distantly away, yet, as I reached out, they were tactile and immediate. The air itself seemed to warp, wavering with the ebb and flow of the energetic flux of the corridor walls, beyond which a distorted field of stars bent and blurred. Hanging from the visible stars, striations bent and wavered, and celestial bodies made of nothing more than darkness twisted and flowed along the tapestry. Below us hovered a perfect circle of dark blue starlight, completely opaque and still. I was drawn to the circle, drawn downward, as everyone else stopped to view the rifts in probability. I sensed it, as if calling to me. I descended to the deepest point. Mounted in the center of the fathomless chamber, the starlight circle hovered directly above, held in place by four crystalline pincers which seemed to emerge from nothingness and delicately clasped the circle's edge. From every angle the object appeared as a perfect, dark blue circle. The distant walls were barely visible, dissolving into near total transparency, through which a field of stars burned brightly, albeit arranged in a configuration unknown to any starchart I had ever glimpsed. There was movement in the distance, winding bulges in the darkness that pushed at the visible objects. [A sketch is included, this time in a midnight blue ink, the minor difference from the usual black creating an almost startling contrast. A circle is drawn, deeply inked, slight striations belying the steadiness of the hand that drew it, as if the pen were pressed ever deeper with each revolution.] I was arrested by it. Stopped in my tracks, consumed. The past twisted and opened around me. The past expanded, excised itself from any notions of causality or linearity, and I watched as stars underwent a backwards and forwards cycle of collapsing under their own weight, burning brighter, then erupting into a cloud of diffuse gas, with all points occurring simultaneously. The dark blue circle nearby, I knew then, is not a moment in time, it is an Involuted Passage, roaming the cosmos and epochs for -- I found I could not say, though gleaming civilizations rendered into starburned dust rapidly flickered before my view. The circle, I was certain, has shaped and molded many things in its journey, though the aesthetic is difficult to understand. Somehow I also knew that, eons in the past, the circle reacted to my observation and was confused, rippling as it dug into the when upon which it rested, and in eons to come, it prepared for my arrival up the starbeam, readying its story. Reeling from the circularity of it all, I found myself stumbling, stammering answers to what felt like too many questions. I don't recall how I managed to exit the asteroid, or what happened to it. Fortunately the steady hand of my spouse was on my shoulder when I returned to myself, and he was able to tell me what occurred. He told me of the rifts of shifting probabilities and their strange views. Since I don't think these are recorded elsewhere, I will do my best to describe them here as he told them to me. There were five in total. ~ The First Rift: The Darkness ~ Peering into the first rift revealed nothing. There was nothing but endless darkness, and he immediately began to feel a deep chill. The rift seemed to expand, and he found himself unable to look away. Something shifted against or above the void, a winding bulge pushing against and distorting the image. The movement began to spiral towards him, and with some effort he averted his eyes. The rift rippled, but seemed otherwise unchanged. He had no sense of where or what this vantage may be viewing. ~ The Second Rift: Mathematical Fields ~ He was almost unable to look into the second, blinding rift. Blue-white light poured from the edges and surface of the opening, momentarily solid before evaporating into a fine cloud. Arcing field lines bent and billowed in toroidal loops, riddled with mathematical equations which flickered in and out of view, their described harmonic resonance and descriptive transformations fleetingly sensible then immediately foreign. He was left with the impression that this rift provided an incomprehensibly distant vantage. ~ The Third Rift: The Dragon Planet ~ Peering into the third rift, he saw a binary star system, the pair orbiting one another in a perpetual dance. At the bottom of the vantage rotated an icy planet, rung with lights. A sinuous dragon-like creature hovered nearby, snarling in his direction. He was left with the impression that this rift provided a fairly distant vantage. ~ The Fourth Rift: Grey Elanthia ~ In the fourth rift, he saw a field of mostly familiar stars, brightly singing with rippling silver and gold as they shifted closer into the constellations of the night sky. At the bottom of the vantage rotated Elanthia, its landscape dotted with craters and grey oceans. He was left with the impression that this rift provided a very close vantage. ~ The Fifth Rift: The Burnt Planet ~ In the fifth rift, he saw a field of stars arranged in a completely foreign orientation, absent any familiar constellations. At the bottom of the vantage rotated a burnt planet crisscrossed with smoldering flames and a crackling purple miasma, barely illuminated by a bloated orange sun. He was left with the impression that this rift provides a nearby vantage. Saragos tells me that the rules of space began to unravel soon after the group viewed the rifts. He felt briefly nauseated as the visible distance to his hands wildly snapped between fathoms and a mere hair's breadth. He stumbled, his feet unable to occupy the space directly above the ground. The stars outside began to bleed, wobbling like wet paint. One star, unremarkable and not part of any constellation, erupted with light. A wild energy began to build, and he was left with the impression that it was very much time to go. A thrum was escalating around the area, winding up and then down with constant periodicity. The group quickly made its way back to the starbeam. Suddenly, a blinding flash of dark blue light filled the area, and he felt himself thrown to the ground. When his vision cleared, he found that everyone had been transported back to the crystal mosaic in the area where the scuttlers live on Elanthia. A brilliant flash of dark blue light erupted across the sky and then, it seemed, the Involuted Passage was gone. It seems we succeeded, though I've never before felt quite so uncertain about just what we succeeded at, or if it was even a success. Still, I am grateful to continue on with the life I have built here, with no foreign asteroid shooting crystals at my homeland. Perhaps Allye put it best when she said, "I am very glad Elanthia is not a starburned husk. Despite not knowing quite exactly what happened, I'm very glad to be here with you all now and not floating with space centipedes, untethered and planetless." I am overall relieved, but more may be to come. Our esteemed Visionist Miskton once again warned us of a vision that has come to him, this time of a large chunk of crystal on the ocean floor. It was fractured and vibrated slightly, contracting and then violently expanding much like the crystal chunk on the Involuted Passage. So it may be that the pieces fired upon us yet have a role to play. As always, the Herald will follow the story and report it to you, dear reader. For now, I stand in relief, gratitude, and awe before an expansive universe we can never hope to fully understand. Stay safe, Navesi Daerthon True Bard, Zoluren's Herald Editor in Chief of the First Land Herald

Real Date: Unknown Date

Subject(s): Avtalia scuttler Crauyarin scuttler Dragonspine Mountains Elanthia Involuted Passage Katamba Moon Mage Nascent Unknown

Author(s): Navesi