Post by Illiandi Bondsmiller on Jun 29, 2013 11:03:54 GMT -5
The Town
Smelling like old mortar and sun-baked stones, the town manages to look like it has sat in the same place for hundreds of years, even though its longest residents will swear some of the buildings are only a year old. Moss and lichen creeps up the walls, and the planks of jungle wood forming floors and ceilings are cut thick and heavy. The windows have no glass in them, because without a breeze anything indoors would be chokingly humid and hot, and residents seem content to trade some privacy for the mist of rain on stormy days. An enormous jungle tree so tall it sometimes hangs onto the evening mist far past noon, looms behind the children's home. Chickens and potato people pervade the town, hiding in shady places under the stage or wedged up in the railings. Well kempt and obviously loved gardens dot the cobbles and break up the monotony of grey and brown.
The Farm
On average, the expanse of the farm is a thirty-to-forty minute walk from town, up a broad-cut track and bumbles and fumbles through the suffocatingly dense jungle. A shock of space with the nearby volcano stretching up to the northwest with sheer black stone, the openness of the area compared to its surroundings makes it feel immense. Extremely fertile land is put to work here, with sun-baked gourds, thriving grain, exotic imports species and milling livestock, there are only six buildings out here. The largest of them, beside the barn, is the home of two of the three resident Lords, and a personal crest hangs outside their front door over the deceptively simple welcome mat.
The Jungle
Meaty, thick flowers with leathery petals compete alongside their feathery delicate counterparts on stems and vines that hang from the overhead canopy like God's bunting. The jungle trees are perpetually at war with each other for light and nutrients, and sometimes press together so thickly as to block out light to everything below them. Buzzing with insects, colourful chattering parrots, snakes and screaming frogs, it is always full of life and a stunning amount of noise. There are no 'quiet woods' here! The jungle is a pressing presence, damp, dank, and overgrown.
The Lake
The nearest lake to town is highly mineralized and, in the south bank, slightly brackish due to an underwater channel to the nearby ocean. The cloudiness of the water still allows sight of the rocky bottom in places, as well as the occasional hazards of rotting deadwood piles. Sometimes used for industrial retting of jute plants, which stand like teepees off to one edge, the fish and water beetles thrive in the shade of all that gathers at the base of this lake. Kidney shaped, the back portion of the lake is slightly more private and used as a bathing spot by some of the residents On the banks nearer to the town, crumbled alabaster and marble arches and wall mark the land owned by one of the three Lords of the Island, sometimes decorated to his whimsy as his personal park.
The Volcano
Dominating the view from any spot on the island, the central volcano perpetually announces to the eye that it is there, and seems to exclaim that in the end, the island will always belong to it. Nevertheless, the western side of this behemoth of stone bears scarring, with a great scoop dug out of the side in which opportunistic trees have grown. Sometimes lights dance in the night over the top of it, though no one who lives here can explain what the phenomena is. Wobbling unsteadily above this is a shelf of dirt and stone, slightly T shaped and hovering there in direct defiance of gravity. On very cloudy days, the sharpest observers will notice how the clouds flow around this island but seem to avoid touching it. Birds trying to fly above or behind this shelf of turf seem to smack into something invisible and then flutter off in an obvious daze.
Dead Dragon Bog
Inaccessible to the villagers, Dead Dragon Bog is a marshy, extremely stench-laden cess-pool of raw life energy, crowned by a dragonskull large enough to sail around the world in. It is rumoured that the dragon and the great wound in the side of the volcano are related.
The Mines
Referenced by the Lords and the guards as a penal colony, the mines are still owned by the Darkhands, though under local accounting. The source of a small portion of public support, they are also pivotal to negotiations with the local red dragons. No resident is allowed to go here, until they are sentenced there as dire punishment.
The Dragon's Reach
Here being quite literal, most of the northwest portion of the island is under the exclusive control of a colony of red dragons, from whelps to drakes to full sized dragons and their larger breeding couples. While rumours abound regarding exactly how allied or not these dragons are, everyone is ordered to completely avoid this area, no matter what.
The North Colony
Maybe this exists, maybe it doesn't. Anyone going looking for it can't seem to find it, and that alone causes the rumors to fly about this being the spot from which the Darkhands can still monitor the goings-on of Dandria's Rest.
Smelling like old mortar and sun-baked stones, the town manages to look like it has sat in the same place for hundreds of years, even though its longest residents will swear some of the buildings are only a year old. Moss and lichen creeps up the walls, and the planks of jungle wood forming floors and ceilings are cut thick and heavy. The windows have no glass in them, because without a breeze anything indoors would be chokingly humid and hot, and residents seem content to trade some privacy for the mist of rain on stormy days. An enormous jungle tree so tall it sometimes hangs onto the evening mist far past noon, looms behind the children's home. Chickens and potato people pervade the town, hiding in shady places under the stage or wedged up in the railings. Well kempt and obviously loved gardens dot the cobbles and break up the monotony of grey and brown.
The Farm
On average, the expanse of the farm is a thirty-to-forty minute walk from town, up a broad-cut track and bumbles and fumbles through the suffocatingly dense jungle. A shock of space with the nearby volcano stretching up to the northwest with sheer black stone, the openness of the area compared to its surroundings makes it feel immense. Extremely fertile land is put to work here, with sun-baked gourds, thriving grain, exotic imports species and milling livestock, there are only six buildings out here. The largest of them, beside the barn, is the home of two of the three resident Lords, and a personal crest hangs outside their front door over the deceptively simple welcome mat.
The Jungle
Meaty, thick flowers with leathery petals compete alongside their feathery delicate counterparts on stems and vines that hang from the overhead canopy like God's bunting. The jungle trees are perpetually at war with each other for light and nutrients, and sometimes press together so thickly as to block out light to everything below them. Buzzing with insects, colourful chattering parrots, snakes and screaming frogs, it is always full of life and a stunning amount of noise. There are no 'quiet woods' here! The jungle is a pressing presence, damp, dank, and overgrown.
The Lake
The nearest lake to town is highly mineralized and, in the south bank, slightly brackish due to an underwater channel to the nearby ocean. The cloudiness of the water still allows sight of the rocky bottom in places, as well as the occasional hazards of rotting deadwood piles. Sometimes used for industrial retting of jute plants, which stand like teepees off to one edge, the fish and water beetles thrive in the shade of all that gathers at the base of this lake. Kidney shaped, the back portion of the lake is slightly more private and used as a bathing spot by some of the residents On the banks nearer to the town, crumbled alabaster and marble arches and wall mark the land owned by one of the three Lords of the Island, sometimes decorated to his whimsy as his personal park.
The Volcano
Dominating the view from any spot on the island, the central volcano perpetually announces to the eye that it is there, and seems to exclaim that in the end, the island will always belong to it. Nevertheless, the western side of this behemoth of stone bears scarring, with a great scoop dug out of the side in which opportunistic trees have grown. Sometimes lights dance in the night over the top of it, though no one who lives here can explain what the phenomena is. Wobbling unsteadily above this is a shelf of dirt and stone, slightly T shaped and hovering there in direct defiance of gravity. On very cloudy days, the sharpest observers will notice how the clouds flow around this island but seem to avoid touching it. Birds trying to fly above or behind this shelf of turf seem to smack into something invisible and then flutter off in an obvious daze.
Dead Dragon Bog
Inaccessible to the villagers, Dead Dragon Bog is a marshy, extremely stench-laden cess-pool of raw life energy, crowned by a dragonskull large enough to sail around the world in. It is rumoured that the dragon and the great wound in the side of the volcano are related.
The Mines
Referenced by the Lords and the guards as a penal colony, the mines are still owned by the Darkhands, though under local accounting. The source of a small portion of public support, they are also pivotal to negotiations with the local red dragons. No resident is allowed to go here, until they are sentenced there as dire punishment.
The Dragon's Reach
Here being quite literal, most of the northwest portion of the island is under the exclusive control of a colony of red dragons, from whelps to drakes to full sized dragons and their larger breeding couples. While rumours abound regarding exactly how allied or not these dragons are, everyone is ordered to completely avoid this area, no matter what.
The North Colony
Maybe this exists, maybe it doesn't. Anyone going looking for it can't seem to find it, and that alone causes the rumors to fly about this being the spot from which the Darkhands can still monitor the goings-on of Dandria's Rest.
