With a relieved sigh, Gibbou soared lethargically in a zig-zagging pattern, trying to woman herself up for her encounter with the boar. She wasn’t looking forward to it at all, but if anything could be used for self-defense, it would be stone - that was a truth of reality. She would lay a plan - sneak in, capture the pig’s consent and be halfway across the planet before the boar got wise, and--... Wait, how would that even work? Okay, okay - she’d go in, politely say hi to the boar and just ask, like she’d done every other time so far, and…
Oh, but what if the boar got difficult again? How long had it even been since they saw each other? A week? A year? Millennia? No, wait, it couldn’t be millennia - then Adrian would’ve already died long ago, and that hadn’t happened yet.
Right?
A pang of anxiety slammed into Gibbou like an oncoming meteorite and she wondered for a moment whether she should rocket back to Mydia to check up on him. It would only take her a few minutes and--...
No! No, no, no, she couldn’t have been away for that long. Come on, Gibbou - focus! She just had to obtain the final blessing on her artifact - then, she could return home and offer one of the night elves the first drink. Although, she would then have to take it back to Toraan… And then take it over to Kubrajzar. Wow, it was such a hassle to move this thing! How would mortals even do it?!
She pondered this thoroughly as she approached the tallest peaks of the World Anchor. She landed on the highest zenith, completely ignoring a certain nearby punctured stone with a sword stabbed through it. She sat down on a similar, yet much healthier stone and pondered the solutions some more.
Unbeknownst to Gibbou, the boar kilometers away, chuffed in the crisp fallen leaves of the subalpine. For hours he sought the perfect spot to spoil himself upon. And for hours he rustled the damp undergrowth in his self-pleasure. He deserved the moment of respite. Creating had drained him, and the Lifeblood seemed to need a break itself. What better to do then to disturb the rest of fallen leaves with his nose and break them apart with his mighty hooves and back.
Amidst his activity, the presence of another caught his attention. He froze. He recognized this scent. The moon girl. The one her rump upon his former woman. The boar snorted, blowing leaves every which way. What could she possibly want? Maybe a divine had come through these parts, doing every sort of weird thing. But this one in particular peaked his interest. Not so much as to what she could be doing, but it gave him a chance to reconcile…”past misdeeds”.
And so the boar sunk into the earth, crashing his hooves against rock and anhailiating it until he reached the peak of the World Mountain. Earth shifted and Boris poked his head out of his hole, ignoring the sword and gazing at the god.
”Hello you.”
Gibbou jumped with a ‘waaah!’ and fell backwards off her rock, kicking her legs all around as she struggled to get back up from the snow. It took a few good seconds before she regained her posture and redeposited herself upon the rock. There, she attempted to assume a majestic, formal pose with a raised chin and a partially squinted look, almost as if she was looking down at him. “Hello, mister Boris,” she said curtly. She then looked around, twisting her neck an unbalanced angle further right than left, challenging the seriousness of her composure. “Nice place.”
The boar snorted. ”Thank you. What brings you here? I hope you brought snacks.” Boris intoned curtly.
“Oh, uh, yeah, hang on…” With the snap of her fingers, Gibbou conjured forth a tray of blueberry muffins. She willed the snow between them to pack itself into a table, pulled her stone seat over and leaned her elbows on the table, propping her chin on her two hands. She hardened her squint at the pig and voiced with a mouth hidden behind intertwined fingers, “The muffins are fresh. Baked them just now. Go on… Have a taste.” She punctuated her sentence with a raised brow.
Delighted, Boris dug himself out of his hole and plopped his rump in the cold snow, his body large enough to reach the table. Clumsily, he craned his neck to take a muffin into his gullet and chew. Blueberries exploded in his mouth and Boris’ eyes widened. ”Ohhhhhhhrrrr…how did you know I loved blueberries!?” he bleated between mouthfuls.
“Call it… Intuition,” Gibbou replied, her right eye squinting to the point where it was almost closed. Her voice put on a certain odd wheeze and she took a muffin for herself, biting into it with cold, calculating snaps. She drew a breath through the teeth and clicked her tongue. “Listen, I’ll be straight wit’ch’yu, mister Boris - I’ve a lil’ proposal for ya.”
”Mmmhmmmm.” he hummed, swallowing another muffin.
She extracted the horn and put it discreetly on the table, looking over her shoulders as if someone who definitely wasn’t there was watching them. “This is the ‘package’ - it needs a blessing from the mountains. You in?”
Saucers of white fire became rivers as the Boar’s eyes narrowed.The thing reeked of divinity. ”You ought to explain.”
“Sure, I owe you that much, I can see that.” The stone Gibbou was sitting on formed a chair-like back which she leaned against and crossed one leg with the other. “This is Hir, the druid maker. It’s a tool me and my sister made to help mortality protect themselves. Using it, mortals can summon miracles in our names to do wonders so we won’t have to. Of course, their power is dependent on our willingness to help them - this is why these ‘druids’, as I call them, will piously work to show they are worthy of this help. I used the example of taking care of groves for Mister Tree, but for mountains, uh… Stop exploitative quarries, I suppose?”
If the mountainsmith could laugh, it would sound sort of like a boulder crushing a howling monkey. Such was the sound the boar made. ”In return for my blessings, thinking-things will love and protect my crafts? A fair trade.” the boar affirmed.
“I knew you’d see it my way, mister Boris.” Seeing as the sun was coming up, Gibbou snapped into reality a pair of disks fashioned from black glass, held together by strings of metal. She deposited the central metal string, which was slightly curved, over her nose, and wrapped the others behind her ears. “Please, if you would offer it its blessing,” she said and gestured at Hir.
The boar nodded, and summoned from the depths of the earth a great energy. The mountain quaked, and the foundations of Galbar twisted under the weight of the mountainsmith’s power. And granting himself the power of the world, the realm of Actuality folded upon itself, and from the depths of his throat he hacked and coughed and spit a loogie the size of a pea upon the horn. And all stilled.
”Be sure to rub it in now.”
A frown formed behind the glasses. “Do, do I have to? Caaa-, can’t you do it?”
Boris tilted his head. ”Hooves.” he said flatly.
There came a groan, followed by surly mutters as the moon goddess flexed every muscle in her face and started rubbing the ‘blessing’ all over the horn, releasing quiet squeals of displeasure every now and then.
The boar nodded. It was done. ”The blessing of the mountain is yours.”
In the hands of a god the small increase in weight would go unnoticed, but the spirit of the mountain had been imbued in the artifact.
Gibbou washed her hands thoroughly with the ice cold snow, sobbing dryly a “boo-hoo” to show that she felt sorry for herself. She took the horn, tied it to her belt and eyed Boris where he sat. “Know that this only accounts for -half- an apology for what you did to my moon!” she scolded with the point of a finger. “I won’t forgive you that easily!”
”Hath no mercy? She has long forgiven me. You need plenty of healing time.” Boris surmised. She and Moon were nothing alike honestly.
“Has not! She, she would’ve told me if she had!” She looked up at the moon, which was retreating away from the scene over the horizon. “You would, wouldn’t you?!” The moon gave no answer and dipped into hiding behind Galbar. Gibbou was stunned. “You, you cheater!”
A gaze followed the moon. ”O Moon, O Moon, fair and sweet and soft like milk, forgive your keeper. She doesn’t mean it.”
Gibbou sucked in a breath through the nose and pointed at the boar once more. “This isn’t over, mister Boris! I, I’ll be back - and we’ll settle this score once and for all!” With that, she squatted down and jumped, soaring westwards with great speed to outrun the sunrise.
”Farewell.” the boar intoned. Noticing a untouched muffin left over, Boris dove and snapped the thing into his gullet. Divine.
Gibbou boutta grab that last blessing, then suddenly starts wondering how long she’s been gone from Adrian and the rest. Generations? Anxiety overtakes her, but she quickly remembers her mission again and flies to the Anchor top. There, ignoring the sword in the background, she waits for pig. Pig appears. They eat blueberry muffins and Pig spits on the horn to bless it, making Gibbou rub the spit all over it. Gib then goes from mobster to tsundere and I don’t even know what we were writing anymore. The end.
Gibbou had to admit that she was enjoying this little quest of seeking out her colleagues and asking them to join in her little project. It was nice - nice to meet new faces, get to know them a bit better, and then gauge their cooperative nature from the get-go. She grew giddy from the thought that so many of her friends had shown their interest for Hir and the powers it could provide. Oh, she couldn’t wait to show it off to Adrian and the rest once she could make her way back to…
Huh. What was that land actually called? She hadn’t heard anyone actually refer to the land itself as anything special. Not even the elves had given it a specific same, as far as she knew.
She sighed and put on a smug smirk - my, she had to do a lot of things today, huh? She spun around and pointed at the distant specks of land that constituted the eastmost island of those desert-covered, yet also oddly forested, lands. “Hark at me, great clump of, uh, dirt!” she yelled proudly as though imitating Klaar. “Your name, as well as the names of all your island friends - no, comrades! - shall be Mydia!” She paused to taste the word. “Yes! Mydia - the land of deserts, forests and buffalo! Oh, and elves, of course!”
With that out of the way, she flew ever closer to the tree, which by now was clogging up her entire horizon with its mammoth trunk. There was no real way of describing just how large this tree was. It far exceeded the very meaning of the word “large”, yet no other word existed that could adequately capture the very size of this tree. It had to be a god, or at the very least something tightly connected to whomever was responsible for the plants. Gibbou flew over to a rather empty spot on the trunk facing the great sea and spoke, “Hello? Mister tree? I’m Gibbou, goddess of the moon! I was wondering if you had a minute to chat?”
There was some creaking and grunting from behind the bark of the Tree, followed by panting. Then, from an opening in the trunk just a few meters above Gibbou, a wooden face with a crown of wooden horns and two black eyes peeked out.
”Gibbou, Mistress of the Moon. I am the First Voice, The Great Tree graced me with some knowledge about you. You’re the second born, aren’t you? What does someone of such a high stature want to talk about?” The Voice Looked down at the barely visible ground, and then at Gibbou and nodded. ”Would you like to come inside the Tree? Or perhaps you enjoy the-” A strong wind crashed against the trunk of the tree and nearly blew the Voice back inside. ”... the breeze?” It finished with a huff and disheveled leaves.
Gibbou floated a few feet with the wind and soared back to where she had been previously. “Hi! Good point - where’s the entrance?”
The Voice patted the rim of the opening from which he was peeking out. ”It’s not grandiose like most of the entrances on the lower levels, but I believe this should be an acceptable way inside, if a bit tight.”
Gibbou nodded. “Alright, I’ll give it a shot!” With a bubbly hum, she flew over to the chink in the wood bark and squeezed inside, muttering angrily about ‘those damn berries’ on the way. As soon as she was inside, she noticed that the current level the Voice was in, the level she had entered, was rather dark. Almost no openings led to the outside and therefore only a little bit of sunlight reached inside. Instead, the whole area was lit up by all manner of bioluminescent flora. Both immobile and mobile, these plants all seemed to form a whole ecosystem. There were even mushrooms with strange shapes and scents, and fragrantic flowers and herbs strewn about.
When Gibbou set her feet on the mossy ground, vines grew against her skin and stopped at the calves, then their little buds bloomed into bright orange flowers and blew out clouds of pollen. The goddess squeezed silent a giggle as the undergrowth tickled her feet.
The Voice looked at the Goddess, having stepped back, and nodded once more. ”So, what is it you seek here, Mistress Gibbou?”
Gibbou took a second to completely swallow her laughter. “R-right!” She nipped the horn from her hip and held it up to the voice. “I’ll try to be brief. First of all, beautiful place you have here. I love the mushrooms, especially. This here is Hir, an artifact me and my sister created in order to let mortals perform miracles in our names, provided they can be nice and pious otherwise. To you, if you would like to join in on this project, it would mean that the users of this magic would keep your groves clean and healthy in hopes that you will one day return the favour when they need it the most! Sounds like a good deal, right?”
The Voice place a hand over his mouth in thought, and looked up at the ceiling covered in bright vines simulating a wild worldsong. After a moment, he let his hand fall back to his side and nodded. ”The Tree of Genesis seems to like the image of the peoples of the world taking care of their green little groves...” He agreed and as he did so, a small flexible tendril of wood broke away from the floor and coiled itself around the Voice’s wrist, then pulled. The Voice hummed and sat down cross legged on the floor as a similar tendril coiled itself around Gibbou’s wrist. ”So… What exactly do you want the Great Tree to do for you?”
“Just a few words of blessing and well-wishes, as well as Mister Tree’s consent to let users of Hir perform great miracles in their name - nothing much, but Mister Klaar filled it with seawater.” She paused and frowned at the horn. “I’m not sure how he did it, but, well, you can try whatever feels natural to you. The goal’s just that the users’ll be, uh, infused with your power - is that the right word? Yeah, infused!” She glanced down at the tendril around her wrist and politely tried to pull her wrist to herself, which snapped the tendril innocent little tendril in half.
The Voice closed his eyes and took a deep, slow breath. After a moment of silence, a bigger root came up to grab Hir, running itself all over the item, feeling every irregularity and every possibility hidden inside it. It was then that the root gingerly placed Hir on the uneven ground, a little bit of seawater leaking from the horn… And several different kinds of miniature vines with blooming flowers growing from them wrapped around the artifact, followed by a short flash of light and a dimming in all the bioluminescent flora present on the level.
Of course, the sudden darkness was short-lived, as the natural lights came back in force as soon as another breeze hit the Tree.
The Voice then opened his eyes and looked at Hir, a smile finding its way to his face. ”It seems, as long as those vines are alive, the vessel shall do the Wonders of Genesis.” It seemed like all was done. And yet, this bigger root that had taken Hir and aided in its blessing, eagerly slithered its way over to Gibbou and softly coiled itself around her wrist and palm. ”I have to say I’m relieved you’re this pleasant, Mistress Gibbou… I, uh, haven’t had the greatest meeting with Gods. I’m sure the Great Tree feels the same way.”
Gibbou gratefully accepted the horn and hunt it from the rim of her pantaloons. “Oh? What other gods have you met that have been so mean? Also, which vines’re you referring to? These?” She pointed at the vines now growing on the horn.
The Voice nodded once more, ”Yes, those vines. They may burn or wither due to disease, but you may visit these grounds and have the Great Tree replace them. The blessing is only active when there’s those small vines on Hir, you see. As for the other Gods, I believe it is better to keep those details secret. Incredible, how the world was on the verge of being destroyed and no one paid a second glance to it...”
Gibbou swallowed. “That’s, uh, it’s good that it didn’t happen, at least! Look, if you eeeeever need someone to talk to when it comes to gods being mean or rude or impolite or all of the above, just wave at the moon, alright? I’ll come down to say hello.” She squatted down and patted a small mushroom affectionately, which seemed to glow more intensely in response. “Thanks for the blessing, by the way!”
”I will keep that in mind. But I fear if I get in such a position I may not last long enough to wave at the Moon. I’m powerless against Gods, after all.” The Voice said with a chuckle. ”And now I will make my way down to the ground level.” The Voice grunted as it stood up and then began walking off into the darker part of the level, were a large spiral ramp was located. ”If you need anything else be sure to visit, Mistress Gibbou. I’m sure the Tree of Genesis will be happy to accomodate you.”
“Oh, I see… You’re mortal.” She huffed somberly. “I hope the Tree can change that for you,” she said with a smile and headed back through the crack in the bark and onwards.
Gib visits tree. Voice lets her inside. Tree blesses artifact with powerz. Gib leaves.
Oh yeah, and she names Toastland Mydia from now on.
Tree of Genesis 5 MP - 3 DP 1 MP - Add title: Wonder of Genesis I: Grants users of Hir the power to manipulate plants and plant life in accordance with the requirements of druidism. 4 MP - 3 DP Remaining
With a sonic boom, Gibbou broke into the atmosphere, marvelling at the beautiful lights all around, dancing like living brush strokes being painted across the canvas of the heavens. It looked similar to that odd stream of magic that had encapsulated her moon that one time, and she almost forgot her whole reason for returning to Galbar. A little bump against her left thigh sent her look downwards, where Hir was dangling from a strap tied to the rim of her pants. She snapped her fingers and went, “Oh, right!” and kept descending. She scanned the oceans thoroughly, mumbling “Klaar, Klaar, Klaar…” to herself. Eventually, floating some distance east of the Kubrazjar continent, she drew a deep breath and yelled, “HEY, MISTER KLAAAAAAR!”
The waters around Gibbou remained placid for some time after her initial yell, the sound echoing across the ocean in all directions. She sighed and dove a little closer to the surface. Hovering a few inches over the surface, she dipped her head underneath and repeated her shout, hoping that the water would carry her voice better than the air.
Just below Gibbou a fleshlet, no larger than a balled fist, plopped into existence. The little mass of meat thumped like a heart, squiggling and squirming violently. Suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, it began to expand. In all directions the meat-polyp blossomed, flowing out into a vast shape of considerable size. Eyes formed, huge and staring, as the multi-kilometer diameter form of Klaarungraxus formed itself below Gibbou. Eyes, previously gazing with empty stares in random directions, circled up and centered themselves to point at Gibbou. With that, the waters shook with the Deepspeak voice of Klaarungraxus.
”Ahhh, little moon, below and above in equal shares,” Klaarungraxus rose from the depths as he spoke, eyes surfacing to observe Gibbou in her own environment, ”Multitudinous expressions of regret for this time left wanting, Gibbou Rux, your soft reflection lit by moon most yearned for. Calm tides and gentle currents, Gibbou of the One-Good-Orb; what calls my name in your heart’s yen?”
“Hello there, mister Klaar - and a wonderfully good evening to you, too! Don’t you worry - you didn’t waste a second of my time.” She flew in a little closer to one of Klaar’s humongous eyes. “Waiting for someone as nice as you is always worth it,” she praised and cracked a smile.
Klaar stared up at Gibbou before wriggling two unsubmerged tentacles in response to the goddess’ kindly praises. It was not particularly understood by Klaarungraxus, for the concepts of niceties were often wasted upon him, but nevertheless the great god of the oceans deep could understand when he was being flattered. The tides calmed and gentled around his huge form as he sat there, treading water, as Gibbou stared into one of his immense, glowing eyeballs.
”Feelings of mutuality abound, Moonlit Face of Bright Smiles. Now, elucidate my minds as to your presence; though, no reason is needed. If the Moon-On-High seeks to offer her presence freely, who would deny such a fetching glow?” Klaar was sure he was getting good at this flattering thing.
The plum-skinned girl giggled to herself. “I would have gladly stopped by to say hi, but I just so happen to have another thing with me here - a teeny little project of mine.” She presented Hir with a proud grin. “Care to listen for a bit?”
Klaar leaned inwards, his eye seemingly pushing out from its socket to observe the horn with great interest. The power that danced along its edges in the divine vision of the great devilfish spoke a story about the item that only drew Klaarungraxus in further. What secrets did it hide beneath its humble exterior?
”What hath you borne to my watery abode, Gibbou? Does it sing? I would hear its sonorous cries, if it can.”
“Sadly not,” she confessed with a hung head. “But I should add a song function to it! Thanks for the pitch! Now, this here iiiiiis Hir, an artifact that grants certain mortals the power to perform miracles! Our kinds of miracles! Without us even doing anything! Doesn’t that sound awesome?”
Klaar seemed to be confused by the function of the artifact thrust before him. His eyes peered deep into the object, as if they were mapping its design in some deep pocket of the huge cephalopod’s mind. Nevertheless, the lack of its ability to speak and make noise as disappointment quickly dissipated. An object that can unleash miracles, particularly those ascribed to Klaarungraxus, must certainly be a fascinating one indeed.
”Awe hath struck me deeply, aye, for storm clouds brew in distant thoughts. Miracles, miraculous, of our own making? Explain further, Gibbou Rux, for my boundless curiosity is not yet sated. What mean thee by miracles sans we?”
“Oh, y’know - say, uh… Hang on… Oh yeah! Say a user of this artifact wanted to, uh, call in a larger school of fish to their village’s shores than usual - they’d be really nice to the oceans, clean beaches, punish overfishers. In return, they get to perform a miracle with your approval for their good behaviour - and all we have to do is nod and give them a thumbs-up, or, uh… A tent-up-le? ‘Course, if they’re not being nice to the oceans, you can just remove their power over it - no problem. Oh, shoot, did I forget to tell Sirius? Ooooh no…”
While Gibbou began to worry about telling Sirius, Klaar’s thoughts turned to other things. Miracles were an interesting concept and not one he’d ever put too much consideration into. Nevertheless, the potential for an entire species to learn of the ocean’s greatness was without precedent when they could directly gain from him in its service. Vo would teem with more than just life if such a thing existed.
”Warm summer rains on cool waters, Maiden-Moon, for this piques interest of most many-minds. I would offer my potency in this matter, for what is the world of miracles without the sea?”
Gibbou snapped back into focus. “Yes! My thoughts exactly! Here, give it your blessing.” She offered Klaar the horn.
Klaar lifted the Hir to his gaze, two forward tentacles gently holding it in their grip. A fascinating little object and one with considerable power born within, soon to contain even more. Ideal, he thought, for such a function. With that Klaarungraxus leaned forward to peer over the little horn, his beak opening ominously. All of a sudden a vast tide of darkness, seemingly from the deepest depths of the sea, vomited out from Klaar’s beak to envelop the Hir. The cloud seemed to suck inwards, pulling to one point as the ocean dove into the item. Across the world, as difficult as it would be to notice, the sea levels dropped an entire inch.
Klaar looked pleased upon his work. ”Truly consummate in its craft, Gibbou Rux. Honored am I to partake in its birth.”
“Yay!” Gibbou celebrated, retrieved the item and weighed it in her hands. “Woah… It’s still so light! Perfect.” She restrung it to where her belt would have been and hugged the nearest tentacle she could see. “N’aaw, thank you, you amazing, big, amazingly big cephalopod!”
”A welcome distraction from numerous endeavors, Maiden-Moon. May thee have success in further efforts, miraculous or otherwise. Waters keep you wise, Gibbou Rux, and may your One-Good-Orb keep high in the sky. With that Klaar descended back into the waves, one tentacle wriggling a goodbye wave before plopping underneath the waters. The placidity of the surface belied the massive entity that had, only moments ago, resided there.
Gibbou, still floating lethargically in mid-air, produced a list of coal-black paper out of nothing and ticked a box next to the label “My favourite squid” with a white crayon. She eyed the following name on the list and hummed.
“‘Whoever controls the plants’...” she mumbled to herself. “Shoot, I should’ve asked Klaar if he knows…” She floated slowly eastwards, scratching her head furiously as she scanned the lands of Galbar. On the way, she stopped on the neat little islands where she had created the night elves. Finding them still a bit too barren for her liking, she put camels, reptiles and beetles in all the drylands, and made sure the islands were rich with grazers and predators to take them on - buffalo would roam the canyons and be preyed upon by black, white-striped tigers in the night. She also made sure insects and mollusks were abundant in the more humid areas, and made plenty of bats and small birds to eat them. Then she stopped and thought to herself, Maaaaybe… What if I made -more- guardians? Something that can keep watch over the whole world?!. And so she jumped over to a hollow tree, stuck her hand inside and pulled out an owl egg. The mother soared down and pecked wildly at her.
“A-ow! Ow! Hey! Your kid’ll do great things, lady, and-- ow!” Gibbou eventually had to retreat, but she still had the egg in her possession. She found herself a nice little butte to stand on as she worked her magic. She ran her index finger along the top of the egg, as if drawing a mental image of where to hit it with a spoon to crack it open. She whispered to the life inside of it, promising greatness for them and their offspring for all eternity as the sentries of the moon. She then placed the egg down on the ground and waited.
It didn’t take too long - a mere hour later, the egg hatched, revealing a white-faced owl chick with feathers black as night and eyes glowing like the moon. Gibbou giggled. “N’aaaw, you’re such a cutie. Here, have a snack.” She conjured forth a dead mouse and offered it to the owl. The owl chick saw it and immediately scarfed it down. Then it grew - it grew terribly fast. Gibbou nearly rolled back as the owl chick became the size of its mother within fifteen minutes of hatching - and it didn’t stop there. Before long, it was twice as tall as Gibbou, covered in thick, black feathers and with dancing, white light dancing around its eyes like a magical fog. It eyed Gibbou curiously - the goddess was stunned.
“Sister, you grew fast. What did I put in that mouse?” She stood up and scratched her head. “Or more importantly, what did I actually say to your egg?” She gave the last hour and a half a rough reflection and tried to recount as much of what she had said as possible.
“... and as the moon cycles across the world, so shall you patrol it from birth to death, over and over…” She eyed the owl again, which now was pruning its feathers. She eyed the moon, which was approaching a waning gibbous, and snapped her fingers, drawing the owl’s attention by accident. “Of course! Your lifespan is tied to the phases of the moon!” She thought about this for a second. “Oh, sister, your lifespan is tied to the phases of the moon!” With budding tears in her eyes, she gave the owl a weeping hug. It stared down at her sheepishly. “I’M SOOOORRRYYYY!” Gibbou wept into its dowy belly and rubbed her moist face all over. “I’ve given-sniff!- given, given you such a short life and, and, and… Oh, I’m sorry!”
The owl looked visibly uncomfortable, pushed gently at Gibbou with its wings and soon took to the sky. Out of the clouds above, more soon joined it, and it seemed to soar off in the different directions of the world. Gibbou stood alone on the butte.
“Come baaaack,” she sobbed quietly.
After sulking for half a day, she eventually remembered her mission and set off again, flying eastwards scanning the lands. She kept going until a certain fuzzy pillar spiked the sky like a leafy spear. Gibbou stopped and stared at the enormous tree so violently appearing in the middle of an empty horizon. She materialised her list and eyed the description - whoever controls plants. She eyed the tree again.
“HOW HAVE I NOT NOTICED THAT BEFORE?!”
Gibbou goes to get Klaar to bless the druid artifact. They meet, he blesses, all is gucci. Forgetting to ask what the plant god looks like, Gibbou flies aimlessly due east. She stops in Toastland to make some more life there (see MP sum), as well as the Owlix, which is now all over (migratory birds ftw). Finally, she spots Big tree and wonders how the fuck she has 20/20 vision. The end.
Starto: Gibbou - 1MP/1DP
0MP - Fill Toastland with more life, this including more insects like moths and beetles, more small night animals like bats. The canyons are now full of buffalo and the apex predator of the deep canyons are now black tigers with white stripes.
1DP, discounted to 0DP with Moon portfolio - Create extraordinary life: The Owlix: An enormous owl species which lives, dies and is reborn with the phases of the moon - being born as a chick on the new moon, growing to their mightiest on the full moon, and dying again at the next new moon. Live all across Galbar and hunt in the night.
As usual for a night elven worknight, it was terribly, terribly dark out. Seeing as it was also overcast, neither the stars nor moon offered much in terms of guiding light, so even several elves struggled to properly see what they were doing. As a result, many performed their tasks louder than usual to signal their position to the others who carefully maneuvered through the darkness. Rozmari was doing her very best to pluck apart mushrooms for stew - it was luckily a job reliant mostly on her fingers and hands, but it was difficult to see firstly, where she had put the basket she actually stored the mushrooms in, and secondly, where she had put the sharkskin bag she was supposed to store the bits in. She was pretty certain she dropped most of the mushroom crumbs on the ground at this point. Put off by her own clumsiness at work, she decided she had pulverised enough fungi, patted the ground for the sharkskin bag, found it and lifted it up. The unmistakable sound of spongy objects rolling onto the stone below sent a pulse of rage through her. She grabbed a handful and lobbed them at the wall - or at least, what she thought was the wall.
“That was unnecessary,” came a murky whisper. Rozmari froze.
“O-oh, dear. Cilantra, I didn’t mean to, I--!”
A huff silenced her apologies and the huntress made her way over as evidenced by the approaching soft slaps of skin against stone. She bumped gently into Rozmari to signal that she was next to her and began patting at the floor in search of the spilled mushrooms. Defeatedly, Rozmari joined in.
“What has you upset, Roz?”
Rozmari smacked her lips as if she was about to answer, but then remained silent, continuing to pick.
“Hey, you know you can talk to me about stuff.”
“Yeah, but… Ugh, I don’t know, it’s dumb…”
“It’s about Parslie, isn’t it?”
The subsequent blush nearby increased the temperature of the air and Cilantra snickered softly. The huntress offered her a pat on the shoulder. “Why don’t you two just, I don’t know… Y’know…”
“I couldn’t do that! He only has eyes for Bay and you know it!” Rozmari almost spoke with her voice, and Cilantra recoiled.
“Woah, alright, alright - I won’t pry.” They sat in silence for a minute. Cilantra then made a shrug that bumped into Rozmari. “Althooouuugh… Why don’t you get him something? Something really nice - y’know, so he’ll get eyes for you, too.”
“As if… What is there around here but… Sand and, and, and landsharks.”
“Well, to be fair--”
“You know what I mean,” Rozmari complained and picked up the last of the spongey mushroom bits. She packed the sharkskin properly together and bound it with a length of sinew. As she got up, Cilantra placed her hand on her shoulder again. “What?”
“Listen - you shouldn’t give up so easily, y’know. How about you go for a little treasure hunt through the canyon, hmm? I reckon it’ll still be a while until sunrise. You could even bring someone along - have them appraise whatever you find so you know it’ll be good.”
“Who would I even bring? What does Parslie even like?”
“Oh, I’m sure he likes loads of things. As for who, uhm…” An approaching pair of feet made both of them turn and sniff the air. Cilantra sparked a grin and reached out to pat the approaching elf. “Hey, Basil! Want to join Rozmari on a treasure hunt?”
"Oh?" Came Basil's voice, "Are you sure you'd want to bring me?"
Cilantra turned the pat into an amiable squeeze of the shoulder and hummed approvingly. “Yeah! It could do you some good, too - you haven’t had much of a chance to just go exploring for a while, now have you?”
"I'm just surprised is all," Basil replied, "I know the others have been putting distance between themselves and me since... Well you know."
“Well, frankly, I’d like for that to change. You’re as much a part of our tribe as anyone else, Basil - and I know Rozmari agrees. Ain’t that right, Roz?” The other elf didn’t respond, the faint sheen in her shining eyes indicating that she was, in fact, looking away. Cilantra drew an angry breath through the nose and stabbed an elbow at Rozmari, inciting a louder-than-expected cough from her.
“Ow! Yeah, sure, whatever.”
Cilantra hissed disapprovingly, but turned back to Basil with smiling eyes. “So, what do you think?”
Basil gave a hesitant pause before a slow, "Sure, what are we looking for?"
“Just, I dunno, something nice, I suppose--”
“Roz here has a bit of a crush on someone -reeeaal- special, and she wants to get him something nice.”
“Cila--! Ugh!”
Cilantra giggled to herself. “Y’know - something pleasing to the ears or nose. Maybe even the touch. Ooo, if you find, like, a soft animal or something, could you bring that back for me, too?”
“Don’t push your luck,” Rozmari retorted sourly.
Basil popped out of her thinking, "Wait who are we getting this for, exactly?" She turned to Rozmari, "It could help us decide on what to get."
“Go on, Roz, tell her,” Cilantra encouraged.
“What? No, I--... Ugh… It’s for Parslie…”
"Ha!" Basil covered her mouth, "I mean, really? That's so... Nice."
“Just… Let’s just go,” Rozmari decided and stomped off. Cilantra gave a low whistle.
“Hope I’m not giving you lots of trouble now…”
"Compared to the other troubles, finding a pretty stone with a grumpy elf isn't so bad," Basil crossed her arms confidently. Cilantra giggled and patted her back gently.
“I knew we could count on you. See if you can find something fragrant. Parslie does have a sensitive nose.”
Further down the canyons, glowing mushrooms and more open spaces made it easier to see, and the duo could to a greater degree rely on their eyes to see where they were going. Above them, owls hooted in the trees and bats wheezed softly at one another as they snapped up unfortunate moths in the shadows. Feline eyes twinkled in the bushes, and critters would sprint in front or behind them every now and then. Occasionally, the trickle of water would signal a nearby beck, and the changes in sensations under the feet revealed every kind of biome from gravel to grassland to forest. Rozmari held the lead, walking quietly for the most part except for the odd groan every now and then.
"Is there a problem?" Basil said in that stoic if not stern tone she was known for.
Rozmari offered another groan. “No, it’s just…” She paused. “Ugh, nevermind.”
"Well now you have to tell me," Basil offered, "You already started."
“It’s just… Why? Why am I doing this? Parslie’s already practically married to Bay - or, well, kinda. Either way, this is all just-...” She punted a nearby stone into a small creek. “Just a waste of time.” She blinked at Basil before putting on a frown. “But what would you know…”
Basil gave a defensive scowl, "What's that supposed to mean?"
“We both know what I mean, prophet. Tell me, do you have any experience with these kinds of emotions? Or does that thing inside you make you as cold and merciless as it is?”
Basil's eyes widened with hurt before settling into a biting scowl, "Just because I don't want to hump the first gravel face that smiles at me doesn't make me cold." She huffed, a hot snap entering her words, "Find your own damn rock, I don't need this." Basil went to turn around.
Rozmari gasped. “That’s just uncalled for!” she nearly yelled, scaring off several nearby bats. “You’re-... You’re just jealous because nobody likes you!”
Basil flinched, frozen in her retreat. She turned, moon colored eyes stained a frustrated pink, "People like me!" She mulled for a moment, "Bitch!" The execution was weak.
Rozmari scoffed. “Can’t even call me names correctly, can you? Just face it, Basil… You’re a looney, aaand nobody likes you.” She spun on her heel and continued forward. “Have fun walking home alone.”
"Fine!" Basil barked, "I don't need yoooou." Huffing and purple faced, she began her trek back, brow sunken. She angrily kicked nearby rocks as she walked, mumbling about her various sacrifices.
She kicked many rocks. It was no surprise to Basil that rustling came from under one of the abused rocks -- After all, many critters made their homes below the rocks. What was a surprise however was the way the wind suddenly filled with the wafting scent of mint, filling her nostrils and tempting her to find its source.
She knelt down, sniffing comically and spinning in a dizzy circle, "Where... Are... Yoooouuu-ah!"
Her ankle twisted and she rolled to the ground, head bumping off a pillow of moss. She went cross-eyed as her vision narrowed in on a tiny white flower with long yellow pistils and a thick stem for its size.
The tiny flower twitched and turned itself toward Basil’s nose. Then, after shuddering a little, its marble white petals closed around its pistils and a thin cloud of mist shot out of the flower, right at Basil’s face. It smelled strongly of fresh mint.
"PFBT," Basil sneezed. Her nose dripped and she sat up to wipe it. With her clean hand she sent down a finger and poked the tiny plant. It twitched and shrunk a little, protecting its pistils with its petals.
Basil gave out a thoughtful hum and looked around her for more, seeing the faint shapes of a handful more even in the dark of the night, of different colours and sizes, growing from inbetween rocks and gravel.
Grabbing a stick, Basil set to work digging around the first tiny flowers' roots until she had a loose clump of soil with the flower on top. Happy with her prize, Basil rose to her feet and set off into the darkness for the camp.
Already long before Basil had made it back to camp had the strange, yet alluring smell attracted the majority of the villagers. They gathered in a small huddle in front of the main cave, whispering and discussing what the source of this scent could be. It didn’t take long from the fragrance to be tracked to Basil, and Cilantra pushed herself gently to the front of the crowd, backed up by a white-haired elderly man Basil knew well as chief Pinae. Cilantra offered a smile which in itself was completely invisible in the dark, though her eyes revealed it clear as day.
“Basil, you’re back!” she whispered joyously. “What did you bring home? It smells… Oh, by the gods, what is that?”
"It's a flower," Basil recited and held forward the flower. She had taken the walk as an opportunity to spin the discovery in her ongoing plans' favor and with a refreshed voice she continued, "A gift from a god, no doubt."
Cilantra and some others leaned in around it. “Oh, this smell. It’s, it’s just wonderful! Chieftain Pinae, come smell this.”
The chieftain, leaning partially on a walking stick with a dog skull fastened to its head, made his way over slowly and gave the flower a whiff. He hummed approvingly and whispered, “This scent… It stings, yet it cleanses me through and through - there is something divine to it, for certain. Dyll, Time, would the two of you help Basil here dig an appropriate hole for her treasure over by the becks? This flower will be a relic of our village - to be tended to every night as though it was a pet!” He raised his stick authoritatively to punctuate his sentence. What seemed to be small rocks within the cavity of the skull produced a maracas-like sound. Dyll and Time immediately jogged over to the beck to begin their work. Pinae placed a warm hand on Basil’s shoulder and squeezed, “Great job, young one,” he praised with a smile covered by darkness.
"Thank you," Basil's voice defaulted to its stoicness if not with a tinge of social unfamiliarity. She cleared her throat, "So... How's the... How's everything going? For the tribe." Her eyes bounced in the darkness while she stood holding the plant, "Chief?"
Pinae shrugged and scratched at his temple. “Oh, I would say we’re doing well, considering the circumstances. You know how it is - the ibex migrations don’t exactly make it easy to find grub anymore, but at least the cave mushrooms are growing bountifully this year. Some of the kids, too, they… They’ve been making light of the Great Peace. One was playing in the water in the middle of the day earlier. Must’a heard that, right?” As Pinae was talking, he and the rest of the tribe were guiding Basil towards the plant’s new hole in the ground.
"I wasn't here last day," Basil admitted, "but that does sound troublesome."
“Huh, that so? Were you out hunting?” the chieftain offered. “By the way, please plant your wonderful finding here.” He gestured down into the hole.
"No," Basil admitted again, gingerly placing the flower into its new home. She patted her hands and looked at the chief, eyes trying to avoid looking at the crowd, "there!"
As if on cue, the soil began to shift. Like snakes below their feet, the forms of several dozen tendrils became apparent as they snaked toward the lone flower. One by one, they surfaced and revealed themselves to be roots. Thick, writhing roots unlike anything they’d ever seen before. They creaked and strained, some of them covered in mud, others dripping saltwater, and many sporting the telltale signs of a root that had dug through stone for a long time.
One by one, they reached the flower and covered it. Suffocated it. Strangled it. When the flower was visible no longer, they began covering each other, intertwining in what could only be described as a hasty dash toward the center.
As they mixed and strangled each other, they grew still and solid. More and more roots came from under the elves’ feet and they all headed straight for the growing mass. In the end, they settled and what was left was a sight to behold.
A large Kapok tree, a species they’d never seen before in the canyons, suddenly dominated the area. Yet its leaves were different to any other. They were white, and each of them had a different scent.
“By the gods,” mumbled the chieftain and went over to a leaf. He plucked it and gave it a whiff, sighing contently afterwards. “It smells… Oh, it smells like Bay’s cooking.”
From behind him came Bay herself, rubbing her fingers over the leaf roughly and bringing her fingers to her nose. “Oh, wow, if you think my food smells this good, chieftain…” She offered a warm giggle.
Cilantra went over to smell the same leaf, bursting out into a laugh immediately thereafter. “Oh, my gods! It really does! Wow, how is this even possible?”
“I guess the leaves she puts in her stew carry similar fragrances,” offered Parslie, who was busily testing the scents of some of the lower branches, sighing happily with every breath. Chief Pinae dunked the butt of his stick into the ground. “Very well! It’s decided. This particular leaf shall be called, uh… Bay leaf.”
“Woah, fantastically original, chieftain,” mumbled Cilantra and went over to pat Basil on the back. “Hey. You doing okay?”
"I'm..." Basil's face took on a heavy concentration, "going to die a horrible death for this." She blinked rapidly and looked over at Cilantra, "Praise the gods, yeah?" With a gentle pat on Cilantra's back, Basil leaned in towards the chief. "Chieftain, I think it is in our best interest to show our gratitude towards such a blessing by giving open thanks to its creator."
Chief Pinae blinked back before nodding. “A fine idea, Basil. We must pay our greatest respects to the creator of this artwork. The, the, the…” He hummed pensively to himself. “... The Roots of Fragrance!”
“The Roots of Fragrance?” Cilantra questioned.
“The Roots of Fragrance,” the chieftain confirmed proudly. “A fine name for a god, yes?”
"The Supreme Giver," Basil encouraged, "The Roots of our Spice, the Roots of Fragrance." A shiver ran down her spine as she gave a confirming nod to the chieftain, "So says."
“So… Any of those?” Parslie spoke as he broke into the conversation.
“Why not?” Basil crossed her arms.
“Hmm? No, I meant it as in, which of those sounds the best. I do like the Roots of Fragrance, personally,” Parslie whispered confidently.
“I dunno… Supreme Giver sounds more divine. I’m sure the god would find that more pleasing,” Cilantra pointed out.
“Could do both,” Basil offered, “One after the other.”
“Roots of Fragrance, the Supreme Giver?” Bay offered midway through making a little laurel out of bay leaf branches.
“Ooooh, I like that,” mumbled Cilanta approvingly. “Chieftain, I think we have a winner.”
“Wuh? Oh! Right!” Chief Pinae had occupied himself with sampling the lemongrass branches and hastily returned to the conversation. “Yes, what were we talking about?”
“Names for this generous god, of course!”
“Our generous god,” Basil corrected, “Our.”
“Right, -our- generous god. ‘Pologies.”
The chieftain nodded sagely. “Yes - we agreed ooooon… The, uhm… The name?”
“Roots of Fragrance, the Supreme Giver,” Cilantra said helpfully. The chieftain nodded.
“Mhm, mhm. A mouthful, but what is a holy ritual without a long chant?” joked the chieftain and scratched his chin. “Say, Basil, since you found it…”
The Roots of Fragrance seemed to swell for a moment, and then the Gift shrunk and exhaled a large cloud of spores. They seemed to hang midair for a moment, glistening against the occasional ray of moonlight that they could catch in that overcast night. And then, they settled on the ground all around the Gift, and where they settled, herbs soon started to grow. Fragrant herbs, suitable for exquisite and exotic cooking. Herbs they had never seen, or touched, or smelled before.
Maybe it was the Gift’s way of expressing its excitement for chanting?
The crowd clapped their hands excitedly and whispered joyously their praises to the Roots of Fragrance and the Supreme Giver for the fantastic smells enriching their simple camp.
Several hours later, far past early dawn, a sweaty and exhausted Rozmari returned to the camp, her hair a mess beyond compare and the sheen almost completely gone from her eyes. In her roughed-up hands, she held a collection of small, white stones which almost seemed to carry a certain glow in the darkness - or, well, what remained of it. She dragged her feet into the cave and collapsed onto whatever free space was left on the many communal animal skins laid out on the ground to sleep on. Several other elves were already fast asleep, hiding from the sun inside their deep and safe cave.
Sitting up against the wall beside her a sleepless Adrian was picking at his teeth with a piece of dried grass. He eyed the ragged elf and casually walked on over to her gathered stones. Slapping one with an open palm he grinned, “For me?”
Rozmari jumped a little with a quiet squeal and hoarded the stones to herself defensively. “No, they’re, they’re for someone else,” she whispered as quietly as she could so that Adrian could hear and her kin wouldn’t wake up.
“You never get me anything,” Adrian teased and crossed his arms -- a playful glint trapped in his eyes.
Rozmari muttered quietly to herself before taking in some drags of the unfamiliar scents about the village. “What, where’s that smell coming from?”
“Oh,” Adrian sniffed about, “Basil found a piece of a god, brought it home -- makes pleasant plants.” He flicked the grass stem away, “That’s the skinny of it at le-” A thought forced Adrian to pause. He cleared his throat, “It’s actually pretty important. You see, it is a new altar of worship for the tribe, declared by the chieftain himself.”
Rozmari couldn’t believe her over-sized ears. “Wait, Basil did what? A god? Altar of worship?!” Her outburst incited a slap from a nearby sleeper - or attempting sleeper now, most likely. Rozmari whinced and leaned even closer to Adrian. “Where did that little--... Where did she find it?”
Adrian racked his brain, “While out looking for gifts, I think -- for one of the tribespeople.”
Rozmari sank together into a ball on the fur, facing away from Adrian. With a frustrated, sobbing whisper, she muttered, “It’s not fair…”
Climbing onto her arm, Adrian whispered, “What’s not fair?”
“She just came along because she had to, then she was super annoying and then the gods decide that she deserved to come home with a super gift from heaven - like, who does she think she is?”
“Well she is a prophet,” Adrian offered, “I feel like that is her only real claim to fame around here, it fits.” The thumbling sat down, getting comfy, “Can I tell you a story?”
“... Is it to teach me a lesson?”
“I think so,” Adrian pinched his chin, “Or at the very least impart some sort of wisdom -- you see the elder back home would whip out a story whenever thinking needed to be done and he had no direct advice. It always worked, but then again -- I’m not the elder.”
Rozmari didn’t do much other than nod for Adrian to tell the story, adding a hum when she considered the thumbling might not be able to see her.
"Well okay," Adrian started, "So like there was... Okay so my sister Jenny used to..." Adrian waved a hand, "Ugh nevermind -- sometimes silence is all we need." He laid down -- still on her arm -- "Silence... Silence... Silence..."
Rozmari furrowed her brows. “That’s it?”
"I didn't think you were interested," Adrian folded his hands behind his head.
“Well, now I’m not so much,” she muttered back and made herself more comfortable.
"Well somebody is grumpy," Adrian teased.
“I am furious - now will you leave me alone, please?” came a hiss in reply.
“I guess I could,” Adrian’s hidden smile shrunk to a concerned grin, “if you’re sure.”
“Absolutely.”
"Well fine," Adrian scoffed and pulled Rozmari's sleeve like a blanket, settling into an awake silence. Rozmari rolled her star-like eyes before closing them, trying her best to drift off to sleep. She had suffered a terrible defeat today - and part of her felt like she was considerably at fault for doing so.
The Tree of Genesis 5 MP - 4 DP
0 DP Used to consecrate the Supreme Giver’s Gift, The Roots of Fragrance into a Holy Site, giving it the following Title: Herbal Haven II: The Roots of Fragrance will force all kinds of useful herbs to sprout around it once every week. The herbs that grow depend on two factors. Temperature, and requests from the Night Elf Villagers (And only those with the blood of the Night Elf villagers present during its consecration running in their veins). When it is cold, the Roots of Fragrance will spread medicinal or poisonous herbs, depending on the wishes of the villagers. When it is warm, it will spread fragrant herbs well suited for cooking and processing into spices of all kinds, or slightly magically attuned kinds of herbs.
5 MP - 4 DP remaining.
You know me... I'm a Roman, of the old styyyyyle. Also Rozmari wants to bang Parslie so Cataracts suggests finding something pretty as a gift. They force Basil to go. Basil and Rozmari fight and split up. Basil finds a fragment of a god in the form of a flower and brings it back. Everyone confirms Basil is best and they make it a thing. Tree god happy, spice for all. Dune worm.
Duty took him away from Galbar. Away from Xal-Zastarha. Qael’s next task was one that he had delayed for too long. Mortals had gained magic now but they would require tools. Things to aid them on their long and perhaps endless journey. Tools forged from blessed resources. To that end, he required metal. Many different kinds of it. In Galbar, the metal had been evenly spread. Veins of iron and copper there, a deposit of gold and silver here. Even for a God it was spread out too far to do it quickly. Yet Qael’s mana had offered him another option. High above the skies, within the void, floated stones of endless resources. Like eggs to be cracked open and offer up their bounty. So Qael traveled upwards, along the Moon Stream until he reached that very gentle rock and landed on one of its dead seas. With a hand he reached out towards the Void Spread. That impossibly complex net of various asteroids, meteors and comets. He drew them near, closer and closer, faster and faster. Until they came hurling down through the nothingness and crashed with great violence into the moon’s surface. Dust and moonrock billowed up around him. It would look like a great, ethereal wind had created a storm raging on the moon. It was a hollow thing though. Within the dust cloud Qael had calmed the inside of it down already. Pushing the dust down into the ground again. So he could get to work on the fallen pieces.
“-WHAT- IS GOING ON?!” came a high-pitched scream and the light of the stars, sun and Galbar below all seemed to fade as the world around Qael was enshrouded in deep, phantasmal shadow. Two large orbs like blood moons broke the darkness, glaring down at the mana god and his loot. “Who do you sunlight-shining clump of stupid think you are to come here and drop those rocks on my precious baby, HUH?!”
“I am Qael’Naath.” The God of Magic introduced himself rather casually, as he stood hunched over a meteor that was floating just a few feet above the surface. He had broken a few pieces off it to see what was inside. It was fascinating! Yet now, with only the color red to illuminate basically everything around him, picking out the right bits of minerals would get tedious. So he looked up at the two big red orbs and said: “Do you mind breaking the shroud for me, please? I kind of need light to study these things.”
“Break--!” the voice thundered in bafflement. The rest of the meteor was subsequently picked up and thrown into the darkness, presumably to burn up in Galbar’s atmosphere. “Are you also the God of Being a Butt?! What gives you the right to just smash up my moon and -then- have the-- UGH!” Another rock was lobbed off the lunar surface, this one being flung into distant space. “You’re being rude and I want you to leave!”
Qael wanted to put a shard of the boulder back into it when it suddenly flew away. He was still holding the piece. Perhaps it was time that he took a moment to talk to his siblings. The last one he had ever seen was Qullqiya and that was some time ago now too. In fact, he couldn’t remember when last had an amicable conversation with one of his siblings. So instead of bickering or ignoring her, he instead jumped up slightly, leaned back and floated just over the surface as if he was on a long, invisible couch as he looked up at the angry black-shroud face. “My apologies. I assumed the moon was completely empty.” He said, as his demeanor shifted entirely. “Perhaps it is best that I introduce myself completely. I am Qael’Naath, God of Magic, Lord of Mana. And you are?”
“Gibbou, goddess of the moon - the one you are currently using as your rock-cracker.” The eyes squinted sourly. “... And I would like for you to leave. My moon is not some tool, okay? She’s a precious thing and she -has- feelings.”
“Feelings?” Qael said, confused. It was genuine confusion. Instead of continuing to lounge upon nothingness he dropped down onto the ground and took a knee. With a hand he brushed over the dust, revealing the stone below. It was cold. At first, he felt nothing and assumed Gibbou had simply reflected her own power onto the moon. As itself reflected the sun. Yet right before he pulled his hand back, he felt a slight touch of something…more. Instantly he pressed his palm again upon the surface. Pushing his divine senses into it. Searching it for that something. He didn’t find it again. As if it had gone completely from his senses again. Alas, Gibbou was right. What he had perceived as a dumb rock did house something. Even if he couldn’t immediately sense what it was. He looked up at the black shroud with two burning orbs and said: “I would like to offer my sincere apologies, sister. I have committed a grievous fault but, if you would indulge me. I prefer to offer my apologies to you and not some manifestation of you.” The shadows flickered, then slowly dissipated. They retreated towards a single point some paces away, coalescing into a humanoid female form with plum skin, midnight clothes and a glare that could rival the sun. Her arms were stacked firmly over her chest, fingers digging into her skin with anger. She eyed the mana-god up and down and clicked her tongue disapprovingly. “Really, in all my life, I haven’t met a single person who’d think it’s just ‘alright’ to bombardier someone else’s creations just like that. I mean, even Enmity was at least sure to leave the moon mostly unharmed when they flicked it into orbit.” She stomped over and pointed down at the craters the meteorites had left. “I mean - look at this?! How would you like to get pockmarked by rocks, huh?”
“For that, my sincerest apologies.” He said, with a formal bow. As he did so, the rocks rose up from their craters. The far-flung stones and dust began to fly back. Falling back into their original place. Filling up the craters. The meteorites and comets were not placed back into their respective orbit though. Instead, Qael kept them floating close by. He said, as the remarks of getting pockmarked by rocks. He clutched his chest for a moment, feeling the old wound ache a little again. “I must say, sister, you are a sight for sore, tired eyes. The last sibling I met tried to kill me.”
Gibbou frowned. “H-hey, are you alright? Look, I know I might’a come off as a bit of a meanie earlier, but I didn’t mean to-... Look, here.” She materialised a mug in her hand. Its contents were steaming. She offered it to Qael. “It might not heal the wound, but… It might grant you inner peace so you forget about it for a while.”
“I’m not alright.” Qael finally confessed, as he slowly sat down upon the moon. “I haven’t been for quite some time.” He continued as he took Gibbou’s cup and drank from it. The ache vanished, for a moment. “Thank you.” He gave the cup back to Gibbou. “If only I could rest. You cannot imagine what burden magic is. Since my birth, I’ve been going around. Making sure everything is in place for the mortals. Yet I failed. I am too slow. Too weak. And now the mortals can barely summon a flicker of a flame.” He let out a big sigh, as he looked beyond his sister and onto Galbar. “Yet I love it so much. Have you ever been on Galbar, Gibbou?”
Gibbou sat down too and rested her cheek on a propped-up fist. “Yeah, I’ve been. It’s nice down there, y’know. Made a bunch of different species during my time there. Oh! Do you like bats? I loooove bats. I made loads of them when I was down there.”
A soft, uncertain whisper called out, "Why? Did you really.." it trailed off. The small, cloaked figure hovering towards the moon stated. Gibbou blinked up at the figure, automatically looking somewhat more on the defensive. “H-hi there, stranger. Have, uh, have you come to join us?”
"I have come to," He whispered so lowering himself to the surface, but did not place his feet on the ground, "to investigate ... why this happened" weakly gesturing to an asteroid.
“Oh… Ask him,” Gibbou replied sharply and thumbed over to Qael, some of the earlier animosity bubbling through her softer demeanour.
"I am Sirius. I am the caretaker for the stars." He said. "They are… unordered. This is not ideal."
“Oh, -you’re- the nice guy who’s been cleaning up the stars around here?” Gibbou popped to her feet and stuck out her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Sirius! I am Gibbou, your neighbour on the Moon!”
"Nice to ... meet you." He said, awkwardly intimidating her gesture, without knowing what to do. Gibbou squeezed his hand amiably.
“Oh yeah, and this here is, uh… Qael, right?”
Qael wanted to correct Gibbou. But then again his name felt like it held no real importance. He let out a sigh of resignation and said: “Yes. Qael. It’s an honor meeting another sibling of mine.” Qael did not take a hand. Instead, he simply raised his own hand in greeting. “Forgive me, caretaker of the stars. I required nodes of various metals for the next phase of my duty. Mortals must be given the appropriate tools to practice magic. I would use the nodes to identify the right metals, then put them back where they belong.” He explained.
Sirius paused, "The material essence of the stars do not belong on Galbar. … Not in high quantities. They are … unstable."
"How so? They look pretty docile to me,” Gibbou offered and leaned back onto her propped-up arms.
“Things are different here.” Qael noted. “I do not need them on Galbar though. I intend to simply alter certain metal’s properties. Not many. I just have to find some palladium, platinum, gold, rhodium, iridium and some titanium. Perhaps a handful more. Once I’m done, I will make sure your creations are returned to their rightful place. Far way from Galbar. With your leave, I will start at once.”
The star god extended his perception into the celestial debris, “You will not … find much. But the first creations did have … some metals implanted into” He turned to an asteroid, and willed it to dust, “Iridium, Rhodium, Platinum.” Turning to a comet, he did the same, “Gold.” And finally, turning to a meteor, “Palladium, Titanium.”
He pulled together the metal dust, creating a small pile on his cloaked hand. “As I said… not much.”
“So he smashed up my moon for nothing, is that it?”
“Not nothing.” Qael said as he took the dust from Sirius. It floated over his hand, each practical grouping together into a small little orb of its respective substance. He rose up from his seated position, although he moved noticeably slower. As the separated orbs landed again in his hand he turned to Gibbou. He let out an exhausted sigh. “Everything I do, I do for life. For the advancement of magic in the hands of the mortals. I have bled for it, fought for it and sacrificed my own lands. Imagine that, Gibbou. Your moon not just harmed on its surface but shattered. Broken. Every little detail you created here erased. This empty sea we stand in would be gone. If there is life here, it has burned and died. Because I have gone through that. Would you?” He then turned to face Sirius. “I am grateful for your gift. What do you want in return for your help?”
Gibbou snarled. “Was that a threat? It sounded like a threat.” She put her hands on her hips and stood up. “I think you’re more interested in seeing what your magic can do than to specifically be of benefit to life.”
Sirius voice raised from a whisper, but was still quiet and calm, “Please, calm yourself sister. But, that substance you used, … do you claim dominion for it? Are you responsible for its ascent into the far reaches?” he asked. Gibbou, meanwhile, spun around and angrily punted a small moon rock into Galbar’s atmosphere.
The God of Magic did not desire any more fighting amongst his siblings. What Gibbou said carried a nugget of truth. He cared little for individual lives. Perhaps now he cared a bit more because everything was so fragile and new. But as time came, there would always be more mortals to serve his purpose. If a few had to die for the progress of magic, so be it. His sister would learn the truths about being a god soon enough. Until then he supposed he would have to swallow her childish outbursts. “Indeed I do. I’ve called it mana. Or perhaps it has called itself mana. As I was born from it. I did not foresee it’s ascend into the void, but it would seem as if this moon has pulled one of the many Streams of Galbar up from it, and then your objects here in space had a pull on it as well.” He said to Sirius.
Sirius replied, “As I said… they are unstable. Your mana is causing further… complications. Withdraw your force, or do what you need to resolve the… incompatibility.”
“What if I made my creation more…compatible with yours? So the disturbances and complications they cause are removed.” Qael said. “Would you be open to that?”
“The stars predate me. But as I said… Do what you need.” he said, his voice lowering back into a whisper.
“Very well.” Qael floated up into the void and approached the nearest bits of debris. First, he encountered an asteroid. It was a hardy creation, yet utterly unresponsive to the mana. Which caused friction between the two substances. He altered the asteroid so it would be slightly more responsive to the magical power. Then he found a comet, which he found would normally absorb energy. Yet it was such an ill-suited vessel for mana. He altered its properties specific for mana, and instead of absorbing it, they would amplify it. He then found and did the opposite with the meteors. When he returned he gently returned to Gibbou’s moon. The small orbs of metal were still in his hand. “There. The issues were resolved. The flow of mana should no longer complicate things up here. I bid you farewell now brother and sister. There is still much work to do, and not all of us can stay on this moon forever.” With that, he let his stream take him up again. Heading down back to Galbar. Meanwhile, the few stones he had taken slowly moved towards the flow as well. Which then put them into the Void Spread and restored them to their original positions.
Gibbou made a farting sound with her mouth and crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t let the other moon hit you on the way down.” She then pocketed her hands and made a frown. “Ugh, what a sunlighted sun of a…” She tightened a fist in the air, but managed to calm herself with a sigh or six. “Okay, I’m calm. Very calm - calm as the night.” She then turned to Sirius with a broad smile. “So! Mr. Sirius - want to join this neat little project I’m making?”
Sirius paused, “What is this project.”
“So glad you asked!” Gibbou snapped her fingers and an ivory horn rimmed with obsidian popped into her hand. She offered it to Sirius and pointed at it. “This here is Hir, an artifact designed to protect mortality. To summarise, its users will be granted the ability to perform miracles on our behalf, granted to them by us without, y’know, actually needing to do anything. See, it’s all in that little dose of our own essences that we infuse into this thing. Now, the way they get this power is by being good, pious and virtuous mortals, meaning it’s basically a win for everyone! Smart, right?”
Sirius held the relic gently, and runes appeared before him. They rapidly shifted around, and after several moments, they settled. “For those who look into the stars with bright eyes, for those that are resilient, observant, cunning, kind, introspective, and loyal. For these people I grant my blessing so that they may bring hope into the world.” he chanted. Before reaching out to reach the Hir.
The horn flashed a starry blue for a second, then reverted to normal. Gibbou brought it to her nose and gave it a sniff, grinning from ear to ear afterwards. “Mmm! That’s divine essence, alright! Thank you so much, Mr. Sirius! This’ll definitely keep mortality strong and well-motivated even through the worst of times.” She snapped the horn back into its interdimensional pocket of existence. “Your contribution is much appreciated.”
Sirius floated over to where some comet dust had deeply impacted the lunar surface. He gently coaxed it out of the stone, and formed into the shape of a white-furred fox. “A gift. In case… More debris hits your moon. It will be able to… handle the energies that they will leave behind. I will create more of them once I return to the far reaches.” he said, beginning to slowly move back towards the stars. Gibbou gasped and picked up the fox. “It’s awesome! Oh, sister, it’s so adorable and fluffy!” She hugged the fox tightly as it tried to escape her grasp. “Wait, you’re leaving already?” she eventually said and put the fox down. It escaped to some distant corner of the moon.
“Yes, this encounter has left me with much to consider. And there is… is still much I need to do among the stars. There is … a lot of work ahead.” Sirius replied.
“Oh, uh… Alright. See you around, I suppose!” Gibbou gave the floating figure a wave as it returned to the stars. She then eyed the lunar surface and Galbar again. With a sigh, she whispered to herself, “Alright… Time to see how bad the world’s ended up without me.” With a squat and kick-off, she set off down to the surface with a mighty speed.
Qael wants to research rocks, so he goes into space and smashes meteors against the moon. This pisses Gibbou the fuck off. Qael’s like ‘yo, what’s the big deal’ and Gibbou’s like ‘my moon has feelings’. Qael’s sorry and Gibbou offers him some cocoa ‘cuz she feels bad for berating him. Sirius pops down wondering what’s the deal with the mana screwing over his stars. Qael tells Sirius he’s after palladium, platinum, gold, rhodium, iridium and some titanium, which don’t appear that often on Galbar. These are magic metals. Qael then floats off to make mana more compatible with stars. Gibbou then asks Sirius to bless the Hir. Sirius then also makes space foxes that eat excess cosmic energies. They then each go their separate ways.
Sirius Starting MP and DP: 0 Created Extraordinary Species, discounted to 0 by cosmic port: Celestial Foxes, they draw in and consume excess cosmic energies.
The World Anchor, the unrivalled mountains carrying the very sky of the planet - its hundred peaks and thousand crags - all would indicate that it was far from a hospitable place to live. However, its distance from everything was also perhaps something that make it attractive as a home - nothing would really come for you, now would it?
This is perhaps what made it so appealing to the largest of trollkin, the dovregubbes. Theirs was an unmatched resilience and resistance to all manner of damage and unrivaled strength among all mortal kind; theirs was a lifespan that could compete even with immortal gods; and theirs were forms menacing enough to ward off any and all thinking themselves mighty enough to test the former two truths.
Of course, all these were only truths given that the dovregubbe didn’t kick the bucket first thing in the morning.
Thusly lived their kin - or, as it would be more appropriate to say - that specimen. Indeed, for there was only one - a single dovregubbe in the whole world. The ranglefants, draugs, drighinas and askeladds - oh, they’d already found themselves mates and spawned plenty more of their sort. Not the dovregubbe, though - no, he still had a good few centuries left until all the muck, rock, moss and stone covering his enormous form could shed off and pretty much just make another dovregubbe then and there.
Oh, yes - a good few centuries.
Such a legendary creature as him - oh, well - they deserved a name, they did. At least, the dovregubbe thought so himself. He was still fairly young, though, and his mind was much untested in the ways of conundrumming and thinka-dinklin’. So far, he had only really found himself a suitably large cave to call home and, well, called it home. He didn’t really know much about whether it was day or night out - checking to see was a bit of a risk. However, a mighty need bubbled within his belly, and the dovregubbe knew well that he would have to brave the wilderness soon enough.
He was hungry.
It wasn’t peckishness, either - he had been feeling this deep, thunderous rumble for a few days. In the beginning, it’d been easy to just bury it under greater thoughts, like whether he should sit and wait or lay down to sleep. However, as time had passed, he could ignore it no longer. He would need feed soon, or he would be both the first and the last of his kind. He had given stone a try yesterday (or possibly yesteryesterday), but found that it sat poorly with his empty gut. Alas, even stone-like trolls couldn’t live off of stone. Worst part was, all the plants and wildlife around here? Poor on nutrients and immensely hard to digest. The trees were tough as nails - and that wasn’t even mentioning those stone birds. The dovregubbe had tried to snatch one the other night, but they’d just flock up and peck at him senselessly until he ran away. They weren’t even worth close to the trouble.
No, he knew what was waiting for him would have to be in the lowlands below - but could he even get there without being noticed by Gibbou?
Oh yes, the dovregubbe remembered something vague about a divine purpose and protecting life and all that - but! Had the blueberry ever been hungry, huh? The dovregubbe thought not. Wasn’t easy for a goddess to put herself in his… Okay, he didn’t have shoes, but walking a mile with his feet… Well, that actually wasn’t much of a feat either, him being nearly twelve metres tall already. At least, though, she wasn’t mortal - and that was the big difference! Oh, sure, the dovregubbe could live forever, too, but he’d have to watch his skin at every turn! Can’t even walk out during the bloody day - he’d turn to stone in the blink of an eye. Of course, all that had to be stacked on top of the fact that the earth was trembling so badly these days that he feared he’d be sealed in by a falling rock someday. No, being him sure wasn’t easy.
Therefore, he could permit himself, no, he deserve to snap a few mortal necks every now and then! Oh yes, oh yes, he had smelled ‘em even from the mountains - the unmistakable stink of human sweat, blood and droppings, all around the southern tip of that odd little grassland with the cute little hills. Oh, for certain, had he smelled them - even now, he did. His teeth were drowning in saliva. For the first time in days, or possibly weeks, the dovregubbe moved to peek at the cave entrance. Blast, the sun was still out. He would have to wait a few more hours.
Then, at sundown, oh, at sundown…
The dovregubbe closed its stoney lids and began snoring.
The dovregubbe was making solid time - wasn’t even midnight yet and he could already see the end of the woods. The trees parted before him like tall grass, and at his feet, stock and stone crumbled to dust under soles the size of huts. He could smell it so clearly now - the meat and roots cooking over the fire, the age of the sticks used in their lay-tos, the days that had passed since the villagers’ bathing day. At this point, he was salivating so immensely it caused a minor rainfall on the vegetation below. Though, a slight movement on the wind did convey a certain important detail:
It smelled as though the humans all had gathered in unison.
He had probably been spotted - he needed to be quick.
“Are you absolutely sure?” asked chief Teskal to the ragged-breathed hunter Kefir. Kefir nodded, something that sent panic through the gathered villagers like ripples in a still lake.
“I saw not the torso, even! Kefir confirmed. “It was the tallest man any of us have ever seen - so tall that we’re not even sure it’s a man!”
“Shush!” thundered the voice of an elderly lady and both Kefir and chief Teskal bowed down. It was great-mother Grot, and her expression was every bit as stern in the night as it was in the day. “Shush, both of you! What if this is another visitation from the gods? Can we forget what the great Cadien has done for our people? What news from the north have brought us about the kind, noble deeds of Oraelia? Or Neiya? What if this is a test from the gods? No, shame on you both! Shame!”
The villagers all hung their heads somewhat. After a moment of thinking, Teskal raised his skull-tipped stick and declared, “Very well! We shall welcome this creature into our village and show the gods that we do not shun our divine duties!”
The villagers all nodded and voiced their agreement, though few of them were very enthusiastic about it. They began gathering what offerings they had and placed them in baskets in the centre of the village, standing faithfully in wait behind them to behold the approaching creature.
Sure enough, a few minutes later, the colossal mass that resembled a man in every aspect, but could never be defined as such, stomped out of the forest with footsteps that sent tremors through the ground, testing the craftsmanship of the humans’ lay-tos. It gave the air a long, long sniff, bordering on a snort, and knelt down to inspect the increasingly terrified villagers. It then eyed the food, visible confusion on its face.
“What’s all this, then?”
The great-mother approached, her arms lifted up into the air and head bowed down. “Oh, magnificent son of the gods! We accept your visit in the humblest manner.” The villagers behind her also lifted their arms in the same manner. “Please,” Grot continued, “have your fill of our bounty - we know it’s not much, but it’s all we have.”
The dovregubbe blinked. “My, grub’s all laid out for me, innit?” He clapped his hands together with a force that sent a resounding shockwave through the air. “Think I’ll start off with… You.”
The sudden realisation that one is so dreadfully wrong about a situation is difficult to swallow, especially for someone as stubborn and stern as great-mother Grot, who was in the process of being swallowed. It took fairly little time for the terror that already brewed in the villagers to explode into full-fledged panic, and soon they scattered to the winds.
However, the dovregubbe was reinvigorated now. Albeit the old crone had been a gummy mess, she had a flavour unlike anything he had ever chewed on before. Oh yes, now this was a flavour to die for. He rose up and began chasing down the fleeing humans, a small feat for a creature whose legs were as long as five humans stacked onto each others’ shoulders. His every stomp like the claps of a storm, it sent instinctive confusion through every escapee about whether they should run for cover or run for the hills. He managed to snatch most of them like they were ants on a line - when panicking, it seemed that humans only really knew how to run, and not necessarily run smartly. By an hour past midnight, he had eaten his proper fill, and what a fill it had been. Joyously, the dovregubbe rumbled on back towards the mountains, thundering a merry guffaw that sent the resting birds flying.
“Did, did we lose it?” asked Vintr quietly. Kefir held his daughter tightly to his chest and looked around the corner of the rock they were hiding behind. The great shadow in the distance faded, and as did the thunder of its steps. He looked down at the exhausted face of his child. She was asleep, finally - oh, what a terrible reality she would wake up to. He prayed for now that she could dream of it as just that - a dream.
“Yeah,” Kefir whispered and laid his head against the stone. Sobs choked him up and he clasped his hand over his eyes. Vintr tried at first to console him, but shortly thereafter joined him. They just sat there for a time, sharing in each others’ misery. There was comfort in sharing the burden, but that was the only comfort there was now.
“Wha’.. What do we do now?” Vintr sobbed quietly.
Kefir sniffed and swallowed. He had some ideas, but none of them would be easy - especially not if they encountered that creature again. “We will travel north. There’s a village there - a safe place, I’ve heard. We will seek refuge with them and share our story so that they may be prepared.”
“What will we tell them?”
“We will say it like it is - the village of chief Teskal was obliterated in the night… By Thunder.”
The dovregubbe, the first and only of its kind, is feeling peckish. Life for a troll such as himself ain’t easy, so he reckons he had snap a few mortal necks as compensation for living such a dangerous life. He strolls to the southern tip of the Boreal Highlands, where he finds a tiny human village on the forest border. The humans mistakenly believe the troll to be a messenger of the gods and prepare a feast for it. The dovregubbe sees this as an absolute win and, since all the villagers are gathered, starts digging in. He eats everyone in the whole tribe save for three, Kefir, his daughter, Kaia, and Vintr. These three start moving towards Ataket’s tribe to tell the tale of the Scourge of the Boreal Highlands, Thunder.
Gibbou floated towards her moon with her face in her hands, embarrassment colouring its every angle a reddish plum. That encounter with Enmity had been the most awkward moment of her whole life - quite literally, even! Occasionally, she gave her cheek a light slap as punishment for her deeds. After a while, she began groaning obnoxiously to chase the memories out of her mind, though it seemed to do little else than to redouble her focus on them. She then started singing to herself, perhaps also obnoxiously loud, even to the point where the celestial whales began steering away from her. However, no matter what she did, she just couldn’t find a way to forget her actions.
Eventually, she just held her breath and quieted down. The moon was just up ahead now, it’s calm, precious glow soothing Gibbou so noticeably. Gods and natural forces could try their best, but no one could ever take that sweet little orb from her. It was hers - hers and only hers. That thought alone pushed the memory of Enmity far into the back of--
Oh, sunlight, she thought of it again! Urgh! Once more the annoying “la-la-las” erupted from her mouth. She plopped down on the lunar surface and walked around in a circle for a few moments to calm herself again. In the end, she found herself a suitably dark cave, fashioned a blanket from the darkness within it and hid underneath it, droning a long, long groan.
She would awake an unknown amount of time later, to the sound of a persistent tapping outside the cave. Metal striking rock.
Gibbou poked her head out from under her blanket and cooed a ‘huh?’ Then her instincts kicked in and she sprinted out of the cave, materialising a club from the darkness. She lifted it over her head and jumped out of the cave. “Who’s there?! What’re you doing to my moon?!” she shouted in no particular direction.
Standing a great distance away from the cave’s entrance was a tall, broad-shouldered, supernaturally handsome white-haired man. In his hands were a hammer and chisel, his attention focused on a statue of… himself. It was a perfect match, yet the stranger seemed unsatisfied. Meanwhile, a colossal purple-scaled beast with leathery wings was flying circles in the stars above.
The stranger looked up from his statue. “Hmm?”
“Wha-...” Gibbou dropped her club and it turned to smoke on its way to the ground. “Who-... What-... Why-...” Gibbou took an extra moment to eye the man up and down. She collected her feet, her toes pointing inwards. She brushed some of the hair in her face behind her ear and immediately put her hands together next to her waist, wagging her torso stiffly. Eventually, she made an awkward wink with both eyes and went, “H-hi.”
The stranger nodded at her. “Hello there,” he said with a smile, before eying her up and down, and raising his eyebrows. “Blue,” he said, after a moments inspection. “What an interesting choice…” and then the colour of his skin changed, into a shade of blue similar to her own. The figure began to inspect himself, and for now seemed quite pleased with the change.
“Th-th-th-tha-tha--... Blah, bleh, sorry. Thanks!” Gibbou blinked at the colour change, her cheeks turning that familiar shade of red plum. “Y-you’re interesting, too.” Immediately, she closed her eyes hard shut and looked as though she was cursing at herself under her breath.
“Is everything alright?” the man asked, briefly letting go of his tools and allowing them to slowly float to the ground.
“YES! I mean, yes, everything’s…” Gibbou paused to take a deep breath. “... Perfect.” She shifted her eyes around the area like she was shelling it with machine gun fire. “Uh, uh, uhm… S-s-say, what’syournameIreallywannaknowplease.”
“I’m Cadien, God of Perfection,” the man seemed to smile even more brightly. “And who would you be?”
“Ohmysister,hewantstoknowmyname,” she whispered to herself while facing away dramatically. She then spun back, did an open pose, immediately regretted it and returned to her timid stance from earlier. “I’m, I’m Gibbou, g-goddess of the moon. THIS moon, by the way. Sorry I, I didn’t clean properly before you, you, uh, came and, uh… Do you want something to drink?”
Cadien shook his head. “I’m quite alright,” he said softly. Then suddenly he leapt forward, landing only a few feet away from her. “My apologies, it just felt odd to talk at that distance. So, you built this place?”
Gibbou turned a shade redder as Cadien approached, her feet almost involuntarily dragging her back towards the cave mouth. “Uh, uh-huh, yesh, -yes-, I, I made it, m-hm.” She looked desperately for something to say. “Y-you built that?” she pointed at the purple creature.
“I did,” Cadien nodded, following her gaze. “He’s the one that carried me up here.” Then he looked back down to her. “Anyway, I must say, you’ve done an excellent job. This moon is quite beautiful. In fact…” he broke out into a slight grin. “Almost as beautiful as its creator.”
Gibbou swallowed and the fingers on one of her hands desperately looked for more hair in her face to shove behind her ear. She took another deep and, with a cracked voice, said “tha-”, cleared her throat and finished with a louder “thanks”. To let out some tension, she punctuated her gratitude with a giggle, which included a series of snorts. She then froze and cleared her throat, eyes staring Cadien up and down. “Y-you, too.”
The God took another step closer, so that they were only inches apart. “There’s no need to be so nervous,” he said soothingly. “We’re both gods, we’re both beautiful, and there’s no shame in acknowledging that.”
“Acknowledged so badly,” Gibbou whispered to herself and swallowed again. “S-s-so… What’s, uh, what’s up? What’s the haps? The, the, the… The haps and the… Sunlight,shutuuup,Gibs…”
He chuckled slightly. “I wanted to get a better view of the world,” he said, “and this seemed like the perfect place for it. I could see everything. And as I was waiting for this moon to turn to the other side, I decided to keep myself busy…” he gestured toward the sculpture. “Sorry for that. Perhaps I should have asked permission before I began building things upon your creation.”
“NO! No, it’s very fine, I mean, it’s fine - fine as in okay, not, y’know… I mean, it’s very beautiful, too, just so...” She closed her eyes. “It’s fine. Ooooh, wooow! Look how beautiful Galbar is down there, from here!” She pointed frantically at the planet below, hoping it rather than she would catch her guest’s attention.
The attempt failed. “Anyway,” Cadien smoothly went on. “Now that I know you’re here, I can’t help but wonder if there’s a better way for us to… occupy ourselves.”
“O-occupy ourselves?” Gibbou stuttered and slowly turned back to Cadien. “I-I-I-I-I, I don’t know if I’m-...”
“Don’t worry,” Cadien’s smile deepened. “I’ll do all the work. You just need to sit back and enjoy.” He studied her face for a moment, his eyes lingering on her lips, and then… he walked away.
“Building a sculpture of myself was fun, don’t get me wrong…” he continued, as the tools flew back to his hand. “But maybe I should try sculpting someone else, for a change. Is that alright with you?”
A cloud of steam had formed around Gibbou’s head, though it turned to ice the second it formed. She flicked the ice away and let out a sigh. “O-oh, that’s what you meant.” She skipped on after him. “S-sure! What did you have in mind, mister Cadien?”
“Just stay in one place, and I’ll make a sculpture of you,” he said. “Right there should be fine.” Then he continued walking, and rose a small pillar of stone from the ground that was about Gibbou’s height.
“O-of me?” Gibbou stuttered and couldn’t really keep moving even if she wanted to, for fear of her heart collapsing.
“Yes!” Cadien nodded brightly. “Strike a pose!” Then he began to work, his hands and arm becoming a blur as he hammered and chiseled the slab of rock, the shape of which gradually began to morph and change as dusts and shards flew away.
Gibbou hadn’t really struck any sort of pose. She had sort of awkwardly lifted her hand as if to grab something high above her and done a soft shrug with the other, a pose she knew she would regret having made for the next six or seven aeons.
Cadien himself looked somewhat disappointed, but he carried on, and after a few minutes the statue had quickly taken shape. It held a pose nothing like the one that Gibbou had actually attempted to make, with one hand on its hip and another behind its head. Its expression betrayed none of her actual nervousness, and instead smiled warmly.
“There, I think that’s finished!” he finally declared, backing away from the statue until he stood next to Gibbou herself. “What do you think?”
Gibbou blinked. It was so much better than what she had tried to pose as. It showed strength, power, confidence - and it was only made of stone. It was better than her. She forced a smile at Cadien and nodded. “It’s, it’s great! Really, I have no words.”
“That’s good to hear,” Cadien nodded, before his mouth curled into a smirk. “Though to be honest,” he whispered. “I still prefer the real thing.”
Then he leaned down to kiss her.
Gibbou gasped and pressed her hand on his face while facing away. "I-I-I-I-I-I'M NOT READY!" She jumped back so intensely that she orbited once around the moon and landed about twenty paces away from Cadien again. "I, I mean, I just met you and you're really, really handsome, and, and, but this is going really fast, and I, I--" She took a deep breath and shouted, "I'm not comfortable kissing a stranger!"
That took Cadien by surprise. Now, it was his cheeks that reddened. His eyebrows rose, and he physically stepped backward. “I… I…” he stammered, unsure of what to say. His mouth continued moving, but his words failed him, until at last he finally managed: “I’m sorry.”
Gibbou took a moment to let her breathing slow down. "It's fine, but… You and I - we've just met and, and… I just don't think it's okay to just go all the way so, so quickly."
“Oh… I see…” Cadien said, still somewhat numb from shock. “Um… so… next time I think about doing something like that, I’ll ask you first, yeah? Sorry… um… let’s just move on for now… alright?” He scratched the back of his head nervously.
"Yeah, let's," Gibbou agreed with a shifty look. "So, uh, did you want something to drink after all, or?"
“Do you have anything to drink up here?” he asked curiously. “I suppose we could just create something to drink, but I can’t think of anything right now.”
"I have, uh," she conjured forth two glasses and filled them with hot air and some purple drink. "Grape juice?"
Cadien nodded, accepted a glass, and drank. “It’s good,” he said, after taking a moment to savour the taste.
"Thanks," Gibbou cooed quietly and sipped her own cup. "So, uh, did you have anything else you wanted to do up here?"
He glanced over toward Galbar. “I’m still waiting for this moon to circle around, so we can see what’s on the other side. Perhaps we can share stories? Of the things we’ve seen and built?”
Gibbou blinked and made an awkward face. "I, uh, I'm not sure I can just go back to that after, y'know…"
“Oh… I understand. Another time, maybe,” Cadien said slowly. Almost as if sensing that the conversation was nearing an end, the dragon landed nearby, looking at the two expectantly. “Could I at least ask how you built this moon in the first place? I was thinking I might create one myself… make the night sky even more beautiful.”
Gibbou took another sip and, looking to the ground, she answered, "Yeah. Sure." She held out her free hand and materialised a space rock in it. "As is the case with the creation of any large object, you just have to smash together enough material until it holds its circular shapes. I think you can just try that."
Cadien smiled. His skin reverted back to its original colour. “I see. Thank you. I suppose I should be on my way, then. Sorry again.” Then he climbed atop his dragon, which he realized he had still yet to actually name, but that could wait. “Hopefully our next meeting goes more smoothly!”
"Y-yeah, sure," Gibbou mumbled and gave a small, timid wave. "Have a nice trip."
Cadien nodded, and with a flap of its wings, the dragon once again took flight.
The encounter still hung in the back of his mind. It had somehow never occurred to him that he would be rejected, and yet in hindsight, it was something he should have been fully prepared for. He was a fool.
Cadien sighed, partly in embarrassment at the mistake and partly in frustration at his own shortsightedness. There was nothing more that could be done. He had made his apologies and she seemed to have accepted them. Perhaps his words would prove true, and their next encounter would go better. He simply needed to show more restraint - not just to her - but to others, for he doubted she was the only one who might react this way.
As he contemplated the situation further, he couldn’t help but think about how there had been a certain charm to her initial nervousness, and even her rejection of him. But he shook those thoughts off. He shouldn’t be thinking like that right now.
In the meantime, he had a moon to create.
So, he flew his dragon through the stars, circling Galbar, drawing rock and other space debris into a path behind him. Once it had achieved sufficient mass, he used his will to shape it into a ball, and began to expand it further, drawing in more rock and debris from afar. Then, finally, it was done. It was not as large as Gibbou’s moon, but it was closer to Galbar.
He dismounted his dragon, floated closer to the giant rock, and gave it a sharp kick. At once the cold, grey stone suddenly transformed into a vibrant purple, and the new moon began to move - entering Galbar’s orbit, though it would circle the planet vertically rather than horizontally. Galbar had two moons now, and Cadien had to wonder what it would look like if they ever aligned.
He glanced over at Gibbou’s moon, wondered what she thought of it, and then turned back to his dragon. “There’s one more person we should visit.”
Gibbou had retreated to her cave. She laid there on a mattress fashioned from shadow, staring emptily at the black wall. Thoughts as dark as the room swam through her mind: How had she made him feel? Was it her fault that it got so awkward? Should, should she have just gone along with it? She swallowed. Cadien had looked so sad when he left - she didn’t want anyone to feel sad! Especially not people who come to visit! How could she have--
She curled up into a ball and let out a scream into a midnight pillow. She could’ve handled it! Now Cadien would hate her forever and they could never meet again. Everywhere they went, it would be so, so awkward - oh, sunlight, he was even talking about making a moon! What would happen if, if they passed by one another?
Her head took cover underneath the pillow. Could she just die for a few minutes? Would that be alright? Just blink out of existence momentarily - a few aeons or so - and come back as if nothing had happened?
She sighed sharply. No, those were just desperations of the moment. She sat up and touched her cheeks - she had been crying again. Ugh, she was such a baby - she’d get over this in no time. Had to be a grown-up! Like sis! So why was it so damn hard to put her finger on what to do next?
A sudden sensation of chillness set in and she shrunk together, her hands hugging at her arms. This was no outwards sensation, but one of the heart. It was something she had felt before, but never for herself - only of behalf of others.
“I see… So this is what fear is, huh?” she mumbled to herself. She extended a hand and gave it a thorough look. That same hand had kept Cadien off of her, but it had only acted thanks to her instincts. What if those instincts hadn’t kicked in? What would’ve…
She closed the hand into a fist. This was part of her mission, wasn’t it - to understand what life needed protection from. Death was a given, but now - could this sort of unwanted act be included on that list?
She hummed to herself pensively, wagging back and forth on her mattress. Now that she thought about it, perhaps she had gone about this whole protection aspect too literally? Maybe she shouldn’t protect life all on her own, or through guardians that, in truth, seemed to do more harm than good. Maybe the solution would be to, to give mortality a type of power - a power that would let them defend themselves on their own, using her power to strengthen themselves? No, maybe not just her power - all kinds of power!
She clapped her hands together. This would need some thinking!
Gibbou returns to her moon and goes inside a cave to have a nap. She wakes up an unknown amount of time later to the sound of someone working outside.
She goes outside, and Cadien is there, making a sculpture of himself. She is taken in by how attractive he is, and a nervous conversation ensues, made even worse when Cadien begins complimenting her appearance.
Anyway, Cadien then decides to make a sculpture of her, but she is unable to fully appreciate it, as she is insecure about how confident it looks compared to her actual self.
Cadien then attempts to kiss her, and she immediately nopes out of that. Cadien is taken aback by this, because it’s the first time he faces real rejection. He realizes that he can’t just go and throw himself at whoever happens to find him attractive. He hastily apologizes, and attempts to move on and salvage the conversation, but fails. Eventually he decides to leave, but not before asking how to make a moon.
Anyway, he then goes on to build a second moon in the sky - one that is purple rather than white, and orbits Galbar vertically rather than horizontally. He also reflects further on his rejection at the hands of Gibbou, and decides he needs to show more restraint when interacting with others in the future.
Meanwhile, back in the cave, Gibbou is also reflecting. She’s afraid that this will make future interactions with Cadien difficult and is embarrassed at how she handled herself. Eventually she calms down, and turns her thought process toward protecting mortals. She decides that they should have some sort of power to defend themselves, and begins thinking on the matter further.
Cadien -0MP to make a purple moon. It is smaller than Gibbou’s and orbits Galbar vertically rather than horizontally. The two moons can align anywhere between every eight and sixteen years.
It had taken roughly thirty minutes or so for Gibbou to stop crying. The grove had lost its neat magical sheen, and now it looked about as dull and sad as the rest of the fen. Thinking about it again once more made Gibbou’s nose sting, but she had wept herself so dry her eyes looked like overripe plums. She gave a stiff sniff and patted her shoulder blindly.
“Hey… Adrian, are you there?” she mumbled in a cracked voice.
"Ye- yeah!" Adrian's voice came out as a struggle -- the little thumbling's face was hidden behind a massive pile of houllin berries caught in his arms. He dumped them at Gibbou's feet and patted his hands free of dust.
The moon goddess offered him a weak smile and gave another sniff. “So… Packed and ready, huh? It’ll be a long flight.”
"Not quite ready, Blue," Adrian rubbed his nose with his arm, "You're gonna need some pockets."
“Blue, huh. I should give you a nickname, too, y’know.” She patted her hips on both sides. Pockets subsequently sprouted by the rim of her midnight pants she had touched. She knelt down and shoveled some berries into the left one. “How about… Addy?”
"Hmm." Adrian hummed as he climbed up Gibbou's right leg, a bundle of bedding and tiny tools tied to his back with some blue hair. He threw his bundle into the Goddesses right pocket and slipped in himself. There was a slight rustling as everything fell into place and then a tiny:
"Yeah that works, though my sister's name is Addy."
“Oh, that’s cause some confusion if she was around, huh…” Gibbou slowly stood up and stretched her arms over her head. “Are you okay down there?”
"Almost..." Adrian said passively. There was some more rustling and then finally a tiny bark sign threaded into the pocket with primitive fibers was flipped out of the pocket so as to hand at the entrance. On it was an imprint of Adrian's hand in blue. He poked his head out, "Happy as home."
Gibbou leaned over so she could see him better and giggled. “That’s amazing, truly. Alright,” she did some standing calf raises, “make sure to stay put during the whole journey. If you feel yourself getting sick, uncomfortable or about to fall out, make sure to tell me to stop, okay?”
"I'll poke you with this,' he held up a particularly menacing pine needle.
Gibbou made a face. “Be nice, please.” She then hopped back a few steps. “Get ready…” She began jogging, testing the bounciness of the fen moss. “... Seeet…”
"I'm always niiiiii--!"
Adrian was interrupted as she kicked off and rocketed into the air westwards, shouting “GOOOOOOOO!” as her body was encapsulated in the whitish blue light of a shooting star. The pair soared across the land, occasionally spying downwards at the enormously diverse continent underneath them. Gibbou clapped her hands in celebration at the sights, pointing to the various new biomes that had formed during her time with the thumblings.
“Look! Look! That shiny place over there! That has to be my sister’s! WOO! Go, Oraelia!” she boasted while gesturing madly to the Luminant far, far to the south, viewable still in the dark of the night.
A tiny fist raised out of her pocket, forming a thumbs up and a muffled response. Gibbou giggled and landed on a Black Rock peak for a second before jumping back off towards the southwest. She blinked down at the shoreline and gave her head a scratch.
“When did those reefs pop up? Has Mr. Klaar been wanting to move ashore?” Not too long after, she noticed a spot on the sea like a hot coal. Her brows furrowed - it looked inhospitable to life. “Ugh, why do people have to make such nasty places? Adrian, are you seeing this?”
Adrian poked his head out and gave an agreeing nod, "Looks like a lot of places are missing the Golden Light."
“Yeah… The Light would certainly fix it up.” She sighed. “I’m sorry again. I messed up so badly for you and your people.”
"It's okay," Adrian patted her hip, "No thumbling is without a mistake or two -- besides, Elder said the Golden Light will return someday. Uncle Gary doesn't think so, and my old neighbor Ruth didn't seem to really understand what happened, but..." He took a nibble of a Houllin berry he stashed away, and politely swallowed. "But most of us seemed to understand and I don't think anyone can really blame you if it was already said by the gate that it was going to happen. But for now I guess we have to be our own Golden Light."
“You thumblings really are something,” Gibbou sighed thankfully and looked up. A distant landmass was approaching, and over her shoulder, she could see the hard, searing rays of the sun. Her divine eyes noticed that there were a number of deep crevices and canyons on the continent. “We’ll hide from the day down there!” she declared and changed their trajectory downwards.
"Whoop!" Adrian interjected at the sudden change of winds buffeting his face. He slunk back into her pocket and out of sight. With her divine ears she could still hear him, "Hey Blue?" There was a sense of concern laced in his usually cheery voice.
“Hmm? Yeah?” Gibbou mumbled passively as she eyed the canyon around them up and down.
"I don't think the Golden Light splitting was entirely your fault anyways," Adrian added before rustling around in her pocket. There was a hum and a sudden change of topic, "Are you the tallest thumbling in your family?"
“Oh… Thanks,” she answered softly, flashing a sad smile. The following comment made it genuine, though, and she failed to swallow a giggle, resulting in a few snorts, as well. “Haha, oh, Adrian, I’ve told you before, right? I’m a goddess - it’s kind of, like… Not a thumbling, y’know?” She gave the question an additional ponder. “I do think I’m taller than my sister, though.”
"You heard the elder; you're a thumbling through and through, just tall and blue," Adrian poked her. "Goddess or not."
“Eh-heh. Thanks, Adrian, that helps. Say, you’re sure about coming along, right? You aren’t feeling homesick or anything?”
"Nah," the answer was shorter and quicker than most, "let's keep going."
“Sure.” The pair subsequently followed the length of the canyon, remaining in its deep shade even as the sun above began to bake the surface.
"Hey, Gibs?" Adrian poke his head out of her pocket.
“Hmm?”
"Ya think I could get a pair of pants and shirt sometime?" He scratched at his leaf made clothes, "Seems a bit less 'chaffing'"
“Oh! Right, sorry about that.” She snapped her fingers and, surely enough, a pair of tiny pantaloons and a white, threaded-up shirt appeared in her hand, as well as a small pair of sandals. She held them down to her pocket for Adrian to grab. His tiny hands snatched them up and in moments he was hanging out of her pocket by the waist, showcasing his new shirt.
"Ta-da!"
Gibbou took one look and burst out laughing. She cackled to the extent that she had to support herself against the wall of stone. She gave a few snorts as she tried to steady her breathing and gave her face a rub with her palm. She leaned her back against the wall and lowered herself down to a seated position with a wheezy sigh.
“Oh, you’re just too sweet.”
"I'm not the one walkin' around lookin' like a houllin berry," Adrian played with the collar of his shirt, "but I do have to agree with ya."
Gibbou lifted her head up and eyed the blue sky. “Yeah… Speaking of berries, though…” She looked around the canyon crevices and even by the small waterways that ran through the crag centres. Theirs was a particularly dark crag. “This place is pretty empty, huh.”
Adrian hopped out of Gibbou's pocket and paced around the blank rock, "Very empty, and monocolor."
Gibbou approached the water, rolled up the legs of her trousers and gave her feet a little dip. “Suppose I could add some.”
"Make it purple!" Adrian suggested, "Whatever it is we are making. OH WITH YELLOW STREAKS."
“Alright, alright,” Gibbou soothed and stood up, feet still in the water. Drumming her cheek ponderously with a finger, she walked over to a stalagmite in the middle of the little waterway and grabbed tightly onto its shadow. Then, pulling roughly, she snatched herself a nice circular sheet of shadow. The stalagmite had, for a moment, an uncannily bright spot where the shadow had been, before it healed shut again. Gibbou filled the shadow skin with water and tied it into a ball. She then walked out of the water over to a huge boulder. She lifted it up and placed the shadow ball underneath it. As she dropped the stone, the bag went ‘pop!’ However, the shadow and water didn’t flow outwards, but covered instead the whole stone in a black shroud. While it was incredibly hard to see, the shroud revealed that the stone was being broken apart and ground up within the shroud. Then, the shroud itself went pop and unleashed a sea of small, purple geckos with yellow tiger stripes. They immediately scurried in every direction in search of food, and Gibbou made certain to keep Adrian safe as they passed by them.
Joining the commotion all of a sudden was a hungry legged shark. Gibbou screamed as it jumped out of the water, ready to snatch a piece of her (or try to, anyway). However, before it could truly leave the waterway, it keeled forward suddenly, smashing face-first into the ground. Crawling on top of it curiously was one of the geckos, its lethargic stillness occasionally being interrupted by a few nibs and gnaws at the tough sharkskin. Gibbou sighed in relief and loosened her protective grip on Adrian.
“Their bite contains a powerful sleeping agent. I reckoned that was the most humane way of killing something - so, you know, they wouldn’t feel it! I’ll call them Nightsnappers.” She eyed the shark curiously. “Although… Maybe we haven’t explored all these canyons have to offer yet.”
"Hm." Adrian rested his elbows on Gibbou's hand as she held him like a doll, "We should take a look around, who knows. Maybe we will find something me-sized and fun."
Gibbou nodded and deposited Adrian on her shoulder. Then, she slowly began to climb out of the dark crevice. The sun was stronger up here where they came out, but not unbearable yet. In fact, Gibbou found its light almost comfortable. Here, the cold stone similar to that of the crag below was thickly clothed in trees and shrubs growing out of the walls; from these trees, some of which formed great arches to roof the crag, hung vines which drank from the salty waters below; the waterway which had been almost barren down there was here a teeming pool of plants, fish and birds. If she squinted, she could occasionally spot the odd shark fin lurking just above the water surface between thickly growing reeds.
Gibbou gasped and clasped her hands over her mouth. “It’s beautiful,” she whispered intensely.
"Reminds me a little of home, if not more," Adrian made a motion, "Varied." He thought to himself, "You know what it is missing though?"
“What?”
"Mushrooms," Adrian snapped his fingers, but nothing happened. He frowned, "Guess this one is on you again... How do you do that anyways?"
Gibbou blinked and started looking around for a sufficiently moist spot where mushrooms could properly grow. “Huh… Haven’t really thought about it much, to be honest. I kinda, y’know, think about something really hard and then, poof!” To illustrate her point, she conjured forth a truffle. “They sort of just appear. By the way, you can have this.” She offered him the truffle as she dove in under a low cave entrance into a small water reservoir.
Adrian took the truffle and nodded slowly. A solemn look came over his face, "So I've done that once, then."
“Hmm?” she hummed passively as she probed the air inside for its moisture content.
"Well..." Adrian rubbed the back of his head. He paused, "Gibs, remember when I said the Golden Light splitting wasn't entirely your fault?"
Gibbou eyed Adrian on her shoulder to the best of her ability and crossed her arms over her chest defensively. “Yeah?”
"Ah," Adrian stuttered, "Well, nah I'll tell you later. We are busy, right? Makin' stuff."
Gibbou pursed her lips in light disappointment and then nodded. “Yeah, alright--"
"Alright fine -- I'll tell you," Adrian cut her off, "Well remember when that troll snatched me and it was all scary and we had no idea what was going to happen?"
“Uh-huh?”
"I thought of all the terrible things I wished I could do to it," Adrian admitted, "I wanted to punish it... Then when I saw the light following us, I asked it to. I asked it to and I heard a voice. It did what I asked but at... But at the cost of peace." Adrian hung his head, "it was my fault."
Gibbou dropped her arms to her side and stared in disbelief. “What… What’re you saying? Are you saying you asked the Light to punish the askeladd in exchange for the loss of the harmonious existence in the garden?” She lifted Adrian off her shoulder and cupped him in her palms. “Adrian, how could you do such a thing?”
"Well no!" Adrian defended himself, "I would never ask the Light to leave the grove. It wasn't even... It was just anger and the light responded with its own. It was just a thought, just an emotion and then suddenly." He paused, "Joab-Balaam."
“Joe-ab-whatnow?”
"It's the name of the fragment that was left behind," Adrian explained, "I didn't want to say it before... And even now saying it gives me the feeling that it is suddenly close."
Gibbou hunkered together slightly and sat down up against the wall of the cave. “You mean… This Joab-Balaam is around here? Did it follow us? Is it…” She eyed the surroundings accusingly and whispered, “It’s a god, isn’t it?”
"It's angry," Adrian whispered, "Very angry."
“Sunlight,” Gibbou cursed. “Just what the world needed - an angry god.” She groaned and stood up. “You haven’t wished for anything else, have you?”
"Uh," Adrian cleared his throat, "Well that's a little personal, isn't it?"
“Relating to this angry god, Adrian,” Gibbou sighed. Meanwhile, she crawled back out of the cave and back towards the dark ravine they had arrived in first. She had a sneaking suspicion. Adrian clung quietly to Gibbou, clearly ashamed.
When they finally descended back into the crevice, where little light could reach and thus next to nothing grew, they saw a few nightsnappers lick suspiciously at something that hadn’t been there before.
There with grotesque pain painted on its face was a statue of salt in the shape of the landshark.
Adrian shuddered, and then suddenly: "Look!" He pointed to a crack in the wall but there was nothing there. His finger drooped, "I coulda sworn I saw it."
Gibbou stormed over to the wall and placed her hand on it, blasting a tunnel deep into the mountain. The ground quaked as stone was reduced to dust that blew away on the wind, but alas, nothing was inside. The moon goddess grit her teeth and walked over to the statue, placing her hand on it somberly. “It was only doing its part in the cycle of life… Now it can’t even feed the vultures and fungi.” She drew a furious breath. “Who would do such a thing to such a creature? To the ecosystem?”
"Do you think we can fix it?" Adrian asked, "If it is a part of the Golden Light... Do you think we can make it like how it used to be?"
“I… I don’t know. It’s salt all the way through, but… I might be able to do something else for it.” She placed her hand on the salt statue’s head and breathed in deep. The salt began to crack and crumble, drizzling and collapsing down on the ground. Once the statue was reduced to a large pile, the salt began to move. A few curious nightsnappers scurried over to inspect it - one tried to lick at the moving salt. Then, a claw emerged to snap at the tongue, and the nightsnappers retreated immediately. The salt pile began to collapse in on itself as swarms of small, round, white crabs all emerged with snapping clippers. Most of them entered the waterway and followed the stream deeper into the canyon.
“These are saltcrabs. I figured since the waters here are already salty, and that this may not be the first statue of its kind we’ll see here, I made a creature that can sustain itself off of salt and seawater. Then it can be eaten and contribute to the cycle of life once more.” She gave one of the crabs a curious look, picked it up and ran her finger down its back. She gave her finger a lick and frowned. “... Well, edible given that you have a lot of water to filter out the salt taste…”
"Very clever," Adrian nodded with respect, "but I meant the source of the problem; the Light that we broke. I mean it used to be very peaceful and now... This. It's completely different."
“Oh, the Light’s what you meant.” Gibbou put the crab down with an overt hint of embarrassment on her plum-coloured face. “W-well… I could try to convince him if we got in touch, but… I dunno, it might not listen to a fellow goddess.” She hummed. “It could be more inclined to listen to the prayers of mortalkind - after all, that’s what we live to protect, right?”
"Well we gotta try something... Right?"
“Yeah!” Gibbou agreed and jumped back up to the “sunlit” area. There, she did a roundhouse kick, whipping up a great deal of dust in the process. The kick blasted the dust forward to form a canvas-like cloud before them. In the span of a few seconds, Gibbou materialised an enormous brush from bits and pieces of the midnight making up her clothing and painted two humanoid shapes in black on the dust canvas. Once the figures were done, she let out a ‘woosh’-sound as she slapped the canvas away with a strike like a hurricane. The dust travelled all around the area, spawning more shapes as it went on. Around two hundred shapes made a small crowd before Gibbou and Adrian. Gibbou smirked and snapped her fingers. The black around the shapes went ‘poof!’ and the next second, two hundred humanoids, seemingly male and female, with skin like plums, grapes and blueberries, eyes like quartz and hair like midnight, stood blinking in wild confusion at what just happened.
"That's a LOT of berries," Adrian murmured in awe.
Gibbou gasped. “They’re so beautiful! Eeeek!” she squealed happily. The creatures screamed back and immediately tossed themselves behind whatever cover they could find. Gibbou jumped back at their reaction. “Woah! Hey! No need to be scared! I’m not gonna hurt you.”
"This time!" Adrian added with a mocking growl while nudging Gibbou and laughing. The excitement was replaced with curiosity, "but uh... Whatcha do? How is this going to help? What's the plan, Blue?"
“Well, uh… Was thinking that they could petition this Joab-Balaam about, maybe, putting aside their wicked deeds and, y’know, return to being the Light?” She gave a shrug. “No, you’re right, it’s a terrible plan.”
"I didn't say that," Adrian gave a reassuring smile, "It is worth a shot, after all The Light seemed to care deeply for all life before, maybe new life will be what it needs."
“My thoughts exactly,” Gibbou assured, her vigour reignited. Proudly, she strolled over towards the creatures, who were hunkering even tighter together behind their cover. She then knelt down next to the closest rock, where a group of five were covering themselves as if shelled from above. A few of them were crying, even. Gibbou gasped quietly and whispered to them, “Hey, hey - it’s alright. Why don’t you come out, hmm? I’m not going to hurt you, I promise.”
Slowly, but surely, the creatures eased up on the tension, looking up at Gibbou’s smiling face with eyes like the shining moon. The corner of Gibbou’s mouth twitched, but she choked to death any urge to celebrate her achievement of making these beautiful creatures. Gently, she led the group of five out in the open, and after a while, more peeked out from behind their rocks to follow. Sunset was approaching above, and already it was getting hard to see down in the canyon. Of course, this only served to calm the creatures, who already now seemed much more at ease with the world. Quiet mumblings arose within the crowd, followed by gasps as the creatures realised they could communicate. Gibbou chuckled proudly and clapped her hands to gain their attention. The creatures turned to her.
“Okay, sorry to interrupt the lovely conversation, but I feel like I owe you all an apology! I created you in such a rush and didn’t give you the time to adjust to life before I interrupted you. I’m really sorry about that.”
Mumblings once more bubbled through the crowd. “Who are you?” came a question from the back.
“Why, I am Gibbou, goddess of the moon! Oraelia’s my sister and I am your maker.” She sighed happily. “Oh, you are all just so beautiful! Oh, I’m sorry, I know it’s inappropriate to say, but… Oh, I just can’t help it!” She picked up a nearby child who was sucking its thumb and danced around with it as it screamed and cried in her arms. “Beau-ti-ful, beau-ti-ful!” The crowd stared in disbelief and the mother stood there with shaking hands and a quivering lip.
"And I'M Adrian," Adrian gave Gibbou a glance. Out of the corner of his mouth he whispered into her ear, "Blue, stay focused. Putting a God back together, remember."
“Oh! Right!” Gibbou put down the child, who ran screaming back to its mother. The whole crowd seemed to shrink away. Gibbou cleared her throat and put her smile back on. “Alright, so… I have a mission for you all.” The crowd further retracted. Gibbou blinked. “Uhm… I, I need you help?”
“Why should we help you?!” came the mother’s cry, backed up by a chorus of “yeahs!”
Gibbou stood dumbfounded. “Be-... Because I asked? Hold on, is that not how this works?”
“You frighten us, yell at us and then try to steal my baby! You are a monster!”
“Yeah, a monster!” the crowd echoed.
Gibbou found her nose feeling that familiar sting, and her eyes welled up with chalk-white tears again. “I… I didn’t mean it! I just thought… You were all so sweet and, and, and… Oh, Adrian, I messed up again!” She squatted down, facing away from the crowd, and began to sob.
"Hold my hat," Adrian said with a determined face. He swung the hat onto the curve of Gibbou's ear and leapt off her shoulder.
He landed with a poof of dust, that menacing pine needle in his hand. Standing between the lone Goddess and crowd of mortals he brandished the needle like a stabbing sword, "That wasn't very nice! You should all apologise to the poor lady. Shame!"
As he spoke, wisps of light began to snake in from the darkness and unseen crevices. The creatures all grew wary at the sight, their sensitive eyes easily picking up the creeping light. Careful whispers pittered and pattered between the many heads until one stepped forward and crossed his arms over his chest, glaring down at Adrian: “Why should we?”
Adrian let the needle droop to the ground as his voice lost its stiffness, "I don't know, because you're being a real prick?" He winked at the point of his weapon.
The man blinked, then grit his teeth furiously. “Why, I never--... Come here, you little--!” He stomped towards the thumbling.
"Wait." A different elf suddenly piped up, her voice one of concern. She focused as if listening to something beyond quiet, a gentle horror behind her eyes. "Do not..." She concentrated hard, "...do not approach this thumbling. It has been decreed that all mortal life which harms this being shall be punished or destroyed." The horror didn't end as her voice picked up volume, "So says. The child of night will be brought to light; he will bring the end." Her words sped up, "He will begin again. Know him by the white of his eye and the purity of his soul. Know him by the way he sees new where there was old. Know him by the door he opens where no one can. Know him by the year of his birth, when sky rains with sand. He will begin again or forever will remain the end."
The crowd was shocked and there was an uncomfortable pause before the woman's voice boomed again. "First notice the line across the ground, then hear these next words and be bound."
A golden light suddenly carved a violent line between Adrian and the stomping man, causing them both to recoil.
"It is in first decree, that no word shall be greater than Joab-Balaam's and thus Joab-Balaam's shall be first and final in all matters. The word now is a lesson." The woman was whimpering but her tongue kept spouting.
Gibbou stood frozen. “Wh-what the… Get away from her!” She encased her fists in orbs as black as the night and glared all around in search of something tangible.
"Know this line," The woman pointed back at the line, "And know that on one side Joab-Balaam is your protector, your guardian." A light engulfed Adrian. "And to those who cross it and transgress Joab-Balaam, Joab-Balaam is your punishment. Know this line as dogma, and know not to transgress it. This is Joab-Balaam's first lesson."
A sudden howl of wind sounded and the woman fell silent. Her eyed scanned the crowd, suddenly bursting into tears, "I see so much..." She babbled.
The crowd surrounded her, then parted as Gibbou shoved herself over to her. In her hand, she held a clay cup filled with some chalky water. She knelt down and offered it to the woman. “H-here… It’ll calm you down.”
“What are you giving her?” a nearby man asked suspiciously. 8l “Don’t worry - it won’t harm her. In fact, I hope it’ll help her calm down a bit.” She paused. “Actually, how about you all have a drink, hmm?” She thumbed over her shoulder at a small clay well that had formed behind them in a spot that seemed to align perfectly with the trajectory of the moon above. The well seemed to slowly fill with more of the chalky water as the moon’s beams washed over it. Gibbou took a sip of the drink herself as to show the crowd it was harmless. “I call it respirit. It concentrates the peace of the moon’s passing into a drink. Go on - tastes like blueberries.”
Adrian hopped over (after carefully circumventing the line), his presence causing a few of the elves to scatter from his path. He climbed up to Gibbou's shoulder as the elven woman drank and snagged his hat.
"Sorry about the commotion," He discretely whispered into Gibbou's ear.
“Don’t worry about it… I hate to say it, but your commotion got their mind off of being angry at me,” she whispered back. “Well, I suppose we now know what the Joab-Balaam is now… And knowing makes me even less confident that we can bring the Light back as it was.” Gibbou sat down properly and let the woman rest her fatigued body against her chest, gently caressing her creation. “And now, well, we have to take care of these.”
"We have to fix the Light though," Adrian sat down, clearing a spot of her hair, "We caused this."
“Sure, but it won’t change overnight, I think.” Gibbou materialised a cup and offered it to a bypassing girl. It was now late in the evening and the sun had set. The only visible parts of the creatures now were the sheen of their eyes - the rest was neatly camouflaged in the darkness. Gibbou smiled at them all with the same glitter in her own eyes and waved over someone else to care take of the woman on her lap. Once a substitute had been found, she slowly rose up and gave her head a scratch, making sure not to flick Adrian away. “I may need some time to think about a solution. I think we’ll head to my home and--...” She paused, her voice shifting towards a somber alto. “... Actually, I don’t think I can bring you there. It’s apparently cold and airless up there.” She fished out some houllin berries from her pocket and began distributing them around to the creatures, some having already gone to scavenge for food and look for shelter. “Could I entrust you to watch over these people while I’m gone?”
"Oh," Adrian's voice sounded disappointed, "Yeah I can do that for ya, Blue." He patted her shoulder, "Guess I'm pretty safe anyways, whether I like it or not."
"Yeah," she sighed and handed off the last of her berries to a small family of four. "By the way, I think I will have these people be known as Night Elves."
"Children of the night for sure," Adrian attempted to make light of it all. Gibbou smiled
"I'll be back before you know it." She did some squats before blasting off up towards the sky, leaving Adrian in the middle of a night elven crowd. The elves were staring in bafflement at the goddess and then down at Adrian.
"Ah boo!" Adrian smiled, and a few elves recoiled. He shook his head, "We have a lot to work on."
Gibbou and Adrian jump over to Toasty’s islands (thinking the topmost one) and land in a dark spot in the canyons. Seeing as it’s actually so dark down there that nothing grows, the two of them mistakenly believe the canyons are barren. As such, Gibbou makes the nightsnappers to liven up the place. A landshark attacks them right thereafter, but is put to sleep by the nightsnappers as per their trait. Gibbou and Adrian then hop out of the dark hole to find that life’s actually teeming in the canyons. Adrian points out that mushrooms are missing, though, and they crawl into a humid cave to make mushrooms. While there, Adrian says he doesn’t blame Gibbou and admits that he may have been partially responsible for the loss of the Light back in the thumbling home, as he traded the peace for a curse upon the askeladd trolls. Gibbou is shocked and Adrian explains that the being who talked to him is known as Joab-Balaam. Gibbou asks if he wished for anything else to get hurt, and the pair then find that the landshark from earlier that attacked them has been turned into a pillar of salt. Adrian spots some light moving into the wall and Gibbou blasts a deep tunnel into the mountain - however, they find nothing. Adrian asks if they can fix this and Gibbou then makes salt crabs as she thinks this won’t be the first pillar of salt on this continent and that it’s important that there’s no loss of nutrients in the system.
However, it turns out that Adrian meant how to fix the light, and Gibbou proposes making mortals to petition it and then makes Night Elves. However, she thinks the night elves are so beautiful that she scares them away. Then Adrian tries to lecture them when they subsequently chastise Gibbou for her attitude. An elf answers the challenge. However, among the crowd, a prophet of Joab-Balaam is temporarily chosen as their voice, and she warns that no one may touch Adrian lest be punished. This turns the elves off of attacking him. The prophet then warns of the crowd that Joab-Balaam is a protector to those who follow his dogma and an executor to everyone else. Then the prophet comes to her senses and is offered some soothing drink from the Moonwell, which Gibbou made then and there. Gibbou then tells Adrian he’s responsible for watching over the elves and that she has to fly to the moon to think about a solution. She then soars off.
Gibbou start: 4MP/5DP
1DP, discounted to 0 - Make the Nightsnappers, a small species of yellow-striped purple gecko with an incredibly powerful sleeping toxin in their bite. This allows them to take down much, much bigger prey than they otherwise would be able to. Depending on the size and venom resistances of the prey, the sleeping agent can last anywhere from a few hours up to several days.
1MP - Make the saltcrabs, a small, white, amphibious crab species that sustains itself off of salt and seawater. They can then be eaten, provided the eater has some water to filter out the salty taste.
2DP: Make Night Elves, a sapient race. Night Elves are nightwalkers, meaning they sleep during the day and work during the night. They have excellent night vision, but rely mostly on their magnificent hearing and keen sense of smell to move around. They are also easily sunburned.
1DP: Make the Moonwell, a holy site with the power of Waters of Respite I. Like the Lake of Radiance heals physical wounds, the Moonwell soothes mental ones, helping those suffering from trauma, sleeplessness or other diseases of the mind calm down and take their mind off their burdens. The Moonwell is only active during the night, and its contents evaporate during the day. It also fills faster or slower depending on the phases of the moon, maximum when it’s full and minimum when it’s new. (1/5 DP spent to unlock Respite port.)
With a pang, Gibbou, who had been soaring through the air with incredible speed, slammed into a rubbery tree, which catapulted her up into the air again, and back in the direction she had come from. She frowned and caught hold of a misfortunate branch, whose day would be ruined by a goddess’ mighty deceleration. The branch went ‘snap!’ and Gibbou, with a squeal, dropped down into the jungle below. There came a ‘poof’ as she belly-flopped into a moss bed, and it took even the goddess a few seconds to completely stop seeing stars. She pushed herself up, shook her head violently and rolled over so she could sit.
“To-do list: Get better at landings,” she mumbled to herself as she tugged a twig loose from her braids. She saw in the distance that the sun was setting - finally! Her eyes had been hurting terribly almost all through the journey. She shouldn’t have waited until midnight to leave - she should’ve left when it started to grow dark! Sourly, she pinched her own cheek and gave a huff. Well, now that that was over with.
She clapped her hands together. Guardians!
The little moon goddess strolled about in the woods for a while, looking for materials, frequently hopping up through the canopy to see which way she was going - it didn’t help much, as all she saw was just more trees. However, after about a day of walking, her nose picked up a terrible stink. It was downright offensive, worse than anything she had ever smelled before - it reeked of agony, of pain, of rot!
And Gibbou knew she had to find out what it was! Quick-paced steps got her through the jungle quickly, her nose guiding her along. After a while, the trees grew sparcer and sparcer, until she felt the ground under her feet grow moist and chilly. She looked down and slowly began to realise that she had broken out of the woods long ago - she was standing on the edge of a vast, seemingly endless swampland. She gave her head a scratch and hummed a ‘hmm’. Was this all there was to this area?
No, something vaguely familiar had infused the essence of this place… It was almost as if… She was part of it. The thought made her shudder. This wasn’t really a place she’d like to hang around for much longer. Sure, her island didn’t exactly smell amazingly due to all the rot and mushrooms, but at least stuff lived there! Here, it was all mucky and barren and-...
Something wiggled between her toes and Gibbou skipped a metre backwards. Her eyes fixed on the culprit and she assumed a defensive stance. However, it was only a simple worm, curiously probing the air that, a second or so ago, had been an oddly warm stone. Gibbou immediately dropped her guard and went to pick it up. She giggled and tickled at the little worm’s belly. As expected, it didn’t laugh much. She put it back on the ground again and gave its little head (or possibly butt) a soft pat. Looking around, she felt the pull of duty encourage her to make her guardians and return to the moon to keep watch over life again. However, there was just something about this place…
Surely duty could wait, right?
She pondered as she walked. What could it be about this place? Now it wasn’t just the nauseating dread of feeling like part of her was sewn into the fabric of reality here; the fen was actively making her upset. Taking a break from walking, she leaned against a beech tree to support her uncannily-fatigued form.
“What’s wrong with this place?” she whispered through heavy breaths.
A sudden pinch on the back of her arm threw her out of her thoughts. As she looked down, she saw a tiny man standing in a hole in the bark comparing a berry's color to her skin. Gibbou choked a squeal and stopped her instinctive compulsion to flick the man back into the hole he was standing in; instead, a little skip away from the tree would have to do. Collecting herself, she furrowed her brow and squinted at the small man.
“H-hello?”
The miniature man stood stoic and almost bashfully lifted the berry up as if offering it kindly.
Gibbou blinked and politely accepted the berry, eyeing it curiously and occasionally shifting that very pensive look to the little man in the tree. Eventually, she, too, gave the berry a little comparison to her skin and snickered. “What, were you seeing which was darker?” she teased as she popped the berry in her mouth, offering a soft hum at the flavour. “Yeah, that’s definitely sweet. Thank you!” She gave her temple a scratch. “So… What’s your name?”
"Adrian," The voice was small and shy, "what's yours?"
Gibbou gasped and leaned in with a grin. “Oh! You can actually talk! You are so adorable!”
Adrian grimaced and covered his ears briefly before nodding, "Yes, we all can..." He shifted, "but who are you?"
Gibbou blinked again and pulled back. “Oh! Right, sorry, heheh. I am Gibbou, the moon goddess! I’m just quickly dropping by down here to make some-...” Gibbou took a deep breath and unleashed a quiet burp. “Oof, pardon me. That was a, urp, meaty berry.” She swallowed. “Anyway, I came to make some guardians to keep mortal life safe while I fly behind the planet.”
Adrian sniffed a little and craned his neck. The timidness left his voice as he grew comfortable, "Well I have no idea about any of that, but do you want to see our garden?"
“Hold that thought,” mumbled Gibbou and rubbed her chin thoughtfully. She then snapped the fingers on her right hand, eliciting a small ‘poof’. Then, between her index and her thumb, she held a tiny, round, brown hat with two small strands of bat hair in its rim. She gently put it on Adrian’s head and nodded sagely. “Yes, yes, wonderful. Go on.”
Adrian flipped the hat in his hands a few times before returning it to his head with an appreciative nod, half crescent smile and a quick, "Thank you."
Disappearing back into the hole, Adrians voice echoed out, "I'll meet you on the other side of the tree!"
Gibbou blinked and took the two-three steps necessary to circle around the back of the tree. There was a tiny “hup!” as Adrian landed on her shoulder, surveying the sacred grove from the new vantage point as if he had never seen it before. The mossy carpet, the blue mushrooms and houllin berry plants -- as well as the single standing gate at the very center. Surrounding the gate was the sound of a gentle flute and a crowd of admiring thumblings. Adrian took in a deep breath and prodded Gibbou’s neck.
“Pretty great, huh?”
Gibbou gasped and covered her mouth with her hands, softening a goofy giggle. "It's all so-...! I mean, it's beautiful! How long did it take you to make this?" She squatted down (with Adrian holding tight to a tuft of stray hair from her neck) and poked at one of the mushrooms. "How did you achieve such an adorable blue colour?"
“Well I didn’t do it,” Adrian responded casually, “it’s always been there, this all has.” He waved a hand as if re-presenting the grove, “The mushrooms are alright, but the berries are the real tasties -- as you’ve had.”
She ballooned her cheeks out and frowned. "Very filling, too, oof. So, what do you all do to pass the time here? Is this, uh," she gave the beech tree a few knocks with a curled finger, "is this a nice place to live?"
"The best!" Adrian didn't hesitate, "I really like everyone here, and there is always music, food and water. Hey, watch this!"
Without much else, Adrian leapt from Gibbou's shoulder with a tiny cackle. Before he could hit the ground, a wave of golden light unfolded under him, catching the thumbling midair before gently placing him on the ground. The sound of the ghostly flute fluttered around him as he laughed and pointed up at Gibbou, "See? Music! Fun!"
The moon goddess cooed her excitement and clapped. "How did you do that?! Is there a hidden band somewhere?" To accentuate her point, she started looking around searchingly.
"I don't know, it's always been!" Adrian clapped back, "It brings us water and berries, too." Adrian tugged on the colorful leaves that dressed his body, "And made these." He paused, "You never had... Or have... Whatever this all is?"
"What, leaves on my body?" Gibbou asked with a defensive frown and tugged at the centre of her nightsky shirt while looking down at it self-consciously. "I… I guess not. Should I?"
"Well I meant all of it," Adrian pinched his chin, "But now that you mention it, you probably should. You'd look great in a nice orange." He poked at an orange autumn leaf that wrapped around his waist.
Gibbou made a face. "I think I would need a good few more leaves to cover myself like you do, mister Adrian." She lifted her head to the sky - dawn was approaching. "Ugh… Say, mister Adrian, is there somewhere here that I can…-" Her eyes by chance landed upon the inscription upon the gate and hardened. "... The child of Night… Wait, what's this from?" She pushed herself up and approached to inspect it closer, mouthing the words as she walked. The other thumblings scattered at the sudden approach.
"It's always be-" Adrian's eyes widened as the once blank pillar that mirrored the inscripted pillar was suddenly engulfed in a golden light. Slowly more words were mysteriously carved into the stone to the tune of the flute: "He will bring the end."
Gibbou furrowed her brow in confusion. "... The child of… Will bring the end. Is, is this aimed at me?"
Adrian looked even more confused than Gibbou as he leaned against her leg, "I don't really know what that is, or what you're talking about."
Gibbou's breathing sped up. "S-so my child - no wait, it could be metaphorical! B-but who would write something like this, and-... Has it happened? No, no, it's future tense!" She looked back at Adrian. "Did any of you see anyone write this here? Someone like me, perhaps? Maybe taller or, I guess, more boarish?" She looked back at the gate and bit at her thumbnail anxiously.
Adrian shrugged and took a tiny step forward, "If you mean the little marks on the stone, your guess is as good as mine. They have always been, except for that new bit."
"It was the Golden Light," A tiny voice peeped up from behind a mushroom. Slowly an elderly thumbling clamored to the top of the fungus and sat down to catch his breath, "you saw it yourselves." A stark white beard as long as him bobbed as he lectured, "The fluteplayer, the berry giver, the water gifter, all those things are one."
"The Golden Light. It-it can't have been my sister… Right?" She eyed the gate again with a half-bitten index nail in her mouth. "No, no, of course not - right?"
"No," the elder shook his head, "it was no thumbling: no thumbling as big as you or as small as me, it was the blanket that serves us." He sucked in a whistling breath, "The light that catches Adrian when he leaps, the light that saw me to life so long ago. Listen."
As the old man's croaking voice faded away, the faint flute could be heard again. The elder gave a toothless grin, "The light is happy."
Gibbou swallowed uncomfortably and slowly sat down again, allowing the thumblings by her feet to run for cover. "Can, can I talk to it?" she asked with a small voice. Addian sat on her knee, kicking his legs and engrossed in the conversation.
"Maybe," the elder said, "I never managed to, but I have also never been coloured blue and extremely massive." He held out his hands as if to punctuate his point, "I say everything is worth a try if done with good intent."
Gibbou nodded carefully and looked upwards at nothing in particular. She intertwined her fingers loosely and breathed a sigh. "Mister Light? Are you out there?"
A gentle pulse reverberated through the grove. It was as if someone had disrupted a still pool of water ever so slightly. The old thumbling grinned again, "So you see? We are in the light. I reckon it is listening."
Gibbou offered the old thumbling another soft nod, her eyes busily scanning the surroundings. She held out a hand and turned it, observing small tremors in the air as if observing the air above a candle."This sensation… You're lifeblood, aren't you, mister Light?"
The trees rustled softly and a sorrowful flute whispered behind the leaves. Something in the song pecked at Gibbou's mind, and the suddenly melancholic faces of the thumblings told her she wasn't the only one. The elder cleared his throat.
"Only for so long, now," The elder sank in his seat, "Only for so long."
Gibbou blinked at the elder, but closed her mouth before she could say anything upon seeing the first beams of sunlight peek over the horizon. She sighed and shook her head. “Well, I suppose I should find shelter for the day, lest I wanna get a nasty burn. Would any of you mind if I made myself comfortable over here?” She pointed at a nearby moss patch.
"Make yourself comfortable," the elder gave a sage nod before turning back to the music, ears perked. Gibbou smiled back and dragged herself tiredly over to the moss patch, which she tugged at with some effort and, with a little more effort, shaped into a blanket that covered her whole body. She made herself comfortable on the ground and fell asleep to the sound of the flute.
----
In the night, vicious thoughts plagued the moon goddess’ mind, the prophecy digging at her giddy enthusiasm. When she at last woke up at sundown, the bags under her already dark eyes made her white pupils stand out to an uncanny degree. She rubbed her eyes free of as much gloominess as she could and lifted the moss blanket off herself. She stood up slowly and pulled her feet groggily towards the little grove again.
“Hey, mister elder? I don’t know if you’re awake, but I’m not feeling too well. I’m just going to make what I came here to make and woosh on back to my moon to ponder some, okay?”
There was a ruffling in her braid and a tired Adrian yawned, "Whassat?"
“Oh, hi, mister Adrian,” Gibbou cooed through a yawn. “Yeah, I was just saying that I’ll be making those guardians I’ve been mumbling to myself about for… A while now and then head home. I’m a bit under the weather, I think.”
"What's that?" Adrian stretched and folded his legs under him, cushioned by the top of Gibbou's head. He cleared the sleep out of his throat. "The light can take care of you."
She gave a hum. “That so, huh? Well… I suppose, if anything, the light could help me make what I’m making. Are you there, mister Light?” she asked and held out her hand.
Adrian paused and looked around from his vantage point, "We are always in the light, I think." Gibbou made a wry frown and gave a soft shrug.
“Sure do hope so. Well, ready for a little stroll, mister Adrian?”
"Yeah hold on." Adrian grabbed two fistfuls of hair before eagerly nodding. "Onward!" He gave a tiny thumbling laugh. Gibbou couldn’t help but giggle along as she set forth on the journey back towards the forest.
On the way, Gibbou would occasionally stop to pick up fancy-looking stones and sticks, gathering them in a bunch under her left hand. By the time they reached the forest again, it was midnight. Gibbou put down the now-quite sizable pile of materials she had found and placed her hands on her hips. “Hey, mister Adrian? You ready to see some divine magic?”
"I have no idea," Adrian snickered.
Gibbou picked up a stone and threw it high into the air. When it reached the zenith of its trajectory, it burst into a cloud of sand, which drizzled down again from above. However, as it fell, it started piling up at three points, almost as if there was standing someone there - and then someone stood there! It could also be appropriate to refer to it as some-THING, for it was certainly no thumbling, nor was it the size of any mortal this world had ever seen before. There stood a man-like monster, ten metres tall, with a nose like a tree trunk growing perpendicular to the face. It had hair like vine plants, growing in a forest so fast that the top of its head actually sprouted saplings. The vines continued down the sides of its face, forming a thick neckbeard that hung as low as the groin. Its skin was a mixture of pale pink and mossy green, looking almost stone-like in texture, though being as pliable as dough. Its eyes were nearly buried in all the hair, and even from birth, the creature looked many decades old.
Gibbou gave its head a wave. “Heeeey! Down here!” The creature craned its head forward.
“Who’re you, ah?” it rumbled curiously. Gibbou smiled politely back.
“Oh, I’m Gibbou! Oraelia’s my sister and that,” she pointed to the sky, “is my moon! I made you, you see, with the purpose of--”
“Gib-whut-now?” went the creature and scratched its head. Moss and dirt by the kilos crashed into the ground by its feet and Gibbou had to make certain nothing hit Adrian by accident. “You’ve got a funny name, lass - seh, what’s my name?”
“Your name? Uh…” Gibbou stuttered in a taken-aback manner, and while she pondered, the sticks from her pile suddenly stood up by themselves and grew a body. This body was considerably shorter than its cousin, standing only two metres tall. It also took a chubbier shape, had a small, potato-like nose, and grew hair all the way down to its ankles. The hair was riddled with moss and mushrooms, and its skin was pink and pig-like. From its back, a hair-tipped tail snaked its way along the ground. It gave a small yawn and shifted between Gibbou and the giant.
“Whot in gods’ name ‘ave I woken up to ‘ere, ey?”
Gibbou squealed. “Ah! H-how did you form so easily?”
“Daggern if I know,” said the creature with its pinky digging around in its nose. “One moment, nuffin’ - the next? Poof!”
A thunderous cackle came from above. “Aye, you sure said it, lad.”
“Now if you two would just--”
“So whot’s the party ‘ere all about?” came a third voice and Gibbou groaned.
“Another o--OH, SISTER!” she squealed, skipped backwards and hid her face behind her hands. Having risen from some animal bones she had found earlier stood a five metre tall giant with a head like a rotting fish skull if it was compressed into a vaguely humanoid shape. It barely had any head on its head, save for miserable strands desperately holding onto what genuinely looked to be diseased, sickly skin. Its eyes were hollow and bloodshot, and it oozed an offensive stink like rotting meat. Its body was disproportionately small compared to the large head, but despite all these nauseating characteristics, its aura was that of a simple, friendly giant. It had a look between all four of them, grinning as non-threateningly as possible (failing miserably, though).
“Sorry, was a lil’ tough to get that femur in the roight place,” he explained in a voice like warm milk. “Say, m’lady, you were giving us names just now, roight?”
"Maybe we should go," Adrian said shakily behind his hat.
Gibbou dared peek through her fingers and offered a very soft nod. “M-hm,” she replied anxiously, making sure there were only the five of them. Then, all of a sudden, something gripped Adrian by his collar and tried to pick it up from Gibbou’s hair.
“Oi, whot’s this’un, now?”
The air seemed to shimmer and Adrian squealed, "I'm A-Adrian." He kicked his dangling feet. Gibbou spun around and grabbed whatever was holding Adrian by his own collar. It was a much shorter creature, no more than a metre and a half. It was similar to the other three, but horns sprouted from the curly hair on its head, and it had no beard growth to speak of, nor much hair of any kind, really, except on top. It immediately lifted both hands in the air and put on a half grin.
“Roight, roight, no need to get all pissy ‘n all tha’. Just havin’ a lil’ bitt’a fun, a’roight? Say, missy, wanna play a game?”
“A game?” Gibbou offered back, Adrian getting settled back on her head, and before she could say yes, the creature’s tail quickly snatched up Adrian again and it sprinted off with a maniacal cackle, the air bending behind him. In the background, the giant one and the hairy one were both laughing along while the ugly one crossed its arms over its boney chest with a disappointed frown on what could barely pass for a face.
In the grip of the creature, Adrian screamed -- his eyes frozen shut with fear. The laughter of his kidnapper sloshed in his ears, alongside something else: the flute. It was sad, quiet, dying. Adrian opened his eyes and noticed a wave of light following him and his assailant.
Gibbou yelled, “ADRIAN!” and lifted one of her feet to follow in pursuit.
“Oi!” came a voice like thunder behind her and she stopped, shaking anxiously between pursuit and paying attention.
“Yes? What?!”
“Our names?” rumbled the giant. The hairy one gave his neck an ennuied scratch and the ugly one merely sighed patiently.
“Can’t you just--... Ugh! Alright, uh… First! You’re trolls, okay? Remember that! You were made to keep life safe while I’m up on the moon, and-... Can’t we take this some other time?”
“Rather not. Sun’s coming up soon, I reckon,” mumbled the hairy one.
“Oh, that’d be bad. Don’t like the sun much’t all,” agreed the ugly one.
“Why, what’ll the sun do?” the giant asked with a hint of fright.
“PLEASE!” Gibbou pleaded and the three of them momentarily shut up. The moon goddess breathed in deeply and pointed first to the big one. “You! You’re a dovregubbe, got it?”
“But you just said I was a troll.”
“Oh my-...” Gibbou breathed deeply. “Okay, you are a troll - that’s you species. Your subspecies - that’s dovregubbe!”
“My subspeeshis?”
“Nevermind. You!” she pointed at the hairy one, who casually thumbed its chest. “You’re a ranglefant!”
“Sounds a bit dirty, dunnit?” the ranglefant snickered. Gibbou rolled her eyes and pointed at the ugly one.
“You! You’re a draug.”
The draug gave a terrifyingly warming (and also downright terrifying) smile and nodded. “Thank you, m’lady. I’mma treasure that name, I will.”
Gibbou nodded back with an anxious smile. “Alright, are we good here?”
“Question for ya, Gibboo,” the dovregubbe went.
“What?”
“What’s that wee lad’s name, then?”
Gibbou drew a breath. “If it’s alive by the time I’m done with it, I suppose I’ll call it an askeladd. Now, you three, behave!” With that, Gibbou sprinted after the troll on the run.
The three trolls exchanged looks. “So… Whot now?” went the draug casually. The ranglefant shrugged.
“S’pose it’s just about lunchtime, innit?” it went and picked at the ground for something to eat.
“Hey, lads - what did she say we were supposed to do again?”
The ranglefant shrugged again. “Dunno. Somethin’ about keepin’ life somethin’ or uvva’.”
“Safe, I believe,” said the draug. The ranglefant rolled its eyes as it dug up a worm and put it into its mouth.
“Roight, dovregubbe, mate. Want to check whot the woods’ got for snacks?”
The draug frowned. “Mates?”
“O-ho-ho! Now that sounds like a plan!” the giant thundered along and the two of them strolled into the woods, the dovregubbe shoving trees aside in its stride. The draug stood alone at the border to the fen, scratching its head thoughtfully.
“Well, oughta find myself a cave, I suppose.” Then it, too, entered the woods.
Gibbou knew she was much faster than the askeladd, but it had gotten a considerable lead on her and could be hiding anywhere. Divine senses did her little good somewhere as smelly as this place, but it had to be somewhere.
A tiny yelp caught her attention and quickly her divine eyes snapped onto the askeladd. It was headed right for the line of beech trees that guarded the grove. A steadily growing ripple of light followed it, unbeknownst to the beast. Gibbou sprinted over and tossed herself at the askeladd, tackling it through the treeline and to the mossy ground of the grove. Immediately she picked it up to make certain it or she hadn’t killed any thumblings. The flute seemed to hiss faintly around them.
“Okay! Okay, you got me!” the askeladd confessed with a smirk and handed over the shaken Adrian. Gibbou accepted him as if he was a breaking egg and brought him up to her face.
“Adrian! Are you okay? Oh, please be okay!”
Adrian -- who was clinging tightly to Gibbou’s thumb out of reflex, tiny heartbeat pounding against her -- nodded. “I-” The sound of the flute was growing louder. Adrian cleared his throat to talk over it, “I!-” but the flute grew louder.
“Not for very much longer, indeed,” The wise croak of the elder sounded. Looking over, he was sitting on his mushroom, a single finger pointed at the gate. The scripture on its stone was glowing: “The son of night will be brought to light; he will bring the end.” In front of the gate, the askeladd stood in stunning awe as a blanket of light flowed around him.
BANG!
The rusted gate slammed open, the metal smashing against the pillar. An enormous flash broke the night, turning the grove to pocks of light and purple negatives. With a ripping wind, the golden light began to funnel into the gate, disappearing on the other side -- the flute carrying with it. As it peeled from the grove, it was leaving a second sea of light in its place -- a terrible anger residing in this new body as the flow of mercy and care left for the gate.
The scene was frozen as a heart wrenching slam marked the end of the flute’s song -- the gate had closed, the music was dead and all that remained outside the gate was half of the once-loving light; a sea of anger. The markings on the gate recarved to say “The son of night will be brought to light; he will bring the end.” but a single note of a flute played after it, adding yet another line to the prophecy, a tiny speck of hope among the despair “He will begin again.”
The note faded, the gate rusted closed once more and the great anger that engulfed the scene suddenly pulsed. Adrian stuttered, “Why...”
Meanwhile the askeladd was slowly sneaking away. Gibbou turned to it with a furious glare. “Don’t you move another inch! We’re going to have a serious talk, mister!”
The askeladd held up both palms in a negotiating manner. “Of course, of course! Just lem’me sit on right down ‘ere aaand-- SIKE!” The askeladd started sprinting away again. Gibbou blinked.
“H-hey! Come back! I’m your goddess, you know! Do you know what I could do to you?!”
“Up yours, blueberry! Hihihihihi!” the askeladd cackled back as it skipped over a large heap in the fen and disappeared into the night. Gibbou grit her teeth sourly, but refocused her attention on the surrounding light which began to rumble like a thunderstorm.
All at once, the sea of light began to explode out of the grove and after the troll, the waves crashing against trees and Gibbou alike. The forever stream seemed to have little care for who or what it swirled past as it’s intense flow ripped the leaves from the trees and forced the thumblings to cower behind rocks and large sticks. The blasting wind that followed the light beat down the grove until all at once, the light and all peace was gone from the grove.
Gibbou, Adrian, the elder, and everyone else were left in the empty grove -- the music long gone. Leaves littered the once serene area, and the thumblings looked devastated -- tiny eyes looking up at Gibbou for answers.
The moon goddess mouthed the words from the prophecy and drew a quivering gasp. "Child of Night… Oh no. What have I done?" She dropped to her knees, then had to support her torso with her arms. Quartz-white tears welled up in her eyes and began dripping down on the moss, forming little chalky bubbles.
Adrian frowned and patted her elbow, "No one could have seen this coming -- well I suppose the gate did but no one else."
"There, there," The elder said to Gibbou as much as the rest of the thumblings, "What is gone will come again. I can feel it."
Gibbou looked up and wiped away so many tears that they stained her sleeve white. “Wuh-wha’h? Wha’h you meehn?” She gave a sobbing sniff.
The elder took a long inhale and looked up at the now barren canopy. He held his stare, a wise gleam in his eye as he croaked with absolute certainty, "I have no idea."
"See- wait what?" Adrian looked over at the elder.
"Life's a mystery, boy," The elder settled on his mushroom, "take peace where you can."
Gibbou gave another sob. “B-buh… But what’ll happen to you now?” She picked up a batch of moss and used it to blow her nose, immediately regretting it after her nostrils filled with dirt.
“I imagine a lot of things,” the elder said to the onlooker’s dismay, “But where there are downs, there are ups as well.”
“How are you so calm about this?” Adrian asked with a sudden huff.
“Perhaps a piece of the light rubbed off on me during my life,” the elder suggested, “I feel as though I can still hear its flute and the warmth of its grace.” He wiggled his nose and slowly rose to his feet, “But enough talk - it’s time to gather our own water, and pick our own berries -- and Adrian.”
“Yes?”
“No more jumping from tall places.”
Gibbou start: 5MP/0DP 1MP: Create sapient species - Trolls: Trolls are Gibbou’s watchmen on Galbar while she’s away on her moon; however, none of them are particularly good at it. There are four races which will be explored further in the wiki.
Gibbou end: 4MP/0DP
Joab-Balaam-blood start: 1MP/0DP 1MP: Create sapient species - Trolls. 0MP: Troll gets punished off screen, allergic to music JBB end: 0MP/0DP
The Sacred Grove: +5 prestige.
Gibbou finds a thumbling named Adrian and the two have a chat about important things that I’m not going to list here (what could they be?). Gibbou then finds the gate in the sacred Grove and the prophecy “The child of night will be brought to light; he will bring the end.” Gibbou is spooked and meets a wise old elder, Gibbou meets “the light” that cares for the thumblings and the grove, she goes to bed
The next day Gibbou and Adrian leave the grove to go make trolls. The trolls are jackasses and one steals Adrian. Upon reaching the grove with the stolen thumbling, “the light” splits in two, with the loving side disappearing through the gate, while the angry side (Joab) remains and hunts down the troll, wrecking everything in its path. The child of the night brought the end.
A new prophecy forms that is identical to the last, but with the caveat that He will begin again.
I personally would read this entire post, there are a lot of nuances that explains what this light is and why it split, but if you don’t want to, that's fine -- just know that some future actions and interactions with Joab may not make as much sense.
Gibbou gave the surface of the moon a grumpy hit, regretfully soothing it with a few rubs an instant later. That dumb pig had just appeared skipped away in such a hurry - just as they were getting a conversation going! Sure, not everyone could be as awesome as sis, but there had to be some kind of standard, right? She huffed and sat back down, looking down at the greening continent below and the crack and thunder of a million roots breaking at the newly formed soil. There was something almost terrifying about this awesome power, but the exhilarating bubbling in her blood drowned out that fear. She hopped up and down, squealing and whooping at the spectacle below.
YEAH! Plant those trees! she cheered and threw her hands into the air. The motion sent her laying flat down on her back and she breathed a happy sigh. Maybe this life wouldn’t be so bad, huh?
A millisecond of instincts kicking into motion suddenly warned her of something she was far too slow to react to. A series of echoing screams blasted through time and space, and before she could even fathom to think what just occurred, she felt a massive change in G-force and was dropped into space, as her moon suddenly sped off away from her at a speed of a meteor. Gibbou took a second to recover her balance and looked around for her creation.
“H-hey! My moon!” she shouted and sped off after it like a shooting star, moon-white light encapsulating her as she soared through the empty space. She was back on its surface shortly after and instantly inspected it for damages. She found it sufficiently whole and breathed a sigh of relief.
Now to find the culprit. Taking a deep breath, she shouted, “HEY! YOU SENT MY MOON SPINNING AROUND THE PLANET, YOU BUTT! HOW CAN I PAY ATTENTION TO THE LAND ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT NOW?!” With an angry huff, she picked up a moon rock and lobbed in some arbitrary direction. The rock soared off and burned up in Galbar’s atmosphere. A frown discoloured her face as she stared over the horizon of her moon - the sunlight was approached.
“Oh, come on…” she groaned, “you mean the dark side won’t stay dark forever now?! That--! Ugh!” She kicked another moon rock, sending another shooting star down to Galbar. She plopped herself down on the surface and growled in displeasure. Why did the other gods have to be so inconsiderate? It was downright breaking her heart, it was! Gibbou made a sour ‘prrt’ with her lips.
“First I can’t do my job properly and now-...”
A darkbulb dimmed over her head and she suddenly grinned from ear to ear. She rocketed to her feet and began stretching out. Of course! If she couldn’t pay attention to the part of the world with life all the time, she’d just have to delegate the job to someone else whenever she wouldn’t be around!
She bent over to stretch her hamstrings and calves. She could almost reach her toes with her fingers, she grinned in realising. Could probably do this exercise every now and then and reach down eventually! Now, what would they be like, these guardians?
She waved her arms around like windmills. Well, for starters, they should be tall - preferably to deter anyone trying to harm life from, well, harming life.
She rolled her head around on her shoulders. Secondly, they ought to be very strong - oh! and able to live long! Wouldn’t want guardians to just pass away like that, would we?
She stretched her arms over her head one at a time to flex her latissimus dorsi. Lastly, they’re only really needed at night, so they shouldn’t really bother daywalkers too much. Oh! What if they were allergic to the sunlight? That’d keep them from doing anything fishy when she was asleep herself!
She put her fists on her hips and grinned - she had a plan!
She knelt down and, making sure not to damage the surface of her precious baby, she kicked off and soared down to the surface of Galbar, giggling all the way as she soared with two fists extended up front.
“Wooooooooooo!” she half-squealed, half-laughed as she crashed into the water surface with a splash the size of a minor meteoric impact. A few minutes later, her little blue head popped up above the water surface and spat out some water. “Eugh! Salty,” she muttered and pulled her soaked hair out of her eyes before spinning to look up at the sky. As expected, she saw no sign of the sun, but what she -did- see, was possibly something beautiful enough to challenge her sister’s looks.
“... Woah… I made that?” she whispered to herself as her eyes glued onto the sight of the full moon. Its light wasn’t even close to offensive - it was the complete opposite! Unlike the sun, it fell gently on the eyes - it was light, a beacon in the sky, an existence of peace and calm - all without that painful glare.
”Well done.”
The voice rolled through Gibbou’s mind and shook the world around her. Unlike those most wholesome of words shared with lovely voices between caring siblings that Gibbou had heard, these were something far different. Though they imparted meaning far deeper, their sounds were of tides and bubbles and many other things of the deep. Nevertheless, the compliment was clear.
Rising from below with bright orange-yellow eyes ringed in light blue came the vastness of the growing Klaar. The Old Growth of the deep stared unblinkingly at the new entity that splashed in his waters with one pair of eyes while the others looked about in fascination with the world above. Most of all, that gentle orb that hung calmly in the sky.
Gibbou blinked at the creature’s single eye and cocked her head to the side. “Oh! Hello! Are,” she pulled at her nose to clean it of seawater, “are you the one who made the ocean here?” She made an effort to extend a hand towards the eye while using the other to keep herself afloat amidst the powerful current forming from the surfacing of such a grand god. “I’m Gibbou! Oraelia’s my sister! What’s your name?”
Klaars eyes twisted in their sockets at the strange words. They were understandable but vague, soft, and without form. What a grand and intoxicating innocence! The surface of the waters bubbled and rippled as the huge mass of Klaarungraxus vibrated with excitement at this most interesting of meetings. A momentary pause in his works as he extended the seas and set about creating so many fascinating things.
”My pool grows and the First Water flows,” bellowed the huge cephalopod, ”Now it is a lagoon of my making. You are Gibbou, and I am Klaar, and we have spoken. An empty space given place. Joyous tidings and sounds of soft white waters abound~!”
The tip of one large tentacle exited the waters and hung in front of Gibbou, matching her stretched out arm’s posture. Three eyes now focussed on Gibbou, all from one side, while the others looked upwards at the moon with clear delight. A far softer, gentler thing than that vile fire in the sky.
Gibbou grinned from ear to ear and used her other hand to pull her hair out of her face again, resulting in her dropping under the water surface for a second, getting all her hair up in her face again. She surfaced and made a sheepish giggle. “Oh, uh, just a second, would you mind? I just have to…” She snapped her fingers under the surface and, after a short minute, a large manta ray appeared underneath her, pushing her seated form to the water surface. She smiled at it and then at Klaar. “There we go! Oh, I hope you don’t mind me just, uh, putting stuff in your waters without asking.” As she talked, the manta ray drifted off slowly in an arbitrary direction. Gibbou gave it a small frown and looked back to Klaar again. “You mind if we chat on the way?”
The manta ray was soon joined by a large pod of its kind, and below swam a number of blue and black fish, all around a great, silvery, coral-covered reef that had suddenly appeared. The corals seemed to almost bloom in the light of the moon, and the spectacle was further enhanced by the dance of fish dancing between their many colourful arms.
Klaar bubbled and shook as he descended below, perceiving the new life that had entered his seas. They were as his own, the creations he’d been spawning across the oceans, yet each and every one a unique and interest design. Corals, his most beloved of creations wrought by his tentacles, had been placed with tender care into a vast reef below and Klaar spoke gentle tides into being to bring nutrients to this most lovely of reefs.
”Life must teem, came his sonorous reply, sounding as a pleasant seashore, ”And so must we. To where do thine tides take thee?”
“Yeah, making life’s great! I’m having a blast!” The blue girl twisted a handful of saltwater out of her braids. “See, I’m actually really happy I ran into you! I’m heading for land - that would be the, uhm… Did you see the boar come crashing down from above earlier?”
”Tusks-and-Fur-and-Fury,” Klaar’s eyes sunk inwards as memories turned to images in his mind, ”A mind unappreciative of oceans vast. The beak he pulled from waters deep now towers ponderously. Affirmative. Mine eyes hath held his visage.”
Gibbou nodded. “Unappreciative of a lot of things, really. But okay, you know him - good! See, I was heading to, as I mentioned, but I’ve lost my way, sort of. Could you point me in the general direction of the biggest landmass here?” The manta ray, meanwhile, casually splashed its noodle-like tail against the surface, no doubt eager to dive deeper. Gibbou gave it a soothing pat on the… Head? Neck? She was uncertain.
Klaar wriggled with curiosity at the comment of Gibbou on Tusks-and-Fur-and-Fury, so-called Boris despite Klaar’s lack of knowledge. His immense and corpulent form turned and gestured with glowing eyes in the direction of the continent, the first of its kind.
”It resides in mountains high, of its own creation. Thou wilst find Tusks-and-Fur-and-Fury there, rooting and stamping. I wish thee swift tides and kindly waves, Moon-in-Sky Gibbou. A truer name I will speak for thee after thine parting.”
Gibbou blinked at the name, but quickly switched the confusion for joy and waved cheerfully at the grand frame of Klaar, who was now a short distance away, actually, due to the manta ray’s laborious efforts. “Thank you so much, Klaar! Hope we’ll see each other again soon, yeah?”
”We have watched and we have listened; mine eyes look upwards and yours downwards. We shall see eye to eye again.” With that, Klaar descended into the depths to return to his works, admiring the Moon-Reef as he passed over it.
It took a long while, but eventually, the manta ray had brought her to land. She casually flopped off of it into the water, spun around to give the manta ray a kiss which it seemed reluctant to accept, and swam towards the shore while the ray returned to its pod. Gibbou stepped onto the beach and looked up - dawn was approaching and she felt herself cringe. The island was about as barren as her moon, but so, so, sooo much brighter. The sands were already reflecting the dawnlight into her eyes and she felt that familiar sting right away. She spun around, looking for any kind of refuge. Not finding it on the islet of sand she could hide under, she desperately brought her palms together, creating a shocking blast that shook the very foundations of the island.
In the blink of an eye, the sandy floor grew furry with black, white and blue fungi as small and and thin as blades of grass; all around her sprouted enormous black mushrooms, blotting out the sky like trees with sun-resistant, shield-like caps; between the “grass” and the “trees” sprouted shrub-like colonies of enoki; in between the blades of fungi grass sprouted puffballs that seemed to ooze clouds of calming spores. Gibbou knelt down next to a few of them, squeezed at them gently and took a few deep breaths to help her panicked nerves calm down.
“Phew… One day more out of the sunlight is a happy day, huh, mister mushroom?”
The mushroom didn’t say much, but it was likely in agreement.
Gibbou, having calmed down sufficiently, stood back up and had a look around. The forest was nice and dark - only smidges of daylight broke through the roof of mushroom caps. However, it was also terribly, so terribly silent. The thick foliage now drowned out the sound of the ocean, even, so Gibbou could really only hear her own breathing, and almost her heartbeats. She didn’t mind the quiet, but there was also something very off about such perverse silence.
She snapped her fingers. Something had to be done!
The first thing she did was to create insects - lots and lots of different beetles, flies, moths and gnats to feast upon the forests’ bounty with gusto! She conjured forth slugs the size of cats to gnaw at the slightly larger fungi, and made a bunch of smaller terrestrial mollusks to keep the insects company. A bunch of different bacteria, mosses and lichen also began to grow on the mushrooms, and slowly, but surely, these took on a very dim, beautiful hue that coloured the forest an almost eerie, but dreadfully exciting shade of cyan.
Finally, Gibbou walked over to a mushroom tree, which was currently being gnawed at by a group of hungry beetles. She placed her ear against the moist trunk and knocked on it twice. A tiny hole appeared where she had knocked and out popped a little head, with a triangular nose, massive ears and two tiny, curious eyes looking at Gibbou. Gibbou, barely able to contain herself, gently plucked the little bat out of the hole and cuddled it up against her face.
“You are the most adorable thing I have ever seen,” she whispered to it as it wheezed in light-hearted confusion. Gibbou plated a little kiss on its belly and let it skip off of her hand to chase a bypassing moth. Before long, lots more bats like it were flapping all around the forest, chasing insects and hanging upside down from underneath the mushroom caps. Below, cockroaches were happily feasting on guano.
Gibbou stayed in the forest so long that she forgot her original purpose for coming down to Galbar - she just had too much fun creating life. She made porcupines and moles that trundled slowly after the even slower snails and worms; she conjured forth mycophagic mice and rats and then made black owls to chase after them; she made glowing bugs that sat on the trunks of mushroom trees and minded their own business until predators dropped by - which the bugs would proceed to momentarily blind with bursts of light; she made vines that tangled around mushroom trees and sprouted glowing berries that also made their consumers glow - made for nice meals until a predator caught you shining like the sun above.
Gibbou had no idea how many days had passed by the time she was done with the ecosystem. By chance, she remembered that she was supposed to make some guardians to keep life safe when she couldn’t see the main continent! That was it!
She waited until dark. As she stepped out on the beach, she noticed a beautiful blue glow around her moon. This wasn’t anything of her own doing, and for a second, she felt compelled to soar up and see if anything was wrong. However, for now, she was enchanted by the sight of this blue energy dancing around her moon. She couldn’t help but smile.
Reinvigorated, she turned to face the forest. She pointed at it with one hand on her hip and felt her smile become a cheshire grin.
“This shall be Neverday Isle (sorry, sis), and here, all things of the night shall forever have refuge!”
And with that, she kicked off and soared across the sky in the direction of the Toraan main continent.
So Gibbou’s pissed that Boris just hopped off like that, but quickly gets over it as the sight of Galbar is just too fine. Then, outta nowhere, physics is suddenly invented, and Gibs is knocked off her moon as it starts orbiting. Now pissed that someone knocked her off her moon -and- that the Dark Side won’t stand still -and- that she can’t pay attention to the same part of the world at all times anymore, she hops down to the surface to make some stand-ins for when she’s away.
On the surface, she runs into Klaar, and they have a sweet little meeting where Klaar praises Gibbou’s moon and Gibbou calls Klaar a nice squid. Since Gibbou doesn’t want to swim through the whole conversation, she makes a school of manta rays carry her. In the act, she also makes a nice little reef called the Moon-Reef, with lunar-friendly fish and corals. Klaar and Gibbou say their sweet goodbyes shortly after.
Gibbou then ends up on an island far from the mainland. There’s no vegetation and the sun is approaching. In a panic, she makes the mushroom forest of Neverday Isle, but ends up having so much fun making life that she stays on the island until her ecosystem is complete. Once it’s done, she names the island and jumps off to the main continent to do what she was actually supposed to do.
Gibbou: Start: 5MP/0DP
0MP - Make the Moon-Reef, a large reef far off the west coast of Toraan. It’s home to manta rays, moon-reflecting corals and other fish that enjoy life in the dark of the night.
0MP - Make the ecosystem on Neverday Island. It’s an ecosystem which is shielded from the sun day and night, thanks to great fungal trees with parasol-like caps that blot out its rays. The fungal “trees”, “grasses” and “shrubs” make up the lower trophics, while the higher trophic levels are occupied by mushroom-eating fungivores and predators that prey on them.
Member
Kangutso
Lord Zee
Dinh AaronMk
Timemaster
Lunamaria Hawke
Taeryn
Nallore
Sigma
ButtsnBalls
