Locations and Maps
POST NAVIGATION
LOCATIONS
Cenote
Centralia
The Passages
Mushroom Kingdom
---Mushroom Kingdom: Nightmare-Fuel Edition
Lake Omphalotus
---Laundry Pool
---The Island
The Gardens
---Dawn Garden
---Midday Garden
---Twilight Garden
---Midnight Garden
---Distillery
The Larder
---The Chocolate Tree
Ice Caverns
Fire in the Hole
Room of Illusions
Topside
Beyond the Oasis
MAPS
Underground Caverns (Omphalotus)
Topside
THE CENOTE
Your first port of call. This cenote is long dried up, any water it once held now drained away, its underwater reserves moved on. From where you stand, the sky is simply a circular patch far up above, the walls steep enough to seriously discourage climbing, especially when the winds above blow sand down rock walls in cascades. If you are sensitive to it, you may feel a tingle wash over your body, as if you were standing in statically-charged air. It is possible to exit that way, of course -- if you're really determined -- but it's not particularly desirable. Near the ground, a narrow fissure in the rock wall offers the only other way out. This passage gradually gets wider and more decorated, the limestone growing cleaner and picking up a glow, lit up by fluorescing minerals and bio-luminescent fungi. Eventually, this leads to...
Sandfalls and distant sunlight (or moonlight) bid you welcome.
CENTRALIA
Although not the largest of the chambers (the Ice Caverns are biggest), Centralia is definitely the most important (and, at nearly one mile in diameter and half a mile tall, it's certainly impressive in its own right). The entire cylindrical chamber is terraced, each level accessible from the those above and below it via both gentle slopes and crystal formations that can be climbed like steps. Each level is dotted by a line of small caves that can be used as single or double-occupancy rooms, each one containing a fountain that runs a never-ending supply of a mercury-like liquid. However, its most striking feature is the fact that it's entirely open to the sky, with a huge, sprawling garden situated in its center.
This central garden contains many varieties of plants, as well as a few areas where groundwater has formed small, clear pools (some packed with aquatic vegetation, and, thus, frogs). Not only does it provide a reasonable amount of two significant fungi, the bread shrooms and cheese shrooms (see Mushroom Kingdom for more details), it also has plentiful amounts of cacti, succulents, herbs, cycads, ferns, mosses, willows, fungi, and other fascinating plants. Many of these are edible. Of particular interest are: coffee beans, leaves and flowers suitable for brewing tea, herbs suitable for seasoning and spices, peyote, and many medicinal plants, such as aloe and willow.
There are many smaller passages leading off from Centralia, but the most significant is the one leading to Mushroom Kingdom (which then itself leads on to the Gardens).
THE PASSAGES
The bulk of passages in the caves (not marked on the map) are quite alike - twisting, at least wide enough for one person to walk through. The limestone itself gives off a faint glow, and its walls are studded with crystals and veins of mineral that give off a slightly brighter one. Adding to this glow are bio-luminescent fungi, mosses, lichens, and the occasional colony of fireflies danging from a distant ceiling. In a few places, they open to the sky, either roots poking through the gaps or sand cascading down. Rarely, if ever, do these tunnels lead to dead ends, and so at least a few more oddities yet lie undiscovered, waiting to be found.
MUSHROOM KINGDOM
The main source of food for the caves, Mushroom Kingdom is a large chamber, threaded with water (both still and running, and beautifully clear) and covered in patches of a multitude of fungi, some large enough to be buildings. Going one direction, it's connected to Centralia via tunnels. Going the other way, it's closest to the Twilight Garden. The southern end leads to Lake Omphalotus. A back portion of Mushroom Kingdom is open to the sky.
There two types of fungi of particular interest, here - large white squares mostly found on bare rock that bear a startling resemblance to bread, and branching orange clumps found closer to water, resembling cheese and filled with something very much like milk. These two shrooms provide much of the food staples for the residents of the caves. The other fungi found here ranges from the tasteless to the really, really strange, and some is outright poisonous, so care is highly advised. As in the tunnels, much of the fungus here glows. Some has grown extraordinarily huge, and tough as rock, making them capable of supporting the weight of a person. Towards the cliff wall in back, a cluster of these can be climbed like platforms. There is open sky in this section, and thus Topside can be reached.
Mushroom Kingdom: Nightmare-Fuel Edition
Those of... unorthodox dietary needs are not forgotten, either: off the beaten path, you'll find a secluded area that is distinctly darker (both in quality of light and in quality of cheer). Here, somewhat more nightmarish forms are to be found: mushrooms that resemble various internal organs, including brains and entrails, twisted trees with a blood-like substance, instead of sap, and, oddly enough, a variety of restless spirits. Interestingly, all these odd flora are, indeed, suitable nutritional substitutes for the very things they resemble.
LAKE OMPHALOTUS
Extending off from Mushroom Kingdom, this is a vast section of lake fringed by waterfalls and sand falls, which connects to the larger lake outside. The water is crystal clear, although not suitable for drinking due to its mineral content (it does, however, have rather tasty fish, and the minerals leave the skin smooth). Small beaches have formed beneath the rocky overhang which makes up the roof of this area. There is also a narrow island towards the far end, still under the overhang. The lake's name comes from the glowing fungi that covers parts of the walls and nearly all of the island, although these specimens are abnormally large for their species.
The northeastern part of the enclosed lake is warmer and more humid, allowing a greater variety of vegetation. Reeds, rushes, hyacinths, water lilies, and other aquatic plants are all present, screening off a shallow area where shyer characters might feel more comfortable bathing. There are many small waterfalls along the rock walls, some large enough to stand under for a makeshift shower.
Although shallow around the beaches and laundry pools, the far end of the enclosure is quite deep. Not far beyond the rocky overhang, the floor of the lake drops again, the waters extending at least fifty meters down, and anyone who can hold their breath for a very, very long time may find tunnels leading to further underwater caves.
The lake also features a strong halocline - a region where the less-dense fresh water floats above the denser salt water. When settled, this forms a visible distinction, and those swimming in the fresh layer may be surprised to see what looks like the surface of the water, but beneath them. This halocline also allows for both freshwater and saltwater species to co-exist in the lake, although the most accessable ones are freshwater.
Who knows what's lurking down there?
Laundry Pool
Off to the side, you will also find a small pool, which while connected to the lake, does not actually empty into it. Here, the mineral content is such that you can actually wash your soiled laundry. There's even patches of strange, grey-colored lichen growing on the rocks, which you can squeeze to create a sudsy foam that works quite well on stains.
Laundry pool.
The Island
Towards the back half of the lake is a narrow island and its hot springs, accessible by a narrow sandbar from the shore (it ranges in depth from ankle-deep to raised entirely out of the water). Like many other parts of the lake, huge specimens of the omphalotus mushroom grows there - man-sized orange mushrooms with gills that glow quite brightly in the dark. The climate of the island is quite humid and muggy thanks to the springs (which are cool enough for people to sit in comfortably, and have step-like protrusions for people to sit on). It's a fair bit more private than the lake's shore.
THE GARDENS
Located in the midst of a circular chamber lined with crystals, the Gardens are a perfectly circular patch of oddness in an already odd place. Divided in to four quadrants, once you step under the thick boughs, you find they each maintain their own climate, time of day, and environment, despite the chamber they reside in being underground and cut off from natural light. When you step into one portion of garden, all else seems to disappear, as if you've stepped into a whole other world. Cross the invisible boundary, and the season changes, or you find yourself back in the cave. The exact cause for this is unknown. Perhaps it's just an incredibly well-crafted illusion. But if it is just that, why is it that anything you find inside the gardens can be brought outside? And if it's magic, why can it not be sensed or dispelled?
Dawn Garden
Permanently a spring dawn, colored in soft pinks and golds and yellows. It's packed with flowers covering nearly every single surface, including wisteria dripping down from the trees.
- Currently in season: artichoke, apples, beans, beetroot, blueberries, carrots, garlic, grapefruit, lemons, lettuce, mandarins, mulberries, mushrooms, oranges, rockmelon, passionfruit, peas, pineapple, potato, shallots, spinach, strawberries, sweetcorn, tomatoes.
Always summer in the middle of the day - it's like a tropical retreat, swelteringly hot and with a constant sound of cicadas. There are a lot of fruit trees - apricots, nectarines, mangos, grape vines, bananas - but also tropical flowers, like hibiscus and frangipani. The canopy is so thick that a lot of light is blocked out, but what does reach the floor causes little patterns over it as a breeze moves through the trees.
- Currently in season: only fruit grows in the midday garden, but it is a good variety: apricots, avocado, bananas, blackberries, blueberries, cherries, currants, grapes, lychee, mangoes, melons, nectarines, oranges, passionfruit, peaches, pineapple, plums, raspberries, strawberries
Eternally autumnal, eternally in twilight. The leaves, although still clinging to the trees, are in shades of orange, or brown, or red, or yellow.
- Currently in season: apples, beans, broccoli, cabbage, capsicum, celery, chestnuts, cucumber, eggplant, figs, lettuce, ginger, limes, mandarins, mushrooms, onions, oranges, pears, peas, pomegranates, potatoes, pumpkin, spinach, tomatoes, various squash and calabash, and various nuts
A state of perpetual night and winter. Snow coats the ground, but there are also flowers - all white, all glowing faintly, and little white berries (all quite inedible) and a few pale bushes covered with snow. There are no leaves on the trees, but they are lit up by fireflies, looking like strings of fairy lights (or perhaps they're actual fairies?). The foliage almost glows in the dim, and distant stars dot the sky far above, occasionally illuminated by Aurora Borealis.
- Currently in season: N/A, the only things growing in the Midnight Garden are white flowers, various types of pale holly, and mistletoe.
At the very center of the four gardens is gently-bubbling pool with the most unusual property: whatever organic matter falls in very quickly decays and ferments. Due to its location, it acquires debris from all four gardens, and its proximity to the Twilight Garden keep the pool cool year-round. As a result, this pool's chilly contents are an ever-changing cocktail of high-quality alcohol, sometimes mellow, sweet, and fruity as cider, sometimes hard and dry like gin, depending on what's fallen in. Should residents wish to take some home, they've but to hollow out a gourd from the nearby Midday and Twilight Gardens, or bring their own containers.
As you walk around the perimeter of the pool, you will see and feel the light and season change: it will be dark and cold when you are in the Midnight Garden's portion, hot and sunny in the Midday Garden's portion, etc.
THE LARDER
A twisting collection of chambers and passages, all steadily heading upwards, chambers in the Larder are largely open to the sky, allowing a stunning variety of vegetation to grow. It is closest to the Dawn Garden and, for the most part, mimics the fruits and vegetables found there, although the exact composition can vary slightly by season and it also has a great deal of other types of vegetation - brush, shrubs, ivy, ferns, palms, grasses, and the like.
Small animals can also be found here, should your character be more carnivorously-inclined. There are small birds (occasional visitors from Topside), various reptiles, foxes, rabbits and other burrowing or tree-dwelling rodents, wild boars and pigs, sheep/goat-like animals, and pools connected to each other by underground canals containing fish -- silvery or the less common red -- none bigger than six inches nose to tail fin. There are also smaller cousins of the Mushroom Kingdom's carnivorous plants here and there, so caution is advised.
The Chocolate Tree
Off on its own, in a tiny offshoot chamber, is the cave's sole chocolate tree. The bark is bittersweet and reminiscent of dark chocolate. The fruits have the taste and consistency of cocoa beans. The leaves, while chewy, are diverse shades of brown to milky white, and chewing on them reveals a taste suspiciously like milk or white chocolate (sometimes swirled). All three components can be boiled to make chocolate milk or simply eaten as-is. The core of the tree, however, is pale white and most certainly not good to eat, so please don't cut the poor tree down in an attempt to get at the nougat center; it simply isn't there.
Growing all along the tree and surrounding loam are small mushrooms ranging in color from pale pink and salmon to slightly magenta. Although nearly impossible to distinguish from each other, there are actually two types of these pink mushrooms, both edible, aromatic, and with a lovely, nutty taste.
Of the two, one is a powerful aphrodisiac, causing a surge of hormones to rush through the body, resulting in anything from mild euphoria and feelings of infatuation, to full-blown sexual desire, sometimes irresistibly so. These affects are temporary, and go away as suddenly as they came about.
The other type of mushroom here, however, is a powerful laxative, which can take effect in as little as a minute but can sometimes delay up to fifteen minutes. By some cosmic joke, there is a small, seemingly endless hole at the back of the cave, behind some broad-leaved bushes (may we suggest backtracking to the Larder to wash your hands?).
ICE CAVERNS
Bitterly cold and the furthest underground of all the chambers, those walking along the passage leading to the Ice Caverns will find the temperature dropping steadily, patches of ice forming on the walls and ground, icicles hanging from the ceiling. The Ice Caverns proper are a slick, dangerous, and beautiful hazard, any rock behind the walls and floors and ceiling covered in meters-thick ice, ranging from almost perfectly translucent to so blue they're practically opaque. In places, however, oddly enough, vents in the ice emit blue flames, cool to the touch. There are no crystals here save ice crystals, but even those glow with a steady blue-white light. The rock hidden under meters of ice glows, giving the whole area an ethereal illumination. There are ledges in the back where a careful climber (or flier) can go to look over the entire panorama. There is also a permanently-frozen lake near the center, suitable for skating. It is closest in distance to the Midnight Garden.
Careful with loud, sudden noises!
FIRE IN THE HOLE
Defying all laws of geology, this chamber in an otherwise limestone-lined cave is most certainly volcanic. The 'hole' in question is a circular lava lake at the bottom of a depression, rocks lining it and making a convenient hold to ensure that one does not accidentally slide inside. Lining the walls are falls of smooth basaltic lava, running in channels towards the hole, scorchingly hot, but calm and controlled. For those who can get close enough, the veins of metal that line both the walls near the entrance and the passage leading to the chamber can be mined and worked, using the lava flows to refine and melt the metals. These can be used to produce crude metal furnishings and weapons. It is located closest to the Midday Garden.
ROOM OF ILLUSIONS
For those who manage to make it past the lava lake, a passage leads to a refreshingly cool, almost perfectly circular room. Its walls, floors, and even ceiling are liberally covered with an odd form of mushroom - bright orange and glowing faintly (although dimmer than others found in the tunnels), and spores heavy in the air. Any who come in here may find themselves growing sleepy. Fortunately, the floor is covered in those same soft mushrooms... Maybe you should take a rest?
Any who succumbs to sleep will find themselves somewhere else entirely - be it their own home or somewhere they've never seen. Whether this is a dream or a hallucination or magic is unclear. Hallucination or not, it will be completely real to your character, who can see, touch, taste, and interact with anything they find here. When they awake, the room will be what it was before, and nothing they encountered in dream will remain as proof. However, all characters who enter the room at the same time will find themselves experiencing the same location, able to interact with it, the people they meet there, and the people they entered with.
TOPSIDE
Topside, reached by climbing the cenote or going up through Centralia, Mushroom Kingdom, the Larder, or swimming out via Lake Omphalotus, is not much to look at. A small copse of dense woods surrounds the entrances, with a ready supply of timber for any purpose needed. Larger animals can also be found up here, as can a large, clear oasis. Surrounding the woods, however, is a vast, sandy desert - any who can survive long enough out there will, after several arduous weeks of walking, find themselves approaching the woods again.
BEYOND THE OASIS
Wasteland. Desert as far as the eye can see. No other cities. No other people. No other forests. Not even another lake or an ocean; just the vacant basins of what used to be bodies of water pockmarking the land, and the occasional mountain chain uninhabited, or burned-out volcano to interrupt the endless sea of sand. For reasons inexplicable, nearly all life on this small planet is to be found in and around Omphalotus, with the exception of sandworms, wyverns, some scattered copses of sickly-looking cacti, and various dragon-like creatures that nest near the mountains.
Important note: no matter what unique gifts your character has, he/she/it cannot leave the planetoid. Spells to open dimensional rifts will fail in whatever matter of spectacular fail you wish to use as a plot device. Attempts to summon creatures from other worlds will blow up in your face (sometimes quite literally). Attempts to contact creatures in other worlds will find only static noise (however it is your character's abilities/equipment register the equivalent of static noise). Attempts to fly off the surface of the planetoid will be met with your character being able to go only so high as to barely escape the atmosphere, and then being hit with an energy blast and being blown back earthward. You won't even make it as far as the planetoid's moon (it's small, nearly unblemished, and slightly reddish in color, though its surface is reflective enough it nearly always looks white or pale yellow from planet-side).
Map of the Caves (underground)
[higher resolution map]
Topside (satellite)
(with Omphalotus cave system overlay, for scale and positioning reference)
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