⭗ REDIRECTIONS VIII⭗

 

⭗ THE Q-MODAL MORI-MIRROR ⭗

“There is a strange energy to this place,” Charred-Hand said. He pulled his rough brown cloak closer about his shoulders. “I don’t like it. It feels like cruel desires and shattered dreams.”

“Is that– is that a skull?” Coda-1 asked Coda-3, the polybody blue pilgrim who had joined the party at the Spires of the Broken Song. Thinking aloud, his two male bodies stroked their chins nervously.

“Do you want your answers or not?” The blue oracle asked, turning a shard of singing lift-crystal over and over in her hands.

“Whose answers are we seeking?” Past-Tense asked. She turned her eyes to stare at the Blue Oracle. “Ours or yours?”

“Is there a difference?” The Blue Oracle asked, staring back at the golem.

⭗

There are many places in the world which the bluelanders claim hold the remains of fallen gods. One such place is known as the Blossoming Skull, though those in the know call it the Q-Modal Mori-Mirror, for it only appears as a skull when looked at with human eyes. Other eyes, such as those of gods, oracles and specialized golems, see the “skull” as it truly is. A door, massive and locked by a spell-singer’s hymn so that no one may open it accidentally.

The song to open the skull/door is a closely guarded secret that only a cabal of bluelander polybody monks in a nearby settlement know (though even they admit that the founders of their cabal learned it from somewhere else once.)  In order to obtain the key from the cabal, one must first join them, and the ordeals to do so are as tedious as they are bizarre. Shows of force will not extort the key, but a substantial bribe may be enough to make any given traveler an honorary member of the cabal. Of course, if the key could be obtained elsewhere, the cabal doesn’t have to know about it.

When the sacred, five-fold key is sung on the approach of the thirteen steps of the skull’s platform, the face of the skull will split open along five seams and reveal a huge mirror. There is only enough space for one person to stand before the mirror at a time, and when someone does so, another version of that person from an echo universe will also be standing on the other side of the mirror. Both versions will happen to have something that the other desires, even if it is something non-tangible, like fame, reputation or love. To gain what you most wish for, you must give up the thing that you have that the other wants, and the trade must be honest. No other travel through the mirror into that echo universe is possible, or so the legends say. 

Rarely, no one will be on the other side of the mirror, but no one can say when this will happen or why. Generally, the consensus (among lime nomads, at least) is that this is a poor omen. These same nomads also claim that the crumbling basalt risers beyond the skull/door are a great place to hunt insect-headed gryphon-hawks, especially the juicy ones with cybernetic eyes.

⭗ OUR PARTY (SO FAR) ⭗

"Past-Tense", a golem from the Azure Age.

"Charred-Hand" a perfectly ordinary and unassuming wastelander

The Blue Oracle, Dreamer of Dreams

 

Coda-1, Coda-2 and Coda-3, a bluelander polybody pilgrim, allegedly.

⭗ WHAT ARE REDIRECTIONS? ⭗

My goal with REDIRECTIONS is to add my own contribution to the Psychedelic / Heavy Metal / Ligne Claire art RPG space.  Much in the way that people inspired by Tolkien’s style helped give birth to the modern genre of High Fantasy, the style of Jean “Moebius” Giraud (and others like him) seems to be spawning a sort of genre of its own right now, and I want to expose more people to the wonders of it. I want to share it. I want to be a part of it. Most of all, I want it to grow.

    REDIRECTIONS is a collection of wondrous places and resources presented in story format (as a game in play, specifically traversing the universe of UVG (Ultraviolet Grasslands) but it is also kept more general for your own RPG characters to visit and explore regardless of the system you use. Each place is unique and wholly original, with a bevy of interesting stories, plot hooks and characters to color your experience. If you like these posts and find them useful, let me know! All art is generated on Stable Diffusion or Wombo because I can’t draw anything better than stick figures, so consider them homages to the genre and pretty pictures, but nothing more. This is a series, and each entry is numbered. If you like things like this, please support the true artists whose works are part of the genre, such as the works of Moebius, Luka Rejec's Ultraviolet Grasslands, Luke Gearing's Acid Death Fantasy and Raw Fury's game SABLE.