I was told by my uncle that keeping a diary would help with the travel. Make it easier to keep my mind intact as the time goes on. So here it goes.
It's the First Red Moon, 6th of Summer Dawn (6/01), 567 of the 4th Era.
Today was the start of my new life. Wake up, put my stuff in my backpack and meet up with the rest of the crew to set sail.
They started to called it Yuvenia. New lands that were found four months ago. Most of what's known comes from survivors that managed to come back, who claimed to have seen things of Nightmares, so of course I was curious to see Baron Galahad set up a formal request on the bulletin boards for work: "Explorers needed to venture out into Yuvenia. 100 gold pieces per year of service."
I took it. Me and a bunch of other people with nothing left to lose.
And now I'm here. Fucking seasick in a ship filled with people who are just as miserable as me or probably just insane, heading to what probably will be our graveyard.
Day 12:
Met up with some other people. Our total count is 20 'soon to be explorers'. Reed told me that they're going to put us into groups of 4 and send us out into the wild. He thinks that the baron isn't really looking for knowledge and all of this discovery bullshit. He just wants to fit in with the other barons that have enterprises like these.
We're expendable workforce for these people, but honestly I couldn't care less. This my chance to restart and I'm going to take it.
There are other people around here that I talked about too. Lee and I came from White Hook, so we managed to have some fun talking about stuff. We have a lot in common, but when I asked him why he wanted to go to Yuvenia he just closed up. It makes sense. We're all running from where we came from in this ship.
Lorelei is probably the most well off of all of us here. Daughter of a Peer and a wealthy seamstress, wife of a captain, I have no clue why someone like her would want to just leave, but then again, there's stuff around here that we don't talk about.
Jamie is a cunt, but of a good kind. Piece of shit keeps pranking everyone. Clown of the bunch of us, really.
Troy is probably the best of us when it comes to survival. He's been to Desser, to Alethia and even worked as a mercenary for the bloody Vordrans. Hopefully we can be grouped together so that I can learn a bit from him at least.
Then there's Dom, Tarik, Lessa and Rowan. These were all guild members that were trained to kill off beasts and so on, so they're right at home.
I guess I'm the odd one out. A small game hunter trying to survive in a place that was meant to kill you. Fucking idiot what am I doing here?
Day 20:
We're arriving in 5 days, apparently. We're all expecting to see these new fabled lands with our own eyes. All the stories say that it's a deadly land with dark rocks and deadly animals all around.
Some are starting to regret it but we were informed by the crew that they did not account for anyone wanting to come back, so they don't have extra supplies for the trip back if people don't want to continue.
One woman, Ellie, said that she needed to go back, that she couldn't just leave her family like that.
"Then you shouldn't have gotten in this ship, ma'am."
Most aren't this panicky though. Some are even happy that they'll be finally reaching the destination.
I don't really know where to put myself in this.
Excitement. Fear. Regret. Wonder. It's a mess.
Hopefully it'll be cleared out when we land.
Day 25:
We're here.
It's different than I had imagined. I was expecting pointy black rocks, spiked foliage and all that but honestly it just feels... empty. Like there's something missing in it.
To give the stories credit, the shores are indeed of black sand. They stretch out to the horizon on both sides, about 30 meters of beaches.
But the striking thing is the grass. Well, pretty much is just that. Tall grass as far as the eye can see, flowing on this gods' forsaken never ending wind.
The only thing that breaks that pattern are these weirdly shaped columns of black rock. Jarred (we like to call him the mad scientist) said that they're a natural wonder of whatever the thing but to me they're just weird columns stacked together on some spots of the shore.
But there's nothing else. No birds, no animals, no trees. It feels like this place is incomplete, like it's missing something to be considered normal.
We're done setting up a camp for ourselves, the tents can barely stand the winds. We're going to pick our groups tomorrow, the priest will do his blessing and we'll be off.
I feel strange. I guess it's expectation.
Day 26:
Well this was a shitty start.
The groups were picked after our breakfast.
Reed, me, Troy and Leah. Thankfully we got Troy and Reed, they're capable of handling themselves. Leah is a quiet woman, but she knows about nature enough to keep us from eating deadly plants, if there are any in this forsaken land.
The blessing of the priest clearly didn't work. I've seen how those happen. Had my fair share of blessing rituals when I tried my life as a sailor. That one wasn't it.
"... and may the roads of the Traveler guide you." And nothing. not even a single seal shined, not even the priest's. I looked at him and he was shook, like that had never happened before. There's something wrong in this place.
We packed up the camp and set it on the ship again. The captain of the ship reiterated that as per the contract they'd be here in one year, waiting to pick us up with any of our findings. Apparently he wasn't eager to stay longer since there was a storm brewing inland, so they left before it was noon.
And we also left.
Each group to one direction:
Lorelei's team went to the northeast, following the coastline to the left.
Jamie's team went to the southwest, to the opposite side.
We're going north, towards some hills in the distance.
The guild members are all together, they're going northeast, straight inland.
And Lee's team is going west.
We already set up camp. Apparently Leah is some sort of druid or something. She managed to control the grass and make us some decent shelter from the wind and the storm. It might get us during the night. I couldn't find any animals here so we're eating our rations for now. We all packed up rations for up to 40 days.
Day 27:
We ventured inland and had our first sight of a creature.
Troy saw a glimmer in the sky. None of them could point out, but I'm quite sure that it was something like a bird, but it's wings were shining in a weird light blue way. If the skies were clear we would've never spotted it.
It flew into the storm in the horizon to the northwest.
This storm is definitely not normal. The winds definitely suggested that it was coming our way, but it just looks static there. There are a lot of lightning and it is a non-stop pouring of water. I also definitely saw something weird coming from it.
The lightning came from the land, not the skies. I could notice that because it didn't really seem like one though, it was more like a whale's blowhole spouting water, but with lightning. No one believed me, but I saw that.
We're done setting up camp and I cooked us something. Leah seems worried about the storm. I am too. Troy is more focused on finding food for us, and he's discussing with Reed if it's a good idea for us to go towards the storm to see what's going on.
Day 29:
We saw the bird again, this time coming from the ground. Since it was literally the only different thing going on, we went towards where it was to examine it, and found this weird crystal thing. At a distance it blended with the grass since it's somewhat transparent. It's as tall as Troy and looks like glass, but it's hard as rock.
Reed tried to break a small piece of it that was sprouting near the base, but his tools didn't even make a dent in it.
It's a bit cold to the touch for me and feels just like all the other things in this place: empty.
Leah touched it and she said that it felt really cold, she couldn't touch it for long. We decided to keep a log of it and the general location and move on. Troy is charting a map of our path but he said that it's hard to measure the distance with the lack of defining features on the land. "It's all just grass and that damn storm there."
We're getting closer to it. The winds are getting a bit stronger, but are still bearable. Leah has been a really valuable asset to the team with her grass modelling stuff. I hope I can find a way to help too.
Day 30:
We're on the border of the storm. It is indeed static. The rain has been present since the beginning and it doesn't seem to be calming down in any way.
We're setting up camp on the border of the rain, there's like a line close to the storm where the wind just stops. Leah keeps saying that this is unnatural and that there's something in there that's causing this. Troy wants to go there but Reed doesn't, so they turned to me.
I'm also curious about this storm, so I'm down to go there and figure out.
Luckily, as we set up our camp I noticed something moving inside the rain. I didn't hesitate and went in with my bow. The visibility wasn't good, but the rain muffled my sounds and smell. I saw it and took my shot.
What I brought back to the group was a deer, but as I took the pelt away I saw some weird things about it. There were these small crystals dotting the fur, encrusted in the skin of the animal. The antlers were also encrusted with these same small crystals, but it didn't seem like they were placed there, more like they grew as a part of the animal.
Other than that, there was nothing special to it. The meat was good and we had a good supper for the first time. Even Leah ate. I thought she was vegetarian.
Day 34:
We went inside the storm.
First day: we started to see more of those crystals, but this time they weren't transparent. There was something in them, like a hazy blue liquid/gas floating inside. Reminded me of one of those potions for stamina that they sold at the apothecary I supplied for.
Inwards, the muddy ground slowed our progress immensely. There were these small holes where you could fit just a pinkie inside of. Leah told us that they were some sort of plant, but she had never seen those.
We did find some other creatures as well. Lizards with only their front arms slithered around in the muddy ground. I managed to catch one with my sling. It was something I had never seen before, like some sort of cousin to both snakes and lizards. I cooked it at our camp.
Second day: we went even more inside. The lightning epicentre was getting closer, and we saw the flashes before the thunder struck getting more and more frequent.
There were more of these crystals. They seemed to be charged with something, a hazy cloud that sparked from time to time. Reed thinks that maybe these crystals are making the storm happen.
Third day: we reached the epicentre and Reed was right about it.
A crystal that had double the size of Troy was endlessly sparking. It definitely fuelled the whole storm. We didn't want to get close to it so we decided to just leave.
But before we left one of those birds came from the skies and perched in the crystal itself. We all saw what happened, but no one wanted to discuss it.
The bird was giant. Like, the size of the crystal itself. Its feathers were all like it as well, and then it wrapped its wings around the crystal and sucked whatever was inside of it.
The wings were glowing with a blueish white hue and we clearly saw that the lightning strikes started to fade away.
I'm sure my arrows can't even scratch that thing. We better keep a distance.
We set up camp on top of a hill close to the giant crystal.
Fourth day (today): The rain has dissipated and opened up the horizon a bit. There are still no large mountains on the horizon, only hills. We saw some more animals appear: rabbit-like creatures that quickly zoomed through the tall grass and the same lizard-like creatures. It seems like nature flourishes after these crazy rains take place.
