Deep valleys covered in thick brush with a singular clearing cut just wide enough for the
Town Gates.
A frigid and cloudless sky reveals the heavens; moonlight washes over blanketed trees. A
singular dwelling reveals itself near the southern face of the mountain side.
The Abandoned Farm
Far removed from contemporary customs and practices and far from the beaten track a
grey cottage looms out of the forest, shaded by an aging Aspen inhabited by
woodpeckers. But no one lives in the grey cottage any more. Its windows are black and
empty, no paths runs from barn to stable, willow herbs blushing in the summer sunlight
encircle the mounds of stone, and stinging nettles draw a veil of oblivion over the
farmtools which is fighting its final battle - against the ravages of rust.
The Waterfall
The thunder of falling water is audible for hundreds of yards, as the trail leads past a
small waterfall. Beneath the fall, a large pool spreads out, its edges covered with thick
growths of water plants. A few water birds quest among the growth, seeking for insects
and frogs. Downstream of the fall an ancient bridge crosses the water, its cracked stones
covered with moss. The path leads to the bridge, but some suspicious soul has tied a stout
rope across the water as well, forming a rope handrail for the decrepit structure.
The Old Tree
There is a range of mountains and a plateau in different shades of red, brown and purple.
The sky is blue and white clouds hang in the distance. A lonely tree is rooted on a rock
which juts out of the ground. The tree looks really old and dry. Some of the branches are
broken and the trunk is twisted. There are almost faded soot marks along the cracks of the
trunk suggesting that it was once hit by a lightning. Small stone statues are littered around
the roots of the tree, covered in dry moss.
Camp Spot
After a long days walk, fending off monsters, we all need a nice spot to layup and rest.
Each step requires purpose and strength of mind, tired, dusty and sodden, you traipse
onwards. The track twists to the left in muddy misery, its seemingly sole intent to cause
you languish. With the bend now turned, the ebb of life begins to reverse. Appearing
around the corner, what was dirt brown and monotonous, is replaced by a lush, green
centered, glade. The sun, having lost its fight to remain in the empyrean, concentrates its
final energies on the surrounding foliage. Rays, soft shafts of fading orange light, glide
through the gaps in the branches and leaves and nestle on the thick tall carpet of grass.
Butterfly's, the size of a mans hand, flitter in the warming glow, dancing in and out of the
shafts of light, fluttering from grass blade to tree trunk to flower. The murmurings of a
brook and the sweet smell of nectar drift gently on the still, silent and clement air.
Pass-On-By Country
The land here is ugly, dry, flat pass-on-by country. The dusty flats stretch for miles,
studded with curling grey weeds whose leaves are silvery with thirsty powder. As you
trek, you pass by the signs of some forgotten exodus through this region- the road is
scattered with the remnants of the abandoned detritus of a displaced life: scraps of
weather-whitened cloth, ancient boots and the rusty remnants of knives, shattered wagon
wheels. At one point, an ornate, carven chair, the wood roughened and silvered with
weather and age, its nobly-embroidered seatback peeling away from the frame, sits alone
alongside the road. Sometimes, there are bones.
At some distance away from the road, you see the dust-wallowing remnants of an ancient
mansion, surrounded by dilapidated fences. The structure looks a yellow-beige color like
bone, and seems to sag and bulge outward like a collapsing pumpkin. Darkness huddles
in its interior, hiding whatever secrets may lie there. The skeletons of trees sparsely
surround it, the tallest objects in the entirety of the sun-greyed landscape.
White Desert
Truly this is an earthly hell. The plains surrounding you are a flat, cracked expanse of
pure white earth from which every step boils thick, dry dust in enormous clouds.
Mountains, unearthly and black, seem to intrude on the horizon as if out of another world.
The sky is a stunningly-deep cobalt, and seems like an endless vault overhead, making
your head hurt to comprehend it.
As night falls, great nebular clouds gather on the horizons. Crackling balls of blue
lightning-fire fill the air and cling to the arms and the head, giving living things strange
glowing halos and shifting flashing outlines. Bolts of lightning rend the distant peaks, and
thunder booms across the dead white plains, but there is still no sign of rain.
Above The Tree-Line
You stand on the entrance to a natural amphitheater of rippled stones, ringed by knifeedged peaks. The morning light is breathtakingly clear, lancing in over the passes in
golden-pink flashes. Frost fuzzes the dirt, and the low shrubs and grasses are greying with
the cold. A footpath, leading to the stairway which will take you down to the valley floor,
curves whitely around the upper slope of the bowl and into the distance.
But oddly, in the center of this stone bowl, there is a single bent pine, a knotty ancient
with limbs heavy with red and green needles. Clots of shining amber sap, like the runnels
of tears, cascade down the trunk and gather on the pile of dead needles around its base.
How did this single eldertree come to grow here, in a stony bowl so far above the tree
line?
The Hovel
A tiny little hovel like so many others that might be found beyond the walls of any great
city, four walls of timber tilted at an angle by the unkind attentions of time and the
elements. The thatch roof is old and ill-maintained, the roof damp and rotting where it is
not missing altogether. Such is its state that the roof certainly will not survive the ice and
snow of the approaching winter. Creepers and sickly yellow moss clutch at the chinking
between the log walls. The awning of planks that has once shaded the front of the
structure are now drooped across much of the façade, one of its support poles knocked
down by some long past storm.
The Desert
The desert has a wild and terrible beauty. Enormous rock formations tower over the
glittering sand like wind eroded statues of monsters. An emerald lake glitter greenly
under the crimson sky. The path has been blown away and covered in white sand sand
long ago. The only hint suggesting it was once there are are dry and broken stones littered
on the ground. Far away are the remnants of a stone fence, suggesting that this was once
a fertile land of agriculture.
The Old Battlefield
The road has never been more than an overgrown mud track, little travelled and little
cared for, petered out to nothing more than a flattened earthen line, barely distinguishable
from the rest of the landscape.
The soil is dark and fecund and dark oaks stand like sentinels at the forest edge, their
branches high and leafy, a mixture of greens and russet browns. A cold mist hug the
ground leading towards the forest, a wild, scrubby heath of unkempt grasses and thorns
with stagnant pools of water and lumpen, snow-covered mounds of earth. Here and
there,is a rusted sword blade, spear point or arrowhead and the occasional bleached
whiteness of bone.
Camp Spot Two
In a hollow depression in the earth with an icy pool at its base and a low cluster of rocks
and bushes gathered around its ragged circumference rests an ancient waystone. It rears
up atop a flowering mound of grass, its smooth grey surface carved and painted with
strange symbols and spirals that no soul can read anymore. At the base of the waystone is
the remnants of a bonfire, that side of the stone is still charred by the smoke.
The Forest Clearing
Chilled rain patter down through the naked branches of black elms and twisted maple.
The ground beneath is coated in a stinking, matted slime of dead leaves that had fallen
the autumn before and now lay rotting back into the dark soil. Spring will take a long
time coming here. Occasionally a woodpecker hammers in the distance, or some loon or
other bird would whoop. Cobwebs are nestled in low branches hung with rainwater like
diamond chokers. A rusted iron bucket with a rotten rope is half buried in the dark soil,
indicating that somewhere; Hidden by leafs, is an old well.
The Second Forest Clearing
The clearing is wide and open trees have been cleared for it and now the wood has been
burnt on a stone slab set before a crude statue. The ground is marshy and stinging nestles
with purple flowers grow in the black puddles of water. Frogs, black snakes and all sots
of critters live slither and jump around in the bog. Big logs in the black mud makes a safe
passage across the clearing and past the statue. The statue, composed of dry mud is
fighting against the ravages of moisture and rain. Someone has poked it with a stick that
is left buried in it's belly.
Mud Pit
A festering pit of brown muck and putrid animal decay, this mud pit is the size of a small
lake. Closer inspection reveals obvious shallows while darker spots indicate deeper
depths. Flies buzz around a half-eaten duck while a carrion bird attempts to pull out the
remains of a rabbit. An occasional gurgle and bubble from the mud pit indicates that there
could be additional life forms dwelling within it. A small boat is marooned on the mud
banks.
Cliff’s Edge
Standing at the edge of a cliff, salt air fills your nostrils and the wind chills your bones.
Although an obvious dead end, the view is breathtaking. Wildflowers dot the cliff edge
and small animals scrounge for possible edibles. Far below, the sea crashes onto the
jagged rocks while seagulls soar through the blue sky.
Fruit Orchard
Clusters of luscious peach and apple trees can be seen in this flourishing orchard.
Healthily trimmed, the fruit grow comfortably within its required space despite the
variety of bees and birds that partake of the ripe fruit. A young boy can be seen in the
distance as he fills his pack while up in a tree.
Rice Paddy Field
The symmetric rows of rice shoots extending from the water gives the impression that
this flooded land is carefully looked after. The water, though muddy, does not appear to
be contaminated. Rising from tall stilts in the center of the field is a large platform with a
box filled with agricultural tools.
Spoiled Fruit Orchard
As if ravaged upon by a disease, this fruit orchard has dropped most of its fruit. Covering
the ground is a thick layer of rotten pears and decaying plums. Some trees are completely
barren while others are simply devoid of life with cracked and worm-hole riddled trunks.
One tree, with a single pear hanging from a bough, has a broken butterfly feeder at the
base.