Ghyll:Ungerry-Tubers
Contents
You will find no advertisements for it in Folktown. It is not the ultimate challenge to any mountain climbers. No Wakanpantricist guards have ever been stationed there. It is not well-known nor is it often sidestepped in conversation due its eerieness. No disappearances have occurred there, alleged or otherwise. And it isn't where they, them, those, or that! come from. It is simply a spot, geologic, and isolated - very isolated. It is Ungerry-Tubers.
It is so isolated that only a smidgen of the scholarmatic pool have even looked into it. Those interested in biotoxicology or in taxidermatology seem to find enough work in their own backyards; the geomantics who should take interest are too busy... elsewhere. But those few who have taken on the long trek, the hefty hike, the incongruous terrain, and the hot-cold showers that fall without warning, have found therein a realm of wyrding effects.
Cartographic Placement
Located within the vastness of the Sarfelogian Mountains, the Ungerry-Tubers is quite easily misplaced. The whole undulating scape of slopes, valleys, and rivers is filled with both friendly and unfriendly locales, most of them unvisited. One must not forget that the term Sarfelogia is a name that brings to mind economic marginality, isolated peoples, and distinctive folkways. For this reason, it is necessary to get a guide in some parts of the journey, odd guides from within the odder townships that one finds in those most odd parts of the mountains. Yet to speak of the Ungerry-Tubers is to speak nonsense to these people, rather they speak of the Goode Smellie and the Obbnixious Foots, others give the name Mztlplik or Zingry Karzt. There is an unspoken deference to the Ungerry, or to something therein, by the folk who live close enough to it; whether they see it as being magicked, hexed, or pyxied is hard to tell. Once the traveller finds his way into Hat (aka Prollztqx), however, it is quite easy to feel the formation of the Tubers. You see, the attitude changes.
- "The Ungerry ist one o the lytl-troddn places of ooure world; I find that my senses are enhanced, perhaps, or ist this my owne imaginings?" --Ser Daffid Lud (journal entry -36 EC)
Formational Denotation
The Ungerry has been explained briefly by Orogenezis, a student of Rancticirchiretic within the discipline of theoarcheology:
- "The Ungerry-Tubers is but one more proof of the post-mortem rearrangement hypothesis, for whereas the whole of the Sarfelogian is obviously the parietal bone of the divine #47, this bastion of protruding unction is securely a segment of the lachryma."
Rancticirchiretic, himself, never mentions the Tubers in his writings nor does Oblibestircus, and when this place is mentioned in the heated debates and rebuttals between scholars, students, and members of the Cranee Historical Society, it is usually a name bantered about as if it were a donut held in the hands of a constable from Bute.
No one has ever taken the time to excavate the Tubers, indeed, with so few involved in the subject and fewer still interested in this particular location, the question of cranial dismemberment and the exact metabiological make-up of #47 has been poorly developed. Questions such as did #47 suffer suspension?, was he/she/it/they murdered by an assailant, deific or otherwise?, or did #47 die from a pre-historic gardening accident? have been left for anyone else to study on their own. Discounting the few exaggerated entries in Aliens Everywhere, the most prolific writer on the Ungerry-Tubers has been Dash Humbugg of Umbo Moor.
What can be said is that the top-most cranium piece of a god is what makes up the majority of this mountain chain, along with a grand mixture of sand, rock, dirt and clay. Upon this one specific area of the mountains there has been added a fore-piece of the god's skull face, the lachrymal bone, along with yet more earth, mud and rock: this is the Ungerry-Tubers.
Denotative Poverty in Associative Phenomena
- "Dessication is but a fool's quible; #47 could have or might not have died or dispersed or simply slithered away. The proof is in the puke-puddle: look at what we've got, not what we want to see." --Dash Humbugg (-5 EC)
Oblibestircus and his following states the current and well-defended explanation that the old gods simply lie where they died (for whatever reason), and that their incorporation into the landscape is the result of natural processes. Blivingdel's school, however, holds quite evocatively that we ourselves have taken the immortal remains of the gods of previous generations and have cut, split, buried, vaulted, hemmed & hawed them over. Though both theories give explanations as to how the divine remains may or may not have gotten to where they are now, they do not give any explanation as to the various phenomena associated with selected body parts of those same dead gods.
A third theory regarding the formation of the Sarfelogian Mountains is that they are a result of the dirt, rocks, boulders, sand and mud of this northern area heaving, undulating, and being folded over itself and then some. Though this is a favorite idea of the geomanticists and the masonrics, it is still but a theory. The Sarfelogian does indeed appear like unto a marbled crumbe-cake with its swirls of light and dark, and the geodizers state confidently that the folded bands are the remains of silt and sediment pushed up over time. Even if this is true, however, the majority of this group concedes that it was probably #47 who did the heaving, pushing, and folding... a secondary group believes that this was the work of a second god, the one who perhaps murdered #47 and then used the silt, sand, rocks, and earth to cover up his/her/its diabolical deed. When did the death of #47 occur? No one knows, but what is known is that the Sarfelogian is the oldest mountain chain on our world.
Attitudinal Observations
It has been noted by many that the Jorvyll Mountains are differentiated from the Sarfelogian Mountains primarily by their attitude. The Sarfelogians are a much calmer, more peaceful and helpful range of mountains than the Jorvyll. Yet while the distinction between the northern edge of the world and the mountains which abutt them is useful for some inquiries, it doesn't help a dawdle when looking only at the Sarfelogian! Within the Sarfelogian one finds numerous elevations and attitudes, as well as varied ecologies that encompass much more than quaint Pziqq trees and mountain meadows. Not all within these mountains is pure and fluff, there are many vales and faults that hold darker tuff.
The scenic ranges of the Sarfelogians abound in trails, paths, passes and crude roads built by the Keglacians. Many of these routes feature breathtaking vistas and are popular spots for camping and travel. None of these lead to Hat, as it lies in the unfortunate gravel vale where the only view is of the sheer rock wall on which it perches and the deep river which lies many tens of unanits below (far enough to kill a foolish Ghyllite stupid enough to fall from the many rope bridges). The only reason the place exists is its proximity to the Ungerry. To its south the attitude is quite plain and noncomittal, to the east it is downright rude, directly in the Ungerry it is quite refreshing, however, as I have already noted, the odd Sarfelogians (who cringe at being called so) refuse to build directly on the Tubers.
On a side note, it must be said that Hat, for all its backward, old-fashioned ways - including that awful form of governance named twin governments - did make one contribution to mainstream Ghyllian culture: that of Old hat (though it is my opinion that if most Ghyllites knew that "Old hat" came from a bunch of dirty Sarfelogians, they'd stop using that phrase and make up a new one in a heart-beat!).
Actuated Phenomena
"That is not a crab-cake, that's my wife!"
"Now, THAT is wyrd"
It is well-known to those in the know, which is actually quite a small number of folk (mostly men in white smocks who like to go on safari away from their wives), that howzingery, which elsewhere occurs quite rarely, is quite common in the Ungerry-Tubers.
The commonality of howzingery at the Ungerry-Tubers is one effect of wyrding, others include nearby stands of the zoological etherberrie and the presence of viable squelchous panderat. Why and how wyrding occurs at the Tubers is not understood. Whether it is a result of the Ungerry being part of a dead god is not proven, though probably not for most of Ghyll would then be subject to wyrding; whether it is a result, in particular, of being part of the divine cranial case is not proven either, though more suspect this to be closer to the truth.
Consequential Vectors
- "I've a friend of a friend who has an acquaintance whose second sister went wassailing one night and returned a whole month later babbling of cold mountain lakes and the magic rock that saved her from monsters. After much coaxing and sending her to a twitch doctor I have come to believe that the "magic" rock she holds so dear comes from the Ungerrie." --From an article by Tue published in Wyrd Tales (-7 EC)
With all that has so far been noted, observed, and stated, can it be argued that, even as the Elminster Mire was long ago, the Tubers is a force to be reckoned with? For the time being, no. It is far too far from even the smallest semblance of civilized Ghyll (Hat being only a rude outpost of the crudest individuals). Even the Cranee Historical Society, which has taken the lead in maintaining standards of exploration and discovery and amassing deep historical records, has taken no interest in the Ungerry-Tubers. Yet is it a force? Yes.
Although my aides brought back no proof, the men and women of Hat spoke of the Ungerry's connection to the heh-blammo balance. If there is any truth to this, the Tubers may prove a part of the concept known as the Grande Gray Fractional.
Citations: Grande Gray Fractional, Howzingery, Squelshous Panderat.
--Nikos of Ant 19:10, 10 October 2005 (EDT)
