Part 2 begins with … THE ESCARPMENT RIVER
In this Picture is the Escarpment River as it flows north towards the Zom River. The river runs between the Get Volcano and the large lava rock escarpment. On the valley side along the river, below the Volcano is the RED TENT, the Geologist camp, the Palm oil orchard, the tobacco fields, the melon patch, Get Hill, the river weed patch and finally the Zom River.
At the bottom of the pictue you can see a small ishand full of river weed, ripe for harvest. In the left part of the picture some of the village center buildings, and guild houses can be seen. The farmer’s huts and their fields are behind and on the side of the village center. Behind the fields, next to the volcano in the upper left hand corner of the picture, is the ceremonial entrance to the Warding Path that leads 75 miles through the jungle to the Dragon Riders Goddess Temple.
The Escarpment River is the Western-most border of Get Village. Running parallel to the 60 foot tall volcanic rock escarpment cliff on one side and the valley on the other, this river separates civilization and humanity from the dangerous jungle. Even though they hear the happy screams and squeals of the Invisibals native children playing in the rivers, there are too many things waiting in the river to eat Get children that can’t see the Invisibals children.
All Get village children are taught at an early age never to enter or cross the two rivers that borders the “Sides” of the village, the East River and the Escarpment River. They are also warned to never enter the Zom river that borders the front of the village. There are crocodiles in the border rivers and there are fresh water sharks in the Zom River.
The escarpment cliff is the result of a massive lava flow that emanated from the grandmother volcano two hundred and fifty miles to the West.
The two legs, as Uths the dragon calls them, occupies a small dot of land on the outskirts of his domain. That land is bordered by the three rivers and a small vein mound to the south. To Uths, all volcanos are veins. The Village is situated at the edge of the great grandmother vein’s lava field in a small flat depression that was washed out a few thousand years ago.
Like all dragons, Uths holds the memories of all his ancestors. So his memory also includes his Great Grandfather’s, who saw the valley being carved out of the earth when a lava dam next to the great grandmother volcanio vein collapsed. All at once the big lake of water behind it, rushed to the ocean like a small sea running to it’s mother. That massive rush of water washed out the valley floor that the village now occupies.
THE GET VOLCANO
The Volcano that you see in this picture, borders the back of the Get valley and is one of the grandmother volcano’s smaller vein mounds.
Get village is bordered on the West by the 60 foot tall escarpment of lava fields formed by a massive grandmother volcano that is situated 30 dragon flaps to the West. (Five miles equals one flap of a mature dragon’s wings, Times 30 flaps = 150 miles). No human, except the dragons riders, have ever seen it. The Get volcano lies just past the edge of the grandmother volcano’s massive lava field cliffs called the escarpment.
Although impressive to the humans, the Get volcano just a little outlet vain that is connected to the Grandmother volcano.
The Get villagers have lived with this active volcano for generations. They have learned to drill beneath their houses to access the natural underground hot springs to provide fresh hot running steam water inside their houses, something that even the richest houses in the big port city of Artune at the mouth of the Zom river, do not have.
This Volcano is having its strongest eruptions ever recorded in the short 100 year history of Get village.
The King has sent his Geologist to investigate and the territorial regent has used the eruptions as an excuse to visit Get and collect the taxes early, even though he is really here to buy a horse.
The Get villagers know their volcanos temperament and have lived with it for generations. Like the natives who live on the ice continent in the far north have 25 names for snow, the villagers of Get have many names for the different stages of the volcanos molten lava rock. The Zom Jungle natives call lava “Mother’s Blood.”
The villagers are not concerned about the eruptions. They can see that the molten lava is just now reaching the Volcanos original footing. By its changing color, they also know that the lava flow will soon cease, cool and harden before it reaches the edge of the village.
What really has the villagers interest is the Phoenix fire bird that has suddenly appeared and has been seen flying above the volcano.
THE PHOENIX
The Phoenix as it flies above the Get volcano’s eruptions.
Whenever the Get Volcano has a substantial eruption, the Phoenix appears above the spewing lava. The fire bird has been seen more in the last few months than in the whole 100 year history of Get. Some say he lives inside the volcano’s throat and vacates it during the eruptions. Some say he is an illusion caused by the heat of the lava flows.
There is no explanation why the Phoenix only appears during volcanic episodes. Maybe the dragons know. A delegation Wizards and Magus are in Get, representing “The Order”. They are here to take the seventy five mile hike through the jungle to the Goddess Temple to ask the Dragon about the Phoenix phenomenon. None the less, real or illusionary, the phoenix is a beautiful sight.
THE PHOENIX’S LONG LOOK
In this picture, shot by a dragon rider in flight, we get to see the phoenix from behind for the first time.
Here you see the Phoenix from the back of the volcano looking down onto the village. Through the heat haze of the volcano’s eruption you can see the red roofed Horse Stable on the right. Between the flames of the lave flow and the stable you can see the blue top of the ceremonial guard tower. The guard tower is the entrance to the Warding trail that goes deep into the Zom jungle to the Goddess Temple. On the left of the Phoenix are the craft houses surrounding the village center, and beyond that, the Zom river and the jungle.
From where ever you are in the village, when you look up at the Phoenix flying over the volcano, it always seems to be facing you.
THE FLYING DINOSAUR
The flying dinosaur is gliding down the side of volcano towards the RED Tent. Notice the black lava field at the base of the volcano. It was left by the last big eruption 100 years ago.
There is something about the magic of the dragon lair’s realm that sustains the primeval conditions that allow dinosaurs to live and prosper. Most dinosaurs reside within a few miles of a dragon’s lair itself. The flying dinosaurs usually use the dragon’s lair mountain as their nesting place. At first they had only been seen by the relatively few dragon slayers who actually made it close to the dragon’s lair mountain and escaped out of the jungle with their lives.
Now that the Goddess Temple is complete, and situated almost next to the dragon’s lair mountain, the temple’s residents and their visitors are gifted regularly by the sight of the boney winged lizards soaring overhead. Until the appearance of the one flying around the Get Volcano’s latest eruptions, the people of the village, like most the rest of the world, had never seen a flying dinosaur.
THE RED TENT
The RED Tent is for the exclusive use of the women of Get Village.
For every boy born in Get, there are three girls. That is because of the nature of the dragon’s realm magic. The same applies to all of the animals born inside the dragon’s realm.
With that fact alone, it is no surprise that Get is a matriarchal society. The women spend their “Moon Time” bathing, steaming and meditating in their restorium called the RED tent. Although it is a sanctuary for ceremony, it also a place to just “Hang Out” for the women.
The menstrual cycle of the whole population of the village women have entrained in such a way that once a month, the running of Get village is left up to the men for around three days while the women commune and sing ritual songs in their RED Tent. The inner chambers of the building resonate harmonically whenever the woman’s voices merged in song and their voices can be heard echoing throughout the valley. So once a month the men of Get are serenaded by their woman folk.
THE RED TENT IS A BUILDING
The Red Tent is in actuality, not a tent. It is a building.
Called the RED Tent because of it’s ancient traditional origins, this special building is situated at the base of the Get Volcano and next to the fresh water river that runs parallel to the lava escarpment cliffs. The RED Tent has all the heat and water that it needs for the hot tubs and saunas inside. Its saunas and hot tubs are fed and refreshed by the volcano’s hot water steam vents under the building. The water for the cooling tubs come from the Escarpment River.
The RED Tent was erected by the first group of Goddess Temple priestess initiates who came to Get to study with Annindale, the first dragon rider. This building was used by the dragon riders initiates during the early formation of the Dragon Riders order. It was made available to all of the women of the village during their monthly “Moon Time.”
When the construction of Goddess Dragon Temple next to the Dragon’s lair mountain was completed, the Annindale handed over the Get RED Tent to the women of the village. There is now an exact replica of the RED Tent in the meditation garden at the Dragon Riders Goddess Temple in the valley of the Dragon’s lair mountain.
MIDNIGHT MOON TIME AT THE RED TENT
The RED Tent during Moon Time at night.
This building is made of a rare translucent red obsidian stone that the Goddess Temple priestess had carved form the center of an extinct volcano deep in the Zom Jungle. It was then brought to Get by Uths the dragon, one brick at a time. When the fires witin the Red Tent are lit at night, the translucent building radiates a glow like a lantern.
THE RED TENT PRIESTESS
The Get RED Tent priestess.
Just by coincidence Juanna the RED TENT Priestess is also one of the GET RED sisters. Juanna is the second eldest in the first set of the Reddish triplets. Because Juanna lives in the RED Tent, it is considered a village Craft house.
Although all the buildings in this “LEGO” diorama are detailed inside, you will not see the inside of the RED Tent. That is unless you’re a female LEGO “Mini-Fig” that has been invited in by the Get witch, or the RED Tent priestess.
THE GEOLOGIST’S CAMP
The geologist and the Fort Artune soldiers have set up a camp in Get near the Volcano. You can see the village tobacco fields behind the encampment.
Because the Volcano that borders the back of the Get Valley has currently been erupting more than it ever has since its recorded history, the King of the North has sent a team of geologists to investigate. He also sent a squad of soldiers from the Port Artune fort along with them to protect the geologists from the wilds of the surrounding jungle.
The village council tried to convince this group that the Zom jungle was like no other they have ever encountered. The elders explained that because the volcano is within the realm of a dragons magic, the jungle surrounding it was a living death trap. They requested that, for the troops own protection, the geologists send the soldiers back down the river and hire the local village woodsmen as guides and protection.
The geologists rejected the council’s offer of woodsmen as guides, thinking that it was just a ploy to gain some employment for the locals. In the 2 weeks since they arrived, the group has lost one geologist to a sword bush, one soldier to a crocodile and another soldier to a spitting frog. All standard jungle causes.
The remaining geologists have now realized that they have underestimated the situation and are going to take the council up on their offer. The soldiers, although happy to be relieved of duty by the local woodsmen, will be sad to leave this village full of strong beautiful single women. Most of the strong beautiful single women of Get, however, are glad that the soldiers leaving for Port Artune on the next trade ship.
A Get Woodman is like no other woodsmen on the planet. That is because they carry the legacy of the teachings that the founder of Get passed on to all of the woodsmen of village.
By the time the original Get woodsmen and explorer established the village at the bottom of the escarpment falls, He had become a living legend in his own time, as the most knowledgeable and skilled woodmen on the planet. But it took more than just the knowledge and skill to survive inside a dragons realm jungle for any length of time. Get had the natural attributes of a witch or wizard and developed and used them in his chosen profession as a woodmen.
Get’s reputation brought woodmen up the Zom river to study and apprentice with him. A large parentage of his apprentices did not live long. That is because the kind of learning situations that a woodsmen encounters in this dangerous jungle are very deadly.
The apprentices who “did” live through Get’s “dragon’s realm jungle survival training” were sought after by towns and villages situated in woods and jungles all around the world. Because of this, many of the woodsmen that Get trained, did not stay in the dragon’s realm jungle for long.
The woodsmen who stayed to serve Get village, where the ones who had learned Get’s ultimate lesson.
That lesson was, “To survive in a dragon’s realm jungle, you had to learn how to love the jungle instead of fear it”.
PALM OIL PRODUCTION
You can see the dwarf palm oil trees in the back ground of this picture. The mini-warding lamps on the fences that surround the orchard keeps the jungle rats from eating the palm seeds.
Depending on their age, most mature nut producing palm oil trees are naturally 40 to 60 feet tall. But with the help and advice of the native Invisibles, Get, the man, developed a variety of dwarf palm oil trees, which made harvesting the palm nuts much easier. After cultivating this new variety, he handed the trees over to the village farmers.
Palm oil is an edible plant oil derived from the fruit and nuts grown in the palm oil trees. The oil is used for cooking, baking and other food production. Palm oil is a major ingredient in most soaps and washing powders, and is also used as a machine and wheel lubricant.
The Goster family is harvesting the last of the palm nuts of the season. The oil is being siphoned into containers and prepared for shipment to Port Artune and beyond.