Here’s this week’s quick questions thread!
The Cave of Nadir has some great cards. I think my favourite is Lost at Sea. But I can’t quite get who are we remembering.
Eggs, Love outside of the Chain, Multi-eyed zee-beasts. You have any idea who’s speaking?
[quote=Lucius Vera]The Cave of Nadir has some great cards. I think my favourite is Lost at Sea. But I can’t quite get who are we remembering.
Eggs, Love outside of the Chain, Multi-eyed zee-beasts. You have any idea who’s speaking?[/quote]I’m not sure if there’s any definitive answer for that question, so I can only offer a supposition. Lengthy theory follows:[spoiler]It seems likely that the memories you are experiencing belong to another human. Given that their love was initially manufactured via the consumption of moon-miser milk, the person might have once been an ‘orphan’ which, in turn, means they were probably forced to fall in love with something monstrous. The other figure is described as glistening, which honestly doesn’t tell us much, but they can also click like a machine, lay eggs, and apparently have limbs that are worth taking as trophies.
I’m going to propose that the figure you are talking to in the memories is a tyrant moth. Insects do not have lungs, so their ‘vocalization’ typically involves vibrating the air/surrounding matter or stridulation (rubbing body parts together). Some members of the Lepidoptera family (butterflies and moths) have tymbals (you’ll probably be familiar with these because of cicadas) that allow them to produce high frequency clicks through stridulation. Of course, the figure is also speaking to you normally but the Neath/Nadir is weird like that (also, it’s difficult to have a meaningful and haunting dialogue if you can’t understand it). Tyrant moth wings are also described as being like a ‘map of the unconsenting sky’ and can project visions of the Garden in the elder continent where Stone shines. Interesting to note: if you say something glistens the thing you are referring to is typically wet but if you say something is glistening it merely means that it is shining with light, regardless of whatever state it may be in.
Moths do lay eggs and some moth larvae, as well as imago stage moths, can be carnivorous. There seems to be some concern about what will happen to the father when the eggs hatch, so the love-struck tyrant moth could be worried that the larvae would consume their relatively fleshy father. The figure mentions heading north with their ‘fruit’ (often an analogy for eggs/ovaries) to hunt among the zee-bergs. Tyrant moths are typically found in the north near the ragged crow lighthouse, but they can also be found in the far east near saviour’s rocks/gossamer way. These locations are both very far from London, so it would take an experienced zailor to be quite familiar with these beasts. Killing a tyrant moth is quite the feat and their limbs could potentially make nice trophies for any daring zailor. Their antennae are apparently quite delicious as well.[/spoiler]But all that is really just a guess. I doubt the answer will ever be revealed, so it’s another one of the many mysteries of the Neath.
Thank you, that’s a great answer, even if it’s only a theory. I somehow forgot about that creature. Also,
that reminds me of Almost Dead Man who lived in the Undercrow. He’s in the northern part of the Neath, very close to a Tyrant moth and have something called Most-moth growning inside of him. Possibly the same kind of moth? My headcanon now, that after a failed ambition he has become that ‘orphan’.
Is there a way to cash in Investigating… quality?
[quote=Waterpls]Is there a way to cash in Investigating… quality?[/quote]You can trade in Investigating… at the storylet ‘The Heights of Chicanery’ in the Flit. The options ‘Raid a Message-Drop’ and ‘More than just Messages’ both have an investigating… challenge. The first gives 270 cryptic clues, while the second can give 540 rostygold or 540 foxfire candles, 10 second city relics, and a reprehensible lizard on a rare success.