Scree fields
- "Shrouded in fine mists and caressed by swirling winds, the scree fields were alive with hissing and whistling and soft howling moans that sounded horribly alive."
- —Nate Quarter's first impression of the area[1]
The scree fields were a mysterious place found at the very bottom of the edge cliff. The majority of the fields were made up of lots of rocks, or scree that had fallen from the edge cliff. Yet there were a few patches of luminous plant life found there.
The fields were discovered by Nate Quarter and Ambris Hentadile on their fourth descending expedition.
History
Arrival
Nate and the Professor discovered the fields accidentally through a controlled fall using their phraxpacks. However when they reached the bottom of their fall, their phrax packs broke and Nate landed on the Professor, breaking both of his legs.
Survival
They began to get used to their life at the bottom of the edge cliff, with Nate quickly making a bed for the professor out of various different types of moss he found there. He also began to keep a log of how long they had been there on a boulder that he removed of moss. They discovered many edible plants down there, and tried them out on the professor, who insisted that they experiment on him to save Nate the risk. Plate-Moss was edible, yet tasted like wet barkscroll. Pattern-moss seemed promising at first, but after a day of extreme sickness, they agreed to never try it again. Meat-lichen was delicious but rare to find, and the blue-spore moss satisfied their want for something sweet. The strange moss types grew back very quickly and were very numerous as they survived off only moss for 14 years.
After they stopped their documentation of the time spent down there, they began to lose track of time, not knowing how old they were, or how long it had been since they had talked to each other. They began to have strange vivid dreams, Nate dreaming of Edge-Wraiths, Grint Grayle and a crying Eudoxia. This could be caused my a number of things, the longing to return to the top of the edge cliff, going insane from the lack of sunlight an loneliness. Or the moss could have had an impact on them, either through their diet or from the light they gave off.
Return to Sanctaphrax
However one day the professor discovered a strange rock, it began to hiss and spin. He asked Nate to come over and drive a stake into it, the rock then pulled Nate into the air and left the professor in the fields alone. The scree fields were very important in the role in process groundrise as it was where the flight rocks came from.
The descent with the Linius Pallitax
The professor was left in the fields for a further 3 years, passing the time by meticulously documenting the movements of the clouds that travel up the edge cliff. As the scree fields were also important in the fact that they harboured many cloud formations. He was left there alone until Nate returned to rescue him in the nightship, Linius Pallitax. Upon arrival to the fields, they found the professor missing, but Nate copied down the descenders markings he had made on the clouds and where he was headed and followed him. They eventually found him later in Groundrise.
References
- ↑ The Descenders, Chapter 2