WORLD BOOK WORLD BOOK WORLD BOOK 0107 0107
Bạn đang xem bản rút gọn của tài liệu. Xem và tải ngay bản đầy đủ của tài liệu tại đây (1.56 MB, 1 trang )
Chapter 5: TRAVERSING THE WASTELANDS
were the steppes and grasslands of their day. Chieftains
and nobles raised buried mounds atop their fallen ancestors and packed these many-chambered graves with trinkets and tools to ease the afterlives of those buried there.
The cataclysmic climate changes of the last couple
of centuries and their resulting erosion has collapsed
many of these mounds into sinkholes. What lies within
are the crypts and sarcophagi of the ancient dead, along
with any poisons, traps, or curses meant to keep plunderers at a distance. These sites often have extensive
networks of dark tunnels linking them to other burial
mounds, some of which still rest deep underground.
Common lore tells travelers to avoid such places at all
costs, and any fool who willingly enters one should be
abandoned in favor of more cautious companions.
Personal Dangers
While Khitus harbors many dangers, there are some
limited to one’s body and safety. There are yet those
on Khitus who do not know basic survival strategies,
though most quickly find how precarious life can be in
the wastelands without preparation.
Dehydration
Regardless of one’s surroundings, water is always a primary necessity. A man doing any work in desert heat, or
just walking and traveling, needs 25 pounds of water per
day; rationing and less activity can reduce this by half.
Krikis and Cold Skins adapt better in these environs and
require half that amount. Pachyaur (and thakal or swafa
draft animals or mounts) need four times as much water
as humans to survive in the deserts.
Carrying that much water around is a heavy burden,
but places to stop and replenish in the desert are uncommon at best. Water skins are heavy and inconvenient, while pack-mounted skins provide ease of movement. Those fortunate enough to have draft animals
can put the burden on them, provided there are skins,
amphora, or other appropriate containers. Still, the animals’ needs must be considered, too.
A wise desert traveler looks for desert plants that need
water, such as the khitan oak or the blood bush. He
knows that birds tend to circle over water sources. He
knows where to find water in low areas or how to prepare
to gather morning dew. He also knows to look for waterholding life like cacti or fleet fullets (see Chapter 7).
The consequences of dehydration emerge quickly. A
victim becomes weak in body and mind. Strenuous activity becomes impossible first, and walking may falter
or end after just a day or two. Decision-making becomes
increasingly difficult as a person thinks only of finding a
way to slake his thirst. Still, very few die from dehydration in the desert. Predators take down the slowed and
befuddled long before they die of thirst.
Of course, some mitigate the need for water through
the application of heyeshel, the “water spice.”
Hesheyel, the Water Spice
Carrying enough water through the arid lands is a
problem Khitans have dealt with that for centuries. Alchemists have long known of a substance to help mitigate these problems. The so-called “water spice” hesheyel helps someone go much longer with much less
water, though it carries its own dangers.
The ingredients to this harsh-tasting concoction are
fairly common: fedethu cactus roots brewed with the
leaves of common garden vegetables and the blood and
sinew of various desert animals such as the kuroo mouse
or the tiny arara lizard. Hesheyel creation requires no
magic but is a skill carefully guarded by an enclave of
alchemists and country witches. They are rare enough
that each can make a good living brewing and selling
the spice but numerous enough that none hold a monopoly on hesheyel. The final product is either a foul
liquid to be drunk quickly or a soft lozenge packed with
salt that one can suck on for an hour or more.
A single dose of high-quality hesheyel allows a human to survive on one-tenth the required hydration for
a day. This holds true for other nonhuman races as well,
since the spice alters the water intake of living tissues.
Profit-minded caravan masters often require workers to
take water spice, since doses of high-quality hesheyel
are half the costs in water conveyance alone. To boost
those profits, though, dishonest merchants use inferior
hesheyel, which is cheaper to produce but more dangerous. Most desert people, even those accustomed to
hesheyel, cannot distinguish the difference between
good- and poor-quality water spices until far too late.
Hesheyel shuts down certain body tissues that can turn
into “death flesh” in just a few days. For the first few days,
death flesh remains hidden internally, but slowly manifests
as grey and brown patches on the skin. Growing side effects include (in order of occurrence) increasing hair loss,
bloodshot eyes, a thickened tongue, loosened or lost teeth,
and darkened nails or hooves. Most say none can survive
more than three weeks on hesheyel before all of one’s nails
are dark—a sure sign one has become a desert zombie. The
body can repair any damage short of that, however, by
drinking full complements of water and abstaining from
hesheyel for three times the number of days spent using it.
105
