Edge of Iara

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The last beacon of Iara keeps staid vigil from its pedestal atop the husk of a Rothalgan air temple. Above it survey ships tarry, borne lofty by winds from Carentan. Where they go, few can follow.


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Retropost OOC, 2019.06.12: 

This image was a breakthrough for Finding Calais, and was well-received enough for viewers to comment on it with their own takes on its context (for that I am so, so grateful — as I’ve stressed ad infinitum, the ability to connect with others who feel for the same ideas I do (no doubt in their own special, special ways) is one of the most important driving factors behind my work.)

~ A little on my own understanding of the content: This high place is the furthest South a fellow can go over land on the Iaran continent before temperatures soar enough to fry eggs on rocks well into dusk. Be fool enough to proceed onward, and you’ll have to descend into a sweeping immensity of fissure-trellised desert. Five thousand kilometres later you’ll cross the equator, where the daily average is sixty-two degrees celsius. No vertebrate life has been documented in this band of equatorial wastes, nor is there any surface water to rely on; sans the ‘en stygia’ (subterranean) approach that riddles Malendar pulp fiction, the only reliable way to reach the other hemisphere is by air. 

It is no surprise, then, that this site appeals considerably to the human imagination. The air temple in the image was the spiritual home of Rothalgar, a realm which at its peak sent marches north which would cover two-thirds of the modern Federation. The temple’s husk has since 1286 housed the best-known beacon (Floor ‘Zero’) in all of Iara. Excursion ships bound on the dangerous passage South signal their departure to the beacon, and it receives them afterward by shining their way home. 


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