The World of Acqua

[Cheka Man]

Murderer's Isle, fifty miles from Banhoesea, is where, once a year, a cargo of murderers is sent to kill each other off.They have clockwork collars placed around their necks that if not unlocked within three days, will send a short sharp spike into their throats, slashing them open. They are given bags containing food and water for one day and a random weapon, which can be as deadly as a wizard's staff or as harmless as a jester's staff.The island itself is covered in a dense forest.

The collars are enchantted to come off when there is only a single survivor. The survivor is then collected.Some become galley slaves, others become torturers for the Shogun.It is said that the island is full of the bones of previous murderers.

[Maggot]

I've finally finished the Black Tide.  

[Maggot]

Captain,when will work begin on the various Jovian clans? (No pressure on you, of course. You've got  a ton of commitments no doubt.)

  I just can't wait for Acqua to be fully fleshed out!  This is one setting I would give my little finger to be able to RP in.

[Cheka Man]

If the Captian feels too busy to create the Jovian clans, then I would be happy to create one or two of them and leave the rest for him.Normally I would not suggest such a thing as it would be pushy but this is a special case...Acqua is my world after all,and I need to add to it soon.

[Cheka Man]

Snapper Bass

Snapper Bass look very much like normal Sea Bass but they are a bane to the fishermen and fisherwomen and a menace to many of the other creatures of the sea. They are concentrated into a few great shoals for protection, but whilst most shoals are not dangerous to anything except fish fry and plankton, when something attacks this shoal it retaliates. Each fish has a mouthful of sharp teeth but by itself would not be much of a threat. In shoals of up to perhaps thirty thousand, they are a menace, because they turn on almost anything that they see as a threat. By their numbers alone they have been known to kill sharks and strip them to the bone.

Even the larger predators tend to avoid these individualy feeble but collectivly fearsome fish, which have been known to bite right through ordinary fishing nets and can only be caught with metal nets.

For eleven months of the year they eat plankton, but in their breeding month they eat almost everything they can find.Cleaner fish, who eat parisites and fungus from other fish and sea creatures, are left alone
as nothing sane in the oceans, not even the G'Thrann, will deliberatly eat a Cleaner fish.Most other sea creatures are fair game, to the point where they can cause famine to islanders who depend largely on fishing for their food.

[Cheka Man]

Once it is said, in the mists of time, the greatest G'Thrann of them all, Oggogogogoch, decided that he was not satasfied with lording it over the depths of the oceans, but would challange the great god Jove for power, and rose to the surface roaring what he would do.When he reached it he caused great waves to drown many of the islands and their inhabitants. Amongst the few who did survive was Bel-Tamaguchi who rode the waves in an Ark.

So large was Oggogogogoch and so close was he to Acqua (this was before Jove knew that Acqua was homosexual) that Jove could not simply blast him into pieces, and had to draw his mighty Sword of Punishment that he used to cut apart the souls of those who had sinned,and hack Oggogogogoch to pieces. Yet there was so much life within Oggogoggogoch that he could not die totally. His slashed up pieces of tentacle became millions of tiny worms, and Jove thought they had no intellect and let them live as he coulden't be bothered to dredge them all up from the oceans.

They became the Black Tide and to this day they possess the bodies of humans, hoping one day to find a spell that will reconsitute themselves so that they can get their revenge on Jove.

[CaptainPenguin]

Yeah, hold on, I'll get to it in a while...

*looks distracted*

[Cheka Man]

My brother was playing "Age of Empires" on my computer and now it goes slowly and all the colours are wrong. So if I don't write anything new for a while then my computer is being fixed.

[Maggot]

I've changed the the second type of beastie in my post,the Black Tide,a little. Now,they're magic-phobic.

[Cheka Man]

Far to the north of Acqua is the Mussel Shore, a place full of geysers and warm pools on the ege of the great northern icecap.The pools and some of the geysers,where the water is not too hot, are full of bactrial and algal life, and the shellfish which are at the bottom of the food chain feed on it. There are large crabs the size of a dinner plate and birds with oversized beaks that are designed for eating shellfish, that eat the mussels and oysters and limpits, and there are a few tribes of humans who eat everything else,and who catch fish and seals from the seas and wear sealskin clothes.

In summer things are pleasent except for the occasional storm that penatrates into the fjords which are normally much calmer then the highly dangerous seas of the rest of Acqua, except for the clouds of Scratchmee flies that congregate at dusk and dawn. Scratchmee bites itch horribly and once someone scratches it is hard not to scar.People wear sealskin suits over their whole body if they are out at such a time when the Scrachmees are active.

[Maggot]

BUMP!

 Save this thread from oblivion,Cheka! Don't let Acqua lie forgotten1

[Cheka Man]

The People of the Coral are a species of Merpeople that live in warm sunlit areas amongst the coral reefs. The males would look ugly to human eyes and quite possibly to other mer-species as well. They are grey-skinned and around five feet tall, with large round eyes that can see well in all but the darkest or the most murky water., and with flippers instead of feet and long, muscular arms. They can change their skin to the colour of the water around them, be it blue or grey or another colour, which makes them hard to see.

And that is just as well, for Sea Spiders and several dangerous beasts of the oceans will happily eat them if they can catch them, whilst many members of the other mer-species see them as inferior and a threat to their territory.

Their weapons, clubs and spears, come from different types of coral,as do the few tools that they use.The males roam around finding fish that they can spear and bring back for food.They spend quite a lot of their lives hunting.Their weapons are tipped with Fire Coral which means that even a touch from the point can cause a nasty wound that is slow to heal.

The females are beautiful to look upon, with beautiful many-colored scales all over their bodies that glitter in the light of the sun.Unlike the males, they are poisonous to most of the dangerous creatures that would otherwise eat them,although there are a few that the poison has no effect on. This beauty causes them to be very visible, which is dangerous within the seas of Acqua. Anything that can eat them can see them easily, whilst there are other races out there which like to kidnap them.Their eyesight and hearing,whilst good, is only half as good as that of the males, and their arms are weaker.Just like the males they have flippers instead of feet.

The females are the ones who look after the children, tell the myths and the stories of the People of the Coral, tend the kelp plants that forms part of their food, and sing beautiful songs.

Laws amongst the tribes are few and commonsense and lawbreaking is rare.
Those who do break the laws in a serious way face being expelled from the tribes and left unprotected amonsgt the horrors of the Acquan oceans.

The tribes like to live in underwater caves near reefs.They often share the caves with Cleaner Fish and Glow Fish, that live on thier leftovers.The Cleaner Fish eat any parasites that start to grow on the People,whilst the Glow Fish emit a soft green glow at night.

Pairs normally mate for life and will have several children.A kiddnapped female will slowly lose the colour in her scales, as they turn into a light grey color after a long period of unhappyness, but her sweet voice is unaffected.
If rescued in this state all the colours will rush back into her scales within seconds.

Sadly, the People are declining, as the Shura are taking over their kelp beds, coral reefs and caves, on which they depend for food,tools and safety.Where once they were numbered in the tens of thousands, now they are only a few thousand strong.

[Cheka Man]

The Aquan-Man-O-War is a feared creature, a blob of transparent jelly the size of a full grown Manta Ray, with tentacles on the sides tipped with deadly stingers, along with less dangerous but still painful stinging cells all along the tentacles.Where jellyfish drift with the waves, this creature has several fins that it uses to swim whereever it wants.Where jellyfish eyes are almost useless if indeed they exist, this creature can see far ahead in clear water.The most deadly thing about this beast is that it cannot be seen until it is really close to it's prey.It races up, kills it's prey and drags it into the depths to eat. Few creatures will eat it because it tastes horrible and is not worth the effort.Even Shura warriors fear getting in a fight with it.It eats most creatures smaller and weaker then itself but stays away from Shura as it has found that it is not worth being almost killed for one meal.

[Maggot]

The People of the Coral make a nice,solid addition to Acqua,Cheka. I like the way they are presented as an embattled race,besiged on all fronts by aggresive foes. Perhaps having heard of Big Red,they might decide to seek for a protector of their own?

[Cheka Man]

OOC-Maggot, I think that they would, but I'm not sure who their protector would be.

The Seelies live on the edges of the polar lands to the north and south of the planet, moving with the seasons. They would look to a human like large gray seals with arms, and have large tusks like a walrus and strong sharp teeth.They are hunters,and whilst their main food is fish, they are not afraid to attack, kill and eat other Mer-races.They will not eat the beautiful females of the People of the Coral, prefering to kiddnap them for their beauty, their sweet singing voices and their storytelling ability.

Sadly most of the females they kiddnap suffer and die in the freezing polar seas that the Seelies rule.They have tried to keep them warm, with such things as blankets taken from wrecked ships, but it only keeps them alive for a few days.The colourful scales of the kiddnapped females turn grey first, then they die rapidly and are left to float to the bottom. So they kiddnap more to replace them. Once they dared to raid the Shura to try and take their females, but the Shura massacred the raiding party, so after that they left the Shura well alone and only fight them in self-defence.

Whilst they can raid the warm waters, they cannot settle there as they grow sick and parasite-infected  if they remain too long in the warm waters.

Like the People of the Coral the Seelies tend to mate for life.It is up to the females to choose when to become pregnant and they turn purple when they are willing. Younger females occasionly go on raids but the  older ones look after the children and pups and hunt for food for them. The normal number of pups a family will have is two or three.

For the first three months of it's life a pup needs near constant feeding to put on blubber and avoid dying of cold.Also, it does not grow arms for a year and a few human polar hunters have mistaken Seelie babies for seals and clubbed them.If such a thing happens the Seelies will wait until the hunters row out to their ships and then flip their boats over and tear them to pieces, since they are a water-race and can only move very slowly on land.

Within seven years after growing it's arms a Seelie is fully grown and has learnt about how to do well in Seelie society.The Seelies are a warrior race first and foremost.Laws are few and based on common sense, and offenders and cowards in battle are either executed or exiled and banished to the Warm Waters.They have limited stocks of amythest but the thing they prize most is iron tools that can cut breathing holes in the ice and enable them to rule over a greater area then the edges of the ice.

They wear no clothes except, for the bravest as a symbol of bravery, amythest armbands cut out of solid amythest blocks.Their weapons are their fangs and tusks plus whatever they can find on a raid or take from their enimies or from sunken ships.

[Maggot]

Cheka,is it all right with you if I add some aditional info to my Shura post?

[Cheka Man]

Of course it is OK with me. I enjoy what you write.  

[Maggot]

Added a whole new paragraph on Shura society,and if possible,plan to add to the items section,a new spellcasting tool used by their Shamans,within the next few days.

[Cheka Man]

OOC-On Sataday I will be going to Scotland for a week and will have no Internet access during that time.  Anyone who wants to add to Acqua is welcome.

[Maggot]

Fifty leagues off the southern flank of the grim penal colony known as Murderer's Isle,lies a vast reef reknown for the beautiful anemones that seemingly swamp every inch of it. They come in all kinds of breath taking colors,ranging from blue of the deepest hue to  a violet so bright,it hurts the eye of one who looks at it. Strange tales surround these amazing jewels of the ocean,tales that stem from the mysterious  folklore of the local islander cultures that live in the vicinity of the reef. Tales that seem to complement bizzare stories told by certain divers from the Demadden Company who claim that the anemones would startle them by crying out for help in human voices filled with desperation and despair when attempts to pry them loose from the reef were made.

  The local islanders say that the anemones are nothing like what they seem. It is the work of the Sea Hag,they say,the beautiful but sinister mer-sorceress of ancient myth who has always called the reef her home since time immemorial.

 Local legend states that deep under the surface,the Sea Hag lives in a vast castle carved out of the living coral. There she keeps her vast treasure of precious riches and even more highly prized mountains of amethyst,the possession of which can make so many feverant fantasies and dreams come true for even the most desperate..

 It is a prize that awaits any man daring enough to brave the terror of the deeps and confront the Sea Hag. Only a man,for the path to the Sea Hag's dwelling is concealed from all women,even the most gifted of witches. Once the visitor convinces her that he means her no harm,she is willing to let him carry off as much of it as he can. Provided that he answers three simple questions of hers. Firstly,''What must keep moving,or it dies instantly?'',follwed by ''What is the destroyer that even the dread G'Thrann fear?'',and finally ''Name the monster who devors entire reefs''. If a man answers all these correctly,he can take anything he wishes,and return to the surface.

 Should he fail however,his punishment will be awful indeed,a fate far worse than mere death. Cackling with a glee so maloveant it makes the unfortunate man's very heart tremble,she calls upon her diabolical enchantments and sunders his unfortunate soul from his body,imprisoning it in one of the famed anemones that sprout everwhere. There it will be forced to languish for all eternity,calling out in vain to be rescued,even as it's fleshy shell becomes food for the ravenous sharks.

 As the islanders say,''A brave man will go in search of the Hag's treasure,but if smart he is not,part of her kingdom he will become''. A cautinory warning that all avaricous men hungry for her treasure would be wise to heed.

[Cheka Man]

Kossier Island has changed a lot in the past two centuries since Big Red became it's protector. Big Red encouraged trade in amythest and other items, protecting the first tentative convoys from attack by pirates or the Company, even using his huge body to stop large waves from wrecking the ships. Slowly Kossier Island became rich and a power in it's own right, but they never forgot to pay tribute to their Kraken-God who made them who they were. They made three great harbours, one for their own fleet, one for visiting ships, and a third for Big Red to live in.

Other smaller Krakens began to get ideas of power of their own.One tried to chalenge Big Red and was lucky to get away with only the loss of one of his tentacles. They then decided to do the same thing with other nearby islands.Far from being menaces to the islanders, they were normally very welcome.No more could pirates, slavers and De Madden Company warships raid the islands. And what the islanders lost in tribute of amythest from the rich stockpiles on their islands, they gained in trade.The Krakens were careful never to take too much, knowing that a more prosperous island could ultimatly produce a lot more tribute for them, and prefering to rule willing people, since they need them to mine the amythest and drop some of it into the sea for them.

They joined each other and once or twice a year, by night, each Kraken leaves his or her city-state and travels to the Deeps, a vast deep cavern that they have made their own.The People of the Coral, Seelies and even the Shura normally avoid the Deeps, partly because there is little or nothing of value within this rocky trench, and partly because the Krakens made it very clear that if they did catch any of them in the Deeps, they would eat them.

There, protected by the depth from spies and scrying spells, they talk and try and decide if they are strong enough to destroy the De Madden Company and take over it's home islands.So far they have decided against it, prefering to live lives of luxury instead of risking their lives against large warships and land defences.

[Cheka Man]

The Merpeople, as well as eating fish, survive with the help of quite a few of the weeds of the sea.Other weeds may even be of use to land dwellers. Here are a few of them.

Kraken Weed This purple,sweet tasting weed, if it is dried and crushed with a mortar and pestle, and the right spell is said over it in the right way, can let a non-Kraken speak the Kraken languadge.It is only used on a regular basis by the wizards who rule the city states of the Kossier Archipelago.For a start, if the spell fails then the words will  come out all wrong.For another thing, Krakens, with the exceptions of when they talk to the above wizards, generally dislike speaking to non-Krakens and are notourously touchy and easy to anger.And angering a Kraken tends to get one eaten.

Kelp The staple, basic diet of many of the Mer-races.

Scratchweed When applied to an itch, this blackish weed often stops it.A useful item to have.Normaly used by Mer-races, although De Madden Company divers sometimes harvest it.It grows in five strands  spreading out from the base,and looks rather like a long-fingered human hand attached to the sea-bed, groping for the surface.

NargaThis bright red weed can be used by Shamens and Mages of the undersea races to have dreams that can fortell the future.Too much, however, can lead to delusions and insanity.A few grams given to a human  causes insanity that lasts for several years.Several high ranking Company bosses have been poisoned in the past by ambitious underlings who have taken their jobs.By the time the insanity has worn off, the bosses have long since lost their jobs and all their power and influence, even if they do get set free from the asylums that they were sent to.Bosses of high rank now employ food-tasters,who are well paid  but risk themselves at every meal.It is a serious offense on most islands to possess this weed.

[Cheka Man]

On the islands of Acqua gold and silver are too rare to be used in coinage.Metal itself is used for tools and weapons rather then coinage. So instead three items are used as money that is legal tender through all the islands.

Kaori shells are beautiful green scallop-shaped shells an inch long that are the equivilant of copper coins in other worlds. One Kaori shell will buy a glass of beer.Five will buy a night in a basic hotel and breakfast afterwards.

Black coral, which only grows in the deep sea and is hard to harvest, is the silver coin of this world. It is carved into shining discs. A piece of it would be worth five days of wages for a manual labourer or an oarsman.

Amythest is the gold of this world, owned only by nobles, the richest craftsmen/women, the mages and witches, and the bosses of the criminal underworld.A small piece of amythest will buy three nights in the finest hotels.A large piece can buy a ship.