The blooms of spring paint the mountains of Dovmille in every colour, and the spores are in the air.
As the sun rises over the mountain’s peak, many a Caplium will already be up and about, looking for the first buds of Poetica, a white flower that brings one luck for a whole year. The perfect present for young fungi in love or the arrival of a new baby mushroom.
Some Caplium like to grow their caps for several years, growing beautiful dense clusters, others trim them down every autumn, once the heat of the sun loses its edge.
And as the nights cool and the morning dew gathers on the grass blades, the dancers take over the forests.
Each year, for seven days, the Seta dancers dress up in long silky garbs as they spend the mornings dancing for every leaf, every stone and every log. And during that week, every evening the forests fill up with the smoke of pink beechwood burning in fire pits all over Calangara, roasting fruits, nuts and whole hogs for their autumnal feasts.
But luck does not shine on every mushroom equally, and every so often a mushroom is born different.
Dangerous.
Poisonous.
Best case scenario there will be early signs, a brightly coloured or brittle cap, but often you won’t know until a tragedy happens.
Any poisonous Caplium are sent to the Temples of the Exiled, carved onto the face of Mt Kayesh.
There they live as monks, plucking their caps every fortnight to prevent their spores from poisoning the mountain and dedicating their lives to creating antipoisons used all around Obalan.
There are more Caplium around if you look hard enough, here’s a few of them:
The fearless leader of the Caplium Bandits, Walwyn. See more of him here.
Myco got sidetracked again, someone should go looking for him. See more of his story here.
Master of Arms Ōkukinoko, the only thing sharper than his oakblade is his aim. See more about him here.
If you are browsing through all of the different people of Obalan you can use the links below to navigate.
To you, from the home of magic.
Marco D Blanco.
I hadn't expected to read about poisonous mushroom monks! I'm a big fan of weird worldbuilding though, so I'm here for it
Aaah such a cool idea!! I love the character designs!