Selected Mushrooms and Funghi from the Mura Katur
From the Black Marsh to the Glowing Swamps of Luminiall, the Mura Katur is home to a great abundance of funghi. Enclosed is a sampling of the many species found in its dank mires and soaked forests.
The Mura Katur is an are of land created when the western cities of Thralindor were sunk into the seas. Forests and fields are now salt marshes, swamps, wet forests and sunken cities. Here is a short selection of mushrooms and funghi from the 60-odd ones I have made. Enjoy!
Name - Luminous Drubheade (Mage-Torch Mushroom)
Grows - at base of trees
Description - Luminous Drubheade is a large, tall grey mushroom covered in large holes. At night, these holes emit an exceptionally bright greenish light, coming from the center of the mushroom. Cutting the head open will reveal a rock-hard, glowing center, in the shape of a teardrop. Holding the center will grant night vision to a user as long as it is held, or until dawn, at which the center will 'burn out'. If left in the mushroom, the center will 'recharge' over time. There are magical and alchemical methods of fixing the center to glow continuously, which are then made into lanterns or left as they are.
Name - Rottpill (Rotcapp)
Grows - near water, on heavily rotting plant matter
Description - Rottpills are large, vile-looking short brown mushrooms with sickly yellow spots on the cap. They smell faintly of rotting vegetation, and are slimy to the touch. They border on the line between poisonous and inedible. Eating them causes severe vomiting, and in some cases, unconsciousness. They have no true magical or alchemical properties, although they can be mashed and brewed into a vile stew, if one would want to (why would one want to?). Oh right, drinking brewed Rottpills is a reliable, albeit crude way of purging the body of ingested toxins.
Name - Golden Hallucinole (Deadmerchant's Stub)
Grows - dry ground in sunlight
Description - Golden Hallucinole is a thin, tall, golden mushroom that seems to shine, or even glow, depending on the light. It has a faint, sickly sweet odor to it, somewhat like rotting honey. If eaten, after a few minutes, the user's vision will begin to take on a bluish tint. In the later stages, everything the user sees will be bright blue, and surrounded by swirls of color in the corners of the user's vision. During this time, the user will be unable to speak, and find it very hard to move. The user's eyes will also take on a bluish tint. In the final stages, the blue slowly fades to black, and the user will slip into a coma. Powdered Hallucinole is often mixed with neutralizing agents to create a powerful hallucinogenic drug.
Name - Slippery Chunkstuber
Grows - in wet ground
Description - Slippery Chunkstuber is a short, fat, mushroom with white stubble on its cap. It is bright orange, with a white stem. If eaten raw, it causes nausea and indigestion, however, Chunkstuber is a delicacy when cooked properly. It has a fairly strong, but delicious taste, and is used in soups, salads, sauces, and almost every stew in the Daugmires. It is also immensely popular in the Borderlands, for the way it retains its richness and flavor when dried.
Name - Danemer's Weepercup (Ghostcup)
Grows - in dry ground
Description - Danemer's Weepercup is a dark blue-purple, wrinkled mushroom with magical properties almost opposite to Ovhid's Bane. If dried, ground, mixed with water and sprinkled into the eyes, after a moment of stinging and tearing, they allow the user to see all sorts of concealed items. Users can then see people or objects affected by spells of invisibility and concealment, as well as see during the night, and see much farther and clearer. However, they do not help the user to see spirits or ghosts, like Lunacuppes, and creatures with natural camouflage are just as hard to spot.
Name - Gnome-Catcher
Grows - on coarse-barked trees
Description - Gnome-Catchers are jokingly named for the way they sometimes catch small animals. They are small, bulbous white fungi that secrete a sticky solution to catch bugs that might eat them. This substance is often used as an adhesive, as it hardens and adheres well when dry.
Name - Old Crunklecaps
Grows - on coarse-barked trees
Description - Old Crunklecaps are dry, withered brown fungi that smell of wet earth. They taste fairly bland, but have a way of staving off some of the minor ailments of age, such as failing eyesight, loss of hearing, and stiffness of the joints. Eating one Crunklecap a week is enough to reap the benefits, and rightly so, for if more were needed, they might be in danger of extinction!
Name - King's Larders
Grows - on trees
Description - King's Larders are dark green-brown fungi that are invaluable to adventurers making long treks into unknown wildernesses. Although they taste bitter and earthy, they can hold off hunger for several days, forcing the body to completely digest and absorb a meal before needing more. Eating a King's Larder after a meal can make it last for several days, up to four. However, they also can cause painful stomach cramps and muscle stiffness in the later stages, and dependence is not recommended.
Name - Vixen-Catcher (Bogstain)
Grows - on trees
Description - Vixen-Catcher is a dark blue fungus with golden spore-caps. It gets its name from the story of 'Gawyn and the Vixen'.The king Gawyn was able to tell his queen was carrying on an affair with a nearby duke by the stains she always had on the hems of her dresses. Although she swore she never left the castle, the King knew that a certain mold grew along the path from the castle to the Duke's keep, the same mold that had stained her dresses. Vixen-Catcher leaves dark blue stains on the clothing or skin of anything that touches it. These stains are nearly impossible to get off, and last for several days before fading. If dried and ground, the powder can be spread around or on objects of value. Anything treading near or touching these objects will then have to explain the blue blotches on his or her hands. Also great for pranks.
Name - Smoldermold (Torchmold)
Grows - on living trees/plants
Description - Smoldermold is a large whitish-red mold that is fairly dry and warm to the touch. At night, it gives off a glow not unlike smoldering cinders, sometimes quite bright. It has led many explorers astray, many thinking they have found the campfire of a fellow man. It does not burn, and keeps its heat indefinitely; after it is picked it ceases to glow and lasts for several weeks before cooling down. It is often sewn into packets to warm the hands in frigid regions. The only way to extinguish its heat is to submerge it in water for several hours.
Name - Maidensglove (Haremsmold)
Grows - on rotting plants, trees
Description - Maidensglove is a bright red fungi that is slimy to the touch and smells of bitter spices. If forced down (it tastes terrible), it brings a blush to the cheeks, a fullness to the lips, and a slight red tinge to the eyes. It also makes the user feel confident to excess and lustful. It is sometimes slipped into the tea as an aphrodisiac by those who would seek to seduce someone. Some ladies of the court have developed an addiction to it as well.
Name - Stolen Witch-Brood (Screaming Hagmold)
Grows - on rotting trees and plants
Description - Stolen Witch-Brood is a nondescript brown-green mold with dark brown spots. However, if touched, it hisses and shrieks, burning and scarring the skin with a black web-work. If held for a long time, it can completely disintegrate the flesh surrounding it. Stolen Witch-Brood is sometimes spread onto the prongs of weapons, or pressed onto the flesh during interrogations. It retains its properties when dried and ground, although it loses some potency.
Silver Cloudballs
A silver-gray puffball, when eaten raw this has the effect of making the user seem to leave his or her body and *fly* to whatever destination they have in their mind.Commonly used by skilled shamans. An overdose is not recomended as it causes terrible and realestic aural and visual hallucinations.
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? Responses (13)
sparK!, I have not seen you around the citadel before, but if you keep turning up such rich, high-quality posts as this, I have no doubt you will be welcomed with open arms. This is a perfect background and campaign defining article. You may want to convert it to a scroll, I had trouble with that my self at first.
Edit please. The odd characters that you have inserted (or the HTML editor has interpreted) is hard to read.
Some browsers won't show him the characters. He might not know what we speak of :)
Thanks Roack; once I found the citadel, I knew I had found a great place, and I would love to be a member of the writing community! As for the characters, I'm using firefox, and I didn't see anything wierd, but I viwed it in IE and the dashes and apostrophes were messed up. It should be better now, and I'll edit my other posts too. I turned it into a scroll (hopefully I did it right), and I'll turn it into a codex once I have a few more posts churned out.
Nice.How does a fungus shrik though?
Shriek? Think of it as dropping pennies on dry ice. As it comes into contact with flesh, a rending, whistling shriek emits as the flesh is painfully burned away. The fungus does not actually open its mouth and yell, it's just a sound that is produced by the burning. The reason it's called a Stolen Witch-Brood is that the scream sounds much like a hag shrieking. A fungus normally can't cause skin to turn black and crumble either - this fungus is somewhat magical.
Good solid idea, just like the it's sister post.
Keep it up.
Fun with Funghi! Come back Spark
Ha! I love Magical Fungi! To me, nothing says 'Fantasy' like forests of gaint fungi! Will be contributing soon!
Voting 4 and the accompanying statements says it all for me.
I really like small touches in this submission -- like how you included both a primary (scientific?) and secondary (local/common?) name for each fungi. Well done!
Now this one is cool. Very useful!
