《Tales of the Lost Mountain》 The Lost mountain- The Fog As any good story starts lets start at the foot hills of that old mountain. This story goes out to my old man, this is his story after all. Back in 1905 the mountain was just a regular old mountain, There wasn''t any real proof that there was tricksters and demons on that mountain, but as a boy my da thought he knew better then everyone. As all adventurous ten year old''s do, he went up the mountain, ill prepared and on top of the world he left his house early on a Saturday morning just as the sun was rising and his mama was starting on the chores, he snuck out the back door and started the hour trek to the foothill of the mountain. It was a pretty chill summer day all things considered. The sun was rising, the clouds were making a beautiful tapestry out of that old sky full of the richest blues of night turning into the brightest of yellows unseen by man since the dawn My dad considered that a good day, considered it a sign of good luck that the day was starting so beautiful. Well... It was a sign. Omens, such as the crow that watches you walk home after classes or the black cat who crosses your path are all considered omens of the things to come, unfortunately for my father, the omens of bad things to come decided to pay him a visit. At the time he thought nothing of it in all honesty, back then crows and black cats hadn''t become omens of the things to come yet. Quickly after getting to the base of the mountain he noticed the chill in the air increase, it was mid summer when this happened so as you can imagine the weather had been fairly warm for the better half of two months. This sudden chill spooked him enough he nearly shat himself, least that''s what he said, in my opinion he probably did. The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Suddenly a massive fog comes in thick enough you can''t see a foot in front of yourself, tinted a light green with flecks of iridescent gold floating in it. My dad took one look at this and said nope! He hauled it on out of there, fast as he could, like an avalanche down the mountain he went, the wind at his back and the sun still rising, he fled calling for his mama with all his might. Unfortunately for him, he went to the mountain on that day and even worse, the fog decided he was worth taking. Sixty three years later he finally exited that fog. Still the same as when he went in, nothing about him changed, still the same ten year old with a little too much daring. As he flew down the mountain he arrived home and saw everything covered in webs and foliage. All except for one building, where as everything he was used to was made of wood and hand made this place was a stark white stone with edges so clean they seemed impossible. At the door was two featureless beings with eyes that reflected the sun, motionless in white armor they stood. Then they saw him and yelled halt. He said that was thescaredesthe''s ever been in his life, least till he was told he had been sent sixty three years in the future and realized all he loved and knew were dead, well maybe not his siblings but he didn''t know that at the time. The moral of the story is that the Lost Mountainisnta safe place, if you see the fog at the base turn right around and come back another day. The fog always takes its due The Living Mine Welcome back to Tales of the Lost Mountain Everyone! Last weeks story I feel went pretty well all in all. Anyway, enough about that, the story today is about the under dark, the world of lightless mysteries and tragedies of unknown proportions. Let me tell you that the story today definitely has its place in the supernatural, I feel I need to explain something about the mountain that''s not quite obvious unless you''ve traversed the mountain yourself. The mountain cant just be called a mountain as its so much more than that. Based on the many stories that have been told to me the mountain seems to be a world all its own, from the outside the mountain looks like a lonely peak surrounded by clouds, but once you cross the imaginary line that in all honesty changes every time you enter the lonely mountain it becomes a range of mountains with plains and hills, swamps and caves galore, and from one story an entire ocean full of monster that swallow ships and beasts that make the entire world glow when the sun sets. The Mountain is an entire world unto itself, mysteries upon mysteries abound, weirdness around every corner. But those are stories for another time. Todays story is about the dark, the deep, the world of crawling shadows and black as sin air. Welcome to the Moreau Mines. Most Mines never have the issues the Moreau Mines have. In the beginning this was a regular mine, they mined coal the hard way, with pickaxe and manual labor, the business never had enough money to buy the fancy tools but they had enough for good old manual labor. Working in a coal mine is nasty business and it covers you head to toe in coal dust. Most of the time people get some form of black lung too. So the symptom''s went unnoticed for months, it started with a darkening of the skin that was dots black as ink appearing on your skin, no bigger than a need point so you cant hardly see it, especially if your already nasty and covered in dust. The deeper you go and the longer your in the mine the worse it gets, more and more spots appear till your pitch black and smelling like coal no matter what you do, you can scrub and scrub but it never comes off, least you think it wont. If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. The first clue anyone had of more issues than stained skin was lumps that were hard as stone that appeared on the stomach, I say they were hard as stone but for all purposes they were lumps of coal adhered to the miners. The more coal they became the better it was in the mines for them. They could see better and breath better under the earth, hell they even had a small sense of where the coal extended under the ground. They went deep under the ground, deeper than most mines go even, more than five miles below the earth, more and more coal was found, it seemed endless at least till they reached the five and a half mile mark. Then they found IT. The story gets muddied from this point on because nearly every miner couldn''t''ve spoke any longer, the lungs and vocal cords of the miners had turned to coal by this point. But this part goes something like this. It was nearing the end of the last shift for the night. A miner that went by the name Craig was wanting to get a little more coal so he could get more money for his family. That''s when he broke through the wall. First he smelt it, a putrid rotting smell that encompassed everything. Past the wall was a dark cave of gigantic proportions black as umber night except for lines of red light on the walls. Pulsing and writhing in what seems like excitement. Curious he took a step inside and felt a wet squishy surface under him, crouching down for a closer look he realizes it was flesh. Oozing exposed flesh with veins of glowing red that pulsed in time with a staccato beat. blood and pus was everywere, on the walls and on the ceiling. Dripping, like stalactites from the ceiling hundreds of feet above. As he went inside the red glowing veins sped up. All converging on the center of the cave where a hanging heart of coal hung. When you take from the earth it takes just as much from you, beware the heart, or yours will be added to the Moreau Mines. The Colosseum of Chivalrous Amphibians Back in the day when there was knights and bandits, warriors of glory and chivalrous might, there was a court. A court of Five immense soldiers and Three intelligent beings. This court was the court of Amphibians. Bubbles the Fearless, Croak the Singer, Goliath the Warrior, Lily the Fair and Tad the Young. These were the Courts finest warriors. They were led by Three wise frogs, Boggart the Feared, Flavius the Powerful and Charles the Kind. With these Warriors of the froggy lands there was never any fear in the common citizen. Till THEY appeared, Titans of truly colossal proportions, they grabbed all of us, one by one we were taken, put in cages like common animals. Our warriors were gone that day. We screamed and screamed for our saviors but they never came. Our people fought with all we had, poison and sound, all hope was lost till at first one titan was felled, then two. They fled, for a time. The sun rose and they came again, and again and more times then we could count, till our people were decimated. I was one of the few to escape that day, I broke my leg on the fields of battle that day. I watched my fellow soldiers get taken while I was escorted off the field like I was nothing. Useless and broken. Till I saw them while I was on my fellow soldiers back. Our warriors, our brave Five were in cages, stronger and thicker than the rest these cages I could tell were made to hold our strongest. They fought to escape, the cage rattled ands bent but never broke, till all they could do was rage at the heavens as the people they swore to defend were taken, to be eaten or as pets is unknown, but our people were decimated that day. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. Long live the memory of the lost souls. May we ribbit in there glory. May the song of our lost people guide our tadpoles to a new dawn. On the day of our destruction our elders guided our people to a hidden stronghold. Lakewell Palace, under the very earth itself they guided us. For what felt like days, weeks even, we walked till we reached a small pond under the earth. barely big enough to let us dive one at a time. But we did it, for the promise of a new home and a new dawn we swam till our lungs nearly burst. Then we found what some would consider Elysia, a ready made keep in the walls and a giant cave full of all the bugs we could farm. Our people were finally safe to recover and mourn the loss of our best. From the ashes of a fallen kingdom we made the golden empire that we are now. In the years since, we conquered Four new frogdoms. The Bullusia, strong as there namesakes the Bull frogs were worthy additions to our Frogdom. The Glassarium kingdom, spies of incredible might and illusionist light. The Parisian Darts, they make the finest posions and weapons in the world. The Amaza were the latest, they increased our food productions by ten times. We were unstoppable by the time the titans knew we back. The court of amphibians rose anew, never discount the smallest of enemy''s. The Shadow weaver Spiders This is a little bit of an older story. Back in the day there was an old farmer who never once wanted to go up the mountain, he thought the story''s were a bunch of hogwash made to scare children. So in a fit of drunken foolishness he decided to take a day hike up the mountain. Which in this case wasn''t a great idea all in all. His time on the mountain was short lived but all in all he encountered very little of the dangers of the mountain. The only thing of note was when he was walking up the mountain he encountered a group of trees with nothing around them for fifty feet. a clearing devoid of life and no signs of any animals. In the middle of this clearing was a boroughs of trees, not any ordinary trees however, the leaves looked like shifting shadows and moving horrors. Till you get closer that is, then they spring alive with the wrath of a million hunting spiders. These spiders had carapaces made of shadows that shifted from the darkest of blacks to the most vibrant sapphire blues, sometimes you get the rare spider that has some red on its back. These are the shadow weave spiders. They manipulate the shadows of twilight bending them to their will, which in the process makes strings of gossamer shadows that suck the light of day from the world. At least that''s the account farmer john gave us. As he got close to the trees he suddenly felt a jolt and with a thump he was nocked on his back and as the spiders were about to drag him away he grabbed his grandpas twice blessed knife and cut threw them like a a hot knife to butter. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. He did the logical thing and ran from that point till he made it to the base of the mountain. When he arrived home he asked his wife if she had heard of these monsters. Most encounters on the mountain are singular in nature. However for some reason these spiders have been seen by three other people. At least three others that escaped. No one knows the reason the spiders are encountered more then the other flora and fauna of the lost mountain. But, take solace in the fact they don''t leave the tree they live in. Each tree has a different species of shadow weave spider in it. Differentiated by colors and abilities. They all weave shadow for certain. But sometimes with the different colors you get some that also weave light, or fire or any of the elements found in nature. The Matriarch of the spiders hasn''t been seen except for the faintest of shadows found in the depth of the trees. She''s one big bitch that''s for sure, definitely don''t want to let her stick her fangs in you. That''s some of the background of the shadow weave spider. But they aren''t the only thing to be found on the mountain. There''s whole kingdom''s under the earth and between the flickers of the light. Hellfire The Lost Mountain has a typical backstory to it, at least as far as mountains go. The old fire gets tired of being underground and pushes itself up then a mountain is slowly formed from the resulting breach, then the volcano cools and becomes a mountain and does nothing but look cool. However The Lost Mountain has a special twist to it that can be called unique to the Lost Mountain. Once a year at the zenith of summer, when all the heat of the world congregates to the highest places, the mountain wakes. Like a beast from slumber slowly waking from the brink of death, the mountain does something similar. Everything has a memory or a footprint left upon the mountain and the mountain itself has a memory too. It remembers the fire. The moment it was born to this world. The shockwaves of a thousand explosions and millions of deaths was the birthright the mountain claimed upon the first awakening. But, at the zenith of summer the mountain remembers and the world around is transformed from forests and trees to but a brief five minute period of molten rock and the wrath of extinct power. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. At least that''s what it looks like to the naked eye, after the zenith of summer passes the mountain reverts to its previous state. The animals are still there. The old mine is still consuming the miners and the fog still hunts for its next victim. The Echo, that''s what the people of the mountain call it, the mountain reverts as if it is on a clock. always the zenith and always the hottest day of the year. Tick Tock till the clock stops. The memory falls on the mountain top run, run till the world stops. Either way the mountain is not a safe place, if you wanna live never go on the mountain, death is around every corner. You cannot prepare, most things on the mountain are not a feasible thing in the rest of the world. The laws of physics dont allow for most mountain being to exist away from it. Dont worry though. You should be safe off the mountain. Just keep your wards charged and your blessed knives ready. You never know if life has a curveball to throw at you The River of Molten Life Long before the Frogs were a kingdom, long before they had kings and queens and even before they had the ability to communicate with each other. They lived along the rivers and streams just as normal frogs do in our world today. leaping all day and singing the light away. But they weren''t alone at the river. There was another group that called the river home. The Fish of Igneous. They were the sons and daughters of the First Conflagration and the Last of Monoliths. They were baby elementals in there own right. All of molten metal and all of varying kinds. From copper to Tungsten they ranged from the hardest to find and even some that haven''t been used in lifetimes. The Smallest of them were the Koper (copper) dwarf fish. They lived in swarms of over Five hundred fish that reflected the light of the sun so intensely that if they stayed in one spot long enough that the trees along the river bank were set on fire. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. The next of the kin were the Argent (silver) gill that lived solitary lives but also helped corral the Koper from eating everything in there path. The biggest of the River kin were the Ginto (gold) Koi. They were the rulers of the waterways. Every other fish steered clear when they led their swarms down to open waters. They are rarer then the rest after all, just like with humanity there is only one ruler for millions. But those are all honestly very common Kin. The rarest is the Iridium paddlefish. They sit at the bottom of the deepest part of the ways. Most people never see one in there life, but if your lucky and the water is clear then you can shine a light down there and see the purple reflections they put out from the light. I started this story off with long ago for the sole reason that the water ways haven''t been seen by a man or women in more than a lifetime. I''m hoping someone will have seen the rivers of molten fish. I doubt they''ll see the frogs though. They had left just before the last of the fishing trips my people hosted yearly. We have unfortunately stopped that too. It got too dangerous for us up there, the magic of humanity is fading fast while the magic of the world is growing even faster. The Lone Ranger Most places of either great outstanding beauty or of some historical importance get inducted into the national park system where they have some form of Ranger force that helps keep the area safe, clean and undamaged from the misadventures of humans and other folk in our world. Usually the national forests or Parks have upwards of a few hundred rangers on staff all year long, that changes obviously however for our tale today were not just talking about national park rangers or other enforcement of the parks. We are delving into the the lost mountain today to meet the fabled Lone Ranger. The Lone Ranger is a singular existence on the mountain, he is described to be of roughly eight feet tall with goat like legs but the torso of a heavily muscled man. He also supposedly has great facial hair from what i have heard on the grapevine. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. He has on a small pair of tan shorts like that of a forest ranger in the summer, however he also has on the typical forest ranger coat, green with what seem to be plenty of stars and achievement''s on it. They seem to be in a language no one can read from what all the reports say. He also has the typical forest ranger hat with a big brim to keep the snow and rain off his face. All in all he cuts an intimidating figure if you catch his gaze on the mountain, unless you desecrate the mountain, he wont hurt you however. He may knock you out then drop you off at the outskirts of the mountain though. No one knows where the Ranger lives. For the most part he just appears from the ether then disappears into the ether after he''s done doing whatever he needs to. But like all national parks have protectors, the lost mountain has protectors too, or a singular protector in this case. The Gems of the mountain Welcome back everyone to another story from the Tales of the lost mountain! Today we have with us a precious little thing, rare beyond rare, there are a total of 300 of these beauty''s in the world. The Jeweled Leptir or more commonly known as the Gem butterfly. Beautiful beyond compare, I have only seen 25 of these beauties in person, all relating to the more common gems in the world, however In my research I have read about rarer ones being found the deeper you go in the earth usually found near a collection of the gems these lady''s are made of. I unfortunately have a photo of a dead tanzanite butterfly for your purview today, nothing compares to them when there alive, but you take what you can get when looking for the rarer things in the world. Members of the research community believe there to be butterflies corresponding to each gem found in the world, so far there is assumed to be 300 different kinds of gems with a corresponding butterfly to go with it. Almost like a unique elemental of the material. Ive made mention of some of the first elementals from a previous story which was the first conflagration or the first flame elemental and the last of monoliths or the last earth elemental. As far as I can tell these are mini elementals themselves, wholly unique in there make and singular in there existence. Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. The most recent one some two miners found near an underground stream was a ruby butterfly, its very pretty I love how you can see through the wings of this beauty here. Just imagine. The dark expanse of the mines, you shine your flashlight around after hearing a noise from further down and you light up something fluttering around without a care in the world. I wonder if there wings are sharp? since they are made of gemstones after all. I went looking in the archive of the White Rangers to see if they had anything on these specimens in the extensive underground archive they have, which is were im finding most of this info for these stories. Kinda illegal but eh, ill be fine. They love me after all! But in the archives, previous researcher''s mentioned that artisans supposedly tore some of the butterfly''s apart while still alive to make a crown for certain kings in the mountain, they got there wish for a crown, however seventeen people died to make this crown, The diamond butterfly broke free of the pins holding it down and tore through almost every single person there. Unfortunately for it another artisan had a specially crafted net to catch them in the wild in the first place. So he caught it and flung it to the ground and stomped it to death, surprisingly the diamond wasnt shattered during the struggle but he sure as shit killed that butterfly. I dredged up a photo of the last crown made, which is kept in the royal archive of the mountain deep underground, The White Rangers I have yet to tell you some of my story. What I have told you however was how my father was lost to time in the fog at the base of the mountain, how he escaped some 60 odd years later. Then how he encountered the soldiers in white. Well I have yet to expand too much on this information. I figured if your reading this you deserved a treat and im feeling especially bored so I wanted to just give some background for everyone. We left off on my fathers story with him seeing the soldiers in white armor. Those soldiers in white armor are part of a order of knights sworn to guard the mountain and monitor the things that go on there. They have yet to intervene in the life of the Mountain, or the people that reside on it. Since 2010 this order of knights was renamed the White Rangers to better fit in with the national forest service and to get some grants from the government''s they report too. It seemed to work better then they could have ever expected with there PR team broad casting there ranger status to the world to get potential recruits to sign up. See, the mountain is kind of an open secret among all the government agencies, no one may be allowed on it without the permission of the rangers but it has not changed that everyone wants to catch a glimpse of the flora and fauna that resides there. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Some of the different agencies have tried and failed to enter the mountain. They never succeed since the Rangers guard the mountain approved routes up the mountain. I said mountain approved because the mountain itself has to approve every route up and down it. The Rangers dont guard a ordinary mountain, we just guard the routes so less people go in and die. These routes are approved because they dont go through most of the dangers, yea you occasionally get a demon that crosses the path or a random encounter that destroys the entire road, like the dog sized ants from last years nuptial flight, they destroyed half of all the routes up and down the mountain. The White rangers may seem like what popular culture dubs the SCP foundation, however there not the same in the slightest. As of this story the SCP foundation is purely a fictional story archive for random writers to post there brain child. The White Rangers are the opposite, they cant contain, or neutralize, anything of the like, we just keep people off the mountain. The White rangers are seen wearing a standard issue white coat with white armor plating of a unknown material, there are different insignia''s on the armor depending on the squad they are part of or of the accomplishments achieved during there tenure with the White Rangers. They have white combat boots and a hat facemask combo that protects them from environmental hazards. The White Rangers are based out of Dublin Ireland in a bland factory that is a cover for defenses and giant elevators for supplies in there underground industrial complex. This is where I am writing from, specifically the lowest floor, which is The Vault, which holds all the current records of all encounters on the mountain we have accrued over the years. I have attached a photo of the current Rangers in there standard issue outfit. The Clockwork Frog Welcome back everyone to another chapter of this perilous world that is the Lost Mountain. Today I have brought you a different story then usual, So far we have explored some of the flora and fauna of the Mountain. However today we have a special prize not many have heard of, The Clockwork Frog. As you can tell by the name, the Clockwork Frog is a small, hand sized frog made of gears and copper plating in the shape of a chubby bullfrog. It comes with a key that has a copper frog head as the handle, this key is used to wind the frog up so it starts to croak the song of the frogs. This isnt any ordinary song however, any frog that hears this song is compelled to follow any direction of the holder. Mind you, they are frogs still, so they arnt the brightest, but they still do there best to follow your orders to the tee. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. However your orders have to be extreamly detailed otherwise horrible things could happen, almost like the monkey paw situation or the genies wish of folklore. The Rangers, from my digging in the archives, seem to have no records of the maker of this peculiar item. The earliest sightings of this artefact started in 1905, when it was first used by the Old kingdom of frogs to bring there people home to the undermount. The next reported sighting was in 1945 at the end of the second world war by the German''s as a potential weapon of mass destruction, mind you, nothing came of it. The frogs were too unthreatening on a open field, now if you sent poison dart frogs in at night to our supply camps then poisoned our water and food that would be a different story. That thankfully never happened. Tank tread versus a frog, who wins? I think we know the answer to that. After World war 2 the Clockwork frog was noted to be in the hands of a Peggy Guggenheim, who was a famous art collector of the 1930s. Nothing of note happened while the artefact was in her hands. That dosent mean nothing happened during that time however, the archives just have nothing of note. There are many tools and contraptions of old that the people of the Mountain leave to be found by passerby''s. Whether as a joke or not, for us, everything has a price. The Grove Welcome home everyone, to another story by my midnight fire. Todays story features a pretty common sight upon the mountain, The Trees, or more specifically, one tree in a forest of green. When you imagine this tree think of an old oak, lightning struck and burnt inside and out, barely hanging on with the last threads of its life. Out of the surrounding Forrest strolls by a little man with a long scaly tail, clad in black with a golden bow tie, he looked mighty fine indeed. The tree called out, in a hoarse voice, "Please traveler, Please! I need some water to cool my burns" The man kept strolling on by like he couldnt hear the tree, so the tree tried again, " Please! Ill give anything! Just give me some water!" The man turned with a slow curious grin? "Anything?" asks the small man. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. "Anything." says the tree with a weary voice. "If your so sure, how about we make a deal" drawled the small man slowly. "Ill give you water, for a small measly price." "What is it! Ill give you anything, JUST NAME IT!" "Well... I want your name." "My name? All you want is my name and you''ll give me water?" "Sure as sunshine I will." "Listen carefully for ill only say it once." The creak of trees, the movement of storms and lightning, steadfast limbs. The man hears all this and more by the time the tree was done. "Thank your for that for telling me, as I promised here is some water for you." The man brings forth a big heaping waterskin full of water for the tree to drink from. "Slow and smooth, slow and smooth, wise your may choke." says the man. The tree does not in fact drink slow and smooth, he drinks it all in one gulp. By the end of the drink the tree feels refreshed, invigorated almost, until he feels it. The poison coursing through him, changing, consuming him for all he''s worth, as the tree cries out in agony the man says. "The only demons you can control are the ones you make yourself" Slowly he walks away as the tree changes rapidly, the bark turning ghostly white and the leaves all transforming into red pulsating membranes of meat and blood. The life slowly leaches from the land as the sun sets past the mountain. Phil When you look at the sky what do you think of? The Expanse of it all? Maybe the fact every being on this planet is interconnected in some form or fashion. Well, when I look at the sky I think of the vast vacuum abouve us, in the grand scheme of things were just a hairs breadths away from popping like the soap bubble we are. In our reality all of the vastness of space so far is only filled with planet, asteroids and many other things we know probably one/tenth about. But past the entrance to the mountain everything changes, some astronomers of our organization have taken it upon themselves to go star gazing to see if we still have the same constilations on that side of the veil. Unfortunantly, it blinked. The void itself blinked at the star gazers. Some went mad, others went real~ Quiet. Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon. They lost the path before them, if there are being larger then the sun then what reason would they have to continue on in their chosen field. So they changed paths, some went into the generic worship the large being route, while others went the bury there head and forget in booze path. Almost all of them did this, all except one that is. Phil. Good old Phil, a master at what he did and a master at what he does now, which going from programmer to Bionomic Mage is a leap I never thought id say in my life. See he started off by using the the low powers of the Mountain to change himself one step at a time. His first goal was by changing the depth of his being. I dont mean his height or his personality, by depth I mean that he changed the mutability of his soul. This is the part of his record no one but himself knows about. All we know is that he ate something that modified his soul to allow for greater changes down the road. A few known methods of change we have seen is him consuming different parts of creatures. From the bone of a greater salamander in the depth of the mountain, to the venom of a blood leak spider. Other methods I have personally seen was him taking different artifacts he finds on the mountain and integrating them into himself. I cant give you an accurate description of Phil anymore because he''s changed so much that I dont really have any idea what to make of it. But he''s gotten to the point where he went to talk to a god yesterday, or a self proclaimed god I should say. We havent heard back from him and its been three days since his last communication. I have faith he wouldn''t''ve died so easy though