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Lillooler — Ebony Scape
#blue #cloud #clouds #downpour #ebony #grey #pink #scape #sky #storm #stormy #story #weather #keeari #desert #rainstorm #thunderstorm
Published: 2014-10-31 19:19:48 +0000 UTC; Views: 450; Favourites: 8; Downloads: 0
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Description
So far this is my favorite scenery piece that I've done. Of course, this is only my third one, so what can you really expect *shrug*This is Ebony Scape. It is a desert that was created through the eruption of the largest mountain in Ovella (the continent in which Keeari's story takes place). There was no attempt to restore the once fertile farmland to their original state after the catastrophe, so one hundred years later the land remains as desolate and uninviting as the day the ash finally settled. This swathe of black sand and ancient ash that stretches for what looks like forever, is only inhabited by the hardiest of living things, such as poisonous burrowing centipedes and cannibalistic figures of the local wives tales. The weather is dramatic and constantly changing. There are numerous towns set on the outskirts of Ebony Scape, but life within its borders would prove fatal to any settlement.
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Comments: 5
I like the rain clouds and the idea of a black desert is very cool. This is another realistic painting of what this would look like.
But: Don't take this the wrong way but volcanic ash is some of the most fertile soil in the world. As the volcanic soil "weathers" (ages while exposed to the elements) it breaks down into many substances and trace elements that plants really thrive on. There are a few situations where these soils become problematic for plants and I'm no expert on that. But the general idea I'm getting is that after a 100 years you should have some pretty great soil in most situations.
Again I'm no expert but you may want to look into volcanic soils and their fertility before going forward with that part of the story.
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(YEah yeah yeah, I knoooow that volcanic soil is super fertile, but everyone is an idiot and is put off by the insanity of the place. Its super deadly. Poisonous critters blossom there, it would seem they're the only ones that have figured out that its a decent place to chill. But over the summer the family went to all the tourist information places about Mt. Saint Helens and there was a LOT of stuff done to make that land regrow/thrive again after it erupted. In order to replant trees, each sapling needed to have a hole dug out from the thick ash and THEN into the earth beneath it. Of course plants regrew on their own, small ones, but it was the heartier ones first. I promise that this ashy desert will not be put to waste, somebody is going to get their hands in the dirt and figure out how good it is, but not yet! I promise its a part of the plan! XD)
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KK. Like I said no expert. I knew it took a while for the volcanic materials to start to break down and release the good stuff into forms the plants loved to gobble up but I wasn't sure how long it took for it to become, as the scientists say, "weathered" so plants could thrive in it instead of being chemically damaged by its unbroken down form. Looks like you've done a lot more research than I so very good. 
Interesting how the poisonous plants and animals do so well there. If its only been a 100 years there must be smaller colonies of them nearby to have moved there?
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Also as a result of the surplus of these centipedes the bugs that help with making land good, like pooping worms and other stuff that helps get the land workable and fertile, they were being eaten at an exponential rate as the centipedes flourished. This could make it difficult for a lot of plants to even get the chance to grow. Also because of the centipedes there are even spots in Ebony Scape that are impassible because there is nothing but a thin crust keeping you from being sucked down into a sink hole. After a hundred years of these pests I could see how the desert would have a hard time being replanted, not to mention that these buggers are still venomous and a hindrance to people anyway.
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I found a source that works for what I intend to do with my story!!! 
So what I'm getting from this is exactly what I planned, actually. Depending on the thickness of the layer of ash that settles there is either a little or a feck ton of work that needs to go into making the land workable. That means that yes, parts of this desert are going to need to be turned into areas where plants have been able to grow just fine (which will be around the edges or hundreds of miles away from the mountain itself), but because of the vastness of the mountain (freaking enormous) I intend for the blast to absolutely catastrophic. It'll be Mt. St. Helens x6 at least.
As for the poisonous stuff, yeah, they are kind of like the cockroaches of the story, being almost the only things to survive the eruption. There aren't actually a whole lot of things that can live in the desert. The burrowing centipedes are really the only critters that have managed to figure the place out, along with some super tiny bugs that moved in too, or have been able to survive in the earthy layers beneath the ash. Not like I intend to go into it in great detail in the book, but I'm going with the idea that these guys were pests in the farm lands before the eruption happened. Farmers would kill them if they were found because they burrow under crops and eat the good bugs that chill there, as well as burrow around the roots of their crops, making homes for themselves where happy bugs are plentiful. When there were no more farmers the centipedes took over. Because centipedes are all predators I'm under the impression that they survive on a type of sand flea that populated Ebony Scape over a number of decades. And centipedes like to be moist so they burrow deep enough in Ebony scape to find the moisture beneath the ash and so on. You get the idea.
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