Foreword
My days of looting and pillaging are long behind me, my motley horde dispersed to the winds. I have been wandering the wilds of web3 for some years and the more I search for truth and meaning, the less certain this old rat becomes of anything.
Still I think I may have found a home of sorts on the remote island of Scarcity, in a crystal tower with cascading waterfalls and good-natured neighbors.
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The Crystal Staircase - your rat's new home |
A good-natured neighbor - jackdee.eth |
The more I dig into the crystal-rich soil of the treasury next door or explore the flooded caverns deep below my new home, the more I learn about the strange past, present and future of the island - with each revelation I feel the clutches of greed and darkness loosen from my heart. I may never atone for the sins of my past, but perhaps I can be of service to the future. Each day I pull on my eye patch and turn my one good eye to Scarcity. What can I find? What does it mean? Where have all the gnomes gone? I have dedicated my remaining days to this chronicle of discovery.
Scarcity Chronicles Chapter 1 - the early discoveries
The Crystal Staircase (29 Emerald Ave, Scarcity Island, Cryptovoxels.com)
- Carved out of the solid rock and crystal by the ancients in the before times.
- A staircase to the sunless sea below Scarcity and the caverns beyond.
- Rooftop soaking pools have healing properties.
There are gnome zombies down below and a rare zombie dolmentaz crystal (dark faction NFT discovery) on the rooftop
A magic dragonturtle crawled out of the pool at the lowest level, apparently attracted to the magical radiation from the zombie crystal. It has been basking around over the crystal ever since. It seems to be mostly harmless.
Examination of the zombie crystal accidentally released a zombie neck stabber alien parasite. Doh!
Alien Zombie Parasites
The neck stabber hidden inside the zombie dolmentaz crystal proved to be only one of many alien zombie parasites crawling and flying around Scarcity. Diverse in form they all have one thing in common - they deliver zombie plague nanobots, which I initially thought came from a cyberpunk future but now realize may be from an alternate present (more on fractured timelines and alternate realities later).
Zombie Neck Stabber (available as a wearable on OpenSea) (far right above in the image above)
The zombie neck stabber crawls and flies silently around Scarcity seeking to stab its large red stinger into the back of your neck and wrap itself around your head. Eventually, the nanobots delivered by the sting will turn you into a zombie. Removing the alien parasite in the meantime usually results in death. However, until you become a zombie, you can see into the past/future/alternate dimensions through the green crystal eyes of the neck stabber.Zombie Heart Displacer (available as a wearable on OpenSea)(second from right in the image above) This one-eyed bone scorpion type creature will try to crawl on you and suck your ribs and spine into another dimension. But don't worry, it will replace your missing bones with its own body and you will hardly be able to tell the difference. It does turn you into a zombie, but your heart is displaced into a future/alternate timeline (worth noting a prominent gnomish heresy holds the soul resides in the heart, while gnome orthodoxy is of course that the soul resides in the tip of the pointy hat - according to my gnome zombie informants)
Goblinhead Spider (available as a wearable on OpenSea) This strange creature has a chattering goblin head for a butt (erm abdomen) and a tusked head on the other end. The tusks are for rending and ripping while its claws deliver zombie-plague nanobots. Goblinhead spiders seem to control the neck stabbers and heart displacers. They also leave smol alien spiders in their wake which will grow into full-sized goblinhead spiders after a blood meal.
I let all three alien creatures crawl onto me for science and this is what happened - I became something like a spider-taur:
- Zombie Rust Monster (this is not available as a wearable but is available as a larger megavox model in the public asset library in CryptoVoxels)
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The antler-like protuberances on top of the zombie rust monster will cause any metal to turn to rust and fall apart, even usually non-corrosive metals like gold, silver & bronze. In the process a lot of magical energy is released. The creature consumes some of it, but it is a wasteful process and there is a lot of raw magical energy released as a byproduct which might cause strange results in an area, or possibly be harnessed by a skilled alien creature wrangler. But obviously, don't get too close or it will grab you with its big pincers and inject the zombie nanites.
In the next chapter of my chronicle I will cover the fractured nature of reality/time around Scarcity, cyberpunk tech artifacts, and the megacorp research lab. Stay tuned.