written as a public access exploration by Syphogrant Kiana
Given the good reception the previous article had, the Tribunal has given me the task to continue my research so I can publish my results as I dig deeper into how exactly the Elemental Plane of Fire regulates its resources or, more explicitly, its temperature. In the past I’ve narrated how the Society came across the Ash tree, a unique structure that, theoretically, helps distribute heat from the inner mantle of the plane to the coldest parts of the surface. Recently, we’ve discovered how the trees find the spots cold enough so they can grow. Short answer: they are the secondary step in a cycle we’re barely discovering!
To explain the previous statement, let’s remember what we already know about Ash trees (now also known as Pyroflorae Oleacinis). They’re an extremely tall (1.6 km, or 1 mile) dendritic structure composed of hardened ash on the outside with an inner body of unknown material, which emanates an immense amount of heat to the surrounding area. This gives the tree a sort of “volcanic” aesthetic, since the inner material, red-hot, shines through the ruptures of the outer ashen layer. Once the atmosphere thins out enough, the upper parts of the Ash tree grow limbs (its “branches”) and start shedding thousands of fiery flakes resembling leaves, which erupt into embers and ashes as soon as an external body or a powerful gust of wind disrupts them.
When we first discovered these trees, and as we learned more about them, we hadn’t been able to discover why or how they grew in the places they did. In the Prime Material Plane, trees and other flora grow and adapt according to the pre-existing conditions of the soil and environment. We had the hypothesis that these Ash trees were no different… and we were right. Soon, we discovered a vast field of cooling soil, precisely 147 km southeast from the Brass City, in which we found the primal form of the fiery flora: Pyroflorae Pyroblehos, the Blossoming Fire (named by yours truly).
The name, of course, was given based on its function and appearance, but do not think of it as a flower in the usual sense. The evidence suggests that, once the minerals in a certain area are consumed in their entirety and the snakes leave, this absence of metal and life allows the soil to cool down slowly. Once it’s cool enough, it hardens, allowing the heat emanating from deep within the plane to “pool” and accumulate beneath, where it slowly starts rising closer to the surface in the form of hyper-heated metals, gasses, rock, minerals and possibly other unknown materials. This mixture is what we think forms the Blossoming Fire and later the core of the Ash tree.
The material tries to rupture the soil, making it “bubble”, which forms small (between 2 and 5 cm of diameter; 1 to 2 inches) pustules of molten material. The Blossoming Fire is called that because, once these pustules erupts from the intense heat (with a violence that far surpasses the snake eggs, might I add) that which remains is an open cocoon that splits in 4 to 6 “petals” and irradiates lots of energy in the form of steam and other gasses. In the singular space where we researched this event, we confirmed the eruption and presence of 215 Blossoming Fires with an estimated total of 1500 throughout the small field.
Research continues, but now that we know there’s a cycle, a Chronomancy team might work with us in an attempt to understand this cycle, which we think takes place from anywhere between 6 months to several years, depending on scale.
