>>5892560Indeed you do. Your first inkling of understanding comes with the depiction of an array of different humanoid (well, what humans call ‘humanoid’) body-types. You recognize the short, stocky forms of the Short Folk—dwarves, gnomes, and halflings—and the taller forms of Man and Elf and Orc. Coupled with them are curving liens and patterns of paired glyphs, the meaning of which eludes you until you see them paired with maps of familiar locations: Hawksong and its surrounding dukedoms, baronies, and principalities; the Sylvan Realms, the Goblin Wastes and Orcwilds; the Southlands, and even what looks to be a distorted (corrected?) map of the distant and exotic East; this one is pockmarked with dozens of small graphs which the eladrin quickly scrolls past, displaying beastmen and other, stranger races which you do not immediately recognize... Though some vaguely remind you of the legendary 'yokai parade' which Izzy had once told you about. Beneath each are a series of symbols: usually two, sometimes three.
They’re charting… Population and their whereabouts? Races and subraces, seemingly? Why?
Other monitors seem to show similar graphs for particular animal populations. In particular, the eladrin of the moon seem focused on particular types or kinds. You aren’t sure you fully understand the connections, but you automatically take note the varieties you see being monitored: butterflies, moths, and bats; predatory mammals, especially canids and big cats; birds, of more varieties than you knew EXISTED.
Weird…
So too do you see another geographic map, but this one is… Different. The world you know (sajd then some) is layered atop itself, but not quite perfectly; each iteration is a different colour, and around it orbit a variety of other spheres and hazy, half-filled, partly-overlapped circles. Each of them matches the colour of a symbol beside it, which you recognize as shorthand abbreviations for elven words: Har'dro, Niar, Su'aco, Chath, Wussrun'wa, Faer, Aphyon, Kul'gobsula, Liad.
Earth, Water, Wind, Flame, Dream, Magic (or ‘Feycraft’, or ‘Faith’, depending on the context and dialect), Death, Prison, and Law. The Elemental Planes, the Dreamscape… And where else? The afterlife, you’d guess…
And there, matching a spreading stain which creeps across the world from south and west, is another coloured indicator, tagged with the symbol ‘Olath’… Or ‘Dark’. It intermingles with a patch of ‘Liad’ where Hawksong would be, but also with ‘Faer’. The eladrin at the monitor seems to regard that particular confluence with some concern, for it remains on the monitor for several seconds.
