M'OSKQORRG'S ODDITIES
Discoveries from Time in Exile
by David Moskowitz
Hobbtoons
What transformed little people of Floopsyre into a shipbuilder’s holy grail of raw materials? Most theories involve the Floopsyre version of “Bobbing for Kittens” and a litter sacred to the priestesses of Ellehra. But whatever happened, their hobb bodies—lifeless and desiccated- are enchanted so no part will ever go beneath the surface of any liquid. A single hobb can keep a leaking a galleon afloat, but such a ship must have the infrastructure to maintain the balance a hobb body cannot. Many vessels have capsized because their builders failed to accommodate for how this magical buoyancy might alter calculations related to the still applicable laws of physics.
In terms of their weight, toughness—against both physical blows and corrosive elements (they will float on lava and acid for example, but still be affected by the heat and vapors respectively)—treat hobbtoons as petrified wood. The enchantment vanishes when 25% of the mass is gone, and any severed or broken off piece retains no enchantment (and again, once ¼ has been removed, the remaining corpse loses its magic).
The price of a hobbtoon is mostly dependent on its size and the positioning of its limbs. The difference between a spread eagle specimen and one in fetal position—not even good for log rolling contests—is about 15-fold, depending on the market. There are rumors that the Death Empress paid 200,000 gold for one of middling quality, but the credibility ends not with the price, but with the suggestion that Lerotra’hh had to pay for something.
Copyright © 2012, David Moskowitz
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