Varchas

 is a walled city of the Elder Continent, filled with light and mirrors. Darkness is unwelcome in Varchas, and visitors from the darker reaches of the Neath are granted but a single day's stay. The port is called Port Erdonmez.

Port description
"The Mirrored City, where Light was always the Law..."

The city has Five Towers and is covered in a great wealth of vines, flowers, and fungus. Vast arrays of mirrors are carefully maintained and arrayed so that no point of the city is ever touched by shadow.

Port Interactions
There are 4 possible port interactions available at Varchas. The one you see is controlled by the value of Varchas: The Mirrored City. This is in turn increased by exploring Varchas, gaining the trust and favour of various inhabitants, and then attending the pilgrimage. Returning after this will let you decide the final outcome of the Story at A Plague of Broken Mirrors.

The Burning White Light of Varchas
The walled city of Varchas is a tangle of green vines and luminescent fungal flowers slow-blooming around mouldering stone. A quincunx of carved stepped-towers rise over the walls and pour burning white light into the bleak sky.

A rough, shadowed path leads from the docks to the Mirrored Gates of Varchas. Two towering carved-stone lamps throw their light on the angled mirrors, and a blue-cloaked Guard stands in the reflected pool of light.

The city is a beacon against the tree-hushed, sprawling darkness of the Elder Continent. In the far distance a vast mountain glimmers.

Returning to Varchas
Subsequent visits to  (when Varchas: The Mirrored City = 1 or 2) will be met with this opening event, rather than The Burning White Light of Varchas.

The walled city of Varchas is a tangle of green vines and luminescent fungal flowers slow-blooming around mouldering stone. A quincunx of carved stepped-towers rise over the walls and pour burning white light into the bleak sky.

A rough, shadowed path leads from the docks to the Mirrored Gates of Varchas. Two towering carved-stone lamps throw their light on the angled mirrors, and a blue-cloaked Guard stands in the reflected pool of light.

The city is a beacon against the tree-hushed, sprawling darkness of the Elder Continent. In the far distance a vast Mountain glimmers.

The Fallen City of Varchas
When Varchas: The Mirrored City = 3, this is the port interaction you can expect.

The walled city of Varchas is dark. The glowing fungus has been stripped from the Five Towers, and the Principal Mirrors are all smashed to pieces.

The Mirrored Gates are broken into tiny facets and each one glints malevolently. You can see... shapes... moving in them. Glimmers of cosmogone - that burnt orange darkness. Glimpses of smoking sea. Sweet laughter that hitches and skitters like the death of clocks.

The Purified City
Visiting  with exactly 4 x Varchas: The Mirrored City will present this opening interaction instead of The burning white light of Varchas or Returning to Varchas.

The walled city of Varchas is a tangle of green vines and luminescent fungal flowers slow-blooming around mouldering stone. A quincunx of carved stepped-towers rise over the walls and pour burning white light into the bleak sky.

A rough, shadowed path leads from the docks to the Mirrored Gates of Varchas. But there is no fire burning in the towering stone-lamps beside the gates, and no blue-cloaked Guard.

Varchas is barred to visitors.

The Falling City
Visiting  with exactly 6 x Varchas: The Mirrored City will present this opening interaction.

The walled city of Varchas is a tangle of green vines and luminescent fungal flowers slow-blooming around mouldering stone. A quincunx of carved stepped-towers rise over the walls and pour burning white light into the bleak sky.

A rough, shadowed path leads from the docks to the Mirrored Gates of Varchas. But there is no fire burning in the towering stone-lamps beside the gates, and no blue-cloaked Guard.

Varchas is barred to visitors.

At the Mirrored Gates
The Guard stands in the middle of the pool of light, looking warily at the darkness beyond you.

Up close the Guard's blue cloak is threadbare and mossy along the hem. A pattern of embroidered suns runs along the collar, but the gold thread is dull. The kohl around her eyes is smudged.

"Well, Taamas," she asks. "Are you going to ask your questions? Or are you just going to stare?"

Her tone is brusque but her expression is curiously eager; you do not think Varchas receives many visitors.

Inside the City-Walls
Your eyes are blinded by the brilliance of the light; the verdant-rot smell is even thicker. The heat of so much flame and reflected light presses oppressively against your skin. Your head pounds.

It is a few minutes before your eyes adjust, and you can look around: brass lamps and gilded sconces hang from every wall, and phosphorescent fungus grows moss-like upon doorways and ceilings.

Cunningly arranged mirrors catch every droplet of light and diffuse it till each cobblestone and rampart of the city is drenched and blazing and utterly without shadow.

Who do you speak to?

The Centre of Varchas
You walk galleried courtyards wreathed with vines and fungal blooms. Long straight roadways criss-cross the length and breadth of Varchas, the stone worn by the wheels of carts and the tread of thousands of slippered feet.

Lamp-Lighters constantly check the fuel-levels of the sconces, and replace wicks; Fire-Keepers check the coiled-spring mechanisms that control the angle of the mirrors.

There is much to explore; where will you go next?

Evening in Varchas
All visitors to Varchas are given one night's accommodation in the city's only inn. It is a handsome stone mansion arranged around a pleasantly cool courtyard: frescoes of city-life are painted on the walls. Given how few visitors Varchas hosts, you suspect the Inn is more usually used by philandering locals.

Evening falls - or does it? The town's Five Principal Mirrors are mounted on coiled-spring mechanisms, and alter their angles subtly to create the impression of evening. Across the city, the Fire-Keepers throw pinches of coloured powder into the lamps and the quality of light yellows to a softer brightness.