A forest that was not there yesterday

[unprophesied_of_ages]

The Lord Ruler is in his palace, when he sees a sight he hasn't seen in centuries. Trees, sunlight...is he hallucinating? The fact that there's a forest in his living room isn't the surprising part. The fact that there's a forest on his planet is. As soon as he walks through the door to where his living room isn't, it's definitely not a hallucination.

His stores of Allomantic metals abruptly disappear. They're still physically there, but the power is completely gone. He immediately turns to go back, only to see more forest.

At least his Feruchemy still works—he can tell because he's still alive—but that won't last him forever. He only has so much stored youth, and without both sets of abilities he can't replenish it. He hasn't been in so much danger since the beheading that one time. Returning to Scadrial is the highest and currently only priority. If spontaneous forests are a thing, he needs to find someone who can explain them and more importantly how to get back.

The next few hours are spent walking in an essentially randomly chosen direction, with the sun to his right. He's quite certain that suns are supposed to be moving across the sky, but that's not a pressing emergency. He already knew he wasn't on his own planet when he saw proper trees and plants instead of ash-covered monstrosities. Whenever he calls out, nobody responds. If it's an empty spontaneous forest, he's probably doomed.

After some time, he hears his stomach growl. He hasn't seen much that looks edible, but possibly that's just because he's not used to real plants. Berries. Berries used to exist. Those berries look tasty, and if they're poisonous it's not like he needs to worry about it. As always, he has a truly ridiculous amount of stored health in his gold jewelry. Tapping gold just in case, he eats a handful.

Comments

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"Metal that's partly inside someone's body is usually impossible to sense with Allomancy; it's just me and the Inquisitors who can do it, and they wouldn't know those spikes are attached to a person. They rarely have reason to be in the palace anyway. It shouldn't be a problem."

[imeanforever]

"Then I'm sufficiently provided for, for your purposes."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"You're welcome."

He leaves, closing the door but not sealing it with Allomancy.

[imeanforever]

And Promise works, because there is no point in not doing something that it has occurred to him to have her do and wants done, when she doesn't have an escape route.

And with her spare attention she makes little fairy lights.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Alendi has a few other things to attend to. He has an Inquisitor ram an atium spike through Yellow's heart in an attempt to steal his immortality. He burns brass to make Yellow completely apathetic about the ordeal; the screams would be tiresome. Removing the spike fails to kill the fairy, which is disappointing. It means no immortality upgrade.

He then starts stockpiling his metalminds even further. Especially atium; if he gets stranded in Fairyland it'd be nice to have a life expectancy measured in millennia rather than months.

The next time Promise sees him he's bringing food and water.

"Anything unexpected?" he asks when he enters.

[imeanforever]

"No," she says absently, and she puts the rock down to attend to the food and water. She purifies the water again.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"That's good, probably. Long as it doesn't turn out to be impossible."

He offers her some of the food.

[imeanforever]

Nom.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

Eventually she'll finish with the food, and the emperor of the world clears up afterward.

"Do you have an estimate of how long it's likely to take?"

[imeanforever]

"A few more hours. And then I'll be faster with more of the same type. Especially if you bring it to me in pieces all about the same size and shape."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"Will you be able to enlarge the quantity once you have some? Or turn things that don't contain chromium into it? Other pieces like this one do exist, but they're rare."

[imeanforever]

"I could probably turn a metal that was just like chromium but didn't contain any into chromium, especially if I had at least a small amount of chromium too."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"Afraid I can't tell you most of its characteristics, since the pure metal hasn't exactly ever existed. But once you have the first bit I can supply something that looks like it."

[imeanforever]

"Similar in weight, too, if possible."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"I should be able to come up with something.
Is there anything else that would help?"

[imeanforever]

"Books on sorcerous transmutation, but getting them would probably be prohibitive."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"Yes, under the circumstances. You can come find me when it works or is definitely impossible; I'll probably be in my study."

[imeanforever]

Nod.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

He leaves, and sets about collecting a variety of metals so he'll have something similar to whatever she comes up with.

[imeanforever]

Three hours later she goes to his study. Knock knock.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

"You can come in," Alendi says. "It worked?"

[imeanforever]

She hands him a lump of chromium.

[unprophesied_of_ages]

It's gray, shiny, and brittle. Fairly light for a metal. When he touches it, he instantly feels that he could use Feruchemy on this. Perfect.

"Congratulations," he says. "You've managed something no-one else has since ever.

This would be more than enough to handle Thorn with, but of course I'll want a supply for general use. How efficiently do you think you could transmute something like this?" He hands her a piece of zinc. It's slightly bluer and a touch heavier but otherwise similar.

[imeanforever]

"It might take me a couple of hours the first time if I can keep a small piece of the pure chromium to work with."

[unprophesied_of_ages]

He breaks a piece off. It doesn't break easily, but he's stronger than he looks.
"Funny, that metal is currently more valuable than an equal amount of atium. To me, at least.

Getting to Thorn is the next question, though. Would you be able to make a gate to somewhere within traveling distance of as many of his courts as possible?"