Nymphlopedia

Entry 33: Peak Nymphs

"The Naked Empire is already doing a really good job at rising! It doesn't have to be literal!"

Vince and Tania were just walking by at that point, on their way to somewhere else, and they just happened to have been caught in a... somewhat mildly warm argument between Sonata and a particular skinny dark yellow Nymph with long hair who was tapping her toes on the ground, also doing some standing stretches while they talked.

Both of them wanted to quietly walk away, but Sonata - without even turning to look at them - pointed at Vince.

"VINCE!" She said. "You there, back me up! This smug Peak Nymph thinks that the Naked Empire hasn't really 'risen' since her own little castle... thing is literally above us!"

"Uhhhhhh... can I say no? I really don't want to get involved in any argument you make."

Yeah, the sun was shining pretty nicely on a surface Olive-Peak. A cool-looking mountain that shot up through the clouds. There was, in fact, a visible tiny speck on top, which did in fact look like a literal castle.

Finally, Vince and Tania heard the Peak Nymph speak for the first time. Previously, they just got Sonata in the middle of a long ramble:

"Sonata, we are literally and figuratively above the rest. Also, you are far more smug than I am, I shall say?"

"...Well okay I am a smug little fuck. I'll give you that."

"Can I see your castle?" Vince asked. "It sounds like you finally have competition, Sonata. A friendly competition that's not sending hitmen at us every five seconds."

"I think Lindsey is being nice right now." Said Tania. "She's waiting until Cthulhu is no longer a problem before she really starts to go after us."

Sonata ignored what Tania had to say: "Yes I do and I don't like it! You know what competition like this leads to? Sports! Very, very heated sports matches!"

"We work out a lot! We'll be glad to challenge you if that comes to be!"

The Peak Nymph seemed to have finally noticed Tania for the first time. It was also the first time any of the Trio saw her open her eyes.

"...What." She said. "Oh no. Not you."

"Hey," said Vince, "I'd like to see the castle-"

The Peak Nymph just disappeared by shooting to the sky, a huge jump at blinding speeds, leaving behind herself a ripple of dark yelow dust.

"Damn." Tania said quietly. "Another avoidant one... and it's usually Peak Nymphs in particular..."

Sonata put her hand on Tania's shoulder. "Hey... think of it this way... you could be a part of my football team and kick their asses in a match!"

"They like football?" Vince asked.

Sonata's eyes popped open. "Oh fuck. No, they don't... they said... something about golf being a sport of theirs? I normally think golf is fucking boring, but courses with a lot of verticality sound intere-"

She stopped talking after seeing Tania starting to seethe, looking over at the mountain in particular. Yep, the yellow grass at the base was mowed. Vince himself was taking a few steps backward.

"So I guess you won't be joining my golf team since you hate the sport?" Sonata asked. Vince just backed away faster.

"No."

Peak Nymphs.

There have been plenty of reports of figures spotted at the peaks of the yellow spires on the surface or in caves. These are the figures, another type of Nymph with a love for the air.

Preferred Environment: The Olive Peaks.

Environment Threat Level: Peaceful.

Environment Stats: Moderate Percipitation/moistness. Cool. Moderate-Fantastic. Dark yellow-tinted, some times misty mountains known for sticking up high to the sky, or high above expanses of cave. Also has a good amount of unique vegitation, usually capable of growing tall.

Other Names: Summit Nymphs, Rise Nymphs, Jump Nymphs, Vertical Nymphs.

Affinity: Earth.

Color: Dark Yellow.

Traditional Costume Weapon: Usually just one band of stone around their stomachs. Allows them to jump extra high or slow/speed up their descending and ascending speed.

Vince's Comment: If you're good at skydiving, you shoud be able to defend yourself against one pretty well. Also, you can thank them for being the ones to invent the Lucky Horseshoe. That saved my life many, many times.

Sonata's Comment: They want me to exercise. Which, I mean, Nymph exercising means that for some reason all the fat and stuff goes to their ass more, so I like doing that, but dear Pan, everyone I try to one night stand really wants me to get involved with a jumping jack schedule.

Tania's Comment: Peak Nymphs.
Nymphae Cacumen.
Among the mightiest of the Nymphs areal-wise, with those with actual wings being the most obvious exceptions. At their full power, their leaps are able to clear the height of a mountain. ...As you can imagine, however, this makes meeting a particularly elusive one rather difficult. They don't like me, and I don't know why! Whenever I try to talk to one, they will just jump! It's frustrating. The most I have to go by is the sole member of their kind in the Naked Empire. She's very cooperative, thankfully.

Closing AN:

Day 11, done!

...Basically these Nymphs are just Orange-Class demons from Joy Roy over on Fictionpress. Oh and don't worry, Tania will mend things with these Nymphs. Again, this isn't some epilogue set after the finale of Romancing the Last Dryad, RTLD will have quite a lot of post-Moon Lord stuff. Hell I'm probably planning more on that than I am the chapters in-between the introduction and the Moon Lord battle.

"Why aren't these Wind affinity?" Well the out-universe answer is that I already had another yellow Wind affinity. The in-universe answer is that affinity is a really, really complicated thing. The biome is actually more "tied" to its stone makeup than its height. And again, especially since these are common and natural underground.

I wanted to throw a reference to this weird-ass clip from this weird-ass movie called the Holy Mountain that Vinny of Vinesauce played in a stream. (Apparently there's been some stuff going on with him lately? I honestly haven't kept on track with that, I'm just saying I know nothing about the issues right now, so I'm not pushing or denying anything. I saw that stream a while ago, it was Hat in Time.) But I... kind of... couldn't find a way to put it in that wasn't very forced.

Oh shit the tenth anniversary of Hecksing Ulumate Crconikals is coming up. But it snuck up on me, too late to really do anything for it. Hrm. It's kind of a shame. Honestly I'm feeling a tiny bit nostalgic for the whole "Big-scale random-ass hammy adventures" thing of HUC and the related stories I planned out then, there's still a lot of problems with HUC I think (namely the reliance on pop culture humor) but it was the first story of mine that I didn't think was just a complete disjumbled pop culture joke mess. I had kind of wanted Steve Buhvillen's Intriguing Group, Ordinarily United, and Joy Roy to have some sort of similar "feel" with that but they just sort of got bloated and dragged on.

Almost forgot to mention, I fell behind on "keeping ahead" again a little bit yesterday and basically I'd have to do nine entry rough drafts if I want to be caught up by the end of the day. But since I'm near the end of the roughs anyway it probably wouldn't make that much of a difference.