Nymphlopedia

Entry 55: Dryland Nymphs

Beginning AN:

This is one of the most likely biomes to pretty much be completely replaced.

And thus, the final plank was in place, the last bit for the Dryland Home was built.

"I really hope Darnell doesn't decide to move here." Vince said with his hand on his chin, looking at the simply, almost box-like wood home. "It feels like he's been moving around a lot lately."

Sonata hammered in the last nail one more time, and it was done. With the help of the Naked Empire of course. "YEAH-UH!" She cheered. "We've got another home done!"

A naked Madeline, meanwhile, rolled her eyes. "He actually was thinking about it. But hey, frees up the home back in the Power Fields..."

"I mean... that's... it's not that much... I'm not sure what other Humans would want to move in there."

"Heh, I'm sure there's a lot."

"Well... you have a weird boyfriend."

Right on cue as soon as Vince finished saying that, Sonata took out some gigantic horn to celebrate having built another house with the Empire, turning out to have still not improved very much on her music skills. She was also... basically trying to wrap her legs around a corner of the home and support herself with that and absolutely nothing else. She fell off and landed on her ass. But kept blowing as if nothing happened, (poorly) recreating the King of the Hill theme.

Madeline just gave him a smug fucking smirk. "I know, I know, I know," said Vince. "Pot calling kettle, I'll shut up right now."

And out walked a member of the patron Nymph species of the lands, scanning the triple-house building up and down. She sighed.

"One little bit of constructive criticism before I leave..." she said. "Every biome has its own tree. Why don't you... you know, at least make houses out of those? Spice up your neighborhoods. Instead of putting plain Forest woods for every house?"

"Maybe later." Sonata said. "Sorry, but now, we've gotta make the places liveable and that's about it. Keepin' up the Naked Empire embassies in all the land. Also, you got any water?"

She sighed and stuck her hand out, drawing moisture out from the air around her...

And collecting it in to a ball of water, which she then just threw in Sonata's direction. Using loopholes with magic powers to basically do their exact opposite is fun.

"Oh, thanks, you didn't have to use any magic I would have just been happy if you pointed to a stream."

"I have a stream right here." Tania said, pointing to one.

The Dryland Nymph gasped, shook her head, and ran over to that. It was a tiny... yeah, Tania was really overselling it. It barely qualified as a book.

"Dam it." She said.

"What's wrong?" Asked Vince.

"No, I wasn't swearing, I was telling you what I wanted you to do. Dam the little stream here. We... don't really like that much water going around here. You'll piss off the other locals if you spend too long. Where did this even come from, anyway?"

"Well," said Sonata, "after we killed that fucking Ice Bitch, I threw her crown on..." she pointed to the top of a cliff. "Oh, I think it landed there."

Tania sighed. "Sonata! You threw another element haphazardly in to an unfitting biome?! You of all people should know how that angers the Nymphs!"

"Okay, to be fair, I was trying to anger those Christmas fuckers. They pissed me off."

Tania looked like she was about to just fucking tear in to Sonata. She would, but first, Sonata suddenly looked surprised.

"Ohhhhh..." She said. "'Dam' without an 'N,' okay I get it."

Dryland Nymphs.

The rocky plains hold rocky pain and little rocky gain to the rocky game. Nymphs here generally don't take kindly to tresspassers.

Preferred Environment: Drylands.

Environment Threat Level: Moderate.

Environment Stats: Extremely dry. Warm. Moderate-Mundane. Uncommon. Dry, flat, rocky zones, with occasional rock spikes. Has a surprising amount of plant life and small animal life.

Other Names: Dry Nymphs, Dust Nymphs, Rock-Spike Nymphs, "Mines Nymphs" (Note from Tania: I'm not really sure, it started from someone obsessed with a video game about a crying boy trying to not get killed by his mother? And kind of went from there.)

Affinity: Earth.

Color: Light Vermilion.

Traditional Costume Weapon: Stones carefully decorated on their toes. Helps them suck the moisture out of various things, and harden parts of their body and other objects to stone.

Vince's Comment: What's the difference between these and the badlands or canyons? I know a lot of biomes overlap a bit, but it feels like most of them so far have at least been... a "little" distinct. Man, it's getting hard to keep track of where the Naked Empire members are from.
Um, right. These Nymphs like kicking a lot.

Sonata's Comment: Similar song and dance with Canyon Nymphs, "Western references" just kind of go over like a lead balloon. Then again they go over my head like a lead balloon too.
Speaking of which, do not call them Dry-ads. At best, they'll laugh at you, not with you. Trust me, you can feel the difference oh my fuck.

Tania's Comment: Dryland Nymphs.
Nymphae Siccum.
These Nymphs are uncannily close to one of my enemies, the Drought Evil Biome, which may technically be "natural" in origin (this is shrouded in mystery) yet is by definition an Evil Biome to the core, fitting all requirements, and not having a patron Nymph. Yet even within the dry cracks of this land there is still life teeming about. I have, on my quest, been rethinking what it means to be "filled with" or "devoid of" life... I'm on a tangent again.
Dryland Nymphs are predictably a sort of counterpart to Wetland Nymphs, as many Nymphs appear to be in pairs, trios, or even tetra-groups, even if nothing makes this "official." They lie at the center of all things dry and hard and have a firm philosophy to go with it. A Dryland Nymph could power her or himself up via hardening enough to smash through a solid wall of titanium without any injury, possibly even stronger material as well. Finding volunteers for that is a challenge.

Closing AN:

I'm sorry to say, but I beat the Lost Daily Run in Isaac too. Even got Hush while I was at it. So, you'll have to put up with Sheldon for at least one more day.

Why the fuck couldn't this story have been during a win streak where my avatar cycle was on Brenda. That would at least kinda sorta fit because she's like this dumb fanservice parody character thing and this story is...

...Actually I have no fucking clue what this story is.