Dryads' Tears

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rayds' tears were a popular and powerful component of healing potions, amplifying the effectiveness of other ingredients as well as being holistically medicinal in their own right. However, they have been unavailable since the third eon, due to the genocide of the people from who they came. This was driven in part by the other peoples of Olrion who captured and tortured the dryads in order to extract their tears. The history of dryads' tears and how they came to be no longer available is frequently sanitised to hide the other peoples' wrong doing, but there are records and people that remember the horrors unleashed by the ruthless extraction of this precious resource from the people it originated from.

Properties

Material Characteristics

Dryads' tears were a colourless, odourless liquid that tasted surprisingly fresh (not salty like the tears of other peoples).

Physical & Chemical Properties

As a healing ingredient, the tears of dryads potently helped to heal a manner of ailments and injuries. They also had the ability to enhance the efficacy of many other healing ingredients.

Origin & Source

Dryads' tears were produced by the now-extinct (bar one survivor) immortal dryads, who were known to weep frequently and so had a plentiful, renewable supply of them.

History & Usage

History

Once the healing properties of dryads' tears were discovered by the people from which they originated, this knowledge was freely shared with the other peoples of Olrion, as the dryads were a gregarious sort. They were known to cry frequently, and their tears were used to barter and negotiate for the protection of their forests. However, the other peoples of Olrion became greedy and soon demand could not keep up with production. That is when the abductions came, and dryads were held captive and tortured in order to extract their tears. They eventually became extinct after they refused to cry any more and so were killed and discarded as useless expenses.

Discovery

No one knows or remembers how dryads discovered the healing properties of their tears. However, it is believed they learned of this after crying from injuries that then healed more quickly than usual once the tears dripped onto them. Once the dryads noticed this, they began to experiment with their tears in healing potions. As their alchemical properties became properly understood, this knowledge was shared with the other peoples of Olrion.

Everyday use

Dryads' tears could be applied or consumed on their own as a healing tincture, but they were even more effective when combined with other popular healing ingredients. They could be either ingested or applied topically.

Distribution

Trade & Market

Dryads would exchange their tears for goods and services, as well as use them to barter for the protection of their forests. As the population of Olrion grew, so did the demand for wood for settlements, and so the tears were used in a diplomatic manner to get the other peoples to agree to sustainable logging practices.

Once the peoples of Olrion had the knowledge of the tears shared with them, trade internally flourished. As demand grew disproportionately, they decided to attempt a proto-industrialisation of tear production by capturing dryads en masse and torturing them to produce more tears.

by Alberto Bianchini

Type

Biomaterial

Rarity

Previously bountiful, now unobtainable

Odor

Odourless

Taste

Fresh (comparable to cucumbers or watermelon)

Color

Clear

Common State

Liquid