The Petrified Forest of Hemlock Veldt

The Petrified Forest of Hemlock Veldt is perhaps the most important of holy sites to humanoid worshippers of the Hecath Queens: communal godheads and command cores of Waking Materia's only sentient non-humanoid species, the fungal-insectoid Hecath. It is the site of the great Hemlock Veldt Disaster in which a heroic Hecath Queen by the voice-name of Raggedy Azra rescued an entire island nation (both saproling and humanoid) from a catastrophic arcane attack by the Lichlord and Colonial God Vierix Euphraxia, sacrificing herself and killing Euphraxia in the process.

The trees are not petrified through mineralization the way normal petrified wood is: they instead seem to have been instantly transformed into hardened, nonliving husks as a result of the occult conflagration. Pieces of this petrified wood are carefully and worshipfully removed from the trunks to make holy talismans.

History

For more detail on the lead-up to the disaster, see On the Hecath: The Collected Writings of Vierix Clymenikari.
For more detail on the disaster itself, see The Hemlock Veldt Disaster.

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Warring between the Hecath and the ancient New Rozsan Empire reached a fever pitch as the ruthless and ambitious Lichlord Euphraxia decided to solve two problems with one, overwhelming blow: she would release an occult contagion on the heavily Hecath-populated continent of Fayamendi, intending not only to cripple the Hecath populations there but force their submission and teach her the secrets to their indigenous time magic. It was this magic she believed key in creating the Philosopher's Stone, an un-life-long goal of the Lichlord. In response, Raggedy Azra heroically used her time magic to "detonate" the ritual early on the relatively empty Hemlock Veldt, killing both Azra and Euphraxia but mercifully few others. The result of the occult conflagration left the local plant-life hardened and lifeless.

The Hecath Religion

Worship of the Hecath Queens among humanoids is complex and multifaceted, but in general revolves around joining the Hecath in their "Hivemind World" and there either find "Paradise" or receive insights into this Paradise's creation. (Others argue this is based on a false understanding of the Hecath's scent-based communication, which is easy to mistake for telepathy.)

Popular within this worship is making pilgrimmages to the Petrified Forest, which is guarded fiercely by humanoid adherents. It is worth noting there are no Hecath colonies present here (though some intelligent Hecath Symbionts have visited, out of curiosity). What Queens still survive on Waking Materia are still alien beings with unfathomable ways of thinking; it is nigh impossible to know what their opinion is of the event, if they have one at all.

Item type

Religious / Ritualistic

Subtype
Sacred material (petrified wood)

Religion
Cults of the Hecath Queens

Location
The Isle of Vornai, Voidward of Nurin