Father of the fungus

"Many strange and mystical things roam within the unexplored and unknown wilderness and beyond impassable landscapes. Within the deep northern rotwoods, in the midst of overgrown rocky hills and swamps grow and live a special fungus known for its psychoactive capabilities, but perhaps more so by its tendency to become animate. This species of fungi is known as the father of fungus.

The people that have lived centuries nearby the rotwoods have many accounts in their folklore about this particular fungus, and many of them use these fungus as medicine and a part of their rituals. The unique psychoactive effects of it are said to allow the viewing and communication of the arcane forces that control this world. It is mostly only consumed by the elders and leaders of the clans. It is most often consumed in stews or it is brewed into alcoholic beverages, but occasionally it is also ground up into powder. After ingestion the user will experience vivid hallucinations and will appear to be more or less disconnected from their surroundings, what is seen and heard during this time vary, but most believe that these things are often messages from higher beings. Afterwards they will experience something the natives call "arcane deprivation", wherein the person who had ingested the fungi will want to keep doing so, possibly because what they saw and heard was so pleasing that they wish to see and hear this place again. This desire fades away within a day or two however.

This same psychedelic effect extends to the spores of the fungi, but they are not as strong as ingesting the entire fungus. To retrieve these fungi is a dangerous task due to the environment they grow in as well as the possibility of it being animate. Therefore, this is a task that is reserved for the more experienced woodsmen and hunters of the clan. It is unclear how the fungi becomes animate, but many believe it to be the embodiment of rot, brought to the forest to enforce the cycle of life which has been disturbed one way or another. These fungal beasts are not very aggressive and tend to be mostly passive as ling as one keeps their distance. Most commonly they attack if someone is tampering with the fungal growths that grow around their habitat or if someone enters said area. While most people know to avoid inhaling too deeply while being nearby these fungi, those who do not may find themselves become confused and lost in the forest due to the hallucinations. While the fungal beasts aren't particularly fast or mobile, those who become dazed by the fungi will find it hard to navigate the environment and get away from them. Those who are caught are dragged off by the beasts to be never seen again. It is believed that those who are taken by these creatures have been avoiding the natural cycle of life. The clans treat these creatures with reverence due to their belief of them originating from somewhere beyond and they do not ever hunt or kill them.

Most commonly there is only one of these animate forms of this fungus within a territory, but some say they have seen two or three of them at a time. They also tend to appear and disappear infrequently."