Discovery of Port Royal

Discovery of Port Royal is the decisive geographical and narrative turn in Broccoli Bunch’s early journey: an expedition that begins amid the ruins and uncertainty of Threewells acquires a visible destination. From above the settlement, Broccoli sees a distant city and the airships around it, transforming the surrounding wilderness from an enclosing landscape into a map of possible movement.

The View from Threewells

Broccoli reaches the top of the settlement through a creaking ladder and a trapdoor clogged with decades of rotting leaves. The immediate obstacle is mundane but revealing: Cleaning removes the leaves from Broccoli’s face with a small burst of magic, allowing the abandoned structure to become a lookout rather than merely another ruined room. Above the walls, the wind is stronger, but the exposed height provides a broad view of the country around Threewells.

The landscape establishes the scale of the frontier. Forests surround the settlement, while a river winds to the south and the Darkwoods extend as an apparently endless green expanse. To the north lies a dark region where the trees seem almost black; farther to the left are distant plateaus beyond a lake or swamp. The view also places Threewells among hazards and unsettled spaces rather than presenting it as an isolated mystery. Marshes, mountains, waterways, and immense forests divide the visible world into regions that Broccoli has not yet entered.

Port Royal Becomes a Destination

The crucial discovery lies directly north. A mountain rises to a flat summit, its shape resembling a mass struck into place by a giant hammer, and a city stands upon or near it. The city is large enough to be visible from roughly half a hundred kilometres away. Tiny shapes float around it in the sky, identifying them as airships and distinguishing the distant settlement from the ruined buildings immediately around Threewells.

Broccoli’s response is immediate delight. The sight does not yield a full explanation of the city, its government, or its dangers, but it supplies something more important at this point in the journey: direction. Broccoli grins and recognizes the city as a destination. The discovery therefore changes the narrative value of the landscape. What had been an immense, uncertain wilderness now contains a visible point toward which travel can be organized, and Port Royal enters the story as the next major destination.

A World Structured by Mana and Dungeons

The discovery occurs against a background of unfamiliar systems that Broccoli is still learning to interpret. Overseer Hardy records large mana shifts near Threewells, worries that someone may have damaged a dungeon core, and notes a sighting of a person dressed in green whom he suspects might be connected to the Imperials. The doubled guard rotation and dispatch of a scout to the Dunwich Dungeon show that the region’s apparent remoteness does not make it secure. Mana disturbances and dungeon activity give the wilderness political and supernatural depth.

Broccoli is fascinated by this environment rather than simply frightened by it. The idea of a dungeon sounds like an appealing place to visit, and Broccoli wonders whether mana is thick or thin in the air and whether the difference can be perceived. Later, when Broccoli describes the so-called evil hole to Leonard Chand’nuit, Leonard identifies it as the entrance to a young dungeon. Arianne confirms that the group felt a mana surge, while Leonard warns that someone might have destroyed the dungeon after Broccoli left. These reactions place Threewells and its surrounding ruins within a larger network of dungeon exploration, mana instability, and possible interference by powerful outside forces.

The Wider Frontier

The later approach to the Dunwich ruins gives the geographical discovery additional context. From a plateau, Broccoli again sees the Darkwoods stretching into the distance, marshes to the east, mountains to the north, and what may be a huge lake far to the south. The surviving buildings include wooden shacks resembling those in Threewells and a much larger corrugated-tin structure marked by rust and muck. This landscape is not an empty wilderness: it contains traces of settlement, decay, routes, and abandoned infrastructure, even where the original communities have disappeared.

The region is also militarized. At Fort Frogger, Broccoli and Amaryllis observe open wooden gates, one door torn from its metal hinges, and an inner courtyard crowded with undead, mainly grenoil skeletons. Two larger skeletons in plate armor guard the entrance, each carrying a sword roughly the size of Broccoli. The ruined fort demonstrates that movement toward the cities and settlements visible from the wilderness may involve armed defenses, undead forces, and dangerous remnants of earlier occupation.

From Sightseeing to Movement

Port Royal’s visibility does not mean that the route is safe or politically neutral. Gunther explains that the United Republic of the Trenten Flats is the continent’s largest nation and is fiercely expansionist. Its attempted invasion of Deepmarsh ended amid poor scouting, inexperienced leadership, unseasoned troops, swamp water, insects, and resistance from Deepmarsh, leaving a history of territorial conflict behind the region’s borders. Later, Raynold explains that the primitive cannons used by the cervids cannot depress low enough to fire downward, allowing an air skimmer to pass along the city’s broad roads and over sections of its walls, though the maneuver tears off half the rudder.

These details make the discovery more than a picturesque vista. The city is part of a world shaped by air travel, fortifications, military technology, rival states, species-based exclusion, and contested routes. Yet the event’s immediate effect remains hopeful. Broccoli does not respond to the distance, the political tensions, or the surrounding dangers by retreating into Threewells. The distant city gives the journey a future-facing shape: the road ahead is still untravelled, but it now has a destination.