Journey world · Field guide
Rootbound
Living roots and immense trees form the arches of a natural cathedral.
This doorway was planted for someone who had not arrived.
Continue here in the photographic map ↗Meet Ole Red here. Your Color Belt remembers the encounter. Complete the planet expedition to earn a passport stamp. If this planet is sealed in the map, complete more expeditions to enter.
History
Rootbound’s great arches were grown by training young roots across temporary wooden frames. Their builders never saw every arch reach maturity, so the community established care agreements passed between generations, treating patient maintenance as a kind of shared inheritance.
Economy
Living-structure nurseries sell young trained root systems with long-term care plans. Woodworkers use fallen branches for furniture and vehicle interiors, and visitor contributions support gardeners tending arches that are still decades from completion.
Rainbow Road IAS
Joined in Show Year 19 · The New Arch Opening. The Living Hall Gathering joined the tour beneath an arch finally ready to stand without supports, honoring the gardeners who had begun it long before.
A fictional calendar kept by the Rainbow Road IAS. Year 1 begins with the first passage through the sandcastle on the beach in 1999; years count completed journeys inside its pocket of eternity, not elapsed Earth years. Local seasons identify each world’s first gathering. These histories belong to Leonida Larry’s imagined multiverse.
More places in The Verdant Drift ↗Iridella’s arrival · Rootbound
A moment on the road
“Someone planted this doorway before they knew who would arrive. Today it has made room for us.”
In this galaxy · The road we move
A living root crosses the planned route. The company moves the road and finds a better gathering place beside the trees.
The old route has become a garden. Roots lift its paving stones and new leaves lean into the space where the map says the convoy should pass. Patricia kneels beside the youngest growth. Starlite waits for her decision.
They take the longer way around. Iridella crosses out a neat line in the atlas and draws a generous curve. The map is more truthful with the correction. A living world is allowed to change the road that visits it.
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