Scenic Dye

Scenic Dye sits in a slender crystal vial, its brass stopper catching the light while swirls of color breathe inside—blue like dawn over a quiet river, green like pine shadows, flecks of gold like sunlit leaves. The liquid is almost translucent, with a broth-like viscosity that slides slowly when the vial is tilted, and on fabric it blooms into a soft satin sheen, the color pooling in the weave rather than simply coating it. When you tilt the bottle, the scene within seems to shift—a tiny landscape moving with the angle of your eye. Such transformation hints at a lineage of color-smiths who traveled rivers and ridgelines, gathering pigments from stones, moss, and the glassy underbellies of ponds until they could bottle memory itself. Thus Scenic Dye is less a pigment than a compact memory you can wear. On armor or at the edge of a cloak, the dye doesn't alter numbers or stats; it changes the way light plays on the surface, a narrative etched into the fabric. The result is a two-tone panorama where the seams become ridgelines and the front panels pick out hills and rivers that once framed a day’s march. In weak daylight the hues soften into mist, while under a torch or a low sun they sharpen as if the landscape were painted in relief across your chest. Players use it to tell a story with their gear, to carry a memory forward into each encounter, a portable memory palace you can don and re-don as you cross a region, a dungeon, or a festival. If you wander into a market street that smells of resin and wood, you’ll find the Saddlebag Exchange—a row of stalls renowned for rare dyes and curious bargains. Today a glass case holds a vial of Scenic Dye, and a weathered clerk with inked fingers explains the circular price with a nod to supply and season. The tag reads in neat copper and gold: three gold coins and twenty silver pieces per vial, a price that makes the dye a treasured keepsake for those who want their appearance to mirror a moment rather than a uniform. Regulars trade stories as readily as they trade dyes, swapping not just goods but the occasions they marked with them. When you finally seal the vial and brush its color across your shoulder, you’re not just changing how you look—you’re choosing to carry a landscape with you. The river’s cool memory runs along the seam of your cuirass; the hillside and the treetop horizon ride with your gait. Scenic Dye doesn’t just decorate; it remembers, and in a world of constant motion, that memory can be the most durable piece of gear you own.