Purple Amaranth
Purple Amaranth is a flowering plant that grows in the far south-east Threshold, amidst the grasses of the Great Grass Sea. The plant resembles typical amaranth, yet grows larger and flowers in a shade of deep purple.
The plant's primary use is to create a drug of the same name. It is made from the petals of the flower, but must be processed through a variety of biological agents before it is safe to ingest. The dried leaves may be powdered or flaked or chewed themselves, but this is toxic.
The highest grade and original method of production is to feed the flowers to a naturally occurring insect, often called the Amaranth Fly, for they feed on nothing but purple amaranth. When the larvae pupate and eventually grow into six winged insects, black and purple like the flowers they are so connected with, the cocoons are gathered and crushed, the powder from this becoming the drug.
It is possible to make purple amaranth in other ways though, and The Guild has devised several such methods less reliant on season or temperament/population of insects so as to be able to market the drug across Creation. These tend to produce a brighter powder, less black-reflecting-purple and more brightly purple themselves, and this is a lower quality of drug.
Purple amaranth affects the senses, and is taken with meals or mixed into drinks. It is sprinkled over a dish like seasoning, or swirled into a drink to enhance the flavour. Taken thusly, it amplifies the pleasant sensations of eating or drinking manyfold, causing even the subtlest flavours to blossom into multitonal radiance upon the palate and even making the act of swallowing pleasurable as the user feels everything from the contractions of their throat muscles to the delightful taste slowly slipping down into their stomach.
Regular users begin to find eating or drinking without the drug bland and uninteresting, and severe cases may choose not to feed themselves through sheer apathy. The effects are strong enough to cause people to starve or die of thirst, if they are sufficiently addicted to the drug.
Rapid withdrawal from purple amaranth further amplifies these effects, causing all of the senses to dull. Hearing fades into a blurry soundscape of echoes and agglomerated pulses of non-meaning, and colour fades from eyesight. Smell and taste are of course first to go, vanishing as if they had never existed for the user at all. Particularly severe cases may not be able to see as their grayscale vision blurs yet further, and begin to lose the sense of touch also.
Overdosing on purple amaranth causes all manner of interesting synesthetic effects. People often suddenly lose a sense, but begin experiencing hallucinations or synesthesia relating to another sense. It has been said that the experience of suddenly losing all hearing as sound takes on visible yet apparently meaningless colour and waves of similar colour emanate from everyday objects is deeply disturbing, but worse still is when this effect spreads to other senses and the user collapses into an intermingled ball of random and mixed-up sensations. Some amongst House Cynis argue that this is not an 'overdose' at all, but in fact the proper use of the drug.
Originally created by Darloth of the Exalted unofficial wiki.
