Cuisine
All motion and thus all life requires energy.  At the base of the food chain are the plants which process light from the shining spires into carbohydrates and sugars.  Vegetable matter forms the bulk of the diet in the Spires and Harvest Lands while various fungi that process every ounce of nutrition from waste products are the staple in the lower depths.  The cuisine of the Great Work is varied and unusual.  All foodstuffs are derived from non-sentient plants and animals though that divide is less pronounced than it might be in other places.

Dishes of the Lower Depths

Protys
A simple dish, common to the lower classes is composed of simple, jiggling protoplasm.  These small, translucent masses are easily grown tossing a proty into a pail of garbage and occasionally dividing it off as it grows.  Protys are generally washed or seared before eating but are rarely served in other dishes as they digest any food they come into contact with.

Dust
Mushrooms are dried and rendered into a fine dust which is used much like flour to make simple crusts and flatbreads.  This dust contains too few nutrients for protys or leaven to grow and is thus never used to make breads or cakes.  Dust comes in three grades: white, black and grey.  White dust is slightly bitter but lacks body, being only good for very fine pastries or noodles.  Grey paste is tough and bitter but more useful.  The taste is often covered or complimented by sauces.  Black dust is rare and expensive.  Gourmands consider its flavour exquisite but those with less refined palates find it harsh and lingering.

Paste
Paste is a simple dish created by adding water or juice to dust.  While it is filling, Paste is not particularly nutritious and those who subsist on it have a starved, and hungry look to them.  Grey paste makes up the bulk of the children's diet in official schools.

Grinder
The grinders that turn the great shafts are so named in reference to their final state.  Aged grinders are harvested and their meat ground up and sold by the thousands of small stalls where it is stuffed into noodles, wrapped in pastries, and seared on sticks.  The meat is tough and salty but highly nutritious.

Squam
The various skittering and chittering things that crawl through the muck and refuse are often eaten by the poor and hungry.  A few specific breeds are considered delicacies when properly peeled and prepared but those who love them seldom know what they are or where they come from.  The dishes pink lily and delicate sapphire, in particular, are made from the inner organs of large squams found only in the deepest layers where they are attracted by tallow candles and a rotting corpse in a cart which is hauled away when full.  The squams are picked apart and bottled in the Deepest City and shipped by shaft to the very spires where they are eaten by aristocrats and artists in quaint cafes with aged nectar.

The Triple Cities
It must be noted that the dietary regime mandated for the clerks and managers of the Triple Cities is plain and unappealing.  Each and every meal consists of grey paste and jaundiced tea served on grey clay platters.  School children are threatened with being put on such a diet and most would suffer many a beating over such a punishment.  On festivals they are treated to a piece of boiled grinder or a small, sweet sugar pellet but not both.  It is notable that the trading communities surrounding the Triple Cities have a flourishing food culture where the greatest variety of food in all the Great Work can be had.

The Harvest Lands and Spires

Bottle Flowers
The most valued product of the gardens of the Harvest Lands are flowers that grow fat, hanging from heavy vines in well watered vineyards.  Ripe Bottle Flowers contain half a cup of pure nectar in their delicate petals, which is gathered by hand.  Fresh nectar is imbibed at festivals and bottled and aged nectar is an effervescent narcotic that is treasured by the upper eschelons of society.

Dancers
These colorful, lithe, and light footed animals are the source of the most exquisitely tender and delicious meat in all The Great Work.  Even at rest, every Dancer is a thing of grace and beauty but when compelled by the bird symphony they caper and prance in an exquisite display of color and motion.

Seeds
There are two principle varieties of grain that are grown for food.  Soft seed is a larger kernel that is soft enough to chew or crush between the fingers at harvest.  It is used as ballast and texture in many dishes and has a sweet after taste.  Hard seed is smaller and needs to be crushed and ground before being eaten.  It has little taste of its own but forms a particularly sticky dough when mixed with water and is the basis for the baking of breads and cakes.

Birds
The birds of the Harvest lands are known for their calls.  From the sweet notes of the Trills, to the deep baritones of the Honkers and Boomers they fill the air with a beautiful, unending symphony.  The larger birds like Honkers and Boomers are raised for their meat and are commonly available from the market brazier stalls.  Trills, squeaks, and whistles are all delicacies though they are swift and hard to catch.

Sugar Stalk
These large-leafed plants have bunches of fine stalks which could scarcely uphold their heads if it were not for their constant weeping of liquid sugar which crystalizes up and down and inside the stalks to provide structure.  The powdery leafs are used in salads and garnishes, the stalks are a popular treat, the roots are bitter and sour but dried and ground are considered an excellent remedy for childhood illnesses.  Many a youngster has been mislead by a label proclaiming Pure Sugar Stalk Root powder.

Note
The plants of the Great Work reproduce by division or are self germinating.  Similarly the animals are asexual though some have glands for the feeding of the young.  In general the animals have a simplistic and almost cartoonish look to them as they have been fashioned to serve specific roles.

Events
As much as its masters  try to make it appear that The Great Work is a singular and unchanging whole there are things that no amount of bureaucratic hand waving can cover.  A number of these will occur as The Newly Risen claw their way up out of the darkness.  While their involvement and interest are not mandated the events should happen and shape the world around them as great events do.

The Breeding Riots
A heresy of astonishing implications arises from the Trade Towns around the Triple Cities.  A method whereby one person develops a pocket within their very flesh in contact with their genetic pouch and their partner in abomination develops a tube like conduit to theirs by which they mix genetic material in flesh.  Thus the first party becomes a living crucible in which their seed units and grows.  The resulting parasitic growth is fed of the carrier's blood and grows into a small, partially formed child within them and is then expelled through the channel by which it entered.

Knowledge of this horrible deed spreads rapidly downwards among the huddled and corrupt masses of the Deepest City but also, slowly upwards towards the Forges and Crucibles of the upper depths.  By the time the Gendarmes and Breeder's Hierophants become aware of it mad riots begin erupting in the tunnels and chambers.  There are those who claim that a new life is beginning and the old is ending, that the old ways have lost all meaning and the world is crumbling.  The larger body, clinging to their proper role and station have risen up to eradicate the aberration in hopes of saving themselves from the righteous wrath of the authorities.

By the time the Constables and Gendarmes arrive with their cleansers and drivers the Deepest City is burning.  Smoke chokes the vents and chutes and spontaneous gas flares dash up corridors like living things.  Hearing of the arrival of the Gendarmes the heretics retreat to an outlying cave complex and fortify it, hoping to dig their way to the outside and escape into chaos on a gigantic boat.  A leader has risen among them.  A "natural born" prodigy with a rumbling voice and sorcerous powers called The Exodite.

Whatever the outcome, be it escape into the emptiness beyond The Great Work or total dissolution and erasure.  Pockets of heretics will be discovered for cycles to come, even unto The Shining Spires.  The abominable act proves so prolific that even with intense scrutiny and persecution the numbers of natural born persons grow to the point where the population begins to become unsustainable leading to a escalating cycle crime and riots.

The Nesting

At times, gazing out into the void from the highest window, it seems a faint glimmer shines out of the impossible gulf and speaks of another world.

Words of the Creator

At some point after The Newly Risen ascend to The Harvest Lands an unimaginable threat descends out of the void.  Pioneers from another unimaginable creation arrive and seek to gain a foot hold in The Harvest Lands.  These winged horrors come in various sizes but are bulbous and barbed with four gossamer wings and grasping tentacles which dangle beneath them to draw victims into their dripping maw.

The first strike is devastating as the swarm soars over the Rim Wall and begins stripping the fields and villages of food and inhabitants.  Soon a great, round nest like a horrible tumour begins to be built on the ruins of the first town consumed.  The Gendarmes and Constabulary react immediately, mobilizing and arming the laborers of The Harvest Lands and The Factories.  But the crisis spreads faster than their structured methods can react and soon, a second nest begins to be built within a march of the outermost spire.

Worse still, great cracks appear in the earth around the nests and devastating quakes and cave-ins tear through the higher chambers and tunnels killing thousands.

As the crisis spreads unchecked and the Gendarme lead armies suffer their first brutal defeats many begin to ask "Where is The Creator?" but from the great central spire there comes no answer.   Only when a third of The Harvest Lands are lost does It descend on wings of black and surrounded by three terrible messengers.  The Wizards of The highest Circle.  Fire and lightning sweeps the infection from above and a great chunk of The Great Work crumbles and tumbles into chaos.  Leaving a smoking wound in the world and society.  Fearing the empty skies, many turn from the fields and flee into the depths, increasing the social disruption and population pressures that still fester in the wake of The Breeding Riots.

Drivers
The unruly beasts that drag the carts and wagons of The Harvest Lands are motivate by an unusual class of people with long barbed lashes instead of arms.  These terrible figures are cruel and crude using language that would frighten the gentle folk of the spires horribly.  Drivers are also employed by the Gendarmes in crowd control operations and many are enlisted in the constabulary.

Driver
Large
Hit Dice 3d10
Tentacles, Natural Weapons, Large Size  

Cleansers
The gendarmes give some malcontents are given a new role whereby they can benefit society.  A large parasite is lodged in their back and its long siphons work their way down into the Cleanser's arms.  The parasite has an exceptional degree of control over its host and directs it like a puppet.  The parasite has two large bladders that fill with a noxious bile that burns on contact with flesh.  At the direction of its gendarme master the Cleanser burns away downed criminals leaving only a faint scent of lemons.

Animals
There are many kinds of mobile living things which crawl and fly about The Great Work.  Most of those found in the depths are scuttling things that eat refuse but The Harvest Lands have a fairly wide range of animals that serve various purposes.  There is nothing in The Great Work that has not been fitted to a specific role by The Creator but occasionally new uses are discovered for a particular animal.

Lopers
The gendarmes often ride these six-legged mounts.  Large hind legs and gossamer wings hidden beneath the carapace allow Lopers to make tremendous bounds to avoid obstacles.  Loper racing is a popular spectacle that is popular with folk of all stations.  The roaring of wings and formal costumes of the jockeys draw spectators from all over the Harvest Lands and Spires

Loper
Large Animal
Hit Dice 1d10
Wings, Leaping Legs

Bladders
Swollen with water, bladders slowly stride between the rows of crops drizzling them each with fluid that sprays from their dripping sides.  Bladders are used to water garden crops due to their enormous capacity and the particularly nutritious nature of their secretions.

Draggers
Carts and harvesting machines are drawn by massive hairless creatures called Draggers.  These beasts are harvested at the end of their useful life and their parts boiled to produce glue and a pasty meat that is served on large hard seed crackers in the markets as Pulled Dragger.

Huge Animal
Hit Dice D12
Heavy Build

Stalkers
The gendarmes use these predatory beasts to hunt down and kill fleeing malcontents.  Sleek and sharp of tooth and claw, Stalkers chase their prey almost soundlessly and are trained to crush the throat to prevent the victim's cries from alarming the populace.

Medium Animal
Hit Dice d8
Light Build, Natural Weapons,

So, I notice that this project or whatever it is has split down two lines, a setting and a game that is probably the third version of Dark Passages.  I might call it Obscure Passages just to differentiate it and leave the original Dark Passages as the main one.  The second got a little too far off course.

So, anyhow on with some system stuff.

Have I mentioned anywhere that The Newly Risen start at tenth level?  Yeah, they don't remember what they can do but they're not green noobies.  They lead a revolution against The Creator Itself and have been reborn by the malice of Leviathan to rise again and finish the job!

Playing The Game
The game sets a target number for a variety of actions to represent their relative difficulty. To determine whether an action succeeds roll a twenty-sided die and adds their skill level +4 and Attribute -10 to meet or beat the target number for the action. The target number is often set at another character's unmodified Attribute level. The Game Master is, of course, free to assume base line attributes of 10 with Strength and Dexterity appropriately modified by Size and otherwise ignore the attributes of most minor non-player characters.


Learned Lore
Skills represent a trained ability to complete a specific action. Some skills allow multiple dice to be rolled, representing being able to do more in less time. Thus a character with a Fight skill level of 3 can roll for three attacks in the time others take to make one. Others allow a certain number of spells to be cast or a given distance to be moved before making another roll.

Each level provides three points to invest in skills.  A skill can only be improved by one point per level.  The Newly Risen begin at tenth level but don't know what they know.  This means they can try to do anything.  They have a pool of thirty points which can be expended by investing from one to ten of them in the appropriate skill when the success roll is made.  Once a skill is purchased in this way it cannot be increased until the character gains a level.  

Climb (Dexterity)
The character's bonus is added to success rolls to ascend stairs and sheer walls.  The base difficulty for easy climbs like stairs is 5.  Steep climbs are difficulty 10 and sheer surfaces are difficulty 20.  Wet and slippery surfaces are five points more difficulty.

Craft (Intelligence)
The bonus provided can be added to the success roll or divided between multiple projects, allowing more to get done in the same time frame.  There are many craft skills each being specific to a material.  Hence Crafting Wood, Crafting Steel, Crafting Glass, Crafting Fabric and so forth.

Deceive (Intelligence)
Call it fast talk or manipulation, the character is skilled at lying.  The success roll is applied against the subject's Wisdom.  Multiple lies get increasingly difficult adding 5 to the difficulty for little ones and 10 for real whoppers.

Devise (Intelligence)
The character is fluent in the workings of clockworks, locks, mills and similar contraptions.  The bonus is applied to success rolls to figure out (20), operate (15), repair (15) or design (25) such things.  Particularly advanced or complex devices are five points harder to work with.

Fight (Strength)
The character's skill at arms gives a bonus to all attack rolls.  The bonus can be divided between multiple opponents as the attacker desires or shifted to improve their Defense.  Point so shifted must be allocated to specific opponents individually.

Knowledge (Wisdom) + Level to Success
There are many knowledge skills ranging from law to the growing cycles of crops each of which is a separate skill.

Magic (Intelligence)
Magic skill provides the ability to cast a number of spell levels per day.  The difficulty of saving throws against spells is the caster's Intelligence plus their skill.  Spells are learned independently from the Magic Skill.  The difficulty of learning a new spell is 20 plus the level of the spell.

Negotiate (Wisdom) Resist vs Level + Wisdom
Winning out at the give and take of bargaining is resisted by the opposition's Intelligence.  Successful negotiations generally provide an advantage rather than an outright and overwhelming victory.

Notice (Wisdom)
Alertness is a virtue in a dangerous world.  The notice skill resists attempts to sneak and ambush the character.

Shoot (Dexterity)
The bonus for shooting applies to attack rolls with ranged weapons.  The bonus can be divided between multiple attacks or used to reload slow loading weapons faster.

Sneak (Dexterity)
Attempts to sneak up and ambush are resisted by the observer's Wisdom + Notice skill.

Swim (Constitution)
The ability to navigate liquid environments and dive.  The difficulty of such actions is: 10 calm water, 15 rough water, 20 heavy storm one roll is required for every thirty minutes of activity.

Toughness (Constitution) Level HD
The grit to resist wounds and experience rolling with blows makes the character increasingly able to absorb damage.  This is not for the most part an actual increase in durability but rather a reduction in the damage from individual blows.  Each level of Toughness gives the character another Hit Dice worth of Hit Points.
Armored
The creature has a thick carapace of tough cartilage.  This gives them +2 Armor Class and -10' to their Movement Rate.

Beautiful
 The creature's elegant lines and coloration give it +1 Charisma and +1 Constitution.

Big Head
The creature's oversized brain give it +2 Intelligence, +1 Wisdom, and  -1 Charisma as it struggles to understand the irrational behavior of others.

Clawed
This creature's arms and legs end in sharp claws that allow it to make 1 Attack Per Arm per round inflicting damage one die type less than is normal for its Size.

Extra Arms
The creature has two more arms than normal.  Each arm can bear an additional weapon and may make additional attacks.  However, the arms are somewhat smaller than normal and so do one die type less damage than is normal for its Size.

Extra Legs
This creature has more legs than normal lending it additional stability and increasing its Movement Rate by 20'.

Feelers
The long feelers that extend from the creature's head provide an excellent sense of its environment so that it suffers no penalty for fighting in darkness.  Feelers can be struck in combat and are impossible to armor.

Fine Barbs
The creature's body is covered with sharp little hooks and horns that give it a +4 to climbing and grappling actions.

Heavy Build
The creature's bulky shape and heavy bones give it +1 Strength and +1 Constitution.  If it has wings their functionality is reduced by one level.

Heavy Tail
This creature has a tail that is as thick as its leg and acts to brace and stabilize it.  This gives +4 to resist slams and knockdown and can be used to make a rear sweep attack causing damage one die type lower than normal for its Size.

Gaping Maw
The creature's large and toothy mouth lets it make a free bite attack each inflicting the usual damage for its Size.

Light Build
The creature's lithe form and light bones give it +2 Dexterity, -1 Strength and -1 Constitution.  If it has wings their functionality is shifted up one level.

Luminescent
The creature sweats greenish slime that glows in the dark.  It illuminates light in a 30' Radius eliminating darkness penalties but making hiding virtually impossible without taking a bath.

Mandibles
Sharp pincers jut from the creature's cheeks giving it a free bite attack that automatically grapples the target.

Prehensile Tail frees one arm when climbing, prevents falls on failed climbing rolls, free grapple attack
The creature's long, flexible tail wraps around things giving it a strong grip.  This frees one of its hands or feet when climbing, allows a re-roll of failed climbing rolls, and can be used to make a grapple attack just like a hand.

Pincers
Two of the creature's hands end in large barbed and armored claws.  It can make two attacks inflicting standard damage for its Size that automatically grapple the target on a hit.  Of course it cannot use weapons or tools with those arms.

Poisonous
The creature doesn't just taste bad it's plain out poisonous.  If bitten the attacker must save verses the target's Constitution or take 1d8 damage.   Its Blood can be applied to weapons giving the same effect for one turn before contact with the air denatures the toxin.

Small Body
The creature's Size is Small, giving it +2 Dexterity and -2 Strength.  It's Hit Dice become d6s and its base attack damage is 1d6.  If it has wings their functionality shifts up one step.

Small Head
The creature's head is disproportionately small giving it -1 Intelligence and Wisdom and +1 Dexterity and Constitution.  If it has a Gaping Maw or Mandibles they do one die type less damage than usual.

Spinnerete
The creature can spin a 5' radius web once per cycle, this automatically grapples anything moving into the are of effect. They must then spend a round trying to beat the web spinner's Constitution with their Strength to break free.

Stench Gland
Once per cycle the creature can fill a 5' radius with noxious fumes that cause 1d4 damage and -2 to all success rolls for as long as they are in the effected area and one round after they leave it due to stinging eyes and choking.  The gas hangs about for 1d6 rounds before dispersing.

Stinger
The creature has a poison gland and a sharply pointed means of delivery.  This could be in their mouth or on a hand or tail.  Wounds inflicted by this weapon cause one die type less damage than normal for their Size but the target must make a Constitution Saving Throw on their turn or suffer 1d10 damage from the poison.

Tentacles
The creature's arms are long, boneless and rubbery.  They cannot wield weapons but give +2 to Grapple attacks.

Thick Hide
The creature's hide is tough or scaly giving them +2 to their Armor Class.

Wings
Two of the creature's arms are feathered or gossamer and can be used to glide or fly.  The size and build of the creature modify how functional the wings are.  Normally the creature can glide 60'/round but various traits may shift this on the following scale: Slow Fall, Glide 40'/round, Glide 60'/round, Fly 60'/round, Fly 60'/round and Hover.  Slowed falls and gliding requires the loss of 10' altitiude per round.  Flying requires the creature to move at least 30'/round or the loss of 10' of altitude

Playing "The Game" (I need a better title.)
The game sets a target number for a variety of actions to represent their relative difficulty. To determine whether an action succeeds roll a twenty-sided die to beat the target number for the action. If the roll is less than the Attribute associated with the action the player can choose to re-roll their first attempt. If their attribute is greater than twenty they can make a second re-roll if the first re-roll is less than their attribute minus twenty.

Size and Strength and Dexterity
Tiny -4 / +4
Small -2 / +2
Medium 0/0
Large +2 / -2
Huge +4 / -4

The Three Fountains
Water is the great miracle of The Great Work.  It endlessly flows through every living thing passing on into the filters and resivoirs and at last trickling out into the endless chaos.  There is always a loss of water but three great fountains draw water from places beyond to replenish the stores.  One lies in the Deepest City, another in the great central concourse of the Harvest Lands and the last in the Great Spire of the Creator.

Canals
Water flows through The Harvest Lands by way of endless canals and channels.  There are no natural waterways but the resivoirs are popular with the upper classes for swimming and boating.  Some of the major canals are used to transport heavy goods on great barges.

Weather Patterns
Evaporation from resivoirs  builds clouds and eventually rain falls on The Harvest Lands.  The general pattern is lazy and slowly rotates in a consistent manner.  There are no great storms or floods.

Time Keeping
With no astronomical phenomena time is strictly structured by set cycles using water clocks.  Each clock cycle is broken into three shifts with most lower class workers working two out of three shifts.  Every three hundred and sixty shifts is a mandated festival day in which no work is done and carefully managed events and pageants absorb the people's time.

Note

I'm slowing down a bit on this now.  I think it's nearing the end and the only thing I really have left to tell you is how it ends or at least rather what ends lie at that end of things as roleplaying games seldom play out in such a neat and orderly fashion.

And that means coming to the creator, black as night, in towers of radiant crystal and perhaps learning why and maybe even how or just getting killed and cast down into chaos once more.

And then it's mostly organizing, editing, illustrating, filling in gaps and polishing stats.

And it's very tempting to leave the ending to the finished work, you know?

In the mean time I've been playing with a revision of GDW's house system from Twilight 2000 second edition.  In the end it won't look too much like the original but all the same it'll be interesting in its tight and loose wargamey gun porn manianess.