Eggweed

Challenge prompt: A substance known for its unique smell

The Eggweed plant, although known by almost any herbalist in Onil, grows in only a single location natively. The Molten Straight in between Vrofmas and Dumathoin.

The plant is very aptly named after the acrid smell that anyone nearby will experience if it's out of the water. Innocent looking enough when below the surface, the moment you bring it into the open, it will smell like a hundred eggs have been smashed and left in the summer sun.

Avoided by many for this reason, it's usefulness has only grown over the years, though usually it's in some form of a deterrent. The following are some of the more common things it's used for.

• Fishing vessels will keep a crate of Eggweed aboard. When confronted by pirates they'll toss some into the batch of their most valuable catch for that day, in hopes of making it smell rotten.
• Eggweed is a common find at the entrance of underwater settlements of all types of intelligence, from basic seals to entire underwater cities. In the later case, it will be only one of many obsticals one will have to overcome if outsiders are truly unwelcome.
• Herbalists have long understood it's medicinal advantages. Eggweed is second to none when treating acid burns. Those few skilled in extracting the arcane properties of the plant know it to be instrumental in an underwater breathing potion. The customers of such potions know that it tastes as bad as it smells.
• Eggweed is a cheap but vital alarm for when a populace needs to be alerted to a low water level. Some smaller trading ports utilize duckweed to tell inexperienced sailors when to head to sea, lest them be run aground.
• Some communities of Orc's have spoken about boiling it and mixing it in with simple meats like chicken or beaf. That custom has not spread much to other communities.

The plant itself is a product of the special properties of the two lands it sits between. The destructive properties of the molten lava that runs out of Dumathoin, both above and below the water level, have killed off many types of vegetation though. Even more though, just adapted and thrived. Combine that with the deep rooted arcane energy present on Vrofmas, and you find a very sturdy plant that quickly took on some aspects of the molten rock to survive.

The plant itself looks like an underwater Willow Tree. A sturdy thick base the color of alegea clings on to thousands of wisps of almost white strands.