Hell Upriver: Hite's Qelong

Qelong

by Kenneth Hite

Lamentations of the Flame Princess, 48 pages, $8 (pdf)

Qelong is Kenneth Hite's recipe for Apocalypse Now in a fantasy world. It is written in the "sandbox" style, which means that indeterminacy goes far beyond the protagonists. The objectives of the protagonists, the characters they encounter, and their final destination are possibilities. The possible worlds diverge. They do, however, share a nature that is unusual for the role-playing genre: the upriver journey from civilization to hell. The aforementioned Coppola film is the most tonally vivid model, but Hite helpfully offers Valhalla Rising and The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly as inspirations, which helps the reader understand that the mythological resonance of this sort of journey is not tied to the jungle setting, nor even to the river. Dante's Inferno is a spiritual iteration of the journey; Aguirre, the Wrath of God is a historical instance also involving river and jungle.

There is, of course, a nonfictional model for Qelong as a setting: Cambodia in the late 1970s. Like Cambodia, Qelong has been ruined, polluted, and destabilized simply because it is right next to a Great Power war, except instead of the war being a proxy conflict between the United States and communists, it's between rapacious wizards who are so unthinkably powerful that the side effects and errant spells of their combat have distorted and poisoned the very soil and weather of the Qelong river valley. Two of the antagonistic factions are motivated by cruel and totalizing atavisms: distorted fictional reflections of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge. In all of this, and in the incidental details, Hite displays his particular genius¹ for gathering obscure facts from history and mythology, then spinning them into intricate structures of choice and alternative. The toxic environment is analogous to the poisonous herbicide Agent Orange. Your humble reviewer is certain that, were he to read about that era of Cambodian history, he would discover many more historical sources for Qelong's fictional elements.

Speaking of the toxic contaminant, it is called aakom, and the book introduces it early, and on a first read it is hard to imagine characters who would risk this sort of thing.

The most important effects of aakom are its effect on the human mind and soul. It twists both, exerting a dark magnetic force pulling them toward ultimate chaos and corrosion. Even Chaotic characters recoil from the laughing, grotesque specters somehow revealed in the corner of their vision as innately part of the very angles and helices of existence. Those poisoned by aakom become nihilistic or self- destructive, or both; even the meaning that the human ego assigns itself is peeled away in the boiling illumination of aakom.

However, a bit of calculation² indicates that even weaker protagonists likely have at least a few days before the poison might start to set in, and even then its effects can be mitigated or suppressed for the week or two of journeying to any one of the upriver sites. Unpleasant as the poisoned environment may be, it tells us that our possible narratives will converge on missions, motivated by a strong goal. The text provides examples. The protagonists might be selfless heroes, risking death to destroy the source of the region's contamination. They might be searchers, desperately following rumors of a lost friend or family member. Or they might be a band of outlaws, scheming to find a fortune and haul it through the chaos of war.

Whatever the protagonists' goal, they will likely begin their journey in the relatively intact coastal city of Qampong. They come from somewhere else; Qampong is a foreign city to them. Negotiating local markets, they supply themselves and start heading up the river. In a few days, and perhaps after a few harrowing encounters, they will find a mercenary company that has made a base in the mostly ruined inland city of Sajra Amvoel. The protagonists are tempted to be at ease around familiar accents and clothing, but perhaps it is best to be wary of rogue mercenaries in a war zone. Perhaps the protagonists continue; from here, their journeys will branch to various destinations. Or perhaps they have chosen an overland route and avoided Sajra Amvoel altogether. In most of the possible stories, they will meet murderous enemy factions, each with their own agendas for the river valley. The countryside becomes stranger, more hostile: monsoons, evil mists, or the mind-melting aftermath of wizard-war magic. The poison sets in. The protagonists limp toward their goal and whatever final confrontation stands in their way...

It should be noted that some of the protagonists' potential obstacles are truly terrifying, which makes sense given the author's extensive work in the horror genre. Your humble reviewer has found himself rather grossed out by the details of how certain ants in Qelong can take over people's brains. The horror elements generally suit the genre of the journey upriver to hell, although in one case there is an unseemly and probably unnecessary detail that a violent cult rapes its victims, as if simple massacre wasn't bad enough for the genre. Qelong is not for the sensitive reader, and certainly not for children.

But for a reader who can stomach the disturbing sections, Qelong raises interesting questions. What sort of people could make these journey? Surrounded by so much suffering, would they change their goals? Are the potential protagonists strong enough to make any kind of difference? It is an open critical question whether a form that declines to actualize itself in a particular fiction can wrest enduring significance from its inherent indeterminacy. Put another way, is there some higher aesthetic purpose in the arrangement of possibility structures? Qelong is a particularly effective structure for many stories, which are all, mythically, the same story, and as such it is a good clue for the inquisitive critic.

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¹ A genius Hite also demonstrates, weekly, on the podcast Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff.

² The book's back cover, though not the text itself, describes the protagonists as between levels four and six in the Lamentations of the Flame Princess character system. With this source at hand, it is not difficult to estimate likely character hardiness. A protagonist classed as a miracle-working cleric will likely be able to his or her divinity for a measure of protection against aakom.