The Dirdir is a science fiction adventure novel by American writer Jack Vance , the third in the tetralogy Tschai, Planet of Adventure . It tells of the efforts of the sole survivor of the destruction of a human starship to return to Earth from the distant planet Tschai.
17-506: Adam Reith is stranded on Tschai, a distant planet shared by four alien, mutually hostile, advanced species (the Chasch, Wankh, Dirdir and native Pnume). On his quest to get home, he acquires two human companions, Traz Onmale, a teenage barbarian chieftain, and Ankhe at afram Anacho, an outcast Dirdirman. Reith has failed twice to acquire a spaceship (as recounted in City of the Chasch and Servants of
34-612: A form of government and, importantly on the Steppes, an army. At first the army is a sad sight, but Reith uses his experience as a soldier to guide them into something resembling a coherent force. A group of Blue Chasch arrives in Pera, demanding Reith's surrender. When he refuses, a battle erupts, which the newly organized humans win thanks to the element of surprise; the Chasch did not think advanced tactics possible from humans. The Blue Chasch then send their entire armed might, but Reith arranges for
51-417: A fortune; in fact, they have so many sequins, they are forced to leave behind a substantial hidden cache. They journey to the cosmopolitan city of Sivishe, where there are shipyards. They find that they must deal with Aila Woudiver, an enormously obese man with monstrous appetites. The construction of the spaceship progresses satisfactorily, but Woudiver demands ever more money, threatening to turn them over to
68-514: A grave violation of tribal social norms. Before he can be castrated to make him more docile, he escapes, taking Traz with him. The youth is not unwilling to go, since he would be expected to sacrifice himself to the gods in the near future due to the misfortunes the tribe has faced. On their trek, Reith rescues an outcast Dirdirman, Ankhe at afram Anacho, from a Phung, an extremely dangerous native. With no plans of his own, he joins them. From Anacho's explanation of Dirdirman theology, Reith deduces that
85-452: A revolt to overthrow the tyrant. Naga Goho is publicly hanged. Reith's locator indicates his scout-boat is in the nearby Blue Chasch city of Dadiche. He sneaks in and finds his ship, apparently intact, but is spotted before he can make a closer inspection. He barely escapes with his life. When he returns to Pera, he finds to his chagrin that he has been elected the new chief of the city. He begins trying to bring civilization to it by organizing
102-412: A star system 212 light years from Earth. Two elite scouts, Adam Reith and Paul Waunder, are dispatched in a small scout-boat to investigate the planet whence it came. Seconds later, a missile destroys their mothership. The two survivors nurse the severely damaged scout-boat to the planet before ejecting into a forest. The crash site is first discovered by a band of technologically primitive humans. Reith
119-477: Is amazed to find men on a heretofore unknown, distant planet. One of them casually kills Waunder; Reith remains undetected. A second party approaches in a large sky-raft, sending the humans scurrying into hiding. It is crewed (as Reith later learns) by massive, alien Blue Chasch and their human Chaschmen servants. Their investigation of the wreckage is interrupted by a third group, belonging to the Dirdir. The Chasch ambush
136-467: Is to brave the Carabas, the Dirdir hunting preserve, where sequins grow as crystalline nodes. Men prospect for the nodes, while the Dirdir hunt the men. Those they catch, they eat. Reith turns the tables on the Dirdir. He ambushes their hunting parties and takes the sequins they acquired from their victims. When the Dirdir finally take notice, Reith and his friends barely manage to escape, but they have amassed
153-441: The Dirdir if he is not paid. Finally, Reith has no choice but to go back to the Carabas to retrieve the hidden sequins, leaving Traz and Anacho to keep watch. When he returns however, he finds that Woudiver, who desires above all else to be a Dirdirman, has betrayed Anacho to the Dirdir. Reith risks his life rescuing Anacho. Then he goes to confront Woudiver, but the arch-criminal is too clever for him and all three are handed over to
170-404: The Dirdir were responsible for bringing humans to Tschai tens of thousands of years ago. His mission is now clear: he must alert Earth to the possible threat of the Dirdir. The mismatched trio join a trade caravan. Among the other passengers is a group of priestesses, taking a beautiful female captive, Ylin-Ylan, home to participate in an important rite. Reith frees her, but on the lawless steppes,
187-554: The Dirdir. However, Reith demands arbitration, invoking a tradition too strong for the Dirdir to ignore, even from a "subman". When the judgment goes against him, he challenges the Dirdirman arbitrator. By Dirdir custom, the victor of hand-to-hand combat wins the case. Reith dispatches his foe, only to face a second set of charges. This time, he has to fight a Dirdir. When he forces the creature to concede, Reith and his friends are absolved of all crimes and freed. Needing Woudiver to complete
SECTION 10
#1732901184596204-533: The Green Chasch, the mortal enemies of the Blue Chasch, to ambush and wipe them out. With Dadiche now defenseless, Reith and the men of Pera take charge. While their training made them good fighters, it failed to instill true discipline. The army goes on a revenge-fueled rampage that, despite his best efforts, Reith is unable to control and the Blue Chasch and any Chaschmen who move to resist are slaughtered. He frees
221-493: The Wankh ). His exploits bring him to the unwanted attention of the Dirdir. As Anacho explains, his former masters are rarely subtle: they want to question and then kill him. Reith manages to wipe out the first "Initiative" sent after him, but sooner or later, there will be a second. He decides to build a ship from scratch, a task requiring vast amounts of sequins, the universal currency of Tschai. The only way to raise that much quickly
238-465: The ship, they do not kill him, but take him captive. City of the Chasch City of the Chasch is a science fiction novel by American writer Jack Vance , the first in the adventure tetralogy Planet of Adventure . It follows the attempts of a man stranded on the distant planet Tschai to return to Earth. A human starship intercepts a mysterious signal and tracks it back to Carina 4269,
255-450: The surviving Chaschmen and gives them the city, after revealing that they had been duped. The Chaschmen had been told they were transformed at death into Chasch. Baby Chasch were implanted in their corpses in secret, to emerge before Chaschmen witnesses. When Reith checks his scout-boat, he discovers to his dismay that it has been gutted. Ylin-Ylan convinces him to take her back to technologically advanced Cath, where he might be able to build
272-459: The tall, pale Dirdir and their human Dirdirmen, driving them off. The Chasch then haul the scout-boat away. Injured and helpless, Reith cannot avoid being taken captive by Traz Onmale, the grave, mature boy-chieftain of the Kruthe, the tribe which killed Waunder. While his wounds heal, Reith incurs the wrath of the "magicians" who are actually in charge, by showing kindness and affection to a slave girl,
289-445: The woman is stolen by the caravan's scouts and returned to the priestesses. Reith rescues her from the seminary and learns that the mysterious signal originated from her people. The caravan is attacked by Green Chasch just outside the run-down city of Pera, but Reith's group manages to reach safety. The town is ruled by Naga Goho and his brigands. Ylin-Ylan attracts his attention; she and Traz are taken prisoner, forcing Reith to organize
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