Ark of Devgwer

Raptor Calvary

When the primordials were defeated in the Dawn War, some of those captured were imprisoned on the Prime in powerful warded vaults. This was necessary because moving them across the planes was just too expensive and time-consuming for the Nawirrûs Covenant; especially when they were now facing another threat from the demons in what became known as the Demon Spawn War. In the Horgon Era, a primordial engineer named Devgwer escaped his vault on Gatheghu. He was bound to the land with angelic runes so that he could not leave, so he devised a scheme to stay with the land while cutting it free of the continent. He put Cari'phis Icicles, powerful magical devices used to convert rock, sand, and earth to ice, across the northeastern part of Vhurghad. When these were activated, they turned the ground into a deep seam of ice forming a great half-circle all the way to the coasts. He then hired on storm giants, paying them with angelic and primordial spoils hidden away and left behind from the Dawn War. The storm giant workers were put to work with Mauls of the Titan (primordial relics first created in the Dawn War). These magical hammers were used to shatter an ice seam that stretched for three hundred miles. It was not necessary to shatter all of the ice, only crack it enough for it to weaken under pressure and heat. Two months later, part of Vhurghad's landmass broke free of the continent and began drifting out to sea. Devgwer rode this newly created island, the Ark of Devgwer, eastward into Nielalroch's powerful ocean currents and waves. The gap in Vhurghad's coastline became known as the Devgwer Rip. As the Ark of Devgwer moved across the ocean, parts of it broke free leaving a string islands that stretch from the Devgwer Rip to the mouth of Tarag-Khâlu. When the remaining Ark of Devgwer reached the continent Brucrumus, it smashed into sector Ara'phis of the Troll Bogs. This created an uprising of the land that is now called the Devgwer Humps. Devgwer was not the only thing riding on this short-lived island. On an island of nearly 10,000 square miles, thousands of dinosaurs were brought to the shores of Brucrumus with the Devgwer Humps and the Tiyalashe plains becoming their new abodes, and hunting grounds.

Varous holds of the Tarag-Khâlu Enclave employ dinosaurs as pack animals and steeds. Some even use raptors and like meat-eaters but this practice is rare. It comes with costly upkeep with the beast's high meat requirements and dangers of predatory instinct like when the mount turns on the rider to sate its hunger.

Plague Gullet

Otyugh

The Plague Gullets were birthing pools for otyughs, deadly molds, and other horrors that thrive in areas of rot and decay. The first Plague Gullet came about in Andibutt's sewers. This city was a refuge for mortals fleeing the primordial invasion of the Dawn Era. The primordial lord Mephirouth sent his agents into the sewers beneath this city and begin the process of turning this cesspool into a spawning area for his distasteful minions. These included those previously mentioned along with rats in the millions, hordes of dire rats, rat swarms and plague spewers. Andibutt suffered many years of plague and death from the sickness brought forth by all the carriers of disease coming up from Andibutt's Plague Gullet. Ten years after Mephirouth began his misdeeds, Andibutt was abandoned and then set on fire by forces of the Nawirrûs Covenant. There now being no hosts left in the area, Mephirouth lost interest in the place and moved on. He left behind his minions where many turned to preying on each other or perishing from starvation.

The second Plague Gullet formed in the triton stronghold Natar. This bastion served as a training area for angels and other water-breathing Nawirrûs forces. Here, the tritons trained those who may be able to breath underwater and get around, but were not skilled in underwater combat like those born to the element. Natar was built half underwater in the deeps of Nielalroch and half into the open chasm Irôchâr Plunge. Like at Andibutt, nefarious agents of Mephirouth came and polluted the area such that it had to be abandoned for nearly five centuries. Today, Natar is a powerful triton city-state.

Springs of Sehanine

Cresting Vats

In the Second Epoch, the High Wood Quake devastated an area of northern Voternil. This resulted in the desertification of a slither of the Taurquion forest and the creation of the wasteland Baranarth. In 1562, priestesses of the god Sehanine, traveled to the Elemental plane Cresting Spires and brought back three clusters of Cresting Vats. They were able to do this because of a deal struck between Sehanine and Poseidon. This deal stipulated that water would flow from the Cresting Spires to wherever the Cresting Vats were put on Bal-Kriav. One of the points of this contract also said that from time to time water elementals would come through the vats and that no measures should be taken to restrict their occasional use of these inter-planar gateways.

On Bal-Kriav, Sehanine's priestesses placed clusters of Cresting Vats in and about the wasteland Baranarth. There goal is obvious, to rejuvenate the wasteland and perhaps in a thousand years return it to the verdant forest like it was before the High Wood Quake.

Cresting Vats are primordial devices built in the Dawn War as a means of getting troops and elemental water to other planes and worlds. They come in pairs with one permanently fixed on the plane Cresting Spires and the other somewhere else. On Bal-Kriav, the three clusters of them in the High Wood Country are collectively called the Springs of Sehanine.

High Wood Quake

Mîm Khazun Zealot

The High Wood Quake was no normal earthquake. It came about in 1251 when Mîm Khazun zealots out of Tarbhunarâg evoked the last words of a mighty enchantment. This spell involved draining the power of an entombed primordial and transferring it into a weapon that would become one of unsurpassed power. The Mîm Khazun enchanters seem to have greatly miscalculated the amount of power in the primordial because it caused excess energy to spill over in great pressure waves. All those around the enchanting area and most living things up to ten miles away were pressure pulverized and killed. The Mîm Khazun enchanters failed to create an artifact, with the hammer reduced to dust by an onslaught of pressure waves. It is believed by some though that making an artifact was never their real intent. Alatáriël, Spirachiln, and other elven groups of the High Wood Country, and even some Tarbhunarâg historians, say that the true intent of the zealots was to cause a great earthquake that would even put a smile on Geb's broad face. Hopefully then, the quake would drain lake Nelshreen into the bowels of the Underdark causing an ecological disaster for the elven peoples of Voternil. This would then make conquest of the area easier for Daklode's armies.

The High Wood Quake caused breaches to open between the Underdark of the world Kriav and with that of Bal-Kriav's Underdark. These feydark fissures devastated Baranarth and Einreth. Both of these once verdant forests were turned into desolate wastelands. It also led to the development of Nanyerien's entropic breaches. Some of the creatures that have come to inhabit these areas of Voternil and beneath, have blood-lines tracing back to the world Kriav. Today, creatures still come over from Kriav's feydark fissures coming up from Menortamon and then up tunnels that breach the surface in the wastes of Baranarth and Einreth.

Zendanul

Mêzelurûs

Zendanul is a great jungle bounded by the river Spinnaker to the west, the Hurtugen mountains to the north, the plains of Shathirmun to the east, and the looming mountains of the Elephant Backbone in the south. The plants, trees, and animals of this forest grow very big. The typical specimen is at least twice normal size and most animals in addition to their large size are classified as dire creatures. The larger than normal size of things in Zendanul is a product of the inland ocean Mizzen. In the Demon Spawn War, the nature god Mêzelurûs was killed in this ocean by the Obyrith Lord Dagon. Rather than have her soul devoured by Dagon's Cairn Scythe, she released all of her nature energy into the surrounding waters. This caused the ocean and the area around it to be bolstered; resulting in an increased size for all creatures of animal intelligence and plants that live in the jungle surrounding the ocean and in the ocean itself.

In the Lith-Crillion Era, residents of the Ivory Pyramid made forays into this area. This was initially done to study the large size of everything in the area but then changed to finding ways of destroying Zendanul's overgrown predatory plants.

Pickaxes & Loincloths

Pursued

There you are, waiting for the “The Chief” [party selects someone] to make the break and get a chance at freedom.  This escape attempt had been in the works for over a year now.  All except one of you are in position.  Even if you have to leave “The Quiet”[party selects someone] behind, you know that you can pull this off, hell you  rehearsed it 22 times now, it will go-off without a hitch says “The Planner”[party selects someone].   The Quiet only needs to do one or two things to get the dwarf “Tang”, today’s water bearer, to switch positions with him.  The choices are to take care of him in the most humiliating fashion or murder him.

This serious desire for freedom all started after diggers found Zugg’s Gullstones, a name given for a time in the God Era when a slave force of Zuggtmoy was put to work in mines surrounded by the stuff.  This caused many to perish, but others to mutate into the first fomorians. The slaves got to calling these rocks Zugg's Gallstones, or at least that is the tale spun by “The Brain”[party selects someone].   After finding this stuff a pond was drained and then its spring was damned.   This was done with some trepidation since once that stuff was left to dry, if The Brain’s story is true then miners are going to die or be contorted into something hideous looking.  One of your present crew was so bold as to stand out and contest “Ole Stunty’s” (the goblin mining master) order.  This back talk was not something his enforcer, a deformed cyclopean-looking war troll named Naxor, was to let go, so on the nod of Old Stunty, the troll severed off the arm of “The Tool” [party selects someone].   The Tool would have died if not for the healing herbs and skills of “The Hand” [party selects someone].  The Tool was saved, though armless he would be useless as far as the slave masters were concerned.  You were not benched until some cooking or cleaning job opens up.  Most likely he would be armed and send forward as cannon fodder in a wave attack against the Mizagûm.  Luckily, “The Tinker”[party selects someone] called upon a close contact at Brachypelma to patch him up.

Singing then begins from up the southeast passage as you swing your pickaxes into the precious rock seams.  This is it, the signal that The Quiet made whatever choice needed to join the escape.  With one great blow, the Chief smashes a dam engineered for an easy break.   Water gushes into the chamber, with each of you stepping up into hidden grooves and footsteps and making your way for the broken dam.  The neogi overseer tries to signal the alarm, but is swept down the passage along with other hapless miners.  The south passage is above the torrent of water.  Miners run down to gawk at the escape artists.  One even jumps in and with powerful strokes makes it to the last of your group, grabbing onto their leg[party determines who is the last in the line].  The rest of you head north bolting up a draining passage.

Damned Marines

Damned Marines

These units are long-dead marines of many nationalities - Ivory Asylum, Paradomea, Council of Bile, and any other who happens to fall victim to death ships of the Armada of the Damned. There have even been times that Grimsuvelth Trawlers sailed with the fleet, crewed by skeleton, zombie, and wight hill giants.

The undead marines of the Armada are just like their living counterparts as far as acting like marines - they are boarders of enemy vessels or used in amphibious assaults on coastal dwellings. There can be as many as 50 of them on one death ship if it is a warship or none if the ship was once a merchant or fishing ship. Across all 31 ships of the Armada of the Damned there could be as many as 400 under normal conditions. In times of great wars among naval powers, like in the Black Tide War, there have been as many 800 dead marines. This usually comes about from the ships being added to the Armada being warships won in battle with weaker non-combatants often falling first in battle.


One of the most harrowing sights of these marines is seeing them use their innate power to walk on water. They run across the waves as if it were land, storming a town and running off with future shipmates, all before the hapless settlement can muster a defense. Fortunately for the coastal holds of the Pearl Sea and the Sea of Mourning these raids are extremely rare with the Armada of the Damned resting in the deeps.

- Phoslomor, cartographer of the Third Epoch, excerpt from the book "Phoslomor's Survey of Midrêth, Ch. 4-1"