Planeside

[Rebonack]

It was inevitable, honestly, that the Nexus would extend its tendrils once again into all the weird places beyond the material world that exist out there. Sure they showed up now and again in one of those plot threads or every now and again Outside if someone was really desperate, but at this point they really need a nice, cozy meta-location to call their own.

Planeside is all of those places that aren't the material plane we all known and love. Here you'll find the various realms of the dead, the hells, the disco infernos, the realms of madness, the twilight of the faeries, the plane of lost things, the geometry purgatory, the city of doors, the paraelemental plane of ranch dressing, and many, many more. If you plan on having a summer vacation in the Highest Heavens or really need to punch a devil in the snoot to assert authority, then this is the place to do it.

The usual forum and FFRP rules apply. Don't be a jerk, don't godmod without permission, spoiler any gratuitous fan-service taking place on the Plane of Busty Demonesses, have fun! If you want a plane added to the opening post then feel free to poke the thread creator with a stick and ask for an update.

The Presently Finite But Potentially Infinite List of Planes!

Spoiler: Reboplanes

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Spoiler: The Astral Wilds (Holidayscape)

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This is a realm of unfettered growth, life, birth, predation, and rebirth. Unearthly (and often deadly) plants overgrow everything, filling the plane to the point of choking with thick jungles of vegetation that seems to stretch into infinity above and below. The Wild is a vast, untamed and untamable thicket of intertwining vines, branches, and trunks acting as a nursery to innumerable ecosystems both tiny and expansive. All pervading radiance fills this realm, banishing all traces of shadow and lighting it in levels from blinding glory to soft twilight. Colors here are richer, scents sharper, sensations pulsing with intensity. Everything in this realm is simply more.

Including the dangers.

One might think that the fountain of positive energy and the engine of souls would be a nice place, but they would be wrong. The Astral Wilds are, above all else, wild. Magical predators both bizarre and alien stalk the infinite canopies for food. Creatures are constantly devoured and reborn, bursting forth from amniotic pods in the trunks of the trees mere minutes after having their spine broken and their flesh consumed. Nothing dead here remains for long. Many of the material plane's more horrifying magical beasts are predators that have escaped from the Wilds.

Undead that come here will find the Wilds supremely unpleasant. The ambient positive energy will quickly overwhelm the negative, reducing them to little more than a corpse, meat waiting to be consumed. The living mortals not native to the plane face an even more unusual fate. Positive energy pours into them until they quite literally burst, birthing a new and unique monster native to the Wilds. Though this new creature retains the soul, memories, and (to the best of its ability) the personality of its progenitor, it has become a wildling at heart and may feel uncomfortable returning to the drab and dreary material world It's possible to ward both the living and the undead against the overwhelming life of the Wilds, but the adaptive nature of the plane makes any such defense tenuous at best.

Reasons to visit abound, however. As the positively aligned contemporaneous plane, the Wilds are the primary route between the Empyrean Spheres, Midgard, and the Elemental Ring. Vast highways have been cut through the endless tangle, maintained by modrons from The Clockwork Fields of Easter for the purpose of maintaining orderly travel between the planes. What's more, the Wilds themselves are filled to the bursting with rare and valuable reagents and materials sought after all over reality. These simple facts have made the planes' ruler, Demogorgon, the great Demiurge, exceedingly influential in the economy of the planes.

So, enjoy your trip through the Wilds, traveler. Just remember your bug repellent.

Spoiler: The Beneficent Mountain of Christmas (Holidayscape)

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Christmas is the plane of joy, goodness, hope, and compassion. It is a mountain with neither base nor peak covered in snowy forests and workshops. Despite the seemingly cold appearance, the glow of joy pervades here, warming all of pure heart in spite of the snow. The lands are home to tomte, snowmen, and reindeer who serve in the production of all fashion of good gifts for mortals, working under the watchful eye of Santa Claus. Crystal decanters of hope and joy are the primary currencies in Christmas, both valued at the ounce.

Spoiler: The Bottomless Chasm of Krampusnat (Holidayscape)

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Krampusnat is an awful place, a realm of punishment, suffering, torment, torture, evil, and constant conflict. This plane is a bottomless pit formed by four sets of connected spiraling rings that lead ever deeper into the depths of darkness. Each set of rings is home to a different set of fiends who torment both each other and the opposing factions. The self-righteous khanafe of Tartarus, the hedonistic belial Pandemonium, the impulsively destructive iysh'dam of the Abyss, and the tyrannical dibbah of Gehenna. Krampus drags the souls of the wicked into the pit and casts them headlong into the darkness to be twisted and tormented for the allotted time. The favored currency within the jagged depths of Krampusnat is dollop of suffering, a substance not unlike molten glass.

Spoiler: The Clockwork Fields of Easter (Holidayscape)

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Easter is a plane of precision, purpose, order, obedience, and regimentation. It is a beautiful place of perfectly wrought clockwork and machinery overseen by modrons, clockwork rodents of various kinds each or which has a command gear, its shape and number of teeth denoting their rank. Modrons serve the Easter Hare, Master of the Clockwork Field and Orderer of Eggs. Units of obedience are the preferred currency here.

Spoiler: The Elemental Ring (Holidayscape)

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The Elemental Ring is more or less exactly what it sounds like, a torus-shaped plane containing the essence of the elements. In order, they are fire, metal, earth, wood, water, ice, air, lightning, and finally back to fire. The elements smoothly transition from one to the other, becoming more predominated by the major element of that region. The element of each region represents a majority of the elements that exist there, NOT an exclusive presence of that element to the exclusion of all others. However, you will never find an opposing element in a region (no liquid water in a majority fire region, for example.)

The elemental ring is ruled over by various Elemental Lords, each of which control their own regions of the ring. Elementals, beings of more 'pure' elements rather than the flesh and bone of mortals, are the natural inhabitants of the Ring. Many portions of the Ring are lethal to unwarded mortals, though prizes to be found in the depths of the Ring entice many travelers. Ingots of pure elemental essence are the preferred currency here.

Spoiler: The Gloom (Holidayscape)

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This is a realm of undeath and stagnation, a realm where the living are not welcome.

Endless dunes of bone-white sand stretch in all directions, punctuated by massive weathered bones of aeons dead titans. Pools of black necrotic bile sit stagnant and stinking in the low points between the dunes and in some places form vast lakes of rotten fluids which unseemly abominations writhe and wriggle within. Bleached, leafless trees dot the landscape, their surfaces crusted with salt and worn smooth by biting, merciless winds. Headstones, coffins, monuments, mausoleums, and tombs decorate the Gloom. And above it all the permanent blood moon shines down on the dreary landscape, casting everything in an unearthly pallor. Mindless undead wandering, thirsting for the life of the living and finding no reprieve.

There are villages here, echoes of ghost towns scoured clean by undead. There are whole necropolises teeming with the restless dead, testaments to atrocities of ages past committed on horrifying scales. In some places the sands burn as a continual funeral pyre. In others they are frozen and bleak and crawling with creatures of hard, icy hearts. Living creatures that enter the Gloom rarely remain living for long as the plane devours their vitality, rips their soul out as a wraith, melts their flesh into a bile ooze, and animates their bones as a hungry skeleton.

Enthroned deep in the icy depths of the plane, built high atop the colossal skull of a dead god, sits the frozen citadel of Papa Orcus, Punisher of Oath-breakers and Father of Undead. Orcus longs for the life and riches of the Astral Wilds and has launched countless undead incursions into the realm of the Demiurge, but thus far the attacks have proven unfruitful.

Like the Wilds, the Gloom is a plane between planes and it has many paths stretching from Midgard to all corners of planes. The souls of the dead all pass through here on their way to their rightful destination, though without a guide they are left lost, wandering, and likely to be ensnared by an undead spirit and bound once again to a coporeal undead body. Spirit shepherds, the headless dullahan, wander the wastes, carrying their skull as a lantern in one hand and staffs of vertebra in other, in search of lost souls to lead home. All but the most vile and powerful undead give these guides plenty of space. Within the many sealed tombs and crypts forgotten riches sit, just waiting for some brave soul to plumb the depths of the horrors and retrieve them. Are you brave enough to raid these lost treasures, adventurer? Are you strong enough to hang onto your own soul?

Spoiler: The Riotous Revelries of Carnival (Holidayscape)

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Carnival is one vast, never-ending party, a realm of fun, silliness, foolishness, indulgence, pleasure, and a general care-free attitude. Feasting, dancing, singing, parades, it has got it all. Carnival is a massive city of incomprehensible size where the revelry never ends overseen by The Carnival King, the King of Fools. The inhabitants of this place, jokers, are widely varied in their elaborate and festive costumes that at times are more than simply costumes. They exist both to have fun themselves and to help everyone else have fun. Flasks of pleasure are the primary means of exchange in Carnival; let the fun times flow!

Spoiler: The Sanctuary Fortress of Lent (Holidayscape)

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The plane of Lent is a singular cathedral on a scale unimaginable. It is a place of piety, seriousness, self-control, discipline, and somberness. The inhabitants of this place spend their time in quiet contemplation, prayer, and partaking in acts of asceticism. There is no laughter here, no gayety, no frivolous words or actions, only stern and serious business. The archons of Lent, beings as awe-inspiring as they are somber, aid the faithful in their tasks within the hallowed walls of Lent under the watchful eye of the Rose Father. Piety by the pound is the most common form of currency accepted within the walls of Lent.

Spoiler: The Spooky Town of Halloween (Holidayscape)

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Halloween is a sprawling rural village without end to its uncanny fields filled with creepy trees, glowing jack-o-lanterns, and spooky sheaves. Halloween is a land of surprise, mischief, whim, whimsy, funny fear, and the sheer chaos caused by innumerable unruly children prancing about in the dark. Every turning of the moon the costumes of the child-like guisers change, keeping the experience every whimsical and fresh. Pranks are common all around, the tricks to go with the treats. Evil actions, however, are frowned upon by Jack the Pumpkin King. Candy corn packed with whimsy in place of sugar is the favorite form of money here. After all, no one actually eats candy corn.

Spoiler: Tir na nog (Mythosverse)

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Tir na nog, Otherworld, the Faerie, the Hedge, the Briar Patch, a place known by many names, a twilight realm between sleeping and waking. Tir na nog appears to be a vast, misty, enchanted forest where everything seems vague and somehow unreal. It overlaps the physical world such that landmarks and man-made objects have woodland analogs. Great hollow trees or caves replace buildings, roads give way to rushing rivers of dark water, cars are replaced with massive boulders thick with lichen and scrawled with strange markings. Faeries frequent the mists of Tir na nog, but these are no tiny, playful creatures. No, the fae are cruel, spiteful creatures that were once mortals that wandered too far into the unknown and were taken, twisted by the surreal environment of the Otherworld. Those are the fortunate. The unfortunate are caught by the Daoine Sidhe, beings that never wore human flesh, and dragged into the Dreamlands where they are subjected to the capricious whims of their captors. It is said that on the high mountain tops of Tir na nog one can evoke the names of the Old Ones to call them up, but few have survived such foolhardy endeavors. Entering Tir na nog is simple enough, simply knock on on any archway or door thrice at twilight and ask aloud, 'May I please come in?'. Leaving, however, can be far more difficult...

Spoiler: FoxTails

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Shadow Kingdom of Orochi
On the Plane of Shadows, about a day's walk from shadow-Inside, is a small kingdom ruled by the eight-headed demon dragon Yamata no Orochi

Near the western border, facing inside, is the famous dragon's castle proper: a large and imposing structure built of inky black stone in the style of the great castle-fortresses of Japan's feudal period. TO the west, the highway to Inside stretches between relatively "tame" lands.

To the north, a wide swath of somewhat sparse forest houses giant spiders which spin the precious shadowsilk. The silk is not adhesive, relying on its strength and the tangled nature of the webs to trap prey. This silk is the main product of the kingdom, collected at some risk by harvesting the webs while taking pains to not harm the spiders.

To the south, shadow analogues of farms quietly provide food for the kingdom.

To the east, the land gradually becomes fallow and fades into the wilds: a dangerous, untamed land of monsters and danger.

[Ionbound]

[Astral Wilds]

A young magi is here, barely out of the academy. She does, however, have protective wards up, though they are, in fact, tentative. She stands on the edge of one of the highways, looking at a map showing the elemental trees she intends to make her first stave from, and, with no further ado, steps off and enters the jungle.

[Aric Kale]

The Gloom - Solana in the Shadows

Foolish mortals...next time I will destroy them utterly!

The nightwalker sits on a pile of white sand, her dark cloak clutched about her body.
Solana is young for one of her kind, standing at less than 6 feet tall.
Her figure is well shaped, but she has no hair to be seen. As for clothing, she is not truly naked, having a mystique like effect over her intimate bits, and furthermore she wears the cloak.

This truly is a desolate plane.

[Rebonack]

[Astral Wilds]

There comes a polite cough from behind the mage as she begins walking away. Should she turn, she'll find herself looking at the three foot tall clockwork squirrel that has been standing by the door leading back to Midgard. The creature's brass body has a four sided gear in the middle of its chest, turning ponderously and denoting its low rank as a modron, a servant of Easter Hare. It holds out its right paw to her.

"Miss? The toll for using the Hare's highway, if you please."

Gotta pay the toll!

Can't run around using other people's roads and expect not to pay for it.

Hopefully she brought something to pay with, something that's actually valued beyond the material world. Like a vial of hope, some pure chaos, or maybe a unit of duty? Barring that, she could always pay with a soul in a gem. She should be well aware of the toll and what the modron would be willing to take as payment. And any mage worth their salt would be able to procure such things with some time a little bit of ingenuity.

If she doesn't have anything to pay with... well... The clockwork squirrel will mark her down as disobedient and the Easter Hare will be very cross with her. She might also get killed and/or tossed back through the door.

[The Gloom]

A desolate place? Oh certainly, no doubt about it. In all directions the lone and level sands stretch far away. There are, however, monuments. Testaments to the atrocities that have come to pass in the material world. And some of them are quite recent additions. Nearby an apartment complex loom in the eternal night, its upper half burned away. It is a ghost, a shell, an echo of what exists in Midgard where the Gloom began bleeding over into physical reality. It is a haunted, cursed place now where the restless dead wander. Wights that were simply destroyed within the bounds of the gloomy land were not freed to go to their rightful rest, rather their twisted souls were pulled into the darkness where bone sand and necrotic sludge sloshed themselves together to form new cages for the damned. No, the wights weren't able to move on. They're trapped here, wandering the defiled halls of the skeleton of a building, aimless and restless. Without purpose or direction. In time, this place may become the heart of a new necropolis.

Or perhaps some new master will arrive to give the wights purpose.

Those unfortunate people who died within the clammy embrace of the gloomy land failed to escape as well. Some took their own lives in hopes of escaping the chains of undeath. Others were simply unfortunate. All were pulled bodily into the Gloom at the last moments of life, their souls rent out and warped into wraiths, their flesh dissolved into bile ooze, and their bones whispered into a mockery of life as hungry skeletons. A little over one hundred new undead in all.

There would have been many more if not for the intervention of those vile little ponies. But what could have happened to them? Several were slain within the gloomy land. Shouldn't their souls have been pulled into the Gloom as well? And yet... there's no trace of them. Not a hoof. Not a hair. Had they somehow managed to overcome the inexorable pull of the Gloom where all others had failed? Or perhaps there simply wasn't anything to take. After all, they pinged as no more alive or undead than a pile of rocks. A mystery for another time, perhaps.

[Aric Kale]

The Gloom

The nightwalker looks over at the apartment complex and feels the tug of the undead...now they had no master...

These restless souls should be easier to control, she should be able to claim twenty, at least.
Yet not a trace of the foals...they are not of any world...they must be eradicated.

And what better way to annihilate a race than by creating an army of undead? :D

The Necromancer walks towards the ruined building, her right arm outstretched and her silver fingernails glowing as she exerts her power towards the wights inside.

[Rebonack]

[The Gloom]

With nothing fighting against her will, nothing obscuring the call, the wights come shuffling out of the husk of a building and kneel before Solana. They're under her command now.

At least until something more powerful wrenches them away.

Or until they get destroyed.

One of those things.

As for the remaining restless dead? They simply look on with anguish, some comprehending their damned state while others shuffle about in blank, mindless existence. As far as horrible limbos go, the Gloom is pretty much at the top of the list.

Her servants now gathered, it may be wise for Solana to depart. If Papa Orcus was expecting the whole apartment to be consumed and the Crucible retrieved then he would have anticipated the building's ghost to manifest here in the Gloom. He would doubtless be sending messengers soon to greet his forge wight champion and claim the much coveted prize.

[Aric Kale]

The Gloom

Solana takes her new children and shepherds them along to the next nearest monument.
Something dark and defensible, for this would be her fortress, enhanced with dark magic. Literally. Dark Magic.

The place will be a beacon of Negative and Necrotic energy that should bring undead flocking to it...
The family must grow. Solana's children will conquer the world...

[Rebonack]

[The Gloom]

There is no lack of haunted monuments in the portion of the Gloom that overlaps with Inside. No, not by any means. Great atrocities aplenty have been committed here and the ghostly shells of buildings abound, sticking out of the sands like bleached bones of titanic size. Some almost appear as though they're in the process of becoming bleached bones of titanic side, curving and rounding like ribs, though with windows and doors and rooms within all carved out into the marrow.

Solana will have no difficulty finding a tower to call her own.

The difficult part, however...

The difficult part will be convincing whatever abominations may already inhabit the towering tomb that the monument has a new master.

What shall she choose?

Something tall? Something squat? Something that burrows down into the blighted sands like a planter's wart? So many citadels to choose from.

[Ionbound]

[Astral Wilds]

The mage nods and says, "Oh, of course! I think I have something...Give me just a sec..." She rummages around in her pouches, before eventually pulling out a shard of crystallized magic essence she made a few days previous. She tosses it to the squirrel and says, "Is that enough?"

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

The squirrel modron catches the chunk of materia and examines it for a few moments before giving a curt nod. The chunk of magic is stowed away into a little box attached to the modron, who then gives a wave to the mage. "That will be sufficient," it says. Then it opens its mouth and plays a recording. "Please do not tamper with any of the signs on the Hare's Highway. Should you experience ontological metamorphosis while on the Hare's Highway due to a flaw in the Highway's wards the Plane of Easter will aid you in recovering your previous form at no additional charge. If you leave the Hare's Highway at any time you wave any claim of liability against the Plane of Easter or its associates due to death, dismemberment, injury, metaphysical scarring, ontological metamorphosis, or any other hazard or peril inherent to traveling in the Astral Wilds."

The message played, the squirrel's mouth snaps shut again.

Well!

Now that the legal nonsense is out of the way the mage can start looking for her loot!

The chances of anything good being on the Highway is basically zero. She'll have to begin bushwacking her own path through the Wilds if she wants to make that staff.

[Aric Kale]

The Gloom

A castle will do nicely...

It is small, with walls only twelve feet high and a single tower in the center.
The walls themselves were made of a once sparkling stone, now worn dim by the oppressive nature of The Gloom. Fortunately, these walls are wide enough for a man to walk on top, and they have (mostly) complete palisades tall enough to duck behind.

There is one flaw with this fortress, however, and that would be the gaping hole in its north wall, splitting it in two. The other three walls are fairly intact, but that hole will present a problem in the future...

No matter!
Solana leads the wights and zombies to Azgul Fortress.

Yes...this will do...quite nicely...

She commands the wights to guard the perimeter of the fort while she explores the keep itself. She's hoping there will be a room where she can set up her dastardly magic devices!

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mage nods, takes a deep breath, and plunges into the wilds, beginning her search for the elemental trees.

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

Down is the direction she wants. Down toward the Elemental Ring far below.

Compared to the incomprehensible tangle of the pathless tracts of the Wilds, the Hare's Highway is relatively ordered and tidy. The roads are well worn by feet of all fashions and vehicles ranging from the mundane to the truly bizarre flanked on both sides by easily visible signs of clockwork and light that provide warding, directions, and warning against the fate that will likely befall any foolish enough to step foot off the tamed and tempered portion of the endless wilderness.

The mage will likely see other travelers on the highway, some mortal though many creatures of elemental or ethical nature. Even some of the more intelligent wildlings, magical beasts native to the Astral Wilds, frequent these paths when they feel disinclined toward being eaten by some other passing monster. It may be wise to stop and chat with a passing elemental or wildling regarding the precise type of elemental wood the magic is speaking. After all, they might be familiar with a grove that's near enough the Highway that the mage won't place herself at too much risk.

As she treks lower into the Wilds the mage will eventually happen upon a ice elemental chatting with some sort of strange wildling near the edge of the Highway. The former is a handsome being, human in shape and perfectly translucent as if her were a living ice sculpture. The latter is, as mentioned, strange. She looks like a cross between an angler fish, a lemur, and a viper, all long and scaly and covered in fins and glowing spots. In place of hair a set of fins runs along her head, the front-most forming a long luminous lure, though it's presently dangling behind her back. She's garbed in leather and furs with little bone charms and colorful feathers hanging from cords.

But most importantly? She's pulling a small cart filled with various baubles scrounged from the Wilds that the ice elemental is inspecting. "Those are good. You have G'ulk's guarantee on that. Only the highest quality soul silkwood resin. And if you're too busy cast it, G'ulk has some soul amber nodes made already. Interested, yes? Hmm?"

[The Gloom]

Old, decrepit towers always seem to be finned with old, foul things.

A heavy, malevolent presence hangs thick in the stale air, brooding and festering as the years creep by. Upon stepping foot into the central tower Solana will find herself assailed by a hail of stones and rubble propelled by the hateful will of a ghost. The tormented soul hasn't seen fit to actually make itself seen, but rather seems content to toss things at intruders until they go away.

[Aric Kale]

The Gloom - Azgul Fortress

A shield of solidshade protects the necromancer. It is the same materiel which she summoned to fight against the nightmaeres, and she plans on making armor out of it soon.

Spirit...what is your purpose here?

I do not intend to destroy your home...merely to reacquire it.
Seems like Solana will use the diplomatic approach first.

[Rebonack]

[The Gloom]

Ha!

Seriously?

She's going to try to reason with a poltergeist?

Yeah, that isn't going to be doing any good. The ghost continues throwing stuff at her.

Ghosts aren't typically known for being very rational.

[Aric Kale]

The Gloom

Fine then...foolish ghosty.
Force it is.
Solana waves her hand, allowing a wave of negative energy to fling itself towards wherever the poltergeist appears to be.

Be gone from MY tower!

[Rebonack]

[The Gloom]

The ghost doesn't appear to be anywhere!

It's just hurling stuff around!

Ghosts do that sometimes. Toss stuff at people without manifesting. The restless spirit might be in the room. Or it could be most anywhere else. Simply blasting ghosts typically isn't sufficient to get rid of them. More often something has to be done with their remains to put them to rest. Or? Just turn their remains into an undead creature and trap the soul inside the body.

That's sure to get rid of a ghost!

Though it requires finding the thing's remains.

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mage smiles happily. Perhaps the saleswoman would have the would she needs.

She approaches the wildling, and waits for her to be done with the ice elemental before saying, "Greeting. I was wondering if you had a branch from an elemental tree, the kind that grows near the ring? I'd be willing to pay."

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

Eventually the elemental settles on a few already finished amber nodes and pays with an ingot of pure ice. The snake/primate/fish thing grins a needle-toothed grin and takes the payment before handing the elemental his trinkets. "G'ulk's pleasure to do business with you," she gurgles. The wildling stows the ingots in an ornate wooden box before turning her vaguely disturbing attention to the mage!

"Oh hoh! She would be willing to pay G'ulk, isn't that nice?" the wildling laughs. "Elemental wood not easy to find, no ulk-dur na-hee! Lots of nasty things guard it from poor G'ulk! But G'ulk is being very clever, yes? She knows how to sneak it!" The creature says as she rummages around in her cart before at last all of her luminescent spots glow brightly! "Oh hoh! Here it's being, yes!"

She pulls out a long wooden case and opens up the top, revealing eight compartments. Within two of them are some small pieces of wood. One contains two pieces with smooth, almost liquid looking bard the color of the sea on a calm day. The other holds a single piece of wood with rough, stony grey bark speckled with black splinter-shaped crystals.

"Nuar to'saw! Only earth and water left. They sell fast, oh me my! But the Midgardian gets a good price, mmm? A good price from G'ulk. What does the Midgardian have to trade?"

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mage's eyes light up when she sees the earth wood and says, "I've got a bunch of crystal magic shards. How many do you want?"

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

The wildling wrinkles her nose at that reply. "It wants to pay with materia? Uo-snok gul'tha! This is no charity G'ulk runs, Midgardian. Payment in element ingots? Flasks of pleasure? Souls in amber? G'ulk is even feeling generous enough to accept candy corn. But not materia. Does the Midgardian have anything better?"

A moment passes and the creature snorts.

"But if it doesn't, G'ulk is still feeling generous. She will give information for free, yes?" the wildling says before pointing off down another branch of the road and states a sign number. The number is really big. "When it reaches that sign, climb down past it. There is a grove of elemental trees down that way, yes. Many know about it, so gnarls might not be the best. People only to be taking the best gnarls for themselves! Ha! But it is a smart little Midgardian mage, yes? Then it knows the dangers."

The monster grins her needle toothed grin.

"See? G'ulk very helpful."

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mage sighs and says, "Fine. Thanks for the directions." She sets off towards the signpost and begins venturing downwards.

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

Traveling on the Hare's Highway was relatively easy. Pleasant, even. Feral wildlings were kept away, the overpowering positive energy was dampened, and someone could stroll along at a leisurely pace while enjoying the surreal, over-saturated beauty of the Astral Wilds.

Things change drastically as soon as the mage steps beyond the warning signs, off the beaten trail and into the incomprehensible tangle of vegetation. Before the air had a pleasantly warm feeling to it, but now it's humid and stifling. Making her way through the brush is difficult since innumerable vines and shrubs clutter the branches. Alga squelches under her feet, leaving her footing slippery and unsure on branches that are much thinner than those on the Highway. If she looses her footing there's no telling what she might tumble into...

Upon passing a rather strange looking flower stock that looks like bright red muscle and is covered in tiny, bony barbs, the poor mage will find herself suddenly assaulted by a volley of tiny spikes! The stupid flower is attacking her! Thankfully the barbs aren't that much bigger than bee stingers. And like bee stingers each one has a fleshy sack connected to it that will begin pulsing rhythmically should they stick into her flesh.

Should she get shot she might start feeling a little woozy...

Those barbs are probably venomous.

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mage swears as she's pricked, but when she begins to feel woozy, she casts two cantrips in quick succession. The first probably neutralizes the poison already in her system, hopefully causing her head to clear, while the second conjures a suit of force armor around herself, ideally protecting herself from any further attacks.

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

That's a pretty good way to ward off doom barbs. Even thick clothing would probably work. But it doesn't do a great deal about the barbs already in her. The poison neutralizing spell works fine, but unfortunately that removes the numbing effect of the venom. Which means it'll hurt a lot more when the seeds inside those sacs get squeezed into her wounds and begin growing.

Like.

Seriously.

It hurts a lot.

Hopefully she doesn't start thrashing around and go tumbling off the edge of the trunk she's walking on.

Why?

Because that would be terrible.

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mages swears as she keels over in pain, her eyes glowing red as she casts a more powerful spell that transmutes her blood into a blazing liquid that sprays over the bloodspike thorns, hopefully incinerating them before they can grow further.

[Rebonack]

[The Astral Wilds]

That works pretty great!

The seeds are all incinerated before they can develop into bloodspike flower larvae and eat the poor mage from the inside out.

See!

The sign warned you about this stuff, yet to be named mage!

It warned you that this place is the friggin' plane of Double-Australia! Everything here wants to kill you, eat you, poison you, or all of the above.

But, at this point, between her armor and stumbling away the mage will be out of the projectile range of the bloodspike flower. Now that she knows what the awful things look like she should be able to avoid them in the future. Of course, the Wilds are full of all sorts of awful things just waiting to do equally awful things to the poor mage when she goes bumbling past them. Even the plans here are lethal!

Well. The bloodspike flower is a weird plant/cnidarian/insect hybrid thing. But close enough.

Thankfully for the mage her next encounter isn't nearly as awful. As she's walking along a huge root passing between a pair of trees growing on either side of it a thing suddenly stops being invisible. A thing that's clinging to one of the two trees. A thing that looks like a cross between a leopard, a gecko, and a bobbit worm. The creature is sandy brown in color, though its body shimmers with iridescent waves of color. Five long tendrils grow out of the creature's head, two where its eyes should be, two from where its nose should be, an a fifth from the forehead. The wildling's mouth is flanked by a pair of VERY unfriendly looking mandibles.

"You're a Midgardian, right?" it asks curiously. "You're really loud. Like... super loud. I heard you coming from forever away. I'm surprised no one has eaten you yet."

[Aric Kale]

[The Gloom]

The ghost doesn't appear to be anywhere!

It's just hurling stuff around!

Ghosts do that sometimes. Toss stuff at people without manifesting. The restless spirit might be in the room. Or it could be most anywhere else. Simply blasting ghosts typically isn't sufficient to get rid of them. More often something has to be done with their remains to put them to rest. Or? Just turn their remains into an undead creature and trap the soul inside the body.

That's sure to get rid of a ghost!

Though it requires finding the thing's remains.

The Gloom - Azgul Fortress

Fine then...Solana begins her search, now paying attention to the corpses lining the walls...one of them had to belong to this spirit...

Stupid ghost, interfering with her plans...

[Rebonack]

[The Gloom]

Corpses are, perhaps unsurprisingly, hard to come by within the Gloom. Bits and pieces, certainly. A skull here. A pelvis there. But a full set of remains is almost unheard of. Such a thing is quickly inhabited by an undead spirit and whispered by into a shambling mockery of life. So to find a creatures remains intact is a truly singular event.

It shouldn't take Solana long to discover them.

The cadaver is propped up in a corner, dessicated to the point of paper-thin skin clinging to bones, its eyes long since mouldered away. From the untarnished gold ornaments that adorn them, they were likely a noble of some sort in life.

In death?

In death they are just another lost, wandering soul.

It's a small wonder that they haven't been collected by a dullahan yet.

[Ionbound]

[The Astral Wilds]

The mage looks at the wildling, and eventually says in a quiet (to her) voice, "I can guess why...Have you considered that I'm not loud, you just have very sensitive hearing?"