Environment

******** Local ecosystem is tied into poisonous flower/nectar and a beast who feeds on it. Bluish-purple thorned plant which grows all around the slopes of the mountain, all around Elves' area. Mauling thorns protect the nectar sac in the center, the size of a cabbage head. Thorns are super-poisonous (1 drop=Death). Nectar is hallucinogenic/magical. In caves and burrows lives the horrid beast, the Mole Scorpion, which has intricate and mysterious connections to the purple flower.

Tribesman harvest the nectar from where its stored in the esophagus. A team of tribesman/young braves make ritual sport of hunting down MS to gather the juice. They know the creatures well. When braves corner one, they musically charm it, sync up with its 'rattlesnake rattle'. Some use hands and mouth ( re: Renegade movie), some have hand-instruments. They time the beat to anticipate when MS will spit. Then they must strike to get the goods in a flash. Blue flowers toxin coats a large tangle of thorns around the honey-sac. The MS's thorny, tough snout snakes in past the thorns unaffected. It reaches the juice with extendable tongue/mandible. (re: water bear) Heroes role in this: a) influenced by Illithid dreams (re: Call of Cthulu, called there) or b) influenced by by rumors the Elves plant, trying to draw out some greedy adventurers to break the stalemate. MF can't be reached, can't be killed. He continues to warp their people. He can't escape. (Githyanki shock-troops search for him) Local legend/Character idea: One of the tribesman who tamed and rode a MS and fitted it with chitin armor. MS sprays blobs of poison/nectar when attacked or cornered; loogie/spitballs. Concentrated nectar/nuerological toxin. ************ Some ruins on the mountain here and there, a few old towers, a damaged causeway. Local flora/fauna equally mutated/exotic/hostile. ********* Wall Around the Cursed Lands (Broken Lands/Bitter Lands) The "Bosun" at the Gate There exists a large wall sealing off the area and the mutated creatures within it, the range of the MF's magic. (The 'Madness Effect': Saving Throws vs delusion/memory-loss become more frequent as they approach hell mountain.

Critical info about how to pass the gatehouse into the realm must be gained by accessing the memories of a dead man (getting absorbed by carnivorous tree) The last known servant-mage-guardian who knew the secrets of the barrier, its defenses, possesses this knowledge. It is known he is being digested by a carnivorous tree with snaky limbs. A body, dangling from a branch. His knowledge/memories can be gained by eating the necrid fruit of the tree (something civilized people view with the disgust of someone eating dog-shit) In the grove where it is lives a swarm of feral sprites which ride giant mutated moths. Tiny weapons sting the heroes. (tree near gatehouse? Just outside?) (Object: Search)? For Fusilier's Lance. Secreted (literally? Bio-Tech?) on mostly transparent crashed ship within broken lands. Lance of an elite guardsman. MF wants them to retrieve this object to make its escape. Prison-Transport ship crashed; a large flying vessel. (partly buried underground?) (From land of Mage-Kings)? Ship crashed at edge of river-valley. One long sectionof the flying fortress remains, as the wall marking the edge of the Broken Lands. Wall has gaps in it where pieces have separated and cracked. Strange mutated creatures escape from gaps in wall. Walls are strange material, neither wood nor stone, and hot to the touch. Corpse Tree is marker towards Broken Lands. ************* Rougish characters hang around the taverns, an 'interzone' type situation. An illicit/dangerous trade of theifs/magic-hunters and smugglers, the lure of wealth and powerful magic. (Famed Mage-Kingdom?) Story starts at mysterious trading city, desert/arabic in flavor. At river-mouth/estuary, as gateway up the valley into the Broken Lands. A sort of "Go No Further" for traders. Hundreds of years, and the locals have carved many warning plinths on the path to the tree. (The city exists on an otherwise barren island, a supply port for a large military empire. A distant power with naval fleet uses the port to store livestock and a number of warehouses/grain silos. Military movements in area to counter neighboring nation(s) and/or combat piracy) The city guards have a minimal presence on wall to keep trespassers out, but some can be bribed.)

Port of Akana (By all accounts, a thoroughly disreputable place) A port at a silty river estuary, spread on both sides of river mouth. To North and South East, nearly impassable mountains of granite blades and sandstone cliffs. Sharp granite ridges to the north. Silt islands at river mouth make navigation difficult. A handful of shallow canals run out from river to various warehouses. Much of city is seedy and derelict. Dusty, broke-down warrens. Brothels. Gambling. A stone fortified wall with guard-towers marks the beginning of the Broken Lands. In the plain beyond the wall lies the warning plinths and Corpse Tree. Beyond this is the strange wall with gaps. Hot Gates. All they encounter try to menace/hustle them. They arrive on a ship pulled by two giant enslaved fish on big chains. ******* One side of hell-mountain is nearly impassable, a long steep slope of loose scree, rocks and boulders. Frequent unpredictable rockslides. In places, overhangs.