Cocytus

Pandemonium Layer
Order:	Second
Realms:	Fields of Malice Hruggekolohk Shattered Castle

The tunnels of Cocytus tend to be smaller than those of Pandesmos, which means that they funnel the winds more strongly. The resulting wails have earned Cocytus the nickname “layer of lamentation.” Strangely, the tunnels on this layer bear the marks of having been hand-chiseled, but such an undertaking must have occurred so long ago that years do not suffice as a measure.

Howler's Crag

A jagged spike of stone stands in the center of Cocytus. The Crag is a jumbled pile of stones, boulders, and worked stone, as if a giant's palace had collapsed in on itself. The Crag's top is mostly a level platform about eight feet in diameter, with a low wall surrounding it. The platform and those on it glow with an ephemeral blue radiance. The lower reaches of the Crag are riddled with small burrows. Some are merely dead ends, but others connect. The wall of every burrow is covered with lost alphabets that supposedly spell out strange psalms, liturgies, and strings of numerals or formulas. Natives of Pandemonium say that anything yelled aloud from the top of the Crag finds the ears of the intended recipient, no matter where that recipient is on the Great Wheel. The words of the message are borne on a shrieking, frigid wind. Demons of various sorts have learned that visitors constantly trickle to the crag. The visitors are usually archeologists, diviners, and those wishing to send a message to some lost friend or enemy. Most become the prey of the ambushing fiends.

Harmonica

Legend tells of a site in Cocytus called Harmonica. In this place, the winds whip through a cavern with holes and tubes chiseled into gargantuan rock columns, creating a noise worse than anywhere else in the plane. Somewhere within this mazelike realm of tortured cacophony lies the true secret of planewalking: the art of traveling the planes without a portal, spell, or device of any kind. In all likelihood, this secret is a legend with no basis in fact, but that doesn't stop the occasional seeker from finding, then dying among, the columns of Harmonica.

Pandemonium Layers

Pandesmos . Cocytus . Phlegethon . Agathion