Gehenna
| Outer Plane | |
|---|---|
| Layers: | Khalas Chamada Mungoth Krangath |
| Primary Faction: | None |
| Sect: | None |
Gehenna, the Furnace of Perdition, comprises exactly four steep volcanoes, with peaks at the top and bottom and nary a flat stretch in between. The volcanoes float in an impenetrable void, each mount a layer unto itself. Any berk knows what that means: These volcanoes are huge, literally hundreds of thousands of miles across, up, and down. Still, it doesn't hide the fact that Gehenna is, overall, ne of the smallest planes in physical area. That doesn't mean the plane's not boundless like all the rest; the void stretches off into empty infinity. But unlike any other Outer Plane, it's got a finite amount of physical, measurable ground.
On the other hand, what Gehenna lacks in size it makes up for in sheer mean-spiritedness. This is a plane totally without charity, without any concept of pity, mercy, or any other redeeming quality. This doesn't just apply to the inhabitants; the land itself spits on the unfortunates here, and a body can consider himself lucky if he's not overrun by a lava flow or shoved off the side of a mountain.
This plane's home to the yugoloths, one of the few planar races that aren't spawned from petitioners. Legend has it that the yugoloths came here from the Gray Waste, perhaps to escape the constant battles of the Blood War, perhaps for other, more nefarious reasons. Still, the yugloths pose one of the main dangers of the plane, and a body would be well advised to steer clear of them, for both physical and spiritual safety.
Gehenna's four layers are, in order out from the Astral: Khalas, the Gentle Land; Chamada the Molten; Mungoth, the Burning Ice; and Krangath, the Dead Furnace. Each layer has it's own physical peculiarities, but some things are common to all.
The ground generates each layer's light and heat, not some sun or burning star in the sky. On some of the layers, the heat's enough to cause non-natives to burst into flame. The light's red, cast by the slagged rock and the heated metals of each layer. As the layer cools, so does the light die. Thus it is that the light constantly rises and falls around the plane as fresh fumaroles and geysers of lava sprout up and cool off.
As noted above, there isn't a single level plane on the face of the four mountains; at least, not a naturally occurring one. Plenty of folks take the time to clear off a spot for themselves so that they can sleep without fear of rolling off, but most of these don't last too long. Something about the plane just seems to hate a level surface, and most ledges (those not formed by a power, anyway) have a way of breaking off and carrying those on 'em to a painful doom.
If a body doesn't want to fall from the outer slopes, his best bet is to stick inside the canyons. All the layers sport caverns beneath their surfaces. Those of Khalas cave in under the heat of the magma regularly, and only the most addle-coved of all Clueless would consider making one a home. Chamada's caverns are even more dangerous; it takes about 10 minutes for a cavern to fill with boiling rock, and the caverns themselves are really too hot for anybody to step into. Indeed, instead of being caverns, they're more like giant air bubbles in the magma. Berks only enter these "bubbles" looking for a way to get to Mungoth. Sometimes a covern holds off the lava a bit longer; these usually have tunnels ore passages to the outer shell of the layer.
Mungoth's caverns are the most habitable. In fact, they're the most comfortable places on this cold layer, and they're fiercely contested. The cave complex of Krangath is dark and cold, just as the outside of the dead land is. It's home to a variety of beings, each of which regard light as inimical and something best destroyed, along with whatever happens to be carrying it. It's a chill, dank place, without much that any ordinary basher'd want anyway.
The petitioners of Gehenna are the refuse of the planes, or so it's said. They're greedy and grasping, caring only for themselves. They perform no services or favors without some sort of immediate response. Because precious little in the way of valuables exists on Gehenna (at least, not available to petitioners), they're also mighty suspicious, and they won't render any help without demonstration of a body's ability to pay.
Unlike those on many planes, the petitioners here are a willful lot. They've spread out across the plane with no regard as to what they're here for, traveling as freely as they like between layers in their quest for power. They're looking for the ultimate exercise in will as they believe it to be, and they exercise that will whenever they can.
Surprisingly, Gehenna's not all that hard to figure out, travel-wise. Aside from the Styx, which, like a great liquid snake flows where it will, not much is dark about Gehenna's ins and outs. It's not a cage like Carceri, and it's not as diabolically clever as Baator; it's just a plane that seems to have some incredibly hostile intentions.
Obviously, a body can get here by the usual methods: a portal from Sigil, a gate from the adjacent planes, an Astral pool, or the Styx. Portals are always found in the deep caverns of the layer, and they appear as bottomless black chasms. They're usually marked, and this is the only time a service is performed for free in Gehenna. Of course, some of these marked pits are actually bottomless pits, dropping a body into the void beneath the mountain - that's the cruel sort of amusement played by the denizens of Gehenna.
The portals between the layers are also found beneath the furnaces of the plane, usually in dead-end corridors. Occasionally they open into a volcanic bubble if a body's going to the second or third layer, or into a totally sealed cavern if a basher's travelling to the fourth. Sometimes the portals are only one way, too, so a body should be prepared to do some digging, or to protect himself from a sudden rush of lava.