Beastlands

• The Beastlands, also known as the Happy Hunting Grounds or the Wilderness of the Beastlands, is the home of primal natures, sentient beasts, and vibrant ecosystems.
• This plane is occupied largely by beasts, and only the non-magical beasts, and there are very few settlements, as those who live here would rather live with nature than against it. Lush forests of all types cover this plane and its three layers, from giant sequoia forests to snow-laden alpine woodlands to deserts full of cacti and other fauna.
• The Beastlands is broken down into three layers each highlighting a specific time of day, and it never changes on those layers. 
• On the first layer, Krigala, it is always noon and the sun is always shining high overhead. The sun glares down in the savannahs and deserts, though in other locations the sun is barely able to penetrate the thick jungle foliage. 
• On the second layer, Brux, it is in a constant perpetual twilight with the sun rising over the horizon, though the more pessimistic might describe it as in the middle of a sunset. This ruddy glow illuminates the land, and the creatures who hunt during these hours, like bats and foxes, can be found throughout this layer in a variety of environments. 
• The third layer, Karasuthra, is in the constant night with the moon hanging high in the sky and giving off the only source of light. This layer is filled with the nocturnal predators that hunt through the forests, and this is considered the most dangerous of all three layers.

Geography

The atmosphere of the Beastlands is greatly dependent on where you are on the plane, and which layer. The top layer, Krigala, is always in the noon sun with verdant forests, hot savannahs, and blisteringly cold alpine slopes. The beasts that inhabit these areas are always noonday hunters, hunting in the bright light and rejoicing in the perfect beauty. The second layer, Brux, is in the ever-constant twilight of a rising, or setting, sun with its opposite, the moon rising up on the other side of this layer. The beasts that inhabit this layer hunt during the hours of early morning or late evening - wolves, tigers, bears, and others can be found throughout its trees. The bottom layer, Karasuthra, is the pitch black of night with only the moon giving off any light. These are the dark hunters who stalk through the night and is the fiercest of the layers of the Beastlands for only the mightiest hunters stalk through the darkened forests. Because the sun never changes position in any of these planes, it can be difficult to tell time, though time still passes like normal on every layer of this plane. Most track the progress of a day by the rain showers that move through the plane like clockwork. Once a day rain sweeps across the plane, though it is a light rain that is refreshing and encourages the vibrant growth of life.

History

An Outsider’s Perspective:

• Most visitors to the Beastlands are often those seeking the magnificent beauty and views of this plane or they are game hunters looking for the greatest hunt of their life. The Beastlands can be seen as a paradise for those attuned to nature and it awakens something primal in those who visit the plane.
• This plane creates a hunger to eat, a yearning to hunt and to become more bestial in nature. This hunger is not a painful hunger, but rather a singular focus to fulfill the needs of hunting and to take part in eating a meal you hunted for. Though, visitors should be very careful because the beasts you hunt in the Beastlands may appear to be like the typical beasts in the Material Plane, but these beasts are cunning and intelligent. They can speak and form plans among other members of their packs, and they often end up becoming the hunter instead of the hunted.
• Visitors who bring animal companions, mounts, or other beasts should expect to never see them again. As soon as a beast arrives on the Beastlands, they immediately take off, their leashes and other trappings magically falling off of them. Their primal urges overcome any training they had had and they begin their hunts throughout the plane. The most well-trained or magically bonded beasts will find their companions when they leave the Beastlands, but not before.

A Native’s Perspective:

• The inhabitants of the Beastlands are spread far throughout the plane based on their own personal preferences. Of the few settlements, most are made from roughly hewn logs and look more like temporary fortifications instead of permanent settlements. Those who reside in the Beastlands are mostly the sentient beasts themselves, along with hunters, wardens, the Verdant Guild, and the Faction of One, who are also known as the Signers.
• Living in the Beastlands is about immersing yourself in primal instincts, in glorying in the hunt - whether you are the hunter or the hunted, and taking on bestial traits. The sentient beasts all have the ability to talk, and some can even cast spells though they will only do so in extreme danger. The sentient beasts are the petitioners, the souls of those who died and in their afterlife were carried to the Beastlands based off of how they lived. This privilege is reserved for the great hunters, the druids and rangers, and any who gloried in bestial quality of nature. The talking beasts are all these souls from the lowly grasshoppers who hop from one tree to another in the top layer of Krigala, to the mighty jaguars who hunt through the night shrouded forests of the bottom layer, Karasuthra.
• Many of the inhabitants don’t take kindly to outsiders poaching through their forests, not because they dislike hunting but because those poachers are only doing so to gain a trophy, and most are often disrespectful to the hunt and its practices. The wardens, and the Verdant Guild, protect this plane from those visitors, often hunting the poachers and scaring them off from the forests. Their goal is to not kill them, but to strike the fear of the hunt into them and to scare them off.

Type

Valley