Ashrain
Ashrain is the name given to the former planet Earth, remade by the arrival of the celestial visitors known as the Ash Gods in a worldwide series of disasters known as the Great Cataclysm. Unrecognizable to the world of human habitation and dominion, it is a Venus-like wasteland of rock, fire, and magma, nearly entirely blanketed in a great cloud of black ash and smoke that encircles the entire planet. From this choked atmosphere, ash falls like black snow virtually nonstop, day and night, lendingthe newborn planet its haunting name.
Geography
The terrain of of Ashrain is inhospitable, forbidding, and dangerous. Where once there were rolling hills, open prairies, plains, and forests, there are now empty deserts and enormous dunes. But these deserts and dunes are not formed from sand. Rather, they form from the ash that falls day and night from the immense ash cloud that blankets the entire world in soot and smoke, remnant of the Great Cataclysm and the continued volcanism that resulted from the arrival of the Ash Gods.
Physical Terrain
The landscape of Ashrain is dominated by ash, soot, and pyroclastic flows. The predominant feature is the broad, open, empty deserts of ash, hundreds of miles square. These flat, empty wastelands formed from the gradual accumulation of fallen ash over the course of nearly a decade and a half, burying the former terrain of Earth beneath a new geologic layer. Throughout this ash desert, great mounds and piles of ash have compressed and formed into unstable, mountainous formations. Imperfections in this compressed material leads to frequent, unpredictable avalanches many square miles in breadth, avalanches that roar across the flat landscape unhindered and bury anything in their path. More common than these are the dunes: great, long formations that can be many miles in length, blown up into crests hundreds of feet tall by the relentless winds. Winds that also stir the ash into immense storms and whirlwinds that sweep across the landscape. In many places, volcanic activity is still active across Ashrain, triggered by the Ash Gods during the Great Cataclysm and continually thereafter by their colossal Constructs. In the vicinity of these cracks in the lithosphere, magma wells up and erupts as lava, creating vast lava flows. When this lava mingles with the ash and soot, it generates liquified, superheated ash that rushes across the landscape in deadly, pyroclastic flows. Lava also pools beneath the ash, heating it from below and destabilizing it. These regions frequently form pools of superheated, liquified ash that in many places can be large enough to be considered lakes. In many places, giant craters formed from bombardment by volcanic materials raining down from initial and continued eruptions. Not yet filled in by the ever-raining ash, these pockmarks, like mountains or dunes, are often the only features in the blank, flat landscape. Terrestrial lakes, streams, and rivers that once flowed with water have been choked by a decade and a half of falling ash, turning them into fetid swamps. What water remains is toxic and highly acidic, a result of the dissolved ash. Entirely blanketed by the ash cover, water is often the site of weak points in the ash bed, which can be highly dangerous to travelers. Walking carelessly across a buried lake can result in falling through the loose ash and becoming trapped in the viscous, ash-choked water beneath. Even the oceans are blanketed in the ash cover, which dissolves more and more into the salt-water and results in global chemical imbalances.Atmospheric Conditions
The most omnipresent feature of Ashrain is the perpetual ash snow that falls from the global ash cloud that blankets the planet. Day and night, the ash falls as a fine, grey powder, often thick enough to obscure vision and make breathing difficult. The thick ash cloud also traps heat on the surface of the planet, making the average surface temperature across the globe up to seventy degrees. Temperatures in equatorial climates can consistently reach ninety to one hundred degrees Farenheit, creating a stifling environment. The ground itself is typically hot to the touch, warmed by the burning atmosphere and the frequent lava flows beneath the surface. Widespread fires are still common, igniting from flammable gases released from pockets beneath the ash and spreading in raging wildfires until the fuel is consumed. These gases also make the atmosphere borderline toxic in most places, and full on lethal in many. Technically, the majority of Ashrain remains a Class-M breathable atmosphere thanks to the great volume of oxygen already contained in the atmosphere, leftover from the plant life that once covered the green planet Earth. However, the immense amounts of carbon dioxide and other noxious gasses released by a decade of volcanic activity have overwhelmed that stock, reducing the available oxygen of the atmosphere from around a one thousand year volume to a few hundred. And without a renewable source to replenish the oxygen, the atmosphere of the future does not have a high chance of being breathable.
Alternative Name(s)
Earth
Type
Planet
Included Locations
Inhabiting Species
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