Near Sh'maari

Most of the inland regions of Samaria are known for being incredibly dry. Thanks to the Vursan Mountains to the east, the area is dominated by deserts created by its tall rain shadow which blocks the tropical rains coming from the east. Two of those regions stand out from the rest. The first one being the The White wastes to the north; A great expanse of salt flats filling what was once the bottom of a large and shallow interior sea that has now shruck down considerably, leaving only a large salty lake in the middle called the The Dying Sea.

Geography and Climate

South of the Dying Sea and the White waste lies the Red hills, which are a group of high and jagged red coloured hills known for nesting Samarian Occomor. South of those, is the the infamous region known as Near Sh'maari. This desert is large: At least twice as large as the Darnian Desert in Enask. It is also connected to the immense Great Shma'ar desert, which is a vast expance of land, thousands of kilometres across, located in southern Mahador where rain has never once fallen. While the Near Sh'maari region isnt as dry, it is still incredibly rare to see rain fall on the region.
The Vursan mountains, which are tall and strong in the north, near the White Waste, begin to lose their height the further south the stretch until at some point, even the highest peaks of the mountain range are swallowed up by the sea of sand, which allows for both deserts to be more connected geographycaly. Near Sh'maari is even sometimes considered a simple extention of the Great Sh'maari desert. However, the desert isn't just covered in sand, but also of river carved canyons and plateaus. While the water that carved them may be long gone, the rocks are still there and exposed. One particular type of rock. Kartstone, is extremely common here, especialy in the north and west of the region
The region is mainy located on and just south of the Equator, which makes the sun extremely powerful and the day temperatures deadly. This, combined with the very severe lack of any water, either falling from the sky as rain, or coming up the surface via an oasis, means that the environment here is very hostile to life. Nonetheless, some animal species still call this place home.

Fauna and Flora

Amongst the species that call the desert that is the Near Sh'maari their home is the aformentioned Samarian Occomor, which lives in the red hills to the north, but also a species of spiders called Craxin Spiders, which are the largest known spiders in Hysal, aswell as large venomous snake that travel through the sand. Some sparce flora also lives in the region, including the mysterious Bloodspine as well as some scatered Sora Cactus Plant.

Human Settlements

On the south-western coast of Samaria, multiple small colonies were established by the Karthian empire during the first age. Most of them were abandoned during the Long Winter and never reinhabitated. However, the greatest of these colony cities became the exception. The City of Khadyrah has became the largest settlement in mainland Samaria and the second largest in the continent after the city of Khart, situated on the island of Iskhaloala. It is a great port city, which exports the rare resources of the desert, with the most sougth after being Karthstone. This has made the city quite rich.
Thousands of kilometres away, in the middle of the desert lies the biggest abandoned city in the world, Asghoraan. This city was discovered during the first age by Khartian explorers, seeking to explore the interior of the continent. When it was discovered, the city was already long abandoned, with its impresive monuments and palaces all half burried in large sand dunes, with no signs of life except for Graxin spiders, who had made the dark and cool interiors of the buildings their new favorite home. The origins of the city are disputed, with the Darnians claiming that their ancestors built it before the First Age, but had to move away as the region desertified. Some Scholars claim that the city was built by a culture which dont exist anymore.