Rumblecusp

The isle of Rumblecusp is a beautiful paradise of sparse trees and white sands, topped by the single mountain that gives the island its name. Only a few dozen indigenous folk call the island home. The shallow shores of the island often fall beneath the sea during high tides, and a small trail of smoke frequently rises from the volcano. Be that as it may, the waters surrounding the island make for fine fishing, and it’s not uncommon for fishing vessels from Nicodranas  to travel to Rumblecusp during unfavorable fishing seasons.

Society

The Explorer's Guide to Wildemount states that only a few dozen people inhabit the island, and Pono estimated there were close to seventy when the Mighty Nein arrived there. However, Vilya stated later there were close to 120. The island has been populated for ten to eleven generations.

Geography

Dominated by the volcano that gives it its name, the island's shallow white sand beaches and rare trees create a tropical paradise. At a distance, it is dominated by a wild mountain range, with thin switchbacked ridges giving it the odd appearance of an opening flower. In its center rises a massive mountain with a lazy trail of smoke drifting from its peak. The majority of the island is dense, lush jungle, surrounded by a faint ring of white sand beaches against rocky cliffs. The jungle is so dense that it seems to rise and roil with the landscape, rising up over mountain ridges. Some of the trees push up and cause strange tower-like structures that grow much larger than all the others surrounding them. The volcano itself comes to a point, with no caldera visible. There is a bit of an orange glow from a faint magma trickle near the zenith of the mountain, and a fissure from which the smoke emerges.

From the southeastern inlet, a faint mist lies over a large portion of the outer jungle, giving the island an almost dream-like quality. Beneath the water are sandbanks that wind out beyond the beach, looking like white tendrils beneath the ocean. Rising above the mist, the trees are extremely tall, a hundred or more feet up with thick trunks. A little further in, on the path toward the base of the massive central volcano of Rumblecusp, is a clearing holding a small village.

Viridian, one of the leaders of the village, described the island as the central focus of the world, home to many strange slivers of different parts of the world that create the land mass. Beneath the trees are odd landmarks that shelter dangerous beasts that might be a surprise to find on the ocean, a number of unnatural dangerous denizens. To cross the island, moving carefully, she estimated would take a few days, and about eight hours to reach the base of the volcano from the village

Notable Locations

Vo Village

The village, known as Vo, consists of about two dozen or more structures built across the ground and into the tree canopies themselves. There are networks of ropes and other long pulleys and cords that are bound between trees at a distance, and there are buildings held aloft about fifty or sixty feet off the ground, with bridges connecting them. Elements of it appear to be built of driftwood, or carved from local trees, or from pieces of ships that have been scavenged. The villagers wear tattered clothing, leathers, skins, hide, rusted chain, and nothing else. There are no accessories; it is bare-bones basic attire. There is no decor bringing it beyond anything functional.

There are heavy ropes tied to the higher trunks and branches, a massive tangle of treehouses built of makeshift scavenged materials, ship parts, local lumber, and intricately woven and grown vines and dried vegetation. A third of the buildings are built up above at different levels connected by bridges. Most of the structures are supported by thick, healthy green vines, braided, entwined, and tended to hold and wrap them as it the jungle itself had risen to support and help hold the village together, structure to structure. The buildings are diverse in styles, materials, and apparent age.

A central massive tree marks the middle point of the village, lush and perhaps 200-feet tall, with numerous levels of branches. In each of these branches, the vines have grown out to clutch another small homestead almost like a hand, and all of them have connected vine bridges. It resembles a high elven establishment mixed with nature, deliberate and balanced with the natural world around it.

The Winding Core

The Winding Core runs from the northwestern side of the island underneath the mountain and then comes out on the southeastern side, which is where most of the villagers' mining is done. It is the location from which they mine beautiful gems, diamonds, and "various gifts from the land that we can refine". The Winding Core is also an entrance to the Underdark.

The Shaded Tangle

The Shaded Tangle lies along the path towards the entrance to Vokodo’s lair within the mountain itself, a cold place where color seems to be muted, where the mists grow cold. There is no sound of any birds or insects, and the temperature drop and loss of color feels supernatural, as opposed to just a barren location. This is probably caused by an opening to the Shadowfell, causing the plane to bleed into the area and bringing new wildlife and creatures on the island.

The Ruin

The Ruin lies far to the north on the island in the middle of an area of gray, rock-filled emptiness that once held jungle that has now rotted and then petrified. A heavy fog shrouds the entire region. There are a number of broken buildings like a small village. Some structures are mostly intact, but some are bare bones exterior, the corners and the bare remnants of where they once stood. In the center is a singular large obelisk-like spire that is a sheared off portion of a tower.

The buildings of the Ruins resemble those in the Ghostlands on the outskirts of Rosohna. Sheets of ice form on their edges and the temperature becomes quite cold. The creatures within the ruins whispered of Oracs, suggesting that the ruins are a shard of the Blightshore city of Ghor Veles where Oracs lived.

Swarms of mosquitoes and groups of undead tree-like creatures roam the location. A large ghastly creature, as well as a group of spectral figures, occupy sarcophagi within the spire. The bodies were buried with ornamental armor, weaponry, and trinkets, and infernal script is detailed across the building and sarcophagi. The spectral creatures also spoke infernal.

Heaven Falls

Lying to the northeast, the Heaven Falls are forbidden to the villagers by Vokodo and are a mystery to the Vo people. They protect the ocean entrance to the interior of Vokodo’s lair with a waterfall that falls about 150 feet toward the sky before curling into the mountain itself. It arises from a rift to the Elemental Plane of Water from an opening at the bottom of the lagoon, before it breaks upon the cliff face, separating into small rapids, rivers and waterfalls that spill into multiple pools.

Behind the waterfall, there is a tunnel in the cliff face hidden by an illusion. The tunnel leads to a large cavern filled with multiple ships. According to Viridian, when travelers decide to stay on the island, they are instructed to leave their vessels there. Beneath the water in this cave is another entrance to Vokodo's lair, similar to the one on the other side of the island. 

Vokodo's Lair

Vokodo's underwater lair lies deep under the volcano, reachable by only a few hidden and guarded passageways. The entrance normally used by Viridian runs through an area of poisonous gas before reaching a pool filled with breathable water. Beneath the pool is a tunnel lined with dangerous torchblooms from the Elemental Plane of Fire that leads downward to a gargantuan (at least a hundred feet across) underwater chamber of rough black glassy volcanic rock broken by heavy patches of torchblooms giving off pockets of light, in which Vokodo lurks. Some of the rock walls glow faintly orange with heat from the proximity of the volcanic activity. The torchblooms lining the tunnels can close them off when visitors are within the chamber.

Whenever someone wanders too close to an entrance to the lair, there is a chance that they will become inexplicably drawn to the center chamber where Vokodo resides and know the exact way to get there.

Type
Island
Location
Menagerie Coast