The Plane of Fire

The hostile realm of the Plane of Fire has traditionally been renowned throughout the cosmos for being one of the most difficult planes of existence for living beings to visit. With the ongoing march of technological advancement, however, the Plane of Fire has become more open to visitors. The simple environmental protections afforded by most technological armor are sufficient to allow most living creatures to cope in the plane’s more metropolitan areas, and even venture into the harsher vistas beyond. Past the settled regions of the Plane of Fire, however, expanses of lava seas, volcanic plains, and even open skies so hot they match the intense temperatures of stars stretch out endlessly in all directions.
While efreet claim much of the Plane of Fire’s territory, enclaves, holdouts, and even a few minor empires within the immeasurable expanse of the Eternal Furnace operate independently. In addition, the Plane of Fire holds the domains of several deities, including the elemental lord Ymeri, Queen of the Inferno, and the mysterious demigoddess Feronia, the Fertile Flame.
For those willing to brave the dangers both physical and political, the Plane of Fire can be a realm of dazzling beauty and untold treasures.
PLANAR TRAITS The Plane of Fire has certain properties that remain consistent across it and distinguish it from other planes.
NORMAL GRAVITY AND TIME Essentially an endless expanse defined by its blazing nature, the Plane of Fire and its constituent regions exert their own localized gravitational pull on creatures within them, just like on the Material Plane. Time within the Plane of Fire passes at the same rate as time on the Material Plane.
IMMEASURABLE Like the Material Plane, the Plane of Fire remains an immeasurable domain, expanding out in every direction. While maps exist of major regions within the plane, there’s always more to find, and many planar explorers have gone mad attempting to chart the realm’s entirety.
MILDLY NEUTRAL-ALIGNED While the Plane of Fire has a slight metaphysical alignment with neutrality, creatures of any alignment can exist within it without taking any penalties.
ENHANCED AND IMPEDED MAGIC Spells with the fire descriptor are greatly enhanced on the Plane of Fire.
FIRE-DOMINANT The atmosphere of the Plane of Fire functions as extreme heat, and unprotected flammable materials catch fire almost immediately, including unprotected flammable clothing worn by individuals.
Some areas on the Plane of Fire have been made hospitable using special technological devices, magical effects, or wishcraft. These areas prevent a creature from catching fire, though the creature must still generally activate their armor’s environmental protections or otherwise take precautions to endure the high temperatures.

History

DENIZENS While a wide variety of different species live on the Plane of Fire, some denizens are more prominent. The following are just a few examples of those species who call the Inferno their home.
AZERS For recorded history, azers have been one of the Plane of Fire’s most populous species. Sturdy and similar in build to dwarves, these people have a long and tragic history of toiling within fortresses and settlements across the plane. In ages past, the efreet managed to subjugate most of the azer populace, forcing those hardworking people to labor for the advancement of the efreeti agenda. Many azers believe that status quo was interrupted during the Gap, when the azers banded together to form vast unions across efreeti holdings, signing strict devil-enforced work contracts with their former masters that remain in force today. While the majority of azers within efreeti settlements are still looked down up, they remain proud of their heritage, and work for corporations such as the notorious Excoriation Combine or Obsidian Spike Industries for fair wages.
EFREET Still the most powerful force within the Plane of Fire, the fire genies known as efreet oversee numerous nation-states and small empires within the Inferno. Most efreet dwell within the luxury of their notable settlements, with the most influential maintaining villas within the legendary City of Brass. Those seeking to advance within the genies’ complex hierarchy often serve military terms aboard impressive starships commissioned by efreeti nations. The most powerful and well-respected of these empires is the Dominion of Flame, a political entity to which all other efreeti nations and warlords pay at least some tribute. Traditionally assured of their rightful dominance of the plane, the efreet saw this confidence sorely tested in the years following the Gap, when they contended not only with a loss of memory, but with the stirrings of revolution from their azer and mephit servants. The efreet have only recently managed to form a semblance of stability within the Everlasting Flame. Many believe the stability is the direct result of keen maneuvering by the current council that leads the Dominion of Flame, who opened major efreeti settlements—including the City of Brass—to extraplanar travelers, along with granting unprecedentedly lenient trade deals.
FIRE ELEMENTALS Few fire elementals care for the opinions of outsiders, as they tend to act more as forces of nature than as part of any society within the Plane of Fire. Despite this, many visitors to the Plane of Fire seek to entreat with the roiling masses of living flame. Whether by magical force or skillful coaxing, visitors sometimes manage to secure elementals’ services as enforcers and agents of combustion on their planes of origins—though failure in such dealings can be decidedly uncomfortable.
FIRE MEPHITS Fire mephits fill a variety of niches within the Plane of Fire’s most complex societies. While they have settlements and nations of their own, many mephits find personal satisfaction in offering their services to greater powers and extraplanar visitors. Mephits maintain a culture that is distinctly their own, yet enjoy learning about those of others—both to adopt choice innovations for themselves and to mercilessly mock other races. To accomplish this, mephits often take on tasks beneath the more powerful efreet. Many corporations within the Inferno employ legions of mephits to handle tasks like delivering messages, accounting, or personnel management. Those mephits who excel in such positions often move into more prestigious roles, such as consultants for larger concerns.
IFRITS The recent opening of the Plane of Fire to more extraplanar visitors has somewhat eased the previous intolerance shown towards the realm’s plane-touched offspring—ifrits. These impulsive humanoids have come to serve as a bridge between the Material Plane and the Plane of Fire, able to move easily between both planes of existence, though sometimes without feeling they truly belong in either. Many efreeti nobles have come to retain the services of skilled ifrit intermediaries to act on their behalf on the Material Plane, while many Material Plane-based corporations do likewise on the Plane of Fire.
MAGMINS Once a people who distrusted strangers to the point of initiating vicious massacres to protect their homes, magmins have adapted well to the recent influx of extraplanar trade. These small creatures have opened businesses throughout the Eternal Furnace’s many lakes and pools of lava and magma. Often marketing these holdings as exotic spas, magmins cater to less combat-inclined extraplanar visitors. By maintaining this simple business model, magmins have kept their true homelands safe from the interest of both foreign powers and native forces such as the efreet. Unlike mephits, who’ve given up much of their territory and rights, magmins fiercely maintain their ancestral culture and work to protect their most sacred sites and homes from exploitation by offering up a small fraction of their territories to outside scrutiny. When not protecting their homes, magmins tend to exhibit a surprisingly roguish nature.
SALAMANDERS These serpentine creatures once hailed exclusively from the Plane of Fire, but underwent a desperate exodus when persecuted by the ever-expanding efreeti empire; many ended up surviving on the Material Plane or finding succor with the demon lord Flauros on the Abyss. With the recent civil unrest within the Everlasting Flame caused by the chaos of the Gap, salamanders have returned to their home plane in ever-increasing numbers. Salamanders now occupy the fringes of the Inferno in independent settlements, or within the more settled regions of the Plane of Fire as advisors, artisans, or specialists working for other planar interests.

Tourism

With the abundance of technology now available to the people of the Material Plane, hazardous planes like the Plane of Fire have undergone a renaissance of foreign exploration.
AURORIC PALACE The Auroric Palace is home to the elemental lord Ymeri, Queen of the Inferno, who some say is the most powerful entity on the Plane of Fire. This sprawling stronghold, constructed from crystallized flames that still shimmer despite their solidity, sits on a wide swath of crystal, metal, and stone that is constantly being incinerated by the structure’s heat. Consequently, a perpetual haze of vaporized metal and colorful plumes of steam surround the palace. Some believe the changing hues in these clouds reflect Ymeri’s current mood, but the Queen of the Inferno is quick to point to the columns of smoke as proof that the element of fire will always triumph over the element of earth, despite the fact that the two planes haven’t engaged in open warfare for several centuries now. Ymeri entertains supplicants—those that can withstand the fire—in her palace, but some factions believe she is growing increasingly irrelevant as technology brings the inhabitants of all the planes closer together.
CHORTLING SPRINGS OF A HUNDRED WONDERS Perhaps the most famous of all the magmin-operated resorts on the Plane of Fire, the Chortling Springs are the closest thing to a sacred site that magmins allow outsiders to view. Since the springs themselves are almost a mile from the resort, they enjoy none of the hybrid technology that makes the resort complex hospitable to non-natives. Many visitors purchase or rent sets of personal armor so they can make the journey to the springs, while the most affluent purchase powerful magical enhancements that allow them to bathe in the supposedly rejuvenating boiling-hot mercury of the magmin springs. Baiurk (N male magmin) administers the resort, and while he does view the springs as a place of importance to his people, he understands that the springs aren’t the real attraction of his resort. Instead, countless corporations and organizations arrange discreet meetings at the remote resort site, hoping to handle private matters away from the prying eyes of others. For a reasonable amount of credits, Baiurk ensures that corporate representatives and visiting dignitaries enjoy unparalleled anti-divination and anti-technological warding.
CITY OF BRASS The City of Brass is the capital of the efreeti empire known as the Dominion of Flame, and the metropolis is generally regarded as the cultural center of the Plane of Fire. Prior to the events of the Gap, the city existed as the only major hub of extraplanar trade within the Everlasting Furnace, though the efreet have had to expand this policy to restore their former glory in the wake of several civil revolts and other Gap-related upheaval. Today, though the City of Brass is no longer the only trade hub for outsiders visiting the Plane of Fire, it remains the most prominent, and the city boasts an inordinate number of foreign visitors.
Grand Sultana Ayasellah Mihelar Khalidlah VI (LE female efreeti soldier), Vengeance of the Flame and Khan of Magma, is the City of Brass’s undisputed ruler and an esteemed member of the Dominion of Flame’s ruling council. She came to power in the years following the Gap, executing swift and decisive policies to ensure the efreet’s continued dominance in the new order, as well as ensuring the Plane of Fire’s overall preparedness against foreign aggressors. While some efreet scoffed at the sultana’s policy of granting azers and mephits more freedoms (including sanctioned unionization), many more recognize that without her actions, the resulting chaos would have dangerously weakened the efreet’s hold on the Plane of Fire, making them susceptible to outside conquerors. Only a few centuries after the Gap, efreet maintain most of their former holdings and stand poised to expand with a rejuvenated military
Visitors to the City of Brass often find it exhibits a strange and growing dichotomy. Free trade markets exist throughout most of the city, with outsiders from all planes of existence trading wares or making business deals, yet phalanxes of Dominion of Flame soldiers ensure that the city’s martial might is constantly on display, reminding residents that while the Sultana may be more welcoming than her predecessors, the efreet stand ready to maintain their authority at all costs.
CITY OF BRASS LE metropolis Population 9,000,000 (35% efreet, 15% salamanders, 15% mephits, 10% azers, 5% fire giants, 5% fire elementals, 15% other) Government overlord (Grand Sultana Ayasellah Mihelar Khalidlah VI) Qualities cultured, financial center, notorious, planar metropolis, technologically advanced Maximum Item Level 20th QUALITIES Planar Metropolis A planar metropolis is a destination in the Great Beyond; one can expect to meet creatures from across the cosmos in settlements with this quality.
CRADLE OF FLAMES The divine realm of the enigmatic Feronia, the Cradle of Flames is a dais of polished obsidian floating above a column of fire. The platform acts like an oasis, free from the plane’s flames and featuring a wide variety of exotic flora and fauna not found anywhere else in the multiverse. Red-leafed bushes with bright orange blooms provide shade for small rabbitlike creatures with burning tails, while birds with wings of flame wheel around rocky tors. The site is protected by a coterie of powerful sentinels, including a quartet of phoenixes and Feronia’s most powerful minion: the Guardian Blaze, an enormous creature with six wings and talons of molten obsidian. Since the Gap, Feronia has become even more reclusive, and many believe she’s undergoing a period of deep meditation atop her home. The phoenix guardians viciously attack any who try to directly visit the demigoddess. Those few survivors of such excursions have reported the absence of many of her servants, and Feronia’s faithful believes that her minions search the Inferno far and wide for a means of reviving their deity from her torpor.
EMBEREN RECESS Once the site of an empire led by magma dragons, this volcanic region has since changed to become a melting pot of numerous native species and extraplanar visitors. During the chaos that followed the Gap, many of the leading magma dragons fled across the molten rock seas that surrounded the region, leaving the area in the care of a handful of their kind and their former servitors. Instead of the anarchy and infighting that many assumed would consume the region, the Emberen Recess is now one of the most industrious locales within the Everlasting Furnace. A half-dozen corporate interests, including the Excoriation Combine and the Flames of Unity dragoncorp, own and lease spaces throughout the region. The most prestigious of these territories are the vast starship dry docks built upon the ancient sites of magma dragon fortresses. Rising up to ridiculous heights, the docks of the Emberen Recess allow for the construction of the largest starships within the Plane of Fire, and the resident corporations often vie for contracts with prestigious Material Plane enterprises and the Dominion of Flame.
FAHYIE NHIJAD Resting between the walls of lava-filled canyons, the inverted cities of Fahyie Nhijad once belonged to a powerful efreet warlord who seceded from the Dominion of Flame and carved out a personal empire under the Plane of Fire’s terrestrial surface. In the aftermath of the Gap, explorers and traders who frequented Fahyie Nhijad found the subterranean cities exposed by great fissures turned into canyons, and the displaced structures devoid of life. Restless ghosts, frenzied fire elementals, and even cursed ghuls roam the fractured streets of these exposed cities. Efreeti nobles and leaders from other species—especially azers and mephits—routinely hire adventurers and mercenaries to scour the ruins of these destroyed cities in hopes of uncovering the cause of Fahyie Nhijad’s ruination, as whatever caused such overwhelming destruction could easily tip the balance of power within the plane.
INFERNO’S BLISS Both fire and magma elementals partake in unnerving facsimiles of common Material Plane lives within this strange settlement. Taking on humanoid forms, these elementals oddly replicate roles of townsfolk from the earlier ages of various terrestrial worlds, especially lost Golarion. They’ve acquired countless riches and unique magical treasures in their time, and willingly trade with outsiders in exchange for other magical artifacts, though they have no interest in technological items, which they view as useless to their existence. Visitors to Inferno’s Bliss should keep in mind one important fact: the elemental inhabitants of this place devoutly worship Ymeri, and any mention of her counterpart, the good elemental lord Atreia, the Lambent Prince, is met with irrational rage that often turns to violence.
OPULENT PALACE OF SHUQU THE RADIANT An attack on the senses floating lazily above the Inferno’s landscape, this flying fortress is bedecked in brass, gemstones, and tapestries that refuse to combust. Owned by Shuqu the Radiant (CE agender efreeti mystic), this fortress travels the breadth of the Plane of Fire, stopping at seemingly random intervals to disgorge visitors and take in new would-be guests. The interior of the palace caters to the whims—noble and debased alike—of all its occupants. In a horrific twisting of wishcrafting, Shuqu employs a host of genies (including several non-efreet) to routinely grant the wishes of their guests. Many guests enter the palace coaxed by the genie’s offers, seeking their every wish granted or to escape the banality of their current existence. Those who partake in Shuqu’s gifts, however, slowly see their desires perverted and twisted, their wishes becoming living nightmares and the palace a site of endless horror. Beings who come to this realization in time may escape the Opulent Palace as shells of their former selves, yet Shuqu, fueled by their insatiable need to play host, always quickly replaces those despondent beings who depart with new wide-eyed guests.
THE PRISMATIC PITS Named after the visibly vibrant sulfurous fumes that spill forth from its various dig sites, the Prismatic Pits are one of the few stable mining sites on the Plane of Fire. Bordering the Plane of Earth, this area is a site of frequent battle between the elementals of both planes, though these conflicts most often take place near the periphery of the actual mines. Supervisor Nerenu (LN female azer mechanic) oversees the largest dig sites within the pits, whose harvested materials travel to the shipyards of the Emberen Recess and trade stalls of the City of Brass in equal measure. Nerenu routinely hires adventurers of all types to clear compromised mine shafts of rampant elementals and delusional mining crews. In recent years, a growing malady known as the “prism plague” has taken root among several of the workers, with the afflicted believing they see the truth of the cosmos within the shifting colors. Whether this is a previously unknown side effect of the prismatic fumes spewing from the pits, or the tampering of an alien presence such as a colour out of space, is something that Nerenu is willing to pay handsomely to find out.
SLAGHEAP TESTING GROUNDS Part interplanar dumping ground and part corporate office, Slagheap is a mishmash of discarded trash and unnecessary melted metals. Far beyond the influence of the Dominion of Flame and other efreeti interests, the region is owned and operated by Burning Edge R&D, a salamander-run research and testing organization. Profiting off the discards of other organizations, Burning Edge R&D turns the trash into targets against which they test their latest technological innovations, especially firearms. The salamanders boast vast junkyards specifically purposed for the testing of starshipcaliber weaponry, and maintain many lucrative deals with corporations like the Excoriation Combine.
SAKALAYO PEAK The largest and most active volcano in the Plane of Fire’s monumental Afoapi Range, this peak was once considered a prestigious tourist attraction for efreet and other planar natives. It is believed to be the original source of the Plane of Fire in an ancient eruption, and visitors would bathe in the caldera to experience this primal fire. In recent decades, however, an ambitious noble efreeti known as the Malikah has claimed the volcano as her own, evicting residents from the mountainside estates unless they swear fealty to her. This seizure is unsanctioned by the Dominion of Flame, and whispers abound that the Malikah has further plans of conquest that might even reach into the Material Plane.

Type

Dimensional plane