Divine Spots of Interest

The following are ideas for a few locations where divinities have a stronger presence than elsewhere.

Whioma: The research island used by the divinity in residence. Part home, part laboratory, part natural stronghold, all are hidden away under the guise of an attractive tourist den. Home to a living divinity, though no inhabitants are aware of that fact.

Atagata Isle: The horrors of the island are more than mere fairytale. The local Alvanians steer clear of the shore and pay respect to the horrors that lurk there save for the foolhardy and presumptuous. The tale of the child eating his father is a terrible one, but the truth that lies beneath its surface is much more sinister. The island is home to a resident divinity, either mad or unfathomable in its mind, that embodies the spirit of hunger. It is a parasitic entity and will converge onto a creature that bears enough congruence, imparting its madness and cruel hunger onto the subject. When such a melding occurs, the entire island becomes infected with a twisted hunger of its own, and the flora and fauna have grown to reflect that, with larger mouths and teeth, carnivorous herbivores, and other nightmarish creatures. Some strigoi have postulated that this is their ancestral origin point, and that this being of hunger might be the first true strigoi, or that it was a failed strigoi who went mad, and even of a strigoi that had their core shattered but failed to pass on and was stuck between death and life forever. The Pantheon is also limited to Atagata Isle, though they exist slightly out of phase with this world. An adventurer willing to brave the cannibalistic rumors of Atagata Isle would be subject to the unusual phasing effects that The Pantheon radiates. This phasing effectively creates two islands, one inhabited by The Pantheon and the other by the divine beast.

Qala di Ciel: The island in the sky is as isolationist as one can get, though not by the design of its current inhabitants. This and the bizarre nature of its existence has led to a certain divinity taking up residence on the island, though whether the people recognize them as such is unknown. Alone in peace and contemplation, detached from the world’s troubles, the divinity is free to cast its gaze down onto the continent as if watching the largest of plays unfold before its eyes. It is uncertain what it would take for them to be spurred into action, or what their motivations are.

The Hanging Gardens: In the Beteje Forest, there lies a secluded refuge that none but the most lucky know of, called the Hanging Gardens. It is a place of tranquil calm and beauteous nature, where a divinity has decided to take up semi-permanent residence. The being appears like an ancient primordial, but is not of this world. The divinity is the last of its kind, a remnant of a long lost civilisation from a star far away, but has found a charm to life on earth and lets nature make for its own strange epitaph. The divinity has been known to leave for several decades at a time, and while the hanging gardens become overgrown in its absence, it never appears to be untended or forgotten, as if each placement from every twisting vine is intentional in its way. This is also one of the few locations where sprii reside in abundance, drawn to the wellspring of congruence that the divinity imparts into the land, and the divinity has been known to treat them as beloved pets.

The Blighted Lands A land void of anything that one could consider ‘life’. There is an entity raptly focusing on the blighted lands, excited for its expansion into anarchy, decay, and a universe without congruence. As this is part of a monumental scheme, several divinities are watching from the sides, trying their best to stymie the spread.

Anock Hunting Grounds: In the plains of Anock there roam several bands of Arak. On special nights when the stars fall across the sky, one secluded location of hallowed ground the size of a building will glow with a strange teal light where one of the stars will land, serving as the chariot to bring a certain divinity down. One of the other falling stars will fall on another location within Anock, and the Arak therein will begin a type of ritualistic quest (or hunt depending on what the star lands near), to bring the object back to the divinity. Those that succeed are rewarded with strange power, a possible well-intentioned scritching about the head and ears, and/or a position as the divinity’s pet.

The Sea Spine: What seems to be a mountain range growing out of the sea near Garshalla is actually an immense sword. A divinity before the current Epoch waged a battle just above the atmosphere of the planet, and the sword fell to Earth as a result, completely restructuring the continent below. Now the inhabitants of Aropria know to avoid this strangely straight mountain run jutting from the ocean, as it pulls water down next to its blade, destroying many a ship in the process. It contains a power not native to the planet and incompatible with congruence.

Volcano near Kende the Alium city: using the volcano as a self-sustaining terrarium, there lies a divinity within intent on playing ‘god’ by observing potential futures, literally growing them in front of their eyes. Using the rich environment to craft miniature planets complete with their own magnetic fields and life the divinity creates scenarios that it observes in the world to see how likely situations are to resolve. The scenarios and structured planetariums vary wildly from almost perfectly accurate to life as a normal human would view it, to so alien and draconic that it might as well be a puddle of alphabet soup that the divinity is attempting to divine. In most cases though, the predictions that it comes to (regardless of the quality of the construction) are almost always correct.

The New Library: A divinity with deep ties to congruence is very excited to see the return of expansive knowledge, and is helping a select group of librarians begin a new repository of information. The divinity themselves is acting as the repository, and has stationed parts of itself across the world for those it is in contact with to send works, where the divinity then copies the manuscript, recording it within itself, and sends the original back to where it came from. The main body has yet to be located, though there is some speculation that it is slowly repurposing the factory on the Swirl to fit its needs.

Temple of Row: Whichever one Row has decided to call home really, as it literally houses him.

The Pit: A mining operation from the 3rd Epoch, the Pit remains. Most of its levels are filled with monsters, ranging from the familiar near the top to the truly bizarre as one descends. The area is extremely rich in congruence, increasing drastically the danger, as well as the potential reward enticing various adventuring parties to descend through its sprialing floors. Some Alium believe that their colony ship is to be found at the bottom of the pit, but in reality there is a team of divinites originating from another planet attempting to rekindle the original mining efforts of the Pit.