Manual of the Planes

PlutonThe third gloom of Hades is a layer of dying willows,shriveled olive trees, and night-black poplars. It is a realmwhere no one wants to be and no one can remember whythey came. Of course, petitioners have no choice in thematter.Usually, the Blood War does not reach this lowestgloom, though some raids have occurred when one sideor the other wished to retrieve the spirit of a fallen mortalcaptain who possessed particularly sharp tactical skills.Underworld: The Underworld is contained withinwalls of gray marble that stretch for hundreds of milesand are visible for thousands of miles beyond that. Asingle double gate pierces the marble walls of the realm.Constructed of beaten bronze, the gates are dented andscarred by heroes intent on getting past. However, thegates are also guarded by a terrible fiendish beast, a Gargantuanthree-headed hound made from the squirming,decaying bodies of hundreds of petitioners.Beyond the gate, the inside of the realm appearsmuch like the outside. Blackened trees, stunted bushes,and wasted ground dominate the landscape. Larvae areeverywhere, writhing in the dust, as are gray, wraithlikepetitioners who are on the verge of being suckedcompletely dry of all emotion by the spiritual decay ofthe plane. When they lose the last shred of emotion,their remaining essence becomes one with the gloomof Pluton.Sometimes, great heroes or desperate lovers from theMaterial Plane travel to this layer via a tributary of theRiver Styx or portals hidden in great volcanic fissures.They come to the Underworld because they believe thatthey can find the spirit of a friend or loved one and extricatethat spirit from a hopeless eternity. Besides larvae,faded petitioners, and the occasional foolish mortals,demons, yugoloths, and devils roam the land, looking forchoice morsels.Hades EncountersAlternate between Table 7–6: Abyssal Encounters andTable 7–7: Hellish Encounters for random encounters inthe Gray Waste of Hades.BLEAK ETERNITYOF GEHENNAIt is a plane without charity, mercy, or pity.It is the Oven of Perdition, the Fourfold Furnaces.It is where yugoloths cavort on endless volcanic slopes.Gehenna’s top layer borders Hades and the Nine Hells,so it is not a pleasant place. Floating in an impenetrable,infinite void are volcanic mountains seemingly withoutbase or peak. They are only finite in the strictest sense ofthe word, measuring hundreds of thousands of miles ineach direction. A single volcanic mountain dominateseach of the four layers of Gehenna, though lesser volcanicearthbergs drift and sometimes smash into thegreater mountains.There is no naturally occurring level place in any of thelayers; all the slopes are at least 45 degrees, and many areakin to sheer cliffs. Gehenna’s fiendish inhabitants havecarved artificial ledges, some large enough for entirecities, and switchback paths to connect them. But thoseedifices not carved by native yugoloths or deities have atendency to break apart, sending their builders on a long,sliding fall down the mountain.Gehenna’s four layers are Khalas, Chamada, Mungoth,and Krangath. Each layer is differentiated from the otherby its degree of volcanic activity.Powerful entities that possess realms on Gehennainclude many lords of the yugoloths, as well as Melifthe Lich-Lord and Memnor, deity of evil cloud giants.The realm of Maanzicorian, an illithid deity, was oncelocated here. But Maanzicorian was slain by Tenebrous,the name taken by the demon lord Orcus whenhe first returned from supposed annihilation. Accordingly,Maanzicorian’s realm has started to crumble, itsdeity gone.GEHENNA TRAITSGehenna has the following traits.• Normal Gravity: Gravity is similar to the MaterialPlane, but naturally occurring volcanic mountainsseem to float free in an infinitely larger void. Gravityis normal on the steep slopes of a mountain, and a falltumbles victims many miles until a chance ledgecatches them, or continued rolling abrasions of thefall completely shred the victim.• Normal Time.• Infinite Size: The impenetrable void of Gehenna isinfinite, but each volcanic mountain is finite. Each isfar larger than the largest known land mass on theMaterial Plane, however.• Divinely Morphic: Memnor and other deities can alterGehenna’s mountainous landscape. Ordinary creaturesfind Gehenna is as alterable as the Material Plane.• No Elemental or Energy Traits.• Mildly Evil-Aligned: Good characters on Gehennasuffer a –2 penalty on all Charisma-based checks.• Normal Magic.GEHENNA LINKSLike all the lower planes, Gehenna has the River Styxflowing through at least its first layer, Khalas. In fact, itis the biggest river on the layer, and it hurtles throughgorges and canyons with breathtaking speed. Itscataracts are legendary, and the occasional ledge createswaterfalls of epic, if polluted, proportion. Attempting tochange planes via the Styx is a very dangerous thingindeed, on Gehenna.Portals to other planes are fairly common, as are portalsbetween layers of Gehenna. They usually appear as bottomlessblack chasms. Sometimes they are marked asportals, but sometimes yugoloths mark actual bottomlesschasms as portals by mistake or with malice.CHAPTER 7:THE OUTERPLANES111