Manual of the Planes

they first enter the downdraft or be dashed into the icyside of the pit for 20d6 points of damage. If they succeed,they’ve managed to find a stable tunnel of airwithin the swirling wind and can descend to Nessusnormally.NessusThe ninth layer is the deepest realm of the Nine Hells,a plain shattered by rifts deeper than the deepestocean trench. Many of the ravines and canyons herereach thousands of miles into undifferentiated, deadstone. Most of the trenches seem natural, but someappear as if they were cut or blasted into the land.Rumor has it that an offshoot of the Styx flows hereand there, dropping into trenches and trickling its wayacross the layer. Few know how to reach this tributary,if it exists at all.Malsheem: A rift of incredible depth and width liesimmediately below the layer boundary between Caniaand Nessus (the Pit up in Cania leads to Malsheem inNessus). Malsheem, the Citadel of Hell, rises in its dark,elegant, fiendish beauty from the trench. The strongholdis monstrously large, rising miles above the plain. Butlike an iceberg above water, its visible spires and fortificationsare small compared to the vast halls containedwithin the trench.Malsheem is the largest known citadel in the OuterPlanes. It is big enough to house millions of devils, anarmy larger than any fielded in the Blood War.Asmodeus, master of Malsheem, Lord of the Ninth, andundisputed King of the Nine Hells, holds these hordes inreserve for a cataclysmic battle he foresees that will dwarfthe “petty” maneuverings of the Blood War. The citadel isso vast that it is nigh unmappable; Malsheem’s secrets areknown only to Asmodeus himself.Serpent’s Coil: Brutally repressed rumors suggestthat there is more to Asmodeus than he admits. Thestory goes that the true form of Asmodeus actuallyresides in the deepest rift of Nessus called the Serpent’sCoil. The shape seen by all the other devils of the NineHells in the fortress of Malsheem is actually a highlyadvanced use of the project image spell or an avatar ofsome sort.The secret rift, formed by Asmodeus’s plummetingbody when he first arrived in the Nine Hells, spiralsinward over the course of hundreds of miles. His titanic,miles-long form still rests here—and his wounds haveyet to heal. His acid-black blood pools in the hollows ofthe rift, a substance fouler than foul.From where fell Asmodeus? Was he once a greaterdeity cast down from Elysium or Celestia, or is he olderyet, as the rumor hints? Perhaps he represents some fundamentalentity whose mere existence pulls the multiverseinto its current configuration.Nobody who tells the story of Asmodeus’s “true” formlives more than 24 hours after repeating it aloud. But dustyscrolls in hard-to-reach libraries (such as Demogorgon’scitadel in the Abyss) yet record this knowledge. Unless itis pure fancy, of course.Nine Hells EncountersUse Table 7–7: Hellish Encounters for random encountersin the Nine Hells.INFERNAL BATTLEFIELDOF ACHERONIt is where ignorant armies clash by night.It is the refuse-plane of a million failed rebellions.It is a plane of enforced order, where conformity ismore important than good.The hue and cry of battle is the first sound a soldierhears when arriving on Acheron and the last sound arefugee hears when leaving. That’s all there is on Acheron:conflict, war, strife, and struggle. Many armies populateAcheron, but leaders are scarce. Truly, rebels without acause are common on Acheron, whether they’re petitioners,mortals, fiends, or celestials.Acheron has four layers, each made of island- or evencontinent-sized iron cubes floating in an airy void.Sometimes the cubes collide, and echoes of past collisionslinger throughout the plane, mingling with thering of sword on sword as armies clash across the facesof the cubes.Acheron hosts many deities, including Wee Jas, thedeity of death and magic; Gruumsh, the god of orcs;Maglubiyet, the goblin deity; and Hextor, the deity oftyranny and self-proclaimed champion of evil.ACHERON TRAITSAcheron has the following traits.• Objective Directional Gravity: The strength of gravityis the same as on the Material Plane, but which wayis down depends on which face of the cube you’re on.pqqqqrsLORD OF THE NINTH: ASMODEUS, KING OF THENINE HELLSAsmodeus is at the very least an archdevil, but he couldpossess the power of a true deity. He resides in Malsheem butis rarely seen. Only when the elite of the Nine Hells gather inany one of a hundred audience chambers does Asmodeusmake his presence known, usually in the form of an unprepossessinghumanoid with black hair, a black goatee, and eyes offlame. Asmodeus has been challenged many times, mostrecently during the Hells-wide rebellion called the Reckoning,but he has never been defeated.pqqqqrsCHAPTER 7:THE OUTERPLANES123