Manual of the Planes

are needed to swim through it. Moving between layers isas easy as willing oneself to do so. Nonnatives exist ononly one layer at a time, but large Far Realm entities oftenexist on several simultaneously.Combat: Other than the sporadic elemental and energytraits and the maddening nature of the plane, combat isnormal in the Far Realm. Against the entities that rule thisplane, combat is also vanishingly brief.FEATURES OF THE FAR REALMThe Far Realm is composed of infinite layers, but unlikemany Outer Planes, the layers are thin. A Far Realmlayer can range from an inch to a mile thick, though onaverage each layer is separated from the other by about10 feet. Travelers can see through many layers simultaneously,as if holding a stack of translucent parchment upto the light. Usually up to twenty layers can be seen toone side or the other, though each layer is blurrier thanthe next.Features and creatures of the Far Realm are multidimensionaland may exist on more than one layer simultaneously.If the layers of the Far Realm are like a stack oftranslucent parchment, multilayer creatures are like asingle dot marked upon each parchment. Individually,the marks appear meaningless, but viewed through thestack of parchment, they coalesce into a three-dimensionalobject. Such is the existence of everything fromthe tentacled vegetation that writhes throughout the FarRealm, to the massive, drifting entities whose existence istoo vast to even notice visitors who only occupy a singlelayer at a time.Visitors whose minds do not snap upon enteringthe plane apprehend the translucent layers fadingaway to either side, pierced with free-floating riversof milk-white liquid that sometimes run along alayer’s edge for a few feet before plunging into thenext. Rains of blue globes descend from unseenheights, The globes burst when they strike anotherobject, releasing ticks the size of horses that scuttle offin search of blood. Gelatinous worms wriggle fromlayer to layer, wending through tentacled vegetationencrusted with orange moss, all suspended above anamoebic sea.Vast multilayered shapes drift at the edge of sightthrough the layers, blurrily reminiscent of creaturesfrom the deepest trenches of Material Plane seas. Buteach of the blurry forms is as large as a city—andthose are the small shapes.XaxoxPast the edge of reality is a relic from the MaterialPlane: a stone keep securely lashed to the trunk of adessicated tree a mile in diameter. This was an outpostof wizards too intent on discovering forbiddenknowledge to fear for their own sanity. Nor do they fearinsanity now, for rational thought has departed thosewho still live.Amid the wreckage of a laboratory, barracks, kitchen,small library, and specimen cells, some powerful wizardsand their servants yet wander. Daruth Winterwood, anelven wizard, led the expedition, but now his brain is fullof spiders. Literally.Still, he seeks to return Xaxox to the Material Planein one piece. Every now and then he coaxes open asmall portal, allowing the essence of the Far Realm toseep onto some random plane, troubling the dreams ofthose who reside there. Should Daruth ever attractassistance from those on the far side of his portals, ormanage to transfer Xaxox on his own, a permanentportal between the Far Realm and the Material Planecould open. Anticipation of the tidal wave of insanitythat would follow is the delight that continues toinspire Daruth’s mania.MYRIAD PLANESCOSMOLOGYWhereas the D&D cosmology rigidly defines the place ofthe Material Plane in its relationship to the Transitive,Inner, and Outer Planes, the Myriad Planes cosmologyhas a far looser arrangement. In the myriad planes cosmology,every plane is like a Material Plane. Within anyAPPENDIX:VARIANT PLANES& COSMOLOGIES Illus. by W. Reynolds213