Carcosa

Carcosa is a mystical ancient city created by Ambrose Bierce for his short story "An Inhabitant of Carcosa". It is a central element of the horror fantasy story cycle The King in Yellow, by Robert W. Chambers, who places it in an apparently extraterrestrial landscape complete with two suns, strange moons, and black stars. In some of Chambers' stories, it is stated that the towers of Carcosa can rise behind the moon, as if the city itself was a celestial place. The King in Yellow also associates Carcosa with Aldebaran and the Hyades, as well as Hastur (originally the name of a god created by Bierce).
While the mythology of The King in Yellow was incorporated into the Cthulhu Mythos by H. P. Lovecraft in The Whisperer in Darkness, Carcosa itself was referenced in the Mythos stories of August Derleth and Donald Wandrei.
==Description==
Carcosa is often described to have:
*Black stars on a bright sky
*Twin suns
*The Lake of Hali
*Black soaring towers
*Wet winds
==Pathfinder==
In the Pathfinder universe, Carcosa is a highly magical planet which contains a living city that is also called Carcosa. It's the home of Hastur, who resides in the monstrous Lake of Hali. When the light from Carcosa's star shines on another world's night sky, Hastur's power increases on that world. Carcosa is continuously expanding, absorbing the societies and cities of other worlds, serving as the fuel for Hastur's eventual ascension into the ranks of the Outer Gods, at which time he will consume and absorb Carcosa and its inhabitants. The city of Carcosa is a vast patchwork of the cities which it absorbed over the eons, each individual patchwork is a nexus, which may retain some of the properties of their original worlds. Some of the known nexuses include Neruzavin (flying polyp city), Bohlvari (shoggoth inhabited elder thing city), a technologically advanced city of skyscrapers (inhabited by robots and aliens), and an underwater city (inhabited by the undead).
==External links==
* Carcosa at the Pathfinder wiki
==Gallery==
Hastur (Rise of Cthulhu).jpg|Carcosa (Rise of Cthulhu)
Carcosa (Paizo Inc).jpg|Carcosa (Pathfinder)
== Reference ==
# Bierce, Ambrose. "An Inhabitant of Carcosa". 1886.
# Chambers, Robert. "The King in Yellow". 1895.
es:
Category:Extra-Dimensional Locations
Category:Structures
Category:Locations Originating From Mythos-Adjacent Works