Apotheosis Desert

Map of the Apotheosis Desert

## People, Politics, and Economics

### Population

ORcs, blood elves, plains elves, humans, cat-folk, cow-folk, dryads, ifrits, lizard-folk, dwarves, lunar elves, solar elves, high elves, anything else

## Common Knowledge

The Apotheosis Desert is a massive desert east of Binturia that dominates the region as a whole. It is filled to bursting with unusual people, terrifying monsters, and harsh conditions.

## Topography and Climate

The Apotheosis Desert is, as its name would suggest, a desert. Sand stretches as far as the eye can see, interrupted only by the impressive profiles of natural mesas, mountains, and the cooling relief of scattered oases.

The Apotheosis is a land rich with histories, and ruins of various empires hide beneath its shifting surface. Meztec, Jericho, Cat-Folk, Ifriti, and countless other civilizations have made their mark in this blasted landscape, and perhaps even left behind some valuables to the ardent treasure-hunter.

As of 10,019 A.B., the Apotheosis Desert is slowly but surely shrinking in size. The region was once a large jungle, but an enormous and persistent storm brewed by the mages of Jericho sucked the water from the land and left it the barren desert modern history knows it as. With the fall of Jericho, and a deliberate decision by the Binturian Party not to stop its disappearance, the Apotheosis Desert will shrink in size over the next several decades, transforming first into a large grassland and then perhaps into a jungle once more after a few hundred or thousand years.

## Population

Many different species populate the blasted sands of the Apotheosis Desert. Nomadic orc tribes, roving blood elves, plains elves, humans, cat-folk, cow-folk, certain species of dryad (cactus, for example), and ifrits can be found in abundance. Also common are lizard-folk and dwarves, likely travelling from Myrdirit, a smattering of lunar and solar elves lucky enough to escape the eternal war of their parent countries (Everspring and Sol Oas), and the occasional Zondronian Pathfinder (high elves). Just about any other mortal can also be found in the desert on travelling merchant caravans.

A great deal of beastial monsters also haunt the dunes. Snakes, lizards, scorpions, giant scorpions, hive scorpions (a breed that collaborates en masse to form one large scorpion-like body), scarabs, and the occasional undead are all known to plague travellers. Three of the most deadly creatures in the desert are: the Sphinx (or Sphynx, depending on who you ask), a winged lion with the face of a mortal who legends say may let you pass if you answer a riddle; the Apotheosis Death Worm, a massive worm with thick black, red, or purple carapace that erupts from the sands to swallow prey whole; and the Greater Ifrit, a noble spirit who legends say once protected the wastes.

## Exports and Trades

Rare flora, remains of monsters, finely crafted bone goods from Meztec ruins and Myrdirit, powerful magical items from the ruins of Jericho or the Meztec, rare metals, and finely crafted textiles often find their way out of the Apotheosis Desert, to say nothing of the goods that pass through it. Without question, the one thing in highest demand for denizens of the Apotheosis is water and access thereof.

Most people in this region hunt, gather food, sell goods, protect those selling goods, steal from those selling goods, or steal from people who once had goods but can no longer protect them (e.g. tomb raiders, explorers, etc.).

## Government

The Apotheosis is less of a centralized nation-state and more a massive, insufferable region of blistering desert. Individual tribes, such as the Ouroboran blood elves and the various cat-folk civilizations, have their own systems of governance, but no single government pervades the entire region.

In the desert’s ancient past the heavily-junged region was home to many different nations, the most powerful of whom was the mage-city Jericho. In its less-ancient past, after the jungle had been dried to dust, the Meztec Empire claimed the majority of the desert.

## Military

The Apotheosis has no unified military, but it does have many hostile groups of people and terrifying beasts that call the land their home.

## Social Hierarchy and Culture

The cultures of the different groups in the Apotheosis vary too greatly to be categorized individually, but one of the few commonalities is a reliance on the Dripping Sands Calendar popular in eastern Orelisle and the superstitions surrounding that calendar’s Death Day.

## Cities, Towns, and Villages

### Myrdirit

An ancient dwarven city in a crevasse beneath the sands. Currently in a state of anarchy.

### Tent Town

An oasis tent-town north of Jericho’s ruins, mostly populated by Jericho’s survivors.

### Ruins of Jericho/New Jericho

The smoldered wreckage of Jericho, what was once the shining beacon in the desert save perhaps the reclusive Zondros. In its prime, Jericho was a massive, walled city, protected by countless mages and warriors. In the Fel Invasion of 10,016 A.B., the city was demolished, its army routed, and its people cast into the winds and sands. What remains now are the ruins of towers laid low, and a few uncollapsed basements and underground bunkers.

In the years following its destruction, various attempts have been made at rebuilding life in the city’s remains - or at least rebuilding *something*. The most recent, and thus far most successful, attempt has been led by cat-folk and ifriti under the watchful eye of “The Brother”, a god of healing and compassion who drove off the followers of an angry god of plague.

### Bone Peak

A large mountain near the border with Galkador, and the site of an ancient battle between it and the Meztec Empire. Seared into the mountain’s face is a long text in a foreign tongue, old edicts of a dwindling god of the sun and of war.

### Unnamed Cat-Folk Town

A bit north of the border between Sol Oas and Everspring, a small settlement of Cat-Folk live.

### Azar’s Cave

A cavern protected by various elemental barriers this is the chosen home of Azar, a Greater Ifrit. Azar was tasked eons ago with protecting the desert, but has now doubly failed with the appearance of the Desert of Madness and then later the protection of its de-desertification. He spends most his days training physically, magically, and mentally, as well as improving his equipment with the Mythril found in his home.

## Alliances

Being a region and not a nation, the Apotheosis Desert does not have allies, and is not a member of the United Orelisian Council.

## Enemy Countries

Being a region and not a nation, the Apotheosis Desert does not have enemies.

## Historical Timeline

* C. 100 A.B. - Creation of the Apotheosis Desert
* 1,361 A.B. - Founding of Meztec Empire
* 1,559 A.B. - Battle of Bone Peak
* 2,065 A.B. - Collapse of Meztec Empire
* 10,016 A.B. - Destruction of Jericho, Founding of Tent Town
	+ As a consequence of the Fel Invasion, Jericho is destroyed by a Fel Kaiju. Some survivors regroup and found Tent Town that same year.
* 10,016 A.B. - Political Collapse of Myrdirit
* 10,018 A.B. - Desert of Madness
	+ In a botched attempt to revitalize the shrinking desert, agents of the Wizards’ Guild and the Binturian Party accidentally imbue a large region with the essence of an insane, unbelievably powerful celestial dragon. The desert is preserved, but the region in question becomes affected by this essence and produces visions and nightmarish abominations. These effects are contained to the region and spread no further, and region comes to be called the “Desert of Madness”.
* 10,019 A.B. - Destruction of the Desert of Madness
	+ In order to correct their mistake, the Wizards’ Guild and Binturian Party purge the Desert of Madness of its most fearsome monsters, and perform another ritual. This one, having succeeded, permanently cleanses the corruption of the Desert of Madness and returns the desert to a state of shrinkage.

## Further Information

* Binturia
* The Binturian Party
* The Brother
* Cult of Sol Invictus
* Dead Day
* Dryads
* Dwarves
* Everspring
* Fel Invasion
* Galkador
* High Elf
* Humans
* Ifrits
* Jericho
* Lunar Elf
* Meztec Empire
* Myrdirit
* Plains Elf
* Sol Invictus
* Sol Oas
* Solar Elf
* Spirits
* Terrans
* Wizards’ Guild
* Zondros