Black Prison Island

In the middle of the Labyrinth bay lies a small prison island, on which is built an intimidating fortress made out of oily black stone.

The fortress' dungeons stretch many kilometres deep in the continent's bowels, where dark, disturbing dungeons hold thousands of prisoners from all over the east.

The fortress and the underground city of dungeons were built by mute, mask-bearing demons, long before Avangar, Florinth and the Tarot Kingdoms were even conceived. Many of the neighbouring kingdoms give away their prisoners in exchange for gold and other valuable gemstones that are of no use to the Wardens.

Common criminals such as poachers and thieves arrive there from Avangar, while the other realms mostly give away their heretics, necromancers and other practicioners of the dark arts.

What happens to the prisoners there and why they're of such importance to the Wardens is unknown, although great horrors have been whispered about the prison... Talks of prisoners going mad, being sucked of their will to live and every happy memory of theirs, wanting to end their pitiful lives but being unable to, as the wardens magically prolong their lives..

Oh, and let's not talk about the terrifying tortures by the pale twisted pets of the Wardens, endured in the deepest levels of the dungeons.

Horror bedtime stories being told to children in Ouroboria talk of the only sound that one can hear in these dungeons being loud banging, as the only way for someone to end their lives is through endlessly banging their skulls against the black walls until they turn into mush, sometimes not even that being enough.

## The Wardens of the Guilty

In the middle of the Labyrinth Bay, there lies a small archipelago consisting of two islands. These seemingly unimportant islands were only a curiosity for the local fishermen and traders of ancient times, more focused on trying to reach the two straits around the bay, a much shorter travel to cross from Giantstep to Littlestep. This all changed when the Khenomeric Empire reached the coast of the Labyrinth Bay (its original name now forgotten). A much more advanced entity than the local populations, the Khenomeric Empire was focused on expanding its holdings through all directions, and had reached the twin islands in 714 BBE. They built a lighthouse in them to help the growing ship traffic in the area, but oddly enough, other than a small garrison and the personnel guarding the islands, the khenomeric authorities never really considered the islands as part of the empire. According to historical records, the empire was in a bureaucratic fight over the administration of the island, since they was no stable population in the area, and therefore could not be taxed. On the contrary, ownership of the islands would mean having to pay for the maintenance of the soldiery and the lighthouse. Despite these expenses not being particularly significant, the fight between provincial administrations meant that this area was never registered as part of the empire, despite the archipelago being de facto occupied by the khenomeric army.

This technical legal loophole made it a perfect place for the Magoclergy’s dark experiments. Since the beginning of their rule, their aims to expand faster and faster the empire, as well as to control every single aspect of it with an iron fist grant them a lot of enemies. Many of the prisons in the imperial capital, as well as in the provinces, were beginning to fill with the amount of political prisoners coming. The members of the Magoclergy began designing a prison that would serve both as a way to punish the dissidents, to avoid them escaping from their grasp, and to serve as a thorough example to others to not mess with the Magoclergy. They set their eyes on the twin islands in the Labyrinth Bay, and began planning the construction of the ultimate prison. Since the region was technically outside of the law of the empire, the Magoclergy could engage in dark and devious activities free from the inquisitive eyes of any administrative organization that could have at least raised an eyebrow at them. Free of prying eyes, the Magoclergy quickly began building a prison unlike nothing the world had seen before: An underground dungeon, connecting the two islands under the sea, and below that, a seemingly never ending amount of cells to imprison the inmates. To maintain this level of depth, the Magoclergy used many enchantments to keep the underground from collapsing beneath the sea. The upper levels were reserved for lesser crimes, or at least for criminals that could be persuaded into favoring the Magoclergy. Further below, the many dissidents and guerrillas against the Magoclergy were put to inhuman tortures, from using them for sacrifices and experiments or testing the limits of the human body’s tolerance to pain. They would also put to dig deeper and deeper into the ground, expanding the amount of space for prison cells, thus increasing the size of the prison in a seemingly endless process.

However, keeping a growing population of prison inmates, especially those with a similar political view and a collective hatred for their jailers, is not easy. After multiple riots and mutinies, one of which almost ending in a complete takeover of the islands, the Magoclergy began searching for unnatural ways to keep the prisoners under check. They began dark summonings to bind them into the mortal realm. These demonic entities would be put in charge of the jails in exchange of feeding of the inmates’ souls, pain and suffering for as long as they lived. In particular, they began summoning spirits and demons with a particular affinity towards punishing the wicked, those who would relish the task given to them and to make sure they never relent in their will to bring penance pain and suffering to those considered criminals. The horror tales about the dark prison of the Magoclergy spread throughout the empire, but it had the opposite effect, pushing the rebels to more and more daring acts of defiance to stop the atrocities. Furthermore, this was one of the things that made the khenomeri nobility more weary of the Magoclergy’s reach. After the Battle of Empires and the War of Supper, the fall of the Magoclergy was swift and comprehensive, since they barely had any allies left.

Legends say that the few [remaining] members of the Magoclergy, weakened and on the run, went to the Labyrinth Prison to seek refuge from their pursuers… only to be taken by the demons as prisoners, since they had been branded as criminals by the Khenomeric Empire. Rumors run around that these few members of the Magoclergy are still alive millennia after, kept alive by their once servants so that they can pay eternal penance for their crimes, suffering the worst punishments the demons can come up with for all eternity.

Since the fall of the Magoclergy, the Labyrinth Prison has only grown and grown. The rising political instability and the increasing amount of nations have made the Labyrinth Prison a very handy way to dispose of the most dangerous criminals they have. Many nations only sentence to the Labyrinth Prison to the most horrid, vile and irredeemable villains, while others use it to punish more common crimes, as a way to scare the population from crimes such as treason, illegal alchemy, necromancy… The demons from the labyrinth are happy to receive the newcomers, instinctively feeling what wrongs have committed and designing a punishment fitting to them. All while they keep digging and digging further, to increase the space available, even if it has been many centuries since the prison was even half-full. They cannot act against those considered innocent, so if a ship has to stop in the islands for whatever reason (something beyond rare, since the horror stories from the islands are well known for millennia now), the demons will not approach them.

The old khenomeri lighthouse still shines the dark waters to this day, now with a red tinted light. Sailors pray every time they see the light, mourning for whatever souls lay trapped within the labyrinth wall...