• NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.

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It's not abandoned, and it's not a lighthouse. It's the home of an archmage, who's had it hidden from sight with powerful illusions. Anyone approaching or entering only encounters a deserted lighthouse.
 

The Devil Hills? Such a misnomer... The people of the Hills of Artin are strong and hard workers, but their ways are not understood. Some would call them primitive for their beliefs; those who know the truth, well, that's the story eh?

Artin built his Tower long ago, the highest point in the hills of his people. Some say it was to better worship his forgotten gods, who held to high places and allowed him to talk to the wind. Others say it was a tribute to his bladed brother, lost to the Watery Hosts in the times when Blueberry Bay was known as the Drowning Bay. Still others say all of this is true, and that the tribes gather to rebuild the tower on the convergence of stars, and once a generation they add a new level to the Tower, hoping to climb to the heavens themselves and speak to their great ancestor.

How many have gone to the Lighthouse? Noone knows, but so many join the tribe of the Hills, or are eaten by the cannibals who feast on shipwrecks and weary travellers.

Personally, I think it's all hogwash, but I am just a traveler enjoying a drink. Ask a scholar if you want the truth as they see it, or a mage to call down the heavens to speak on it. I have no more time for it.

Slainte,

-Loonook.
 

The last 100 years have seen the resettlement of the southern peninsula, especially with new urban centers like New Town having finally grown up from a small village. Much of the land has yet to be explored by the peaceful settlers, but trappers and the adventurous have just starting making their way deeper into areas like the Devil Hills.

Along the western shoreline of these hills still stands the remains of an ancient lighthouse tower. The human nation of Kal-ram ruled much of this area for hundreds of years before giving in to decadence and eventual ruin. Most of its treasures were stolen, but some still lay hidden, secreted in forgotten caches of the tower. The keepers of the lighthouse sought to preserve some of the nations history and glory, but were ultimately overrun by semi-intelligent giant geoduckmen spreading down from the coast. These beasts still keep a guard at an underwater entrance they built in the tower's stony foundation. These serve to defend the beasts treasures best kept dry. The rest of the edifice has been taken as a lair by several different beasts native to the hills.

The true origin of the tower goes much deeper however. Before it was converted into a beacon to guide trade ships by the Kal-ram it had stood for over one thousand years. Laid by the Interel Burain, a trade family/co-mind aligned under the present shift of the errant galactic spiral, the tower is a dormant chrysalis. Daily psionic pulses emanate into the surrounding astral plane attracting for its food curious astral travelers passing by.

A trio of devils have noticed these regular transmissions and have set up a nearby fortification in the astral in order to leech off those caught, albeit for their own more soul sucking purposes. The devils exploration into the surrounding material realm has lead to an eclectic cult of worshipers enacting typically hellish rites and rituals, finally resulting in routine sacrifices and the devils growing fat on their spoils. One of the unholy strictures upon these followers is to avoid ever entering the lighthouse and to drive off any who attempt so. Up until now this appears to have worked.
 
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It isn't lit to keep ships away from shoals; it's lit to draw in the souls of every sentient creature that drowns in Blueberry Bay. They stream towards the light, and are collected in the high tower by a massive, pulsing gem.

The necromancer who built the lighthouse is long dead, but that hardly matters. The building itself is now alive. And the souls fuel its endless hatred of mankind.
 

Lots of places to explore. That Lair of Agorax looks to be a good start as any.

A foul lich of incredible power who only comes out of his tomb to seek his lost love once every 10 years. However, the Harlot Crones of the Temple of Mists keep him at bay, but it is said that should the mists recede, Agorax, will no longer be bound to just his tomb.
 
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It's the place where the gods stood while creating the world. It is formed of a single piece of stone found nowhere else in the world.

If a way could be found to work it then it could be turned into a weapon that slays extraplanar creatures.
 

While the lighthouse does in fact stand by the water, it is a mistaken assumption that the purpose of the lighthouse was in fact to guide ships travelling in Blueberry Bay. The truth is that the lighthouse was built by planar travellers to safely guide ships sailing between dimensions. It was abandoned after its light guided a small fleet of fiends to this world, who overran the lighthouse and the nearby hills, giving them their current name.
 

Into the Woods

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