Secrets of the Dead Lands
3.5
Undead, Undead Creature, Immortal, Unquiet Dead: The Dead Lands is the name of the Dragon’s kingdom. The souls of anyone killed by the Dragon are drawn to his domain to serve him for all times.
In his urgency Nakkash decided to try to access the Paraelemental Plane of Magma. He was careless in his haste - he reached the “Demiplane of Obsidian” instead. Calling Ur-hafri to help him, Nakkash began to apply some of the new spells he had developed for taming the obsidian. One, then another, obsidian elemental came forth - the defilers sent them out to fight. Yet the battle was still going against Qwith's researchers: clearly a much larger elemental was needed. Heedlessly Nakkash and Ur-hafri started trying to enlarge the gate, succeeding both in increasing its size and drawing forth an enormous elemental.
Ur-hafri directed the massive obsidian elemental out of the summoning chamber, into the courtyard where it waded into the fray, striking down meorty Defenders and Qwith's defilers with equal fury. At the same time, Pandruj and the Tetrarchs, also raised to undeath, saw their chance for revenge and attacked. In the confusion, many of Pandruj’s and G’dranav’s followers attacked each other as well as Qwith’s servants.
Ur-hafri escaped the sudden attack of Pandruj and his undead, returning to the chamber to find Nakkash desperately trying to regain control of the gate - the experimental magicks he and Ur-hafri had used to expand it had rendered it unstable, pulsing with energy, like a living thing. The two men tried, and failed, to reassert control. The first of the burning roofing beams crashed down, crushing Ur-hafri's skull.
What happened next has never been completely explained, and the memories of all the undead who were there are now hopelessly entangled with fiction and self-delusion, so the truth may never be known. Nakkash maintains that his summoning spells performed correctly, and should have stabilized the gate. Qwith long blamed herself, believing that she should have supervised her apprentices more closely, since one of them obviously miscalculated the summoning. Gretch once claimed that he was responsible. In an instant of decisive summoning, the gate was accidentally opened fully to the supposed “demiplane,” with explosive results - the gate shattered.
Millions of tons of molten obsidian poured into the compound, cresting the walls and sweeping aside defilers and Defenders alike. The obsidian, smoking and gurgling, flooded through the city from the magical portal. No one escaped. Outside the city walls, beyond the ring of ruins of old Nagarvos', the farmers and laborers who served Qwith were distracted by the screams of battle, but relaxed when silence fell - clearly another experiment had just failed, and been contained. When the black wave burst out of the city walls and overwhelmed them, the obsidian was utterly silent, rushing over the land.
It also poured into the Pallid Mere, the salty sea stretching north to south on the eastern side of the Navel which once had been the Sagramog swamps, gushing down the escarpment in a terrible cascade. Gouts of steam roiled up, the sea flash-boiled by the molten obsidian. Great bergs of obsidian were frozen instantly as they crashed into the sea, but more kept coming, a waterfall of death that even the sea itself could not quench. The Pallid Mere boiled, sending forth thick clouds of salty spume, blown east by the suddenly savage winds. The chunks of obsidian, tumbling in the rushing tide, pushed to the southeast, coming to rest on the southeastern shores of the Pallid Mere in mounded walls of fractured blackglass.
The obsidian consumed the sea, bubbling and foaming as it boiled the water into briny steam. It also devoured the land, flowing west and north, burning and burying everyone and everything in its path. The wave was faster than the news – few were aware of sudden death before it closed over them, its black glassy maw enfolding all of Ulyan. The Hoarwall, that great wall of ice which had for millenia marked the southern extent of the known world, repelled the first wave of obsidian, acting as a levee running east to west east to west and dividing the Black Basin from the Zagath homeland to the south. The obsidian, like a hungry predator, would not be denied its prey. It grew taller and stronger as the gate pumped ever more molten glass into Athas, and flooded over the Hoarwall, rushing south to consume the cold lands of the deep reaches.
When the obsidian cooled, it formed a vast basin of blackglass, hundreds of miles across. Both the Navel and the ruins of Nagarvos upon which it had been built were utterly buried. None of the wizards survived, and their research perished with them.
But then, the dead wizards gradually arose. The obsidian which poured through the gate from the Paraelemental Plane of Magma and the negative energy which infected it extracted a strange toll on those who died under its influence – it bound them to the Prime Material Plane as undead. So Qwith and all of Rajaat's minions and those of the city rose in undead form as zhen, a name imprinted on their minds when they awoke, to become the eventual rulers and servants of this new land. Nearly all those slain in the deadly tide rose as undead, though not all were zhen.
Let it be said that no death is final in the Dead Land. Every being killed will rise again, sometimes mere seconds after death occurs. But the negative energy still lingering in the obsidian also has an effect on those living things that die here of other causes. Living humanoids or animals which die in the Dead Lands who are touching the obsidian will arise 24 hours later as a zhen or other appropriate type of undead (depending on who or what killed them).
161st King's Age (-2,258)
Ral’s Fury (-2,258): A fight over the Gate breaks it, creating a leak into the Obsidian Demiplane. The Gate explodes, releasing the flow of obsidian that would claim the entirety of Ulyan and the surrounding lands. Thus, the Boiling Ruin begins. Rajaat himself presumes all lost and refocuses all attention on the by now so-called Cleansing Wars.
What happens after the explosion is hard to determine – all factions have a different story. However, the Gate is blocked by an unknown entity a short time after it opens, preventing the flood from covering the entire continent, including the Tablelands. The Zagath Hoarwall has melted down.
Silt’s Contemplation (-2,250): The obsidian finally settles and cools.
Enemy’s Vengeance (-2,249): The first zhen (see Terrors of the Dead Lands, page 75) claw their way out of the obsidian, discovering a barren land of blackglass. Nearly all slain in the Boiling Ruin rose as undead, but not all as zhen.
Something else occurred, however – the Obsidian Wave raised into undeath many of those who had fallen in the cleansing of Ghash-naarg, both human and orc alike.
Gretch hated his role but excelled at it. He collected all the corpses from the Tforkatch River battlefield and soon assembled a vast horde of undead troops.
Truly Ancient Undead: ?
Ancient Dead Despot: ?
Ancient Dead Champiron: ?
Ancient Dead Vizier: ?
Ancient Dead Duchess: ?
Undead Troll: ?
Undead Gnome: ?
Undead Pixie: ?
Bugdead: When the Obsidian Flood burst over the land, it overran the Hoarwall, and the s’thag zagath civilization was devastated no less than the humanoid lands of northern Ulyan. The s’thag zagath and their minions were changed in undeath, and their hatred for the humanoids who had unleashed the obsidian was inflamed.
Unpredictable Undead Insect: ?
Undead Insect: ?
Humanoid Undead: ?
Bizarre Insectoid Undead: ?
Undead Ruler: ?
Insectoid Undead: ?
Long-Dead Lord, Undead Lord of Great Power, Undead Prince: ?
Minion: ?
Undead Inhabitant: ?
Psionically Capable Undead: ?
Walking Corpse: ?
Chimerical Undead Creature: ?
Undead Wicked King: ?
Undead Wicked Prince: ?
Undead Wizard: In his urgency Nakkash decided to try to access the Paraelemental Plane of Magma. He was careless in his haste - he reached the “Demiplane of Obsidian” instead. Calling Ur-hafri to help him, Nakkash began to apply some of the new spells he had developed for taming the obsidian. One, then another, obsidian elemental came forth - the defilers sent them out to fight. Yet the battle was still going against Qwith's researchers: clearly a much larger elemental was needed. Heedlessly Nakkash and Ur-hafri started trying to enlarge the gate, succeeding both in increasing its size and drawing forth an enormous elemental.
Ur-hafri directed the massive obsidian elemental out of the summoning chamber, into the courtyard where it waded into the fray, striking down meorty Defenders and Qwith's defilers with equal fury. At the same time, Pandruj and the Tetrarchs, also raised to undeath, saw their chance for revenge and attacked. In the confusion, many of Pandruj’s and G’dranav’s followers attacked each other as well as Qwith’s servants.
Ur-hafri escaped the sudden attack of Pandruj and his undead, returning to the chamber to find Nakkash desperately trying to regain control of the gate - the experimental magicks he and Ur-hafri had used to expand it had rendered it unstable, pulsing with energy, like a living thing. The two men tried, and failed, to reassert control. The first of the burning roofing beams crashed down, crushing Ur-hafri's skull.
What happened next has never been completely explained, and the memories of all the undead who were there are now hopelessly entangled with fiction and self-delusion, so the truth may never be known. Nakkash maintains that his summoning spells performed correctly, and should have stabilized the gate. Qwith long blamed herself, believing that she should have supervised her apprentices more closely, since one of them obviously miscalculated the summoning. Gretch once claimed that he was responsible. In an instant of decisive summoning, the gate was accidentally opened fully to the supposed “demiplane,” with explosive results - the gate shattered.
Millions of tons of molten obsidian poured into the compound, cresting the walls and sweeping aside defilers and Defenders alike. The obsidian, smoking and gurgling, flooded through the city from the magical portal. No one escaped. Outside the city walls, beyond the ring of ruins of old Nagarvos', the farmers and laborers who served Qwith were distracted by the screams of battle, but relaxed when silence fell - clearly another experiment had just failed, and been contained. When the black wave burst out of the city walls and overwhelmed them, the obsidian was utterly silent, rushing over the land.
It also poured into the Pallid Mere, the salty sea stretching north to south on the eastern side of the Navel which once had been the Sagramog swamps, gushing down the escarpment in a terrible cascade. Gouts of steam roiled up, the sea flash-boiled by the molten obsidian. Great bergs of obsidian were frozen instantly as they crashed into the sea, but more kept coming, a waterfall of death that even the sea itself could not quench. The Pallid Mere boiled, sending forth thick clouds of salty spume, blown east by the suddenly savage winds. The chunks of obsidian, tumbling in the rushing tide, pushed to the southeast, coming to rest on the southeastern shores of the Pallid Mere in mounded walls of fractured blackglass.
The obsidian consumed the sea, bubbling and foaming as it boiled the water into briny steam. It also devoured the land, flowing west and north, burning and burying everyone and everything in its path. The wave was faster than the news – few were aware of sudden death before it closed over them, its black glassy maw enfolding all of Ulyan. The Hoarwall, that great wall of ice which had for millenia marked the southern extent of the known world, repelled the first wave of obsidian, acting as a levee running east to west east to west and dividing the Black Basin from the Zagath homeland to the south. The obsidian, like a hungry predator, would not be denied its prey. It grew taller and stronger as the gate pumped ever more molten glass into Athas, and flooded over the Hoarwall, rushing south to consume the cold lands of the deep reaches.
When the obsidian cooled, it formed a vast basin of blackglass, hundreds of miles across. Both the Navel and the ruins of Nagarvos upon which it had been built were utterly buried. None of the wizards survived, and their research perished with them.
But then, the dead wizards gradually arose. The obsidian which poured through the gate from the Paraelemental Plane of Magma and the negative energy which infected it extracted a strange toll on those who died under its influence – it bound them to the Prime Material Plane as undead. So Qwith and all of Rajaat's minions and those of the city rose in undead form as zhen, a name imprinted on their minds when they awoke, to become the eventual rulers and servants of this new land. Nearly all those slain in the deadly tide rose as undead, though not all were zhen.
Dead Prince: ?
Human Undead: ?
Mindless Undead: ?
Shambling Horror: ?
Weird Constructs of Pieces From a Number of Different Races: ?
Undead Warlord: ?
Undead Denizen: ?
Undead Lord: ?
Bizarre Undead Beast: ?
Undead Sorcerer: ?
Undead Zagath: ?
Dregoth of Guistenal: Friend’s Fury (-1,971): Dregoth of Giustenal is slain and subsequently raised into unlife by his templar Mon Adderath.
Hideous Undead, Such Small Undead, Undead Small Homer, Small Home Undead, Spectral Undead: ?
Larger Stronger Undead: ?
Human Undead: Arludas was cleansed but not lifeless. The grievously wounded and dying, human and gnomish alike, still sprawled where they’d fallen in forgotten side-tunnels and chambers, and the gnomes’ livestock and mushroom rookeries clung to life as well. The dark creatures in the depths of the gnomes’ mines waited and watched, and emerged to feed. In the stale air, those bodies not yet eaten or only partially devoured began to stir.
There were originally two groups of undead in ruined Arludas – the gnomes who arose to unlife and their human foes. Many corpses, insufficiently endowed with hate or dedication, remained lifeless, to be gathered by their respective sides and given burial.
Fungus-Bearer: Arludas was cleansed but not lifeless. The grievously wounded and dying, human and gnomish alike, still sprawled where they’d fallen in forgotten side-tunnels and chambers, and the gnomes’ livestock and mushroom rookeries clung to life as well. The dark creatures in the depths of the gnomes’ mines waited and watched, and emerged to feed. In the stale air, those bodies not yet eaten or only partially devoured began to stir.
There were originally two groups of undead in ruined Arludas – the gnomes who arose to unlife and their human foes. Many corpses, insufficiently endowed with hate or dedication, remained lifeless, to be gathered by their respective sides and given burial.
Most of these lay deeper into the city or down in the mines. The gnomish undead also occupied most of the old fungus-chambers, where their walking corpses gradually became the growth medium of the ever-stranger fungi.
Fungus-Bearer, Gnomish Undead, Walking Corpse, Non-Zhen Gnomish Dead: ?
Free-Willed Undead: ?
Shambling Undead: ?
Troll Warrior-Sage, Undead Troll Subject, Undead Minion: ?
Undead Vermin: ?
Kobold Undead: ?
More Powerful Undead: ?
Hideous Undead: The humans broke through the gates in mere days – Gzhabakr’s fortifications had been designed to resist minor raids, not full-scale assault, and Daskinor drove his men with whips and flayings. Once inside, the massacres were swift and merciless. Gzhabakr’s priests and mindbenders gave the invaders pause, but the humans had spellcasters and mindbenders as well, and soon the smoke of corpses was seeping through cracks and fissures in the battered caverns of Gzhabakr. Daskinor personally supervised the torture of Thuguch and the other captives, while giving the town over to sack and ruin.
Daskinor and his army marched forth to smoke the wandering goblin bands from their improvised hideouts, leaving the fires of Gzhabakr to gutter fitfully beneath Athas’s twin moons. The dead of the goblin-town rested unquietly, however, soon rising as hideous undead.
Animated Corpse: ?
Undead King: ?
Undead Crodlu: ?
Seemingly Mindless Undead: ?
Thinking Undead: ?
Undead Spider: ?
Ancient Undead: ?
Undead Resident: ?
Undead Soldier: ?
Free-Willed Undead: ?
Undead Entity: ?
Harokor's Tormented: These are Harkor's Pits of Sorrow, mystical prisons for those of his undead who have displeased him. Each pit is the prison cell of one or more undead entities, though this may not be readily apparent; many have been robbed of their corporeal bodies as punishment for their crimes and left as moaning spirits for centuries.
Though ripped from different undead entities, Harkor's magic reduces them all to ghostly creatures with just a few powers left, generally those that help reinforce their misery and remind them of their endless sentences in the Pits of Sorrow
Harokor's Tormented, Tormented, Moaning Spirit, Ghostly Form, Ghostly Creature, Ghost: ?
Captured Undead: ?
Undead Warrior: ?
Undead Spectator: ?
Undead Bug: ?
Weaker Undead: ?
Naturally Powerful Undead Creature: ?
Galzu-Rach: ?
Powerful Warrior Undead: ?
Weak Undead: ?
Experimental Undead: When Rajaat, the First Sorcerer, gathered his first human students, Gretch was among them. Born into poverty, he had a passion to venture into the artistry of magic. When Rajaat divided his students into two groups, one to learn preserving magic, the other to study defiling, he placed Gretch with the former. Dabbling in the newfound craft, the young student was drawn more to destruction and death, a passion that drew him like a moth to the flame. He discovered one of his peers practicing the defiling arts and, disobeying his master's wishes, began studying the practice of defiling magic. He applied its power to further his own ends, masking his work to make it appear innocuous to those around him. For years he masqueraded as a preserver in the school of the great Rajaat, building his power slowly, steadily.
One day his experiments grew too large to mask without the sacrifice of living life-forces. Locked away in the service of Rajaat, Gretch had only his fellow students to prey upon, and in one dark moment while penning a radically experimental branch of defiling magic, he decided to make his move.
His first victim did not survive the casting of his magic, and Gretch hid the body in the wilderness. The next survived in an undead form, but the creature was flawed and dangerously insane, so Gretch secured a remote chamber in the school and chained the monster to the wall. He needed more experiments, and more lifeforces to power them. Each time Gretch learned more, but his magic was still experimental. He was the first sorcerer to dabble this deeply into the black arts, a pioneer in discovering the magical lines between life and death. Over time he created more than a dozen creatures, all by different methods, by new applications of his dark art. Nevertheless, each was disfigured, mentally unstable, or both, hidden away beneath heavy chains with the others.
Experimental Undead, Creation, Experimental Creature: ?
Ultimate Undead Being: ?
Undead S'gath Zagath: Gretch credits himself with inspiring Harkor to develop the Bugdead Accords, though he violates them whenever it is convenient – for example, his personal bodyguard is composed of dozens of undead s’thag zagath, which Gretch raised after the fiercest battles of the original bugdead assault.
Volldrager, Free-Willed Undead: ?
Shambling Horror: ?
Shansanar, Unique Undead Treant, Undead Result of an Experiment to Work Life Regeneration Through Preserver Magic, Strange Combination of Undead Animal and Unliving Plant: Shansanar (Unique Undead Treant; FoDL Ch6) is the undead result of an experiment to work life regeneration through preserver magic. The resultant creature is a strange combination of undead animal and unliving plant.
Mindless Undead Servant: ?
Undead Heavy Crodlu: ?
Undead Lizardman: ?
Undead Swamp Monster: ?
Undead Swamp Monster Xemokepper: ?
Undead Swamp Monster Vergoshilm: ?
Undead Swamp Monster D'saliq: ?
Elven Undead: ?
Incorporeal Undead: ?
Corporeal Undead: ?
Insectoid Undead: ?
Chitinous Monster: ?
Mindless Bugdead: ?
Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Bugdead Dragofly: ?
Giant Bugdead Beastfly: ?
Large Bugdead: ?
Ythag Izgr, Undead S'thag Zagath: ?
Ahnthyarka, Undead S'thag Zagath Wizard 9/Necromant 10: ?
Giant Ant Lion Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Pulp Bee Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Firefly Exoskeleton: ?
Scarlet Warden Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Dragonfly Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Bluebottle Fly Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Beastfly Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Aratha Exoskeleton: ?
Giant Termite Exoskeleton: ?
Undead Giant Worker Antloid: ?
Undead Soldier Antloid: ?
Undead Warrior Pulp Bee: ?
Undead Giant Beastfly: ?
Bugdead Soldier Antloid: ?
Warrior Exoskeleton: ?
Undead Giant Pulp Bee: ?
Undead Soldier Antloid: ?
Undead Giant Scarlet Warden: ?
Large Bugdead: ?
Undead Kank, Bugdead Kank, Heinous Undead Kank: ?
Undead Wezer: ?
Bugdead Wezer Swarm: ?
Uncontrolled Undead: ?
Intelligent Bugdead: ?
Undead Vine: ?
Undead Weed: ?
Undead Miner: ?
Medium Undead: ?
Small Insect Bugdead: ?
Swarm of Undead Min-Kanks: ?
Swarm of Undead Locusts: ?
Dead Lord: ?
Powerful Sentient Undead: ?
Sentient Undead: Before the Cataclysm, the planar researchers who were conducting experiments the Navel were using dimensional energy from the Grey as part of their experiments. This was the source of the power which helped create the corrupted demi-plane of obsidian, and when the Cataclysm and Obsidian Flow were unleashed upon these lands, all of those who were killed by it were empowered by this negative energy from the Grey. Many sentient undead have noted that this energy that pervades the Dead Lands originally animated and currently empowers them while they are within the Dead Lands, and they are uncertain as to what will happen to them if they leave for prolonged periods of time.
Undead Sprite: ?
Ghost: ?
Trapped Ghost: ?
Disturbed Ghost: ?
Ireyul, Flesh Golem Wizard 9/Necromant 5, Animated Undead, Undead Boy, Adolescent Undead: Gretch thought that his initial experiments failed because he dealt with the entire specimen. So his second sacrifice for the sake of magic took a somewhat different form, not using the few component parts that he purported to understand. These additional body parts, he reasoned, interfered with the outcome of his experiment, leaving them less than perfect in his eyes. His next experiments needed only the victim's spine, brain, and heart. Ireyul came under his watchful eyes quickly enough and was Gretch’s first successful experiment in that it resulted in an animated undead.
Ireyul was, at the time, an ambitious but young student of defiling magic in the Pristine Tower. He entered his studies earlier than most of the others, brought to the tower by his family and village, held up as an example of a brilliant student with vast potential. Rajaat's subordinates considered the matter and accepted the boy Ireyul at the young age of 15 years. Certainly no student of his age group rivaled his performance, and only a few who had spent many more years in the service of Rajaat could match him. Jealousy of the boy was rampant, and Gretch figured if he were to disappear there would be many suspects and few who wanted to pursue the matter too deeply. He ambushed the unsuspecting student outside his sleep chambers with simple charming magic, leading his victim away to his laboratory for preparation.
Gretch performed a rather primitive form of surgery, removing the required organs to use as spell components. He filled the empty spaces in Ireyul's body with sand and replaced his spine with a piece of steel. He then stitched the undead creation back together haphazardly. Gretch didn't concern himself with the details of aesthetics. His creation rose and obeyed, until the day it saw its own reflection in a pool of water.
Shadow: A collection of shadows and wraiths, disenfranchised from the humanoid undead kingdoms, unwelcome among the bugdead, call the Forbidden Mountains their home. These spirits are those of an ancient tribe of giants which once lived in Ulyan. The bare plains provided little for them to eat, however, and the giants gradually died out, long before the Cleansing Wars.
The giant tribe had called the pre-Ruin hills which originally stood here home, and it was here that they laid their tired and hungry bones as they starved to death.
Shadow, Spirit: ?
Skeleton, Simple Skeleton, Non-Thinking Skeleton, Rank-And-File Skeleton: Elsavos’s entry halls were flooded with molten obsidian during the Shining Tide, but when the wave recoiled from the cliffs, enough air reached the lower elevations to speed the cooling. As a result, the first flush of obsidian hardened rapidly and the inner chambers were not fully flooded. The obsidian also raised many of the city’s former dead to unlife, though the deterioration of the remains has resulted in most of the city’s undead being not zhen but skeletons.
Gigantic Skeleton: ?
Powerful Skeleton Steed: ?
Foul Skeleton: ?
Skeleton Warrior: ?
Skeleton Horse: ?
Shambling Skeleton: ?
Skeleton, Warrior: ?
Skeleton Archer, Warrior: ?
Giant Skeleton Bombardier: ?
Elf Skeleton Shiftwing: ?
Skeleton Champion of the Sunken Graves, Local Resident: ?
Skeleton, Mindless Builder: ?
Human Skeleton: ?
Skeleton Crodlu: ?
Skeleton Mount, Unearthly Steed: ?
Skeleton Rider, Grim Warrior: ?
Trained Skeleton Soldier: ?
Troll Skeleton: ?
Skeleton Soldier: ?
Solitary Spectral Creature: ?
Wraith: A collection of shadows and wraiths, disenfranchised from the humanoid undead kingdoms, unwelcome among the bugdead, call the Forbidden Mountains their home. These spirits are those of an ancient tribe of giants which once lived in Ulyan. The bare plains provided little for them to eat, however, and the giants gradually died out, long before the Cleansing Wars.
The giant tribe had called the pre-Ruin hills which originally stood here home, and it was here that they laid their tired and hungry bones as they starved to death.
Things changed – somewhat – in the burbling aftermath of the Obsidian Flood. The Nameless Shaman rose easily to the surface of the obsidian, and he liked what he saw. The jagged glaciers of blackglass, tumbled and razor-sharp, seemed to him a vast improvement over the hills of Ulyan. Surely all who dwelt in this land were now as dead as he and his people! Indeed, many of the giant’s people, their bones incinerated by the obsidian, rose to join him as lesser wraiths, many of them crimson-tinged through the shaman’s own taint.
Wraith, Spirit: ?
Monstrous Semi-Corporeal Wraith: The giant tribe had called the pre-Ruin hills which originally stood here home, and it was here that they laid their tired and hungry bones as they starved to death. The last giant was the tribal shaman, who fasted, sustained by his faith, as the last of his tribe died around him. As he himself perished, his spirit reached out into the Gray, and found there something hideous and terrifying. He knew not what it was, but it seemed not entirely unlike the air spirits he had worshiped in life, so he embraced its roiling red mists.
The Crimsons (ToDL, pg 28) were then young creatures, newborn as accidents of Rajaat’s magical research. The crimson, which the giant Nameless Shaman encountered in the Grey, took his soul and bonded him to it, prefiguring the t’liz bonds of times to come. The Shaman did not become a t’liz, however; he became a monstrous semi-corporeal wraith instead, his ragged, lanky corpse possessed of hideous power.
Wraith Lieutenant: ?
Weaker Wraith: ?
Wraith Overseer: ?
Wraith Taskmaster of Harkor: ?
Orcish Wraith: ?
Zombie, Simple Zombie, Non-Thinking Zombie, Rank-And-File Zombie: ?
Trollish Zombie: ?
Zombie Child: ?
Zombie Archer, Warrior: ?
Dwarf Zombie Hammer-Bearer: ?
Zombie Mason, Powerful Zombie: ?
Zombie, Mindless Builder: ?
Ancient Zombie: ?
Zombie Beast: ?
Human Zombie: ?
Trained Zombie Soldier: ?
Giant Ant Lion Zombie: ?
Giant Pulp Bee Zombie: ?
Giant Firefly Zombie: ?
Scarlet Warden Zombie: ?
Giant Dragonfly Zombie: ?
Giant Bluebottle Fly Zombie: ?
Giant Beastfly Zombie: ?
Giant Aratha Zombie: ?
Giant Termite Zombie: ?
Giant Tick Zombie: ?
Warrior Zombie: ?
Zombie Vermin: ?
Zombie Rat Swarm: ?
Zombie Soldier: ?
Dwarven Banshee: As failure has existed for as long as men have sought to accomplish tasks, so have dwarven banshees existed for as long as there have been dwarves. Gretch was the first to scientifically examine the process by which dwarven banshees were created, proving the old wives’ tales about failed foci and eternal damnation.
Dwarven Banshee Fighter 10: Led by Egendo, the humans finally broke through the dwarven troops, scaling the cliffs and conquering the empty tunnels where the dwarves had lived. Egendo realized that the mines below were where the dwarves had hidden – he had his defilers flood the mines with deadly poisonous gas, guaranteeing death to those below. Long after Egendo and his army had gone, and the deadly gas had dissipated, the dwarves placed in suspended animation awoke.
For generations the dwarf survivors lived in secret, using the old basket-pulleys and hidden caverns to furtively gather roots and grass-shoots on the plains, adding these to the meager diet of mushrooms they could grow inside. A cadre of dwarven banshees (Male and Female Dwarven Banshee Fighters 10; FoDL Ch2), raised to undeath after the sack of Toganay protected them, savagely hunting any humans who ventured too close to the cliffs near the struggling colony.
Miserable Raging Banshee: Dozens of dwarves were lured to the Grey Tower by Gretch’s false promises, and all perished, their foci unfinished and their failures condemning them to undeath. Gretch kept the miserable, raging banshees in special dungeons under his tower – once they became undead he had no interest in them, except to prevent them from escaping and damaging his reputation as a kind sage. Gretch learned much from the dwarves’ death-throes and rebirths as banshees – it was the moment and means of change that interested him, and he learned much from it.
Nophdeh, Dwarf Dwarven Banshee Rogue 13/Fighter 5: Dozens of dwarves were lured to the Grey Tower by Gretch’s false promises, and all perished, their foci unfinished and their failures condemning them to undeath. Gretch kept the miserable, raging banshees in special dungeons under his tower – once they became undead he had no interest in them, except to prevent them from escaping and damaging his reputation as a kind sage. Gretch learned much from the dwarves’ death-throes and rebirths as banshees – it was the moment and means of change that interested him, and he learned much from it.
The most powerful of the dwarves transformed to undeath under Gretch’s watchful eye was Nophdeh, a dwarf from faraway Tyr who had drifted southwards in search of his lost family – their village had been overrun by raiders, and he presumed them enslaved. Gretch’s agents had found him not far from Balic and enticed him to the Grey Tower with promises of arcane methods to search for them, but instead Nophdeh was himself chained up and “encouraged” to die, so Gretch could observe the process of life becoming unlife.
Olnakan Dwarven Banshee: ?
Pixie Blight: ?
Sprite Blight: ?
Cursed Dead, Weak Undead: ?
Dhaot: The battles of Tarktas had been fierce and many had died. Instead of building tombs for all of the fallen soldiers, those houses that were still standing were converted into tombs. A fallen soldier would be laid out on a table or bench within a home, while for an officer a stone slab would be constructed and placed within the home for the same purpose. Each soldier would be laid down with his spear placed near his right arm, and his sword near the left. The broken weapons of the Tarktas ogre defenders were placed at his feet. Each home was then sealed and an inscription carved stating the fallen soldier’s name and rank. Once the task was finished, Sielba and her army marched for the Winding Way, leaving Tarktas a necropolis.
The dead of Tarktas rested thus, undisturbed, until the Obsidian Flood buried the city, and the dead soldiers awoke as undead. Most of the dead soldiers became fallen, with a few becoming zhens and dhaots.
Fael Overseer: ?
Particularly Nasty Fael: ?
Yughbo, Ogre Fael Barbarian 15: ?
Fallen: Because of the tumbling motion of Tru’ezarr’s fall, the fort took a substantial pocket of air with it when it sank into the obsidian. The glass was already beginning to cool, and within hours Tru’ezarr Fort was suspended upside-down in its very own bubble-shaped tomb halfway between the old surface of Ulyan’s plains and the new surface atop the blackglass. It didn’t take much longer for the obsidian’s more pernicious effects to reveal themselves. Ram-azah (Male Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 6; FoDL Ch2) returned to unlife as a zhen, as did several of his lieutenants (Male Human Zhen Fighter 12; FoDL Ch2). Others emerged back from death as fallen or namech.
The battles of Tarktas had been fierce and many had died. Instead of building tombs for all of the fallen soldiers, those houses that were still standing were converted into tombs. A fallen soldier would be laid out on a table or bench within a home, while for an officer a stone slab would be constructed and placed within the home for the same purpose. Each soldier would be laid down with his spear placed near his right arm, and his sword near the left. The broken weapons of the Tarktas ogre defenders were placed at his feet. Each home was then sealed and an inscription carved stating the fallen soldier’s name and rank. Once the task was finished, Sielba and her army marched for the Winding Way, leaving Tarktas a necropolis.
The dead of Tarktas rested thus, undisturbed, until the Obsidian Flood buried the city, and the dead soldiers awoke as undead. Most of the dead soldiers became fallen, with a few becoming zhens and dhaots.
Shabnas the Last Chief, Orc Fallen Wilder 12/Fighter 14: ?
Chosen of Shabnas, Human Fallen Egoist 7/ Fighter 11: ?
Kigdifi, Orc Fallen Fighter 15: Something else occurred, however – the Obsidian Wave raised into undeath many of those who had fallen in the cleansing of Ghash-naarg, both human and orc alike. For more than a King’s Age, Shabnas struggled to reassert his mastery of the tunnels. There remain at present two clan-chiefs, Kigdifi (Female Orc Fallen Fighter 15; FoDL Ch2) and Riig-bo’ak (Male Half-Orc Zhen Barbarian 17; FoDL Ch2) resurrected by the obsidian, who reject Shabnas’s rule and occupy small sections of the inner caves.
Human Fallen Psychic Warrior 14, Fallen Champion: ?
Feylaar Fallen Psychic Warrior 13: ?
Nagarvos Gnome Fallen: ?
Orc Fallen: ?
Erthne, Ogre Fallen Fighter 17, Particularly Powerful Fallen: In the wake of the battle, the Champion’s armies marched onto Nagarvos’, leaving the corpse-strewn battlefield to the carrion-pickers from Gretch’s Grey Tower. Though few of the Champions’ troops were left unburied, the fallen from Nagarvos’ were deliberately left out to rot in the sun, and it was thus that Gretch’s necromancers found them. Erthne was one of thousands whose corpses were taken to Charnelhouse or the other undead factories for reanimation. She returned to life as a fallen, albeit an extremely powerful fallen, and because of her talent and skill she was made a general commanding the corps of undead that Gretch offered to Rajaat, when Gretch imagined that such an offering might purchase her a place among the Champions.
Eddarkols, Human Fallen Wizard 10/Necromant 8/Fighter 5: ?
Flesh Rind: The humans broke through the gates in mere days – Gzhabakr’s fortifications had been designed to resist minor raids, not full-scale assault, and Daskinor drove his men with whips and flayings. Once inside, the massacres were swift and merciless. Gzhabakr’s priests and mindbenders gave the invaders pause, but the humans had spellcasters and mindbenders as well, and soon the smoke of corpses was seeping through cracks and fissures in the battered caverns of Gzhabakr. Daskinor personally supervised the torture of Thuguch and the other captives, while giving the town over to sack and ruin.
Daskinor and his army marched forth to smoke the wandering goblin bands from their improvised hideouts, leaving the fires of Gzhabakr to gutter fitfully beneath Athas’s twin moons. The dead of the goblin-town rested unquietly, however, soon rising as hideous undead. Priest-king Thuguch rose into undeath as a khvakhas (Male Goblin Khvakhas Fighter 9 / Kineticist 4 / Cleric 4 / Psychic Theurge 5; FoDL Ch3), as did many of his more powerful advisors (Goblin Nobles; FoDL Ch3), while most of the commoners who returned appeared as flesh rinds, or flesh worms.
Flesh Rind, Hideous Undead: ?
Flesh Worm: The humans broke through the gates in mere days – Gzhabakr’s fortifications had been designed to resist minor raids, not full-scale assault, and Daskinor drove his men with whips and flayings. Once inside, the massacres were swift and merciless. Gzhabakr’s priests and mindbenders gave the invaders pause, but the humans had spellcasters and mindbenders as well, and soon the smoke of corpses was seeping through cracks and fissures in the battered caverns of Gzhabakr. Daskinor personally supervised the torture of Thuguch and the other captives, while giving the town over to sack and ruin.
Daskinor and his army marched forth to smoke the wandering goblin bands from their improvised hideouts, leaving the fires of Gzhabakr to gutter fitfully beneath Athas’s twin moons. The dead of the goblin-town rested unquietly, however, soon rising as hideous undead. Priest-king Thuguch rose into undeath as a khvakhas (Male Goblin Khvakhas Fighter 9 / Kineticist 4 / Cleric 4 / Psychic Theurge 5; FoDL Ch3), as did many of his more powerful advisors (Goblin Nobles; FoDL Ch3), while most of the commoners who returned appeared as flesh rinds, or flesh worms.
Flesh Worm, Hideous Undead: ?
Gluk'kiuk, Flesh Rind, Flesh Worm: Khvakhas (FFN Pg. 71) and gluk’kiuk (Flesh Rinds; FFN Pg. 118) are forms of undead born specifically from the methods used by Daskinor to cleanse goblin cities; though these undead types are occasionally found in places not visited by Daskinor, or among races other than goblins, they are overwhelmingly most common in former goblin holds sacked by Daskinor during the Cleansing Wars.
Daskinor ordered his men to capture goblin leaders alive if at all possible. It was his custom to torture them. Then, once he had deprived them of any useful information, he would torment them further by hanging them from the ceilings of the largest chambers in their caverns, suspended by their arms, wrists, or fingers, forced to slowly watch as his men flayed alive any common goblins – males, females, children – they had captured.
The symbolism of the hanging was deliberate – not only did it shame and mock the goblin leaders, but it pleased Daskinor’s men. He had deliberately recruited primarily mountain tribesmen into his army, men whose tribes had long histories of conflict with goblins. Many of these men believed in mountain spirits, glorifying the magnificent peaks and the skies in which they towered, so it proved easy to convince them that goblins, tunneling in darkness at the roots of these mighty mountains, were blasphemous and degenerate. Hanging the goblin leaders from the ceiling symbolically separated them from the Earth and lifted them into the sky as sacrifices to the Air spirits in which Daskinor’s primitive troops still believed.
The result of these gory executions, performed over hours or weeks (as circumstances permitted in different goblin holds), was the creation of unique forms of undead. The common goblins flayed alive often returned to unlife as gluk’kiuk, also called flesh rinds or flesh worms.
Ioramh: ?
Olnakan Ogre Ioramh: ?
Human Kaisharga Wizard 5/Necromant 8/Fighter 7, Kaisharga General: ?
Knor'morhen, Troll Kaisharga Seer 14/Expert 5, Powerful Creature: Finally, as Nuubark’s defenses reached their lowest ebb, the king relented and appointed Knor’morhen to lead a delegation to beg for peace, on any terms. As the king had foreseen, Myron was uninterested in the trolls’ surrender. He laughed in Knor’morhen’s face, and had the entire delegation tortured to death in front of the horrified leader. Knor’morhen was killed in her turn, and raised to undeath as well, so Myron could enjoy the spectacle of sending Yorg-yanak’s ambassadors back to him, his answer eloquently expressed in the corpse like shuffle of the undead.
Pandruj, Human Kaisharga Wizard 15/Necromant 10: Pandruj was with the Tetrarchs when they fled back to the psionic temples, with the Champion’s Daughters in pursuit. Rajaat’s troops finally overcame the Defenders, and Pandruj, to his shame and rage, was captured alive. Rajaat himself mocked the preserver, before turning him over to the tender mercies of Daskinor – the torture lasted more than a week, ultimately delaying Daskinor’s march to the goblin caves of central Ulyan.
Not long after the Champions marched out of Nagarvos’s desolate ruins, Pandruj emerged into unlife. His broken body was restored, and he is today a kaisharga.
Krag: ?
Kragling: ?
Khvakhas: Khvakhas (FFN Pg. 71) and gluk’kiuk (Flesh Rinds; FFN Pg. 118) are forms of undead born specifically from the methods used by Daskinor to cleanse goblin cities; though these undead types are occasionally found in places not visited by Daskinor, or among races other than goblins, they are overwhelmingly most common in former goblin holds sacked by Daskinor during the Cleansing Wars.
Daskinor ordered his men to capture goblin leaders alive if at all possible. It was his custom to torture them. Then, once he had deprived them of any useful information, he would torment them further by hanging them from the ceilings of the largest chambers in their caverns, suspended by their arms, wrists, or fingers, forced to slowly watch as his men flayed alive any common goblins – males, females, children – they had captured.
The symbolism of the hanging was deliberate – not only did it shame and mock the goblin leaders, but it pleased Daskinor’s men. He had deliberately recruited primarily mountain tribesmen into his army, men whose tribes had long histories of conflict with goblins. Many of these men believed in mountain spirits, glorifying the magnificent peaks and the skies in which they towered, so it proved easy to convince them that goblins, tunneling in darkness at the roots of these mighty mountains, were blasphemous and degenerate. Hanging the goblin leaders from the ceiling symbolically separated them from the Earth and lifted them into the sky as sacrifices to the Air spirits in which Daskinor’s primitive troops still believed.
The result of these gory executions, performed over hours or weeks (as circumstances permitted in different goblin holds), was the creation of unique forms of undead. The common goblins flayed alive often returned to unlife as gluk’kiuk, also called flesh rinds or flesh worms.
The only beings capable of sustained control over gluk’kiuk are khvakhas, undead born of the tortured deaths of the goblin leaders. Goblins elevated to positions of power, either as chiefs or priests, naturally grew curving tusks from the corners of their toothy mouths; with such an obvious physical feature, it was impossible for captured leaders to hide among common goblin prisoners. Daskinor singled the leaders out and tormented them as noted above.
Priest King Thuguch, Goblin Khvakhas Fighter 9/Kineticist 4/Cleric 4/Psychic Theurge 5, Hideous Undead: The humans broke through the gates in mere days – Gzhabakr’s fortifications had been designed to resist minor raids, not full-scale assault, and Daskinor drove his men with whips and flayings. Once inside, the massacres were swift and merciless. Gzhabakr’s priests and mindbenders gave the invaders pause, but the humans had spellcasters and mindbenders as well, and soon the smoke of corpses was seeping through cracks and fissures in the battered caverns of Gzhabakr. Daskinor personally supervised the torture of Thuguch and the other captives, while giving the town over to sack and ruin.
Daskinor and his army marched forth to smoke the wandering goblin bands from their improvised hideouts, leaving the fires of Gzhabakr to gutter fitfully beneath Athas’s twin moons. The dead of the goblin-town rested unquietly, however, soon rising as hideous undead. Priest-king Thuguch rose into undeath as a khvakhas (Male Goblin Khvakhas Fighter 9 / Kineticist 4 / Cleric 4 / Psychic Theurge 5; FoDL Ch3), as did many of his more powerful advisors (Goblin Nobles; FoDL Ch3), while most of the commoners who returned appeared as flesh rinds, or flesh worms.
Goblin Khvakhas: The humans broke through the gates in mere days – Gzhabakr’s fortifications had been designed to resist minor raids, not full-scale assault, and Daskinor drove his men with whips and flayings. Once inside, the massacres were swift and merciless. Gzhabakr’s priests and mindbenders gave the invaders pause, but the humans had spellcasters and mindbenders as well, and soon the smoke of corpses was seeping through cracks and fissures in the battered caverns of Gzhabakr. Daskinor personally supervised the torture of Thuguch and the other captives, while giving the town over to sack and ruin.
Daskinor and his army marched forth to smoke the wandering goblin bands from their improvised hideouts, leaving the fires of Gzhabakr to gutter fitfully beneath Athas’s twin moons. The dead of the goblin-town rested unquietly, however, soon rising as hideous undead. Priest-king Thuguch rose into undeath as a khvakhas (Male Goblin Khvakhas Fighter 9 / Kineticist 4 / Cleric 4 / Psychic Theurge 5; FoDL Ch3), as did many of his more powerful advisors (Goblin Nobles; FoDL Ch3), while most of the commoners who returned appeared as flesh rinds, or flesh worms.
Goblin Khvakhas, Hideous Undead: ?
Krag Gleaming Tribunal Member: ?
Meorty: Unknown to Qwith, in the catacombs below the Navel, G’dranav, the last of the Defenders, had become a meorty and had raised his fellow Defenders into undeath.
G’dranav (Male Ogre Meorty Shaper 26; FoDL Ch5) began the arduous work of reanimating his former comrades soon after the Champions left the ruins of Nagarvos’. His chasm provided a secure lair, where he could create several new meorties per year, hidden from any detection from above.
Meorty Defender: ?
G'dranav, Meorty: In a last desperate act, Defender leader G’dranav opens a chasm underneath his dead platoon and his encroaching foes, entrapping them all. As his final living act, he transforms himself into a meorty.
Ni-Angh'akh, The Hermit Majesty, Kobold Meorty Wilder 30: ?
Vengeful Meorty: ?
G'dranav, Ogre Meorty Shaper 26: The Defenders are powerful warrior undead who once guarded the Tetrarchs of Nagarvos’ against Rajaat's final assault. Their final hours of life were spent on the hastily-erected battlements of the Tetrarchs’ compound, fighting off the invaders sent, by Rajaat, to put an end to the work he had begun. The Defenders were gradually beaten back to the psionic temples by Rajaat’s attack, and though they slew many enemies, they were finally overcome. The last of the Defenders of Nagarvos’ was an immensely powerful psion named G’dranav. As he stood atop a heap of human corpses, and saw the next wave advancing, G’dranav drained the last of his strength and broke open the earth beneath his feet, creating a chasm into which he and all his fallen comrades, and many of their fallen foes, fell.
The Defenders were dwarves and ogres, armed with magical and psionic equipment created by the most powerful wizards and psions in Nagarvos’. These powerful weapons and armor are still wielded by the undead, since the chasm created by G’dranav prevented Rajaat’s minions from looting or desecrating the graves. The Defenders were unquiet in their mass grave, even before the Boiling Death, for G’dranav’s last act, when he reached the bottom of his chasm, was to transform himself into a meorty. The secrets of animating meorties were held by few in the Green Age and Time of Magic, but G’dranav had been one of only a dozen people in Nagarvos’ with the knowledge.
Raging Meorty: ?
Ancient Meorty: ?
Malwaenis, Elf Meorty Rain Cleric 11/Seer 3/Psychic Theurge 8: It was in response to these attacks that the Gathered Voice decided to take the step of creating a meorty. Many of the elves in Elsavos had left the coastal cities because they were uncomfortable with these cities’ predilection for creating undead guardians for their polities; however, after a particularly brutal invasion, in which three lizardman tribes penetrated the cavern-gates and savaged several residential quarters before being expelled, the step seemed necessary. A highly respected priest of Water named Malwaenis (Male Elf Meorty Rain Cleric 11 / Seer 3 / Psychic Theurge 8; FoDL Ch7) accepted the role, and became one of Athas’s most circumscribed meorties. His powers were no less than many others of his kind, but he was strictly limited in when he could apply them. His task was to rise in rage and smite any lizardman invasion that penetrated the outer defenses – no more and no less. One councilor suggested a minor addition, adopted by the Gathered Voice – Malwaenis would be able to act freely if an enemy threatened his own spacious quarters, which were located in a sealed cavern in the deepest recesses of the cliff behind the city.
Morg: ?
Human Morg Templar 18, Vizier's Priest, Undead Priest, Caretaker: ?
Human Morg Templar 13/Telepath 7, Vizier's Monk, Undead Monk, Caretaker: ?
Morg Lieutenant: ?
Human Morg Telepath 22: Pandruj’s transformation to unlife poisoned him against all living beings, prompting him to resurrect the fallen Tetrarchs (Male or Female Human* Morg Telepath 22; FoDL Ch5) into undeath with him.
Gretch, Human Morg Wizard 5/Shaper 5/Necromant 10/Cerebremancer 10: Life in his Grey Tower, with lengthening years, did nothing for Gretch’s health, and in a matter of years he was an aging, diseased man, surrounded by strange undead monsters of his own making. He sought immortality in the form of the ultimate undead being. Gathering everything he had learned, he put himself on the slab, to sacrifice his own lifeforce to his passion, aided by his hideous assistants. The spell was set, the components sacrificed, the incantations uttered, but something went terribly wrong. Either Gretch’s spell was imperfect, or one of his servants had made a subtle mistake. Gretch had become an immortal undead of magnificent power, but the error in casting left him with only a minimal capacity to expand his intelligence. His one dream, to forever build upon and increase his knowledge of magic, was ruined. Gretch blames all his major creations, who were present assisting in one capacity or another with his own reanimation, for the unknown error which has since stunted his fearsome intellect.
Las-ufar, Human Morg Shaper 9/Rogue 7: ?
Fnuthaar, Human Morg Kineticest 8/Ranger 7: ?
Col'raoz, Half-Giant Morg Barbarian 16: ?
Uzhgabr, Human Morg Telepath 11/Fighter 5: ?
Tol'thak the Surveyor of Olnak, Human Morg Wizard 5/Necromant 10/Nomad 5/Cerebremancer 4: The sages who came to the Grey Tower seeking answers most often received the wisdom they sought, as best as Gretch could contrive - and with his knowledge of the Tablelands, he did have much to offer, though he never mentioned Rajaat or taught the secrets of wizardry to anyone. Gretch used the sages’ visits to discover secrets of the Ulyan cities from them, and not all the sages returned to their homelands after seeing the Master of the Grey Tower. Some, it is true, died at the hands of the human nomads who roamed the plains around Gretch’s tower, but some never left the mighty fortress from which the Grey Tower rose like a stone lightning bolt.
One of these unfortunates was a scholar from the city of Olnak, south of Small Home. His name was Tol’thak, and he had come seeking knowledge of Tablelands crops that might flourish in the short, cold, growing season of Olnak. Gretch had little to offer on such a subject – agriculture had never interested him – nor could he lie, since Tol’thak was well-versed in the matter and would detect any such subterfuge. Still, Gretch wanted very much to discover all he could about Olnak, since it was one of few mostly human-populated cities in Ulyan. He killed Tol’thak with poison and reanimated him for interrogation.
Wujarrt, Human Morg Wizard 5/Necromant 2/Shaper 5/Cerebremancer 5: Wujarrt (Female Human Morg Wizard 5 / Necromant 2 / Shaper 5 / Cerebremancer 5) was a former preserver student from the Pristine Tower turned defiler during the preserver jihad. She was excited by the marching armies and personally taken by the imperious Uyness. Wujarrt enlisted in the army of Uyness and accompanied that Champion’s forces south to begin the Cleansing Wars at Nagarvos’. She distinguished herself in the Battle at Tforkatch River and again during one of the early assaults on the walls of the city. Her heroism at this latter battle was near-fatal, alas, but Uyness hoped to find magic with which to restore her valued subordinate to life and so preserved the dying Wujaart with various stasis effects.
Gretch’s spies, probably dwarven banshees, discovered the magic-enshrouded near-corpse and spirited it back to the Grey Tower, where Gretch reanimated Wujaart as a morg.
Morg Necromancer: ?
Namech: Because of the tumbling motion of Tru’ezarr’s fall, the fort took a substantial pocket of air with it when it sank into the obsidian. The glass was already beginning to cool, and within hours Tru’ezarr Fort was suspended upside-down in its very own bubble-shaped tomb halfway between the old surface of Ulyan’s plains and the new surface atop the blackglass. It didn’t take much longer for the obsidian’s more pernicious effects to reveal themselves. Ram-azah (Male Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 6; FoDL Ch2) returned to unlife as a zhen, as did several of his lieutenants (Male Human Zhen Fighter 12; FoDL Ch2). Others emerged back from death as fallen or namech.
Namech, Weak Undead: ?
Powerful Raaig: ?
Yorg-Yanak, Troll Raaig Wilder 15/Silt Cleric 10, Former Philosopher-King, Cruel and Domineering Ruler: ?
Harkor The Reborn, Human Raaig Wizard 14/Necromant 10, Wicked Raaig: ?
Servant of Harkor, Harkor's Servant, Raaig, Ghostly Undead Creature, Incorporeal Wraith, Creature of Ambition, Jealous Wraith: ?
Dwarven Raaig: ?
Chimera Raiig, Strange Raiig: The Shining Tide buried their lands and herds under a thick plate of obsidian. The chimeras, too, were wiped out, though the most savage and evil of them rose, under the living power of the elemental obsidian, to wander the surface as strange raaigs.
Racked Spirit: ?
Pixie Racked Spirit Telepath 8: ?
Forest Gnome Racked Spirit Druid 6/Blighted 5: ?
Gnome Racked Spirit Fighter 9: ?
Nafrai, Racked Spirit Silt Cleric 15: ?
Oskyar, Human Racked Spirit Wizard 11/Necromant 10/Nomad 5/Crebremancer 3: Before creating Osykar, Gretch put in several years of intensive study. His failure with Ireyul, and the many months lost trying to correct his abnormal behavior, were things he did not want to repeat. Surgical techniques, he decided, were not his forte, nor were they absolutely necessary. Not wanting to renew suspicion by taking another life, Gretch scavenged the body of Oskyar, an apprentice at the Pristine Tower who was mortally wounded in an unfortunate magical accident involving time. The body, he reasoned, wouldn't be missed, though the nature of the subject's death proved to be the experiment's undoing.
Locked away in secrecy, Gretch combined the new magic he had invented with folklore from the surrounding communities about the nature of undeath. Oskyar (Human Racked Spirit Wizard 11 / Necromant 10 / Nomad 5 / Cerebremancer 3; FoDL Ch6) animated flawlessly, a fine, strong, handsome specimen without blemish, or so his creator thought. He celebrated and spent months studying his new creation, putting Oskyar through his paces, educating him in literature and etiquette. Several years passed before Gretch noted a marked decline in his subject's ability to retain information. The necromancer locked himself away, burning candles to their nubs in the late hours, trying to correct the problem while Oskyar continued to regress. To his horror, Gretch discovered that Rajaat's magical disaster had altered Oskyar's physical form and forever slowed his mind. Despite promising beginnings, Oskyar sunk to the level of an imbecile and Gretch could do nothing to stop it.
Still, Oskyar had the ability to grow, however slowly, and this he hid from Gretch. His intelligence grew once more, over the centuries, as Oskyar developed the habit of playing the fool for Gretch. Yet Osykar could not hide his abilities forever.
Gretch, a genius relegated to reworking the knowledge he obtained in life over and over, now watches while his “imbecilic” creation moves on, helpless to catch him. Oskyar is now Gretch's nemesis, a constant reminder of what he is doomed never to experience again, a hapless metaphor for his own tragic existence.
Ceeryl, Human Racked Spirit Wizard 5/Necromant 7/Shaper 5/Cerebremancer 3/Druid 4: Ceeryl was a woman of exceptional beauty. Gretch worked with her on a number of occasions, seeking vegetable spell components from the Pristine Tower’s extensive gardens. His desire for her grew with each meeting. When she vowed to wed another, Gretch nobly bowed out silently and allowed her happiness. Yet, when she died several years later, at a young age and of an unexpected disease, Gretch could not resist the chance of bringing her back, through reanimation, to become his bride. Surely, she would be so grateful that her latent admiration for him would blossom to full-fledged love.
Growing older, Gretch fully expected to turn, one day, to undeath to continue his work. Suddenly, dreams of an eternity with his beloved Ceeryl blocked his already questionable judgment. He hired unscrupulous men to exhume her corpse and bring it to his laboratory, where he employed the most sophisticated magic he had yet devised. Ceeryl’s body was perfectly preserved, despite her death, for she had secretly dabbled in druidry while tending the gardens. The reanimation went perfectly and Gretch treasured their companionship.
Olnakan Gnome Racked Spirit: ?
Rubiza’if-in-Pain, Unique Rampager: ?
Nocwis, Human Thinking Skeleton Fighter 15, Lesser Creation: Nocwis (Human Thinking Skeleton Fighter 15; FoDL Ch6) is the name Gretch gave to one of his lesser creations, animated from skeletal remains bought from caravan merchants from a distant land.
Elven Venger: ?
T'Liz: ?
Human T'liz Wizard 9/Necromant 8, Negotiator, Powerful T'liz: ?
Chuul, Human T'liz Wizard 16/Necromant 2: Encouraged by his success with Oskyar, at least in so far as the reanimation process, Gretch quickly moved on to procure another subject. Unwilling to wait for another accident, he set up one of his own, choosing another student, Chuul, to take the fall. He arranged a simple mishap, the collapse of a balcony on the observatory level, a fall sufficient to kill but not serious enough to mutilate the corpse. The time came, the accident occurred, and none were the wiser, but Gretch's choice was certainly not random. Chuul was a rival for the affections of a young lady, also in the Tower. Gretch’s dubious motives would haunt him.
Gretch cast spells of his creation, performed perfectly, and Chuul (Male Human T’liz Wizard 16 / Necromant 2; FoDL Ch6) proved to be everything Oskyar was not. He learned quickly, retained information, and built upon his knowledge without his master's aid or encouragement.
Gnome Venger Fighter 9: ?
Gorl-Ik, Viceregent of Aagnikh, Kobold Venger Wilder 15/Fighter 8: As Sacha and his men departed, the grip of undeath upon the most dedicated of the dead raised them to unlife.
Athasian Wraith: Because of the tumbling motion of Tru’ezarr’s fall, the fort took a substantial pocket of air with it when it sank into the obsidian. The glass was already beginning to cool, and within hours Tru’ezarr Fort was suspended upside-down in its very own bubble-shaped tomb halfway between the old surface of Ulyan’s plains and the new surface atop the blackglass. It didn’t take much longer for the obsidian’s more pernicious effects to reveal themselves. Ram-azah (Male Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 6; FoDL Ch2) returned to unlife as a zhen, as did several of his lieutenants (Male Human Zhen Fighter 12; FoDL Ch2). Others emerged back from death as fallen or namech. But the walls of the fort also were raised to unlife – the ogres whose bodies and blood had been mixed into the stonework became Athasian wraiths, able to reach out and torment their human foes (FoDL Ch2).
Human Athasian Wraith Fighter 12: ?
Sentinel of Death, Human Athasian Wraith Wizard 10/Necromant 7: ?
Zhen: In his urgency Nakkash decided to try to access the Paraelemental Plane of Magma. He was careless in his haste - he reached the “Demiplane of Obsidian” instead. Calling Ur-hafri to help him, Nakkash began to apply some of the new spells he had developed for taming the obsidian. One, then another, obsidian elemental came forth - the defilers sent them out to fight. Yet the battle was still going against Qwith's researchers: clearly a much larger elemental was needed. Heedlessly Nakkash and Ur-hafri started trying to enlarge the gate, succeeding both in increasing its size and drawing forth an enormous elemental.
Ur-hafri directed the massive obsidian elemental out of the summoning chamber, into the courtyard where it waded into the fray, striking down meorty Defenders and Qwith's defilers with equal fury. At the same time, Pandruj and the Tetrarchs, also raised to undeath, saw their chance for revenge and attacked. In the confusion, many of Pandruj’s and G’dranav’s followers attacked each other as well as Qwith’s servants.
Ur-hafri escaped the sudden attack of Pandruj and his undead, returning to the chamber to find Nakkash desperately trying to regain control of the gate - the experimental magicks he and Ur-hafri had used to expand it had rendered it unstable, pulsing with energy, like a living thing. The two men tried, and failed, to reassert control. The first of the burning roofing beams crashed down, crushing Ur-hafri's skull.
What happened next has never been completely explained, and the memories of all the undead who were there are now hopelessly entangled with fiction and self-delusion, so the truth may never be known. Nakkash maintains that his summoning spells performed correctly, and should have stabilized the gate. Qwith long blamed herself, believing that she should have supervised her apprentices more closely, since one of them obviously miscalculated the summoning. Gretch once claimed that he was responsible. In an instant of decisive summoning, the gate was accidentally opened fully to the supposed “demiplane,” with explosive results - the gate shattered.
Millions of tons of molten obsidian poured into the compound, cresting the walls and sweeping aside defilers and Defenders alike. The obsidian, smoking and gurgling, flooded through the city from the magical portal. No one escaped. Outside the city walls, beyond the ring of ruins of old Nagarvos', the farmers and laborers who served Qwith were distracted by the screams of battle, but relaxed when silence fell - clearly another experiment had just failed, and been contained. When the black wave burst out of the city walls and overwhelmed them, the obsidian was utterly silent, rushing over the land.
It also poured into the Pallid Mere, the salty sea stretching north to south on the eastern side of the Navel which once had been the Sagramog swamps, gushing down the escarpment in a terrible cascade. Gouts of steam roiled up, the sea flash-boiled by the molten obsidian. Great bergs of obsidian were frozen instantly as they crashed into the sea, but more kept coming, a waterfall of death that even the sea itself could not quench. The Pallid Mere boiled, sending forth thick clouds of salty spume, blown east by the suddenly savage winds. The chunks of obsidian, tumbling in the rushing tide, pushed to the southeast, coming to rest on the southeastern shores of the Pallid Mere in mounded walls of fractured blackglass.
The obsidian consumed the sea, bubbling and foaming as it boiled the water into briny steam. It also devoured the land, flowing west and north, burning and burying everyone and everything in its path. The wave was faster than the news – few were aware of sudden death before it closed over them, its black glassy maw enfolding all of Ulyan. The Hoarwall, that great wall of ice which had for millenia marked the southern extent of the known world, repelled the first wave of obsidian, acting as a levee running east to west east to west and dividing the Black Basin from the Zagath homeland to the south. The obsidian, like a hungry predator, would not be denied its prey. It grew taller and stronger as the gate pumped ever more molten glass into Athas, and flooded over the Hoarwall, rushing south to consume the cold lands of the deep reaches.
When the obsidian cooled, it formed a vast basin of blackglass, hundreds of miles across. Both the Navel and the ruins of Nagarvos upon which it had been built were utterly buried. None of the wizards survived, and their research perished with them.
But then, the dead wizards gradually arose. The obsidian which poured through the gate from the Paraelemental Plane of Magma and the negative energy which infected it extracted a strange toll on those who died under its influence – it bound them to the Prime Material Plane as undead. So Qwith and all of Rajaat's minions and those of the city rose in undead form as zhen, a name imprinted on their minds when they awoke, to become the eventual rulers and servants of this new land. Nearly all those slain in the deadly tide rose as undead, though not all were zhen.
Choked closed by hardened glass and the stubborn roots of the Seventh Tree, the accidental gate to the demiplane still exists beneath The City of a Thousand Dead. Because the gate is still open, heroes who die in the Dead Lands are likely to return to unlife as zhen.
Let it be said that no death is final in the Dead Land. Every being killed will rise again, sometimes mere seconds after death occurs. But the negative energy still lingering in the obsidian also has an effect on those living things that die here of other causes. Living humanoids or animals which die in the Dead Lands who are touching the obsidian will arise 24 hours later as a zhen or other appropriate type of undead (depending on who or what killed them).
161st King's Age (-2,258)
Ral’s Fury (-2,258): A fight over the Gate breaks it, creating a leak into the Obsidian Demiplane. The Gate explodes, releasing the flow of obsidian that would claim the entirety of Ulyan and the surrounding lands. Thus, the Boiling Ruin begins. Rajaat himself presumes all lost and refocuses all attention on the by now so-called Cleansing Wars.
What happens after the explosion is hard to determine – all factions have a different story. However, the Gate is blocked by an unknown entity a short time after it opens, preventing the flood from covering the entire continent, including the Tablelands. The Zagath Hoarwall has melted down.
Silt’s Contemplation (-2,250): The obsidian finally settles and cools.
Enemy’s Vengeance (-2,249): The first zhen (see Terrors of the Dead Lands, page 75) claw their way out of the obsidian, discovering a barren land of blackglass. Nearly all slain in the Boiling Ruin rose as undead, but not all as zhen.
For generations the dwarf survivors lived in secret, using the old basket-pulleys and hidden caverns to furtively gather roots and grass-shoots on the plains, adding these to the meager diet of mushrooms they could grow inside. A cadre of dwarven banshees (Male and Female Dwarven Banshee Fighters 10; FoDL Ch2), raised to undeath after the sack of Toganay protected them, savagely hunting any humans who ventured too close to the cliffs near the struggling colony. However, the dwarven banshees could not protect the pitiful survivors when the Obsidian Wave came, in silent splendor, from the east.
The splash of the Black Tide against the cliff face left a thin coating of obsidian sealing all the entrances to the dwarven colony. The banshees struggled to break through it, so their living wards could get air, but the molten obsidian surged back, and another, thicker, coat of blackglass defeated their efforts. All the living dwarves perished of asphyxiation, and nearly all of them rose into undeath as zhen.
The obsidian had more deleterious effects yet, for many of the laboriously collected and buried dead, both human (Bold of Sacha - Stone Guard; FoDL Ch3) and kobold, rose under the obsidian spell as zhen.
Those who worked in and around the Navel at the time of the Shining Tide were destroyed, then resurrected by the obsidian as zhen.
The Daughters fought well against the last guard of Nagarvos’, such that Rajaat directed that they be buried with full honor and all their equipment. Their tomb was outside the walls, since Rajaat decreed that the land of the city was impure, having so long been home to such a disgusting mélange of races and creeds. Those who lived and worked in the Navel or its outposts often recall the monument with pride – if its gleaming marble pillars survived the Shining Tide, they are now buried deep under the blackglass.
The fallen Daughters rested in these graves until the obsidian exploded outwards and created the Dead Lands, reanimating them as zhen.
The Hungry Ghosts (See Hungry Ghosts; FoDL Ch5) were extremely effective, but it was difficult to infiltrate them past the potent psionic and arcane defenses erected by the Tetrarchs and others in Nagarvos’, so their numbers were always few. Nonetheless, the Ghosts scored some notable successes, despite suffering considerable casualties. Kalid-Ma declared, both for morale purposes and to ensure the secrecy of his effort, that all those Ghosts slain in Nagarvos’ be removed when their teams were exfiltrated. The bodies were buried with much ceremony, in a consecrated plot, inside Kalid-Ma’s camp.
Here the corpses remained for long years, years which saw the fall and ruin of Nagarvos’ and the establishment of the Navel. The Obsidian Boil, which destroyed the Navel, raised the dead of the Hungry Ghosts as zhen.
Tol’thak returned to consciousness to realize that he had not yet died the true death, but was merely entombed in solid obsidian. He laboriously broke free, however – scholars are by nature patient people – and then began liberating his remaining subjects from the blackglass. Marshaling his survivors was unexpectedly difficult, for those who had been alive when the obsidian hit were resurrected into undeath as zhen, a new creature over which Tol’thak had to demonstrate his mastery.
The battles of Tarktas had been fierce and many had died. Instead of building tombs for all of the fallen soldiers, those houses that were still standing were converted into tombs. A fallen soldier would be laid out on a table or bench within a home, while for an officer a stone slab would be constructed and placed within the home for the same purpose. Each soldier would be laid down with his spear placed near his right arm, and his sword near the left. The broken weapons of the Tarktas ogre defenders were placed at his feet. Each home was then sealed and an inscription carved stating the fallen soldier’s name and rank. Once the task was finished, Sielba and her army marched for the Winding Way, leaving Tarktas a necropolis.
The dead of Tarktas rested thus, undisturbed, until the Obsidian Flood buried the city, and the dead soldiers awoke as undead. Most of the dead soldiers became fallen, with a few becoming zhens and dhaots.
Jush-Esgar moved his people outside the original city walls when undead began to be a problem, constructing a New Town adjacent to the old. Everyone there was killed when the Black Tide overwhelmed the city, though Jush-Esgar (Male Human Zhen Psychic Warrior 22; FoDL Ch7) and many of his subjects emerged afterwards as zhen.
Grand Duchess Qwith, Human Zhen Wizard 20/Necromant 10, Powerful Zhen: In his urgency Nakkash decided to try to access the Paraelemental Plane of Magma. He was careless in his haste - he reached the “Demiplane of Obsidian” instead. Calling Ur-hafri to help him, Nakkash began to apply some of the new spells he had developed for taming the obsidian. One, then another, obsidian elemental came forth - the defilers sent them out to fight. Yet the battle was still going against Qwith's researchers: clearly a much larger elemental was needed. Heedlessly Nakkash and Ur-hafri started trying to enlarge the gate, succeeding both in increasing its size and drawing forth an enormous elemental.
Ur-hafri directed the massive obsidian elemental out of the summoning chamber, into the courtyard where it waded into the fray, striking down meorty Defenders and Qwith's defilers with equal fury. At the same time, Pandruj and the Tetrarchs, also raised to undeath, saw their chance for revenge and attacked. In the confusion, many of Pandruj’s and G’dranav’s followers attacked each other as well as Qwith’s servants.
Ur-hafri escaped the sudden attack of Pandruj and his undead, returning to the chamber to find Nakkash desperately trying to regain control of the gate - the experimental magicks he and Ur-hafri had used to expand it had rendered it unstable, pulsing with energy, like a living thing. The two men tried, and failed, to reassert control. The first of the burning roofing beams crashed down, crushing Ur-hafri's skull.
What happened next has never been completely explained, and the memories of all the undead who were there are now hopelessly entangled with fiction and self-delusion, so the truth may never be known. Nakkash maintains that his summoning spells performed correctly, and should have stabilized the gate. Qwith long blamed herself, believing that she should have supervised her apprentices more closely, since one of them obviously miscalculated the summoning. Gretch once claimed that he was responsible. In an instant of decisive summoning, the gate was accidentally opened fully to the supposed “demiplane,” with explosive results - the gate shattered.
Millions of tons of molten obsidian poured into the compound, cresting the walls and sweeping aside defilers and Defenders alike. The obsidian, smoking and gurgling, flooded through the city from the magical portal. No one escaped. Outside the city walls, beyond the ring of ruins of old Nagarvos', the farmers and laborers who served Qwith were distracted by the screams of battle, but relaxed when silence fell - clearly another experiment had just failed, and been contained. When the black wave burst out of the city walls and overwhelmed them, the obsidian was utterly silent, rushing over the land.
It also poured into the Pallid Mere, the salty sea stretching north to south on the eastern side of the Navel which once had been the Sagramog swamps, gushing down the escarpment in a terrible cascade. Gouts of steam roiled up, the sea flash-boiled by the molten obsidian. Great bergs of obsidian were frozen instantly as they crashed into the sea, but more kept coming, a waterfall of death that even the sea itself could not quench. The Pallid Mere boiled, sending forth thick clouds of salty spume, blown east by the suddenly savage winds. The chunks of obsidian, tumbling in the rushing tide, pushed to the southeast, coming to rest on the southeastern shores of the Pallid Mere in mounded walls of fractured blackglass.
The obsidian consumed the sea, bubbling and foaming as it boiled the water into briny steam. It also devoured the land, flowing west and north, burning and burying everyone and everything in its path. The wave was faster than the news – few were aware of sudden death before it closed over them, its black glassy maw enfolding all of Ulyan. The Hoarwall, that great wall of ice which had for millenia marked the southern extent of the known world, repelled the first wave of obsidian, acting as a levee running east to west east to west and dividing the Black Basin from the Zagath homeland to the south. The obsidian, like a hungry predator, would not be denied its prey. It grew taller and stronger as the gate pumped ever more molten glass into Athas, and flooded over the Hoarwall, rushing south to consume the cold lands of the deep reaches.
When the obsidian cooled, it formed a vast basin of blackglass, hundreds of miles across. Both the Navel and the ruins of Nagarvos upon which it had been built were utterly buried. None of the wizards survived, and their research perished with them.
But then, the dead wizards gradually arose. The obsidian which poured through the gate from the Paraelemental Plane of Magma and the negative energy which infected it extracted a strange toll on those who died under its influence – it bound them to the Prime Material Plane as undead. So Qwith and all of Rajaat's minions and those of the city rose in undead form as zhen, a name imprinted on their minds when they awoke, to become the eventual rulers and servants of this new land. Nearly all those slain in the deadly tide rose as undead, though not all were zhen.
Ram-Azah, Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 6: Because of the tumbling motion of Tru’ezarr’s fall, the fort took a substantial pocket of air with it when it sank into the obsidian. The glass was already beginning to cool, and within hours Tru’ezarr Fort was suspended upside-down in its very own bubble-shaped tomb halfway between the old surface of Ulyan’s plains and the new surface atop the blackglass. It didn’t take much longer for the obsidian’s more pernicious effects to reveal themselves. Ram-azah (Male Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 6; FoDL Ch2) returned to unlife as a zhen, as did several of his lieutenants (Male Human Zhen Fighter 12; FoDL Ch2).
Human Zhen Fighter 12: Because of the tumbling motion of Tru’ezarr’s fall, the fort took a substantial pocket of air with it when it sank into the obsidian. The glass was already beginning to cool, and within hours Tru’ezarr Fort was suspended upside-down in its very own bubble-shaped tomb halfway between the old surface of Ulyan’s plains and the new surface atop the blackglass. It didn’t take much longer for the obsidian’s more pernicious effects to reveal themselves. Ram-azah (Male Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 6; FoDL Ch2) returned to unlife as a zhen, as did several of his lieutenants (Male Human Zhen Fighter 12; FoDL Ch2).
Lunikra Brokennose, Dwarf Zhen Sun Cleric 24: For generations the dwarf survivors lived in secret, using the old basket-pulleys and hidden caverns to furtively gather roots and grass-shoots on the plains, adding these to the meager diet of mushrooms they could grow inside. A cadre of dwarven banshees (Male and Female Dwarven Banshee Fighters 10; FoDL Ch2), raised to undeath after the sack of Toganay protected them, savagely hunting any humans who ventured too close to the cliffs near the struggling colony. However, the dwarven banshees could not protect the pitiful survivors when the Obsidian Wave came, in silent splendor, from the east.
The splash of the Black Tide against the cliff face left a thin coating of obsidian sealing all the entrances to the dwarven colony. The banshees struggled to break through it, so their living wards could get air, but the molten obsidian surged back, and another, thicker, coat of blackglass defeated their efforts. All the living dwarves perished of asphyxiation, and nearly all of them rose into undeath as zhen.
Recalcitrant Zhen Undead: For generations the dwarf survivors lived in secret, using the old basket-pulleys and hidden caverns to furtively gather roots and grass-shoots on the plains, adding these to the meager diet of mushrooms they could grow inside. A cadre of dwarven banshees (Male and Female Dwarven Banshee Fighters 10; FoDL Ch2), raised to undeath after the sack of Toganay protected them, savagely hunting any humans who ventured too close to the cliffs near the struggling colony. However, the dwarven banshees could not protect the pitiful survivors when the Obsidian Wave came, in silent splendor, from the east.
The splash of the Black Tide against the cliff face left a thin coating of obsidian sealing all the entrances to the dwarven colony. The banshees struggled to break through it, so their living wards could get air, but the molten obsidian surged back, and another, thicker, coat of blackglass defeated their efforts. All the living dwarves perished of asphyxiation, and nearly all of them rose into undeath as zhen.
Bangad the Founder, Dwarf Zhen Fighter 27: For generations the dwarf survivors lived in secret, using the old basket-pulleys and hidden caverns to furtively gather roots and grass-shoots on the plains, adding these to the meager diet of mushrooms they could grow inside. A cadre of dwarven banshees (Male and Female Dwarven Banshee Fighters 10; FoDL Ch2), raised to undeath after the sack of Toganay protected them, savagely hunting any humans who ventured too close to the cliffs near the struggling colony. However, the dwarven banshees could not protect the pitiful survivors when the Obsidian Wave came, in silent splendor, from the east.
The splash of the Black Tide against the cliff face left a thin coating of obsidian sealing all the entrances to the dwarven colony. The banshees struggled to break through it, so their living wards could get air, but the molten obsidian surged back, and another, thicker, coat of blackglass defeated their efforts. All the living dwarves perished of asphyxiation, and nearly all of them rose into undeath as zhen.
Riig Bo'ak, Half-Orc Zhen Barbarian 17: Something else occurred, however – the Obsidian Wave raised into undeath many of those who had fallen in the cleansing of Ghash-naarg, both human and orc alike. For more than a King’s Age, Shabnas struggled to reassert his mastery of the tunnels. There remain at present two clan-chiefs, Kigdifi (Female Orc Fallen Fighter 15; FoDL Ch2) and Riig-bo’ak (Male Half-Orc Zhen Barbarian 17; FoDL Ch2) resurrected by the obsidian, who reject Shabnas’s rule and occupy small sections of the inner caves.
Cairnborn, Cairn-Born, Human Zhen Telepath 7/Wizard 5/Necromant 3/Cerebremancer 5: Dodam had bigger problems. A fissure in the ceiling of the gnomish great hall had allowed an oozing tendril of obsidian to flow down and pool over the cairn of human dead. Dodam’s honor guard (Male Human Athasian Wraith Fighter 12; FoDL Ch2) fled for their unlives as the corpses within, reborn as zhen, clawed their way out.
Zhen Gleaming Tribunal Member: ?
Zhen Disciple Priest: ?
Zhen Disciple Wizard: ?
Zhen Disciple Psion: ?
Zhen Disciple Warrior: ?
Namech Servant:?
Zhen Disciple Marthagos: ?
Zhen Disciple PriestNarthguk: ?
Human Zhen Rain Cleric 16, Undead Priest: The islands remained a ruin, venerated from afar by the surviving humans on the lakeshore, until the time of the Black Tide. The obsidian covered part of the island, but left about half of it, along with most of the temple precinct, exposed, in the same air pocket as the Fouled Sea. In fact the black waters lap against the shore of what remains of Nolak Island, and the priests have resumed their labors. No longer mortals, or dedicated to Water, the priests were raised by the obsidian as zhen and now they labor for their own purposes.
Troll Zhen Rain Cleric 16: The islands remained a ruin, venerated from afar by the surviving humans on the lakeshore, until the time of the Black Tide. The obsidian covered part of the island, but left about half of it, along with most of the temple precinct, exposed, in the same air pocket as the Fouled Sea. In fact the black waters lap against the shore of what remains of Nolak Island, and the priests have resumed their labors. No longer mortals, or dedicated to Water, the priests were raised by the obsidian as zhen and now they labor for their own purposes.
Troll Zhen Rain Cleric 16, Undead Priest: ?
Formerly Human Zhen: The Black Flood, when it came, encased the ruins in obsidian, covering all but the tallest of Nuubark’s broken towers. It did not slay Yorg-yanak (Male Troll Raaig Wilder 15 / Silt Cleric 10; FoDL Ch3) or his undead minions (Male and Female Troll Warrior-Sages; FoDL Ch3), but raised many more of the city’s unquiet dead as zhen. Many of the zhen were human, once warriors and defilers of Myron’s army – these rejected Yorg-yanak’s rule, but the savage troll king was able to force many of them to allegiance all the same.
The only non-troll inhabitants of the cave like barely-excavated streets of Nuubark are the small cadre of formerly human zhen that were created by the Shining Tide.
Khasti Rasiim, Human Zhen Fighter 5/Barbarian 15, Zhen Warlord: ?
Bael Asim, Human Zhen Barbarian 24, Zhen Warlord: ?
Tatia Ached, Human Zhen Ranger 20/Wilder 5, Zhen Warlord: ?
Inbed Ached, Human Zhen Barbarian 24, Zhen Warlord: ?
Hazzi Shalil, Human Zhen Fighter 5/Wilder 18, Zhen Warlord: ?
The Vizier, Kulrath, Human Zhen Wizard 16/Necromant 10, Ancient Zhen, Undead Prince: ?
Rhokan, Human Zhen Wizard 17/Necromant 7, Great Zhen: ?
Praetor, Human Zhen Psionic Warrior 22: ?
Centurion, Human Zhen Wizard 10/Necromant 2: ?
Zhen, Undead Necromancer: ?
Thikwasa, Human Zhen Kineticist 26: ?
Ohl-numash, Human T'liz Wizard 18: ?
Traleev-eso, Human Zhen Wizard 12/Necromant 10: ?
Magnwag, Human Zhen Wizard 15/Necromant 1: ?
Negchar, Human Zhen Wizard 15/Necromant 1/Magma Cleric 3/Mystic Theurge 10: ?
Ac'nac'wo, Human Zhen Wizard 8/Necromant 6/Shaper 5/Cerebremancer 10: ?
Munavar, Human Zhen Magma Cleric 21: ?
Cheltagthwo, Human Zhen Shaper 17: ?
Zaprarus No-iim, Human Zhen Wizard 18/Necromant 5: ?
Djelj, Human Zhen Kineticist 25: ?
Sinker Kasgat, Human Zhen Wizard 20/Necromant 4: ?
Ulariss, Human Zhen Wizard 17/Necromant 5: ?
Ruuknis, Human Zhen Wizard 23/Necromant 3: ?
Ebliriok, Human Zhen Wizard 17/Necromant 4: ?
Wasagar, Human Zhen Wizard 6/Necromant 1/Nomad 7/Creebremancer 10: ?
Pwiskathi Bone-Eyes, Human Zhen Seer 21: ?
Abak-Enawi, Human Zhen Egoist 24: ?
Kakraz the Putrid, Human Zhen Wizard 6/Necromant 4/Shaper 6/Cerebremancer 9: ?
Hashbru E'abriz, Human Zhen Wizard 19/Necromant 3: ?
Human Zhen Cleric 16: ?
Human Zhen Nomad 15: ?
Human Zhen Wizard 15/Necromant 1: ?
Nukra-dzif, Human Zhen Wilder 15/Rogue 15: ?
Quansak One-Ear, Human Zhen Rogue 7/Fighter 14: ?
Jishashagar No-Footfall, Human Zhen Rogue 22: ?
Redsmile Rog, Human Zhen Rogue 7/Psychic Warrior 13: ?
Powerful Zhen: ?
Guinswai the Forbidding, Human Zhen Wizard 11/Necromant 10, Intimidating and Enterprising Zhen Necromancer: ?
Vassahi Eomwa, Elf Zhen Nomad 25: ?
Feylaar Zhen Fighter 10: ?
Olnakan Human Zhen: ?
D'thul, Human Zhen Wizard 5/Telepath 6/Necromant 10/Cerebremancer 7: ?
Lightweight Zhen: ?
Jush-Esgar, Human Zhen Psychic Warrior 22: Jush-Esgar moved his people outside the original city walls when undead began to be a problem, constructing a New Town adjacent to the old. Everyone there was killed when the Black Tide overwhelmed the city, though Jush-Esgar (Male Human Zhen Psychic Warrior 22; FoDL Ch7) and many of his subjects emerged afterwards as zhen.
Human Zhen: ?
Thinking Zombie Earth Drake: King’s Ages ago, an earth drake wandered by and discovered the Winding Way. It made a lair out of a tunnel near the top of the road. When the creature died the negative energies of the Obsidian Plain reanimated it as a thinking zombie.
Thinking Zombie Earth Drake, Undead Earth Drake: ?
Dodam Linas, Human Thinking Zombie Wizard 15/Necromant 3: ?
Gnome Thinking Zombie Telepath 15: ?
Gnome Thinking Zombie Magma Cleric 15: ?
Gnome Thinking Zombie Fighter 9: ?
Kuo'chthan, Thri-Kreen Thinking Zombie Fighter 7/Psychic Warrior 13: Eager to attempt his defiling magic on an intelligent non humanoid, Gretch saw the thri-kreen as suitable subjects. He selected Kuo'chthan from among the others, knowing that of all of them he would be traveling alone to return to his homeland. Gretch poisoned Kuo'chthan at the ceremonial send-off, introducing a slow-acting agent into his food. Gretch hired thugs to track the thri-kreen, collect the corpse, still fresh but two days travel distant, and return to his laboratory.
The defiler cast the same dark spells on Kuo'chthan that he had on his humanoid victims, curious to see how the magic would permeate the insect's form. The corpse animated as expected, becoming the first thri-kreen zombie on Athas, and Gretch discovered that the monster was easier to command and control than his humanoid forebears. However, the first to practice the dark art was also the first to experience the bane of the bugdead: their minds are unable to cope with the evil thrust upon them, turning them, instead, to utter madness.
Kiwk, Feylaar Thinking Zombie Psychic Warrior 17: Gretch sometimes tampered with the possibilities of reanimating dead creatures whose origins were themselves magical. Virtually all of these experiments ended in failure, except for Kiwk, a feylaar from a small tribe trapped and killed on Gretch’s request.
Olnakan Halfling Thinking Zombie: ?
The Razor, Thinking Zombie Fighter 15: ?
Thinking Zombie Overseer: ?
