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Lands of Deepearth	-	-	-	DSG

Geography: This is a region of living caves. A map of the area
would resemble a spiderweb, with all of the peripheral caves
leading down toward a huge cavern in the center. While enough
water trickles through these caves to add lustre to the cave formations,
it does not gather sufficient volume to float even a
kayak. Instead, the water is generally encountered in the form of
thick, cold mud.

The central chamber has access to no less than 12 connecting
passages, each of which carries a slow trickle of mud. The chamber
itself contains a monstrous reservoir of thick mud, measuring
some 300 feet deep and nearly a mile across. Even though it continually
flows into the chamber, the mud level has remained constant
for centuries.

Denizens: Several intelligent races have staked out their
realms in different portions of these dark chambers. The alien
culture of the cloakers, once prolific throughout Deepearth, has
been driven into a narrow region of a few dozen caverns. The
mind flayers hold more territory, and roughly a third of this entire
region falls under their evil dominion. Several small communities
of derro hold sway over localized caverns that are always well
defended.

There are many monsters here-virtually every creature of
darkness is represented. Since many of the caverns making up
the Dark Realms are not claimed by any intelligent race, they

have become the domains of slimes, oozes, jellies, animated
fungi, scavengers, and all the other unintelligent creatures that
prowl the Underdark in search of prey.

A hundred or more denizens of the Plane of Earth cluster near
the center of the Dark Realms, where their escape route is always
near (see Unique Features). Earth elementals are the most
numerous, but xorn, crysmal, galeb duhr, chaggrin, and dao may
also be encountered in the area. These earth creatures unite to
defend against any threat to the vortex leading to their plane.

Resources: The air in the Dark Realms is generally stale and
foul-smelling. While the water supply is sufficient to keep the air
humid, and to provide drinking water for creatures not particular
about its quality, it could not support a community of more
humanoid inhabitants.

There is a great deal of mineral wealth here, nearly all of it
unexploited. While the areas around the vortex have been thoroughly
scavenged by the creatures from the Plane of Earth (particularly
the crysmal), the rest of the Dark Realms offers a wide
variety of gems and precious metals for the intrepid miner. The
deadly hazards that abound in the region are enough to forestall
almost any mining operation, however.

Unique Features: A creature flying over the center of the mudlake
can see that the mud spins in a deliberate fashion, like a
watery whirlpool in slow motion. This whirlpool marks the location
of an elemental vortex to the Plane of Earth, very similar to the
connection to the Plane of Fire described in Area 21. Mud slowly
seeps through the vortex at just the correct pace to match the
mud flowing into the chamber.

Moving from the Prime Plane to the Plane of Earth requires the
same procedure as a journey to the Plane of Fire described under
Area 21. Characters making this journey do not take heat damage,
of course, but must hold their breath or carry a supply of
breathable air for the time spent in transit.