Geography: This is a key section of Deepearth because it connects
routes to and from so many different places. To the west, a
long, gradually sloping natural cavern leads to the vast dungeon <slope=x>
below the city on the surface world. This cavern is blocked with
many natural obstacles such as pits, chasms, and cliffs, which
make it very dangerous to travel through. The route is generally
1d3x 10 feet wide, and equally high. Like all the other areas adjacent
to Area 9, it is a dead cave. The water that carved it has long
since ceased to flow, and the cave formations have grown brittle
and lost their {shine}.
Five other caverns branch off this huge complex and lead to
the other areas shown on the map. These are all natural caverns,
and make for generally rough travel. None of them are blocked
with the pitfalls that mar the route to the city, however.
The Caverns of Doom contain a vast network of natural caves
that are often linked by dungeons && excavated tunnels. Six
central caverns, each linked to the other five, make up the bulk of
the area. These caverns are truly immense, with ceilings towering
hundreds of feet over the floor, and widths approaching 1,000
feet. They range in length from 2d6 miles each.
The floors of these caverns are rough, and split by many
chasms, cliffs, and huge piles of rubble. Traveling through them
is difficult, but by carefully picking a route around the obstacles,
even a mule can make the passage. Even the connecting routes
between the caverns are at least 20 feet wide and 10 feet high.

Denizens: The Caverns of Doom are home to a whole host of
underground dwellers. The name, incidentally, is derived from
the tales of adventurers who penetrated this region and returned
to the surface to tell of its terrors. These adventurers generally
assumed that they had descended into the utmost depths of the
earth, and that little or nothing of interest could be discovered
beyond this area.
The most proliferate denizens of the region are the jermalaine.
Small bands roam throughout the entire area, and a large community
of jermalaine occupies the northernmost cavern in the
area.
Other caverns contain pockets of drow, duergar, and pech. The
members of these three races, as well as the jermalaine, are not
on friendly terms with each other, and occasional violent flareups
occur. Although the duergar have attempted to create some fortifications
for their lairs, the rest of the creatures roam throughout
the caverns.
Small bands of hobgoblins, goblins, and troglodytes live in the
dungeon beneath the city, and in the cavern leading from the city
to Area 9. Occasionally these creatures are encountered here as
well. Such monsters, when encountered, are usually in a small
raiding party that attempts to pillage the possessions of the permanent
denizens.
Many unintelligent denizens dwell among the tunnels and
caves of the Caverns of Doom. Giant toads, stirges, piercers,
large and huge spiders, jellies, puddings, molds, rust monsters,
cockatrices, gargoyles, wraiths, and wights all roam the area in
small numbers.
In addition, an assortment of fungi have sprouted in most parts
of the caverns where water exists. Although shriekers or violet
fungi are occasionally discovered, most of the fungi are of normal,
and even edible, types.

Resources: The Caverns of Doom are the only portions of this
entire section of Deepearth that have a decent water supply. This
is due to a complicated irrigation system developed centuries
earlier, presumably by the duergar or svirfneblin. The system
relies on several tubes cut through the rock to Area 4. These
pipelines are less than two feet in diameter, indicating that the
deep gnomes were the most probable builders. Water is drained
from several of the streams running through Area 4, and diverted
through the pipelines to three separate caverns in Area 9. The
communities of the duergar and jermalaine monopolize two of
these water sources, but the third is centrally located and shared
by all of the other denizens of the area, as well as the myconids of
the fungus forest.
The duergar and drow each maintain large herds of cave pigs.
In addition, the gray dwarves grow a flourishing collection of edible
fungi, while the nomadic drow harvest the fungi where they
find it.
The pech have located a wide variety of precious metals and
stones in various places throughout the Caverns of Doom. These
persistent miners generally exhaust each claim before moving on
to the next, but the evidence of their past mining activities is obvious
in many places.

Unique Features: In one of the caverns, the pech are currently
engaged in one of their most ambitious excavations: a rich
diamond mine. The other denizens of the caverns have not been
able to figure out where the mine is. The pech furtively decide
upon the exact area to be worked, and then employ their wall of
stonecollective spell ability to screen their work area from all outside
intrusion. The low oxygen requirements of the pech allow
them to remain sealed in a relatively small area for many weeks.
A fortified area constructed by the duergar surrounds their
water supply, which is a large pool fed through a spout in the ceiling.
The entire area is accessible through three narrow caves.
Each of these is blocked so thoroughly that creatures larger than
the gray dwarves have difficulty squeezing through. In addition,
the duergar have carved access tunnels over each of the three
caves, with small holes leading into the caves below. Here the
duergar maintain a large supply of acid that can be cast onto
intruders approaching through the caves below.
The jermalaine live in a honeycombed section of stone. Their
dwellings have been carved from the area immediately surrounding
the water pipe. Many of the high-ranking jermalaine have
small streams running through their lairs. The passages between
the jermalaine lairs are only about 18 to 24 inches in diameter, so
intrusion by larger creatures is difficult. In addition, the outer exits
of the jermalaine lairs have been dug into the wall of a large
cavern about 20 feet off the floor. Rope ladders hang from each
entry tunnel, allowing the jermalaine to quickly pull them up in
order to forestall attackers.