![Senior [500]](https://i.imgur.com/Nmfn8cD.png)
SIN: Mount Helador
http://martanael.deviantart.com/art/Lava-Fields-346661090The landscape of Sin is harsh and unforgiving, few areas more so than where the Undying Society, also known as the Cult of Sin, took up residence. History lessons aside, it has served them well for many generations despite one disaster involving Pergrande Paladins that was taken care of.
http://tyleredlinart.deviantart.com/art/Aegik-6-tile-evil-fortress-399954302Located a dozens of miles inland from the southernmost coast of Sin and surrounded in volcanic activity, the Temple of the Undying is the headquarters of the Society. While many establishments out among the other nations of Earthland exist, they are all well toned down even if secret compared to the Temple of the Undying where nothing is held back in their tribute to who they called The Undying Goddess. They knew little about her personally until they successfully managed to establish a direct conduit to her own realm of The Burning Endless and manifest enough of her power in this realm for her to reach out and take a body to serve as a permanent anchor, forever staining this world with her presence.
High ranking cultists, members of the Society, get invited to the temple where they make a pilgrimage to it. Journeying on their own to find the temple. If they are worthy, they are guided by the will of their goddess down the right path. Whether they survive, guidance or not, is up to them, as the creatures of Sin are great and mighty. It literally cannot be found without that guidance. If Eris does not permit them to witness the Temple, the Temple physically does not exist on the land for them. An H-rank master of dimensional magic (PRIMARY) could in theory force their way if they had an appropriate ability to do so. The ways to naturally enter the area are next to impossible to stumble upon, hence the guidance. But an S-rank mage with powerful chaos (Probability) or luck-based abilities that could do so may happen upon them. To enter you must cross that veil between worlds, slipping into the pocket dimension that houses an alternate version of reality in which the temple exists.
This trick is based off of the same trick used by faeries, in which their cities and gateways just seem not to exist at all unless guided a certain way or by extreme chance through the trees just right. A left here, a right there, passing between those two specific trees just right, circling that bush over there. You get the picture. It's a similar concept.
Once they arrive at the temple they are granted a ring signifying their new status as a Seeker, which allows them to perform a ritual opening up a hell rift to a specific hall in the Burning Endless itself, the other end of the hall being another rift to the Temple of the Undying.
http://lukkar.deviantart.com/art/6th-house-rugs-538700001
^Random relevant decorum.
NPCs:
Note: not well representative of individual duties and authority within the Temple.
The Burning Endless itself is, as you might imagine, an endless. It is a flat plane of stone pocketed with immeasurable oceans of lava. While the land itself is featureless, it is covered in mountains and valleys of the undead all piled together writhing as an endless mass of skeletons and other creatures, including that of titans and ancient long-dead dragons.
The deeper you go below the surface however you find there is a lot more room in caverns and tunnels. These caverns are hotly contested, and the lower you get the higher your status and generally more intelligent and less mindless you are, with caverns that get larger and larger to the point single caverns can be the size of countries and continents down in the extreme depths. These being reserved for the incredibly powerful, beings more powerful even than Lady Red and are indifferent to her efforts and indifferent of the control she has over the lesser beings of the Burning Endless.
Down in those lower caverns you'd also start to see more flesh, even flesh being hoarded on its own right as a symbol of wealth, as gold might for a mortal. Through flesh the undead can gain experiences, eating, drinking, and other pleasures. Though the denizens of unlife still hold their undeath in high regard and prefer to keep deathly visages even while wearing flesh. It all depends. Flesh is a fashion statement. But just like you wouldn't normally want to cover ever bit of you in clothing, they wont want to hide their undeath, but rather they try to accentuate it to varying extents of the individuals.
Aae'phaelleris, or rather, Eris, has her personal.... Lair... you could say, here. In the Endless. It is elegantly crafted though clearly in the style of hell. Rather than carpet, the floors are made up of warm flesh strewn about with different consistencies depending on purpose. Some areas might be flesh stretched out or simply covering a hard bone surface, while in other areas the floor might be a huge pocket of meatstuffs, in which case the floor itself is an undead creature and may include eyes, digestive systems, and teeth. Floors may or may not squish to varying extents, including having blood or not.
The walls themselves are very ornate with bone being utilized similarly to marble and ivory, with pillars of tormented skulls and bodies that may or may not still be sentient. Throughout it all there is a jagged theme as spines arch up or jut out from pillar bases and from ceilings. Doors themselves may often be a large jaw of sharp or human-like teeth. Other doors may simply be folds of flesh and tissue that unfurl. You may even find a sphincter or two.
The entire complex would be lit with flames primarily, having lava flows as a secondary source of light but more just to accentuate rooms, with liquid flowing lava running through channels carved out of bone to flow freely, or covered in a glass-like surface to run underfoot or simply be contained if desired.
And finally... The entire building's main rooms, having plenty of servant corridors and rooms of normal scale, would be massively over proportioned. A lone human of average size would not be able to climb the first step up to her throne itself, which from the actual scale would only be around half a foot on normal human proportions. The red flesh-carpet like a long flat tongue set into a groove down the center of the massive chamber, basically just the same size and shape of a long red carpet, would itself be around the same height as the human.
The lair was clearly intended for an individual of titanic size... For Eris, the Burning Titan. Even larger here than she can be on Earthland, she casually exists in her full size here and does not restrict herself.
Non-giant individuals would take a long time navigating the place, as it covers an area the size of a capitol city on earthland. It isn't all titan rooms, but it is full of normal sized corridors, hallways, doorways, and rooms as well suited to the many servant staff members, guests, and serves as a sort of heaven for worshipers of hers who live in the city-like labyrinth within the giant's walls. Whole cities contained within what would proportionally be small rooms, even just the space literally within the walls. Systems of transportation link cities to cities, fleshy mechanations powered by undead muscles. Portals worked into stone that link places for convenience.
Among the plethora of rooms, there is a single room with a normal door, made of a hard oak wood, notable as there is a distinct lack of non-bone non-flesh non-lavabased materials in most places. It is undecorated and simple, set into a section of brick wall. It may even go unnoticed otherwise among the many, many rooms. It's not titan sized either, but just one of many small (Normal) scale doors throughout the lair/complex.
The Pitiless Tower as seen here is a particular dungeon located in the Burning Endless. Though the Endless is itself one unending prison, the Pitiless Tower is quite specialized for the specific task of directly tormenting individuals.
It is located in a crater of a volcano within a great lake of lava separate from the masses of hell and well isolated. The Pitiless Tower contains tormented still-living souls just as well as it holds demons, live or undead.
If Eris ever takes a particular hatred towards an individual, they may find themselves here. This is a place meant to torment the tormentors, to terrorize the things that horrify the living. Tartarus itself would be sweet release from the Pitiless Tower.
The Burning Endless has countless other notable locations waiting to be witnessed in a topic some day, I already have a few I could detail that would be fun. The thing is most of them would probably only be seen once for specific plots. The Burning Endless itself is a huge plot tool on its own right, existing separate from earthland.
Hazards:
Contact with lava here will cause 200hp damage per body part (Making total submersion cause 1200 damage), effectively incinerating parts that come in contact with it.
This ignores heat resistances.
Areas with visible lava all around would deal 25 damage per post alone just due to the intense heat in the air itself, similarly ignoring heat resistance.
Undead beings feel the heat and feel the pain but don't take damage.
Being killed by the heat leaves the individual as an undead creature.
http://martanael.deviantart.com/art/Lava-Fields-346661090
http://tyleredlinart.deviantart.com/art/Aegik-6-tile-evil-fortress-399954302
High ranking cultists, members of the Society, get invited to the temple where they make a pilgrimage to it. Journeying on their own to find the temple. If they are worthy, they are guided by the will of their goddess down the right path. Whether they survive, guidance or not, is up to them, as the creatures of Sin are great and mighty. It literally cannot be found without that guidance. If Eris does not permit them to witness the Temple, the Temple physically does not exist on the land for them. An H-rank master of dimensional magic (PRIMARY) could in theory force their way if they had an appropriate ability to do so. The ways to naturally enter the area are next to impossible to stumble upon, hence the guidance. But an S-rank mage with powerful chaos (Probability) or luck-based abilities that could do so may happen upon them. To enter you must cross that veil between worlds, slipping into the pocket dimension that houses an alternate version of reality in which the temple exists.
This trick is based off of the same trick used by faeries, in which their cities and gateways just seem not to exist at all unless guided a certain way or by extreme chance through the trees just right. A left here, a right there, passing between those two specific trees just right, circling that bush over there. You get the picture. It's a similar concept.
Once they arrive at the temple they are granted a ring signifying their new status as a Seeker, which allows them to perform a ritual opening up a hell rift to a specific hall in the Burning Endless itself, the other end of the hall being another rift to the Temple of the Undying.
http://timmi-o-tool.deviantart.com/art/Council-Hall-433991191
The main council chamber where the Twelve Arch-Magi will meet. These meetings can be projected out to other sanctuaries throughout earthland, unable to be intercepted by transmitting through the Burning Endless itself rather than sending the raw data out over earthland.http://lukkar.deviantart.com/art/6th-house-rugs-538700001
^Random relevant decorum.
NPCs:
Note: not well representative of individual duties and authority within the Temple.
- Spoiler:
Arch-Magi (x12):
The twelve Arch-Magi.
Each are unique in their own right, but they all generally have Necromancy as a focus of theirs, granted to them by the goddess herself. They each have their own unique appearance, but all are undead. They resemble a council of liches, each with their own unique crown, robes, and staves.
Each are treated as S-rank necromancers, with their own individual alternate magics setting themselves apart.- Spoiler:
The Arch Magi go here as they are seen (and detailed as a result) in a topic for plot reasons (And as for why they aren't pre-built all at once right now, lazy reasons.)
Seekers (x50):
Seekers are not so normal NPCs from varying walks of life and status. Some are honored warriors, some are worthy mages, others are simply politicians and leaders of communities.
What they do isn't what makes them a Seeker, it's their worth to the Society and to the goddess, and the fact that they survived the journey.
There are roughly around 50 Seekers on the temple grounds at any given moment, but hundreds more throughout Earthland.
They are all undead, but allowed to keep their mortal flesh.
Temple Acolytes (x77):
Temple Acolytes are similar to Seekers, but they lost their positions in their communities for whatever reason, or have taken an extended leave due to suspicions. Alternatively, they may have been Brood Slaves before but lost their value as one for one reason or another. They manage the temple grounds and can order designated Endless skeletons to further manage the property, and they are on 24/7 staff.
They can be seen in varying states of undeath, no longer necessary to keep up a mortal flesh suit.
Brood Slaves (30):
The only living residents of the Temple. They are kept for reasons, reasons typically involving sacrifice, flesh, and blood. Some are unwilling, not-so-faithful cultists or random kidnapped victims alike, others are willing and submitted themselves willingly into their position. Brood Slaves will often be rewarded later in life with the gift of the undying, as well as if they die during their duties.
The Endless (x-):
The endless skeletons of the Burning Endless. Like a flood they keep coming over the bones of their fallen careless, fearless, tireless.
They tend to be equipped with mass produced iron weapons and some might even have a piece of armor or two.
These are generic and unranked.
Bone Guard (x40):
Skeletal warriors dressed in armored red robes and carrying glaives. They're quite effective with them and are fast, striking with snake like speed and sudden movements that keep people at bay with the reach of their weapons (up to 3 meters / 9ft). They sprint tirelessly at 60m/s, can leap 30 meters, and seem to be weightless.
200hp, 25% resistance to physical attacks.
50 damage with their glaives, 20 without.
They're capable of doubling their speed when moving in straight lines. An attack while doubled deals an extra 25 damage.
Pit Champions (x10):
Heavily armored skeletons with only burning skulls visible. They are all ancient combat veterans, an fight as such.
350hp, 50% resistance to physical attacks, 50% resistance to magic from non-holy sources.
Their claymores deal 80 damage, 35 damage without.
They regenerate HP at a rate of 10%/post, which can bring them back from the dead and visible as bone fragments or lost limbs return to their place. This can be paused within posts they take holy damage and if killed while paused, it stays paused (They wont recover).
Bone Fiends(x5):
50 meter giant skeletons with large curled horns and boney spear-like tails and great skeletal wings. Their massive legs are inverted and hooved as a goat's leg, but there is no flesh let alone fur on their bodies. A fire blazes in their chest, from within their skull, and from their elbow and knees down.
They don't bother with armor, but wield large axes that look to be made from obsidian, but are crystallized blood of demons.
500hp, 75% resistance to physical attacks, 25% resistance to magic from non-holy sources.
110 damage with their axes, 55 without.
They can breathe fire in 80 meter cones, 50 meters wide at the end, dealing 150 fire damage (Curse Fire).
http://fmacmanus.deviantart.com/art/Corridor-of-Hunger-535390389
http://fmacmanus.deviantart.com/art/Maw-of-Hunger-535391033
http://fmacmanus.deviantart.com/art/Maw-of-Hunger-535391033
The Burning Endless itself is, as you might imagine, an endless. It is a flat plane of stone pocketed with immeasurable oceans of lava. While the land itself is featureless, it is covered in mountains and valleys of the undead all piled together writhing as an endless mass of skeletons and other creatures, including that of titans and ancient long-dead dragons.
The deeper you go below the surface however you find there is a lot more room in caverns and tunnels. These caverns are hotly contested, and the lower you get the higher your status and generally more intelligent and less mindless you are, with caverns that get larger and larger to the point single caverns can be the size of countries and continents down in the extreme depths. These being reserved for the incredibly powerful, beings more powerful even than Lady Red and are indifferent to her efforts and indifferent of the control she has over the lesser beings of the Burning Endless.
Down in those lower caverns you'd also start to see more flesh, even flesh being hoarded on its own right as a symbol of wealth, as gold might for a mortal. Through flesh the undead can gain experiences, eating, drinking, and other pleasures. Though the denizens of unlife still hold their undeath in high regard and prefer to keep deathly visages even while wearing flesh. It all depends. Flesh is a fashion statement. But just like you wouldn't normally want to cover ever bit of you in clothing, they wont want to hide their undeath, but rather they try to accentuate it to varying extents of the individuals.
Aae'phaelleris, or rather, Eris, has her personal.... Lair... you could say, here. In the Endless. It is elegantly crafted though clearly in the style of hell. Rather than carpet, the floors are made up of warm flesh strewn about with different consistencies depending on purpose. Some areas might be flesh stretched out or simply covering a hard bone surface, while in other areas the floor might be a huge pocket of meatstuffs, in which case the floor itself is an undead creature and may include eyes, digestive systems, and teeth. Floors may or may not squish to varying extents, including having blood or not.
The walls themselves are very ornate with bone being utilized similarly to marble and ivory, with pillars of tormented skulls and bodies that may or may not still be sentient. Throughout it all there is a jagged theme as spines arch up or jut out from pillar bases and from ceilings. Doors themselves may often be a large jaw of sharp or human-like teeth. Other doors may simply be folds of flesh and tissue that unfurl. You may even find a sphincter or two.
The entire complex would be lit with flames primarily, having lava flows as a secondary source of light but more just to accentuate rooms, with liquid flowing lava running through channels carved out of bone to flow freely, or covered in a glass-like surface to run underfoot or simply be contained if desired.
And finally... The entire building's main rooms, having plenty of servant corridors and rooms of normal scale, would be massively over proportioned. A lone human of average size would not be able to climb the first step up to her throne itself, which from the actual scale would only be around half a foot on normal human proportions. The red flesh-carpet like a long flat tongue set into a groove down the center of the massive chamber, basically just the same size and shape of a long red carpet, would itself be around the same height as the human.
The lair was clearly intended for an individual of titanic size... For Eris, the Burning Titan. Even larger here than she can be on Earthland, she casually exists in her full size here and does not restrict herself.
Non-giant individuals would take a long time navigating the place, as it covers an area the size of a capitol city on earthland. It isn't all titan rooms, but it is full of normal sized corridors, hallways, doorways, and rooms as well suited to the many servant staff members, guests, and serves as a sort of heaven for worshipers of hers who live in the city-like labyrinth within the giant's walls. Whole cities contained within what would proportionally be small rooms, even just the space literally within the walls. Systems of transportation link cities to cities, fleshy mechanations powered by undead muscles. Portals worked into stone that link places for convenience.
Among the plethora of rooms, there is a single room with a normal door, made of a hard oak wood, notable as there is a distinct lack of non-bone non-flesh non-lavabased materials in most places. It is undecorated and simple, set into a section of brick wall. It may even go unnoticed otherwise among the many, many rooms. It's not titan sized either, but just one of many small (Normal) scale doors throughout the lair/complex.
The Pitiless Tower as seen here is a particular dungeon located in the Burning Endless. Though the Endless is itself one unending prison, the Pitiless Tower is quite specialized for the specific task of directly tormenting individuals.
It is located in a crater of a volcano within a great lake of lava separate from the masses of hell and well isolated. The Pitiless Tower contains tormented still-living souls just as well as it holds demons, live or undead.
If Eris ever takes a particular hatred towards an individual, they may find themselves here. This is a place meant to torment the tormentors, to terrorize the things that horrify the living. Tartarus itself would be sweet release from the Pitiless Tower.
The Burning Endless has countless other notable locations waiting to be witnessed in a topic some day, I already have a few I could detail that would be fun. The thing is most of them would probably only be seen once for specific plots. The Burning Endless itself is a huge plot tool on its own right, existing separate from earthland.
Hazards:
Contact with lava here will cause 200hp damage per body part (Making total submersion cause 1200 damage), effectively incinerating parts that come in contact with it.
This ignores heat resistances.
Areas with visible lava all around would deal 25 damage per post alone just due to the intense heat in the air itself, similarly ignoring heat resistance.
Undead beings feel the heat and feel the pain but don't take damage.
Being killed by the heat leaves the individual as an undead creature.
