Baanjax
The shattered lands
Battlemaps set in this location
Mololom Shatter
Nowhere is the devastation of Baanjax’s history more clear than in the Mololom region, where the breaking of the landscape was the most violent. The islands here are smaller and more chaotic, forming a dense, asteroid-like cloud of broken rock along the edge of the Soulgate, a mysterious barrier said to shield Crudilex from horrors beyond.
The indigenous Mololom people once thrived in the lands of Baanjax before the desolation that shattered their homeland. Despite the devastation, they have adapted to life among the floating islands, becoming renowned for their unique bond with the arc whales. These immense, skyborne creatures, resembling a mix of whales and leviathans, fly among the shattered terrain. The Mololom are among the only people capable of taming and riding these creatures, using them as transportation and companions in the skies.
Rokal
Rokal is the last surviving city of the Mololom people in the shattered expanse of Baanjax. A thriving hub of a living culture preserving its long and complex history. Rokal now serves as both a cultural sanctuary and an arc whale rearing ground. It remains fortified against the ancient enemies of the Mololom, the cenotaph from Bozzeto, an adversary from a war fought thousands of years ago. However, the history of that conflict, like much of the pre-desolation world, has been almost completely lost, eroded by time.
The city is the spiritual heart of their culture, home to grand temples dedicated to Rahido, the progenitor of all arc whales and the guardian of the Mololom people. In the present day, Rokal has become a sacred temple city where the Mololom people preserve this fading heritage. It is here that young Mololom are trained in the revered art of arc whaling, a skill essential for navigating the perilous skies of the shattered lands.
Divialto
Divialto clouds are living, shape-shifting predators that prowl the skies of the Shatter. These awakened beings take the form of serene wildlife or playful, harmless shapes drifting lazily through the air. However, beneath their fluffy exteriors lies a jellyfish-like core of gaseous mass, capable of unleashing deadly tendrils.
These clouds are patient and cunning hunters, preying on the curious and unwary. Their preferred method is to lure creatures closer with their deceptive appearances, then strike with blinding speed, wrapping their victims in tendrils and pulling them into their suffocating interiors. divialto clouds are feared by all who traverse the shattered skies, posing a constant threat to arc whale riders, airship crews, and any brave soul who dares to travel the cloudroads.
Nonstar
Beneath the Iarian island mote lies a vast megalithic structure, hidden from the stars. Now known only as the Nonstar, this prison was designed to contain divine energy. Within its impenetrable walls, godly beings may enter but can never leave.
Deep within this labyrinth, the lumin cultists gather to enact their profane will upon the divine. Through dark and unholy rituals, they strip their captives of their sacred domains, reshaping these once-mighty gods into twisted, unrecognizable husks of their former selves. The gods become hollowed and alien, bearing no resemblance to what they were when they entered.
Over the centuries, the balance of power within the Nonstar has become disturbingly unclear. The deformed gods, hollowed and bereft of purpose, still hold sway over their followers, warping their minds and eroding their free will. Conversely, the cultists' own identities fade as they lose themselves to their grotesque worship. Within the Nonstar, captor and captive have become indistinguishable, their identities slowly stripped away.
Anrahm of Udora
At the heart of the chaotic skies of Baanjax, the city of Anrahm serves as the seat of power for moth queen Udora, the master of the shattered lands. It is the crown jewel of her enduring, unchallenged tyranny. Its sharp silhouette rises over the motes below, shaped by the architecture the city is known for. A blend of the natural and the imposing. Sharp, square buildings topped with organic domes crafted from white clay blend with the brutalist, monolithic structures ancient of Iarian design. All throughout, it is filled with gardens of yellow-green grasses and trees. A beautiful and terrible garden of contrasts.
Iarin
The largest and most prominent of Baanjax’s motes, Iarin is a colossal floating island, its sheer size nearly that of a small continent, suspended above the endless abyss dominating the northern skies of Baanjax. Iarin is home to the iari, a sentient parasitic energy that relies on hosts to sustain its existence. These beings exist within the pink Iari crystals that fill the countryside and moors beyond the cities of the mote. The Iari’s essence is released when the crystals are struck with pure silver, flowing out like a wave of sound, absorbed by everything nearby. If a living thing happens to be in that area, the iari attach to them bonding symbiotically. It intertwines its energy with the soul of their host. Otherwise, it simply flows into the ley lines until it is reabsorbed by an empty iari crystal. The most common hosts of the iari are the Coranth of Anrahm, humanoid inhabitants who willingly undertake the bond, embracing the powers they provide.
Bozzetto
Bozzetto is the seat of the Great Boz Archives, Crudilex’s largest and most storied structure. And home to the ancient and wise Centopah people. Towering above the surrounding landscape, the archive is a monolithic castle of impossible scale. Its interior is a labyrinth of cavernous halls, endless corridors, and vast chambers, each brimming with the accumulated knowledge of mortalkind.
The archive is an indomitable bastion of unsullied, undiluted wisdom and history. Its vast libraries protect its collected knowledge from the poison of mortal morality, opinion, and time. Within its walls reside ancient awakened stone golems, the cenotaph, beings who are intrinsically bound to the archive. These sentient guardians are as eternal as the archive they serve, having watched over its troves of knowledge since the dawn of history. Each golem possesses an intricate connection to the archive, able to access its vast contents as though the knowledge were etched into their very being.
Both the archive and its golems predate the shattering of Baanjax. Like the Mololom people, the cenotaph are indigenous to the region, enduring the devastation that sundered their homeland. Despite the chaos, they have maintained their stewardship, preserving the legacy of Crudilex in stone for all time.
Wiltwind
Many Baanjaxian airships utilize the powers that emanate out from the lay line of air they call “the Manderwind,” riding along its invisible arcane flow through the skies like fish through a current. However, a portion of its natural path dips down between two large motes of Baanjax and flows in sharp bends, tangling the lay line over itself, disrupting the usual magic. Navigating the skies of this magically volatile region is extremely dangerous for those who fail to understand its nature. Countless lifeless airships from all across the world of Crudilex are carried by the flow of the Manderwind’s essence and dropped into Wiltwind, like corpses washed up on a beach, filling the skies with haunting, lifeless ghostships eternally held aloft by the powers of the Auran lay line.
Nil'Hallowrahk, The Umbrian Dragon
The oldest of the primordial dragons, Nil'Hallowrahk, also known as the Umbrian Dragon, was one of the first creations of Iv. Detached and removed from all things, his elemental domain is oblivion, which he personifies.
Once the protector of the Umbral Portal, Nil'Hallowrahk now stands as the living marker of the void itself. The portal he once safeguarded is now sundered completely, its remnants erased by the ascension of Monodono, a being Nil'Hallowrahk took as a protégé during their ascent to godhood. This cataclysmic destruction marked the beginning of the desolation of Baanjax, an event that would later be recognized as the first omen of the Day of Dawn. Today the void dragon watches over the wound of crudilex that is Baanjax and the pit beneath that drops to hell. He empowers those he finds to serve this quest and is particularly fond of the shadow eicio and duergar who tend to live within his dark domain.
Nhilwim, Of the Shadow Eicio
Nhilwim is the lowest of all motes in Baanjax, closest to the Void below. This region is home to the shadow eicio, beings whose souls transformed when the Umbral Ley Line erupts showering the region in a storm of shadowy arcane energy, called a roian font. This rare magic is found only in Nhilwim and the Sunless Sea below the surface of the world, making the shadow eicio unique and mysterious in the broader world of Crudilex.
The mote is shrouded in deep darkness that flows like ink through the skies surrounding it harboring the whispers of creatures who can usually only survive in the heart of the void. This extraordinary ecosystem is used by the shadow eicio who can easily navigate it to collect materials and goods found nowhere else in the world.
Obar'kal
Obar'kal, the Obsidian Mountain, is home to the duragar and serves as a sister city to Undrum’kal. This ancient mountain is steeped in Umbral Essence, sacred to the shadow dwarves, and grants those who call it home unique dark powers.
The duragar who reside here the longest gain the ability to project their shadow anywhere there is deep enough darkness and sufficient paranoia. Through these shadows, they can spy on and observe events all across Crudilex with little to no risk. Among them is a master of this craft, known only as “The Hat Man”. Operating a secretive information brokering syndicate, The Hat Man uses his superior projections to gather and manipulate knowledge. He is considered by most to be one of, if not the, greatest spymaster in the world.
Old Oaknimbus
At the heart of Baanjax stands the withered husk of an Edoroin World Tree: Old Oaknimbus. Like all other world trees in Crudilex, it lies mostly dormant, yet Old Oaknimbus is unique in one way: it still bears fruit. Its towering canopy stretches into the gusty skies of Baanjax, where its sprawling branches weave with puffy clouds, which stream in a steady, mesmerizing flow.
For generations, Old Oaknimbus has been tended by a circle of divination druids, individuals skilled in the ancient art of cloudshaping. This practice, which involves interpreting the winds and clouds to discern omens of change and fate, is said to have been first learned from the tree itself. The tradition of reading the winds dates back to the days of the Mololom and the rise of the Boz Cenotaph, in the ancient history of Baanjax. Today, cloudshaping is employed predominantly by Castle Anrahm and the Moth Queen Udora to foresee and forestall dangers threatening her rule of Baanjax.
Saltuman
Saltuman is a floating island located in the southern region of Baanjax, home to a small, quiet village inhabited by devout clerics. Largely isolated from the world, the village’s worship is seen by most as a cult, though its followers remain steadfast that their beliefs are without any moral misgivings. The community uses a powerful artifact called a fragment of Iv. Its magic grants them all an idyllic and peaceful life. However it comes at a great cost to the one who channels it. Over time, the magic transforms the users, mutating them into mindless, grotesque creatures.
These once reverent clerics begin to crave more and more essence. Hungry for more magic to consume and use. Their forms twist, growing pseudopods, their skin turning a pale, pink-white color, as their grip on reality fades.
After generations the inhabitants of Saltuman are now almost all iv-warped, willingly allowing themselves to be corrupted and changed by the fragment of Iv that they hold sacred. Believing that these mutations are the divine will of their god. Across the whole of the island every member of the community is expected to channel some of the power of the fragment to conjure their daily needs. This way, the burden is shared between all.
Cloudroads
South of Iarin, the region known as the Cloudroads consists of a network of small islands connected by a labyrinth of hanging bridges and platforms. Vertigo-inducing houses dangle precariously over the abyss below, but the people of this region live completely without fear of heights or falling. They navigate the swaying planks and dizzying platforms with remarkable ease, their balance and confidence seemingly ingrained from birth.
The inhabitants of the Cloudroads are those who have forsaken the structured, controlled life offered by the Moth Queen, choosing instead the fringes and freedom of this untamed region. Despite the precarious environment, the Cloudroads are home to a community united by choice rather than coercion. Individual freedom and mutual trust form the foundation of their way of life.
Zakhnaz
Zakhnaz is a frigid hideout carved into the unforgiving ice at the edges of Baanjax and Algere, home to a clan of nomadic Imps who have escaped Monodono's Void. In the frost, the Imps are attempting to forge a refuge for themselves, gathering strength and numbers as they prepare to venture further into the world. Their ultimate goal is to establish a new home for all Abyssal Imps, one beyond the reach of the oppressive void that once bound them.
However, life in Zakhnaz is bleak, and the desperation of its inhabitants has led to a descent into banditry and violence. Wielding the very violence they sought to escape, the Imps raid travelers and settlements along the Cloudroads, not out of cruelty but from a lack of better options. This vicious cycle of survival has tarnished their vision of a better future, leaving the Zakhnaz Imps teetering between redemption and corruption.