Physical Aspects of Demi Plane
There are “cracks” or pathways/portals between the Demi Plane and Mortal Plane. In the mortal world this may be a clearing that mortals think is of some spiritual or metaphysical significance such as some sacred stream or circle of stones, or something much more mundane. Some say there are pathways between the Demi and Divine Planes.
Some of the monsters and magical folk found in the Mortal Plane may have originally come from the Demi Plane thru said portals – orcs, goblins, and dragons to name a few.
Take a bookshelf full of books on myths and legends, throw the books into the air, and where they land in relation to each other is the same as how the legends and legendary places are connected or scattered in the Demi Plane – some right on top of each other, some touching, some a little ways away, some very far apart.
The Demi Plane has places in it of an astral/ethereal nature where you walk thru soft grasses and can see planets large before you in the night sky, lots of beautiful stars and the swirling clouds of galaxies. Light and airy magical/glowing lights Places where you can float up into the sky and drift along at your leisure. The dark and scary Rotting and fetid Bleak and raw. Every environ and scene a mortal could make up from the rapturous to the profane, dreamy and sparkling, to nightmarish and matte.
Every type of landscape and climate and beast from the mortal plane is in the Demi Plane, plus trees that are purple with pink leaves and whimsical creatures and such. Purple lakes.
Places where up is down and down is up. Perpetual night, perpetual day. Perpetual sunrise, perpetual twilight. Like walking thru stars and walking thru hell. Waterfalls that flow upwards, rain that flows up from the ground.
Magical dead zones Zones where magic is amplified
The Nothings – two types. The first type is a lack of something. It appears to be a dark hole. If one goes into it they will end up back out where last they were before they went into the Nothing. Denizens of the Demi Plane like to play tricks on outsiders, or anyone else passing along, by creating an illusion of something over the Nothing, like a bridge or path, the outsider walks on the bridge, falls thru the Nothing, and ends up back on the start of the bridge or path. Laughter can be heard. Usually what sounds like small children giggling – if the outsider is lucky. Areas of Nothings as big as great lakes or like small ponds and puddles can be found in the Demi Plane. The Second type of Nothing = Zone of Sensory Deprivation. Appears to be a normal area, say a forest. As you get farther and farther into the forest it begins to get quieter and darker. You think nothing of it at first as you expect the canopy to be thicker, blocking out the light, and denser trees may mean less rustling of wind and such. You keep walking, eventually all the light is gone, all the sound, is gone, and you cannot smell anything, cannot taste anything, cannot feel anything. You are in a Zone of Nothingness/Zone of Sensory Deprivation where none of your senses work. It’s in this zone where people have accidents as they cannot perceive their surroundings. From outside the forest this zone appears to be the same as the rest of the forest.
The Everythings =opposite of Zone of Nothingness/Zone of Sensory Deprivation. As you go deeper into this zone you begin to take in more sensory data – more sounds, more sights and more detail, more smells, more tastes, more feelings, so much until it is overwhelming and the person has an accident. This zone also appears to be normal from the outside.
The Almost Nothing or The Barrens:No sun, but a light is overhead and stays overhead, or the place is evenly lit and as night approaches it evenly darkens like a dimmer switch is being turned. The sky is blue or blue-gray; the ground is the same color as the last place you left. As you walk farther into the Barrens the ground becomes more flat and detail-less until it appears as though you are walking on a painted, flat floor. No landmarks. No sun, moon, or stars. Easy to get quickly lost in. Sound travels different; things seem closer than they are.
The City Built On Nothing: The city band plays when you arrive – happy; band plays when you leave – sad. Kind of like a Casablanca plus New Orleans meets old west town sort of place. Wooden, clapboard facades. Yellow to orangish, tawny wood buildings, high and built out as go up, sometimes purple. Colorful areas. Some quiet wards. Lots of places to get wasted and have a good time “ . . . ‘cause you survived The Demi Plane. So yea! Party up!” Numerous, varied places for info and some goods. Cops keep the peace, no BS is tolerated. Info is traded. Sort of a sanctuary for the beaten down and weary and those on the run from some authority or someone. Appears from outside as a few to several hundred people could live here. More like several thousand to twenty thousand actual residents, no one knows for sure. The place is bigger than it seems, magically so. Enemies outside this city must put that differences aside when come here or they will be ejected. Place of interest in the City – the Den. A place where the Mistress Evessa – voluptuous, curvy, golden/yellow skinned woman, dressed in free-flowing but conservative green and beige, tribal, long-sleeved blouse and pantaloons can help you find mental escape. For two to four hours she can help a willing individual to experience a hallucination, dream, etc, all senses present, of anything the person wishes – be anywhere and do anything they wish. Evessa appears human but is really a Dragon Faerie or Succubus-looking creature. Her intentions are not harmful. Golden to yellow hair, golden to amber eyes; she stands about five foot, eight inches tall; appears to be in her thirties to possibly early fifties. Wears no shoes. Some soft, wooden band to hold her hair back off her brow. Clothes look like traditional clothes of those from the hot, southern plains and forests. No jewelry.
Nature of Demi Plane
In the Demi plane mortals can exist, but this plane is very dangerous for mortals
The Demi Plane is not dangerous for mortals because of its nightmarish aspects, the Demi Plane is dangerous for mortals because of its dreamy side. Some of the greatest dangers of the Demi Plane are masked by its wonder and beauty. It puts mortals in thrall and they let their guards down.
Only the most powerful, or the craziest, or the most suicidal mortals seek to go to the Demi Plane and most soon wish they had not.
Demi Plane = Land of Waking Dreams and Nightmares. The dreams can kill you. Dreams lull you into complacency. The place breaks you down psychologically.
The more emotion/importance the subject of a dream, nightmare, or unconscious thought has for you the more it will be able to alter the physical reality of the Demi Plane. Whether that emotion is positive, negative, or combination of both. The surroundings will change to your unconscious thoughts for yourself and those around you. You may end up walking into someone else’s waking dream and be subject to its effects. Just as most mortals do not know when they are dreaming most mortals in the Demi Plane will not know when they have walked into their own dream or nightmare made real, or someone else’s. For someone else it will be as though they are simply walking into another crazy area of the Demi Plane.
Your pleasant dreams can cause harm/be deadly as you may end up walking off a cliff, drowning in a river, or be so enthralled in your dream that you do not eat or drink or sleep and simply expire.
There are locales and beings where the rules/morals could be wildly different and change quickly from one place to the next.
The Demi Plane can break mortals’ wills, minds, spirits as well as their bones. Places where you can find rest and places where there is none.
The scenes and locales can change rapidly and smoothly, giving a being no break, just like how dreams can transition from one to the next to the next.
There are some fixed points in the Demi Plane: The Olive Grove; The Ameyan Sanctuary; The City Built on Nothing, etc. However, trying to navigate thru the Demi Plane can be extremely difficult as the areas around fixed places can change. Flying and teleporting great distances can be of no use as well. It’s almost as though this realm is trying to disorient you every chance it gets. And of course, the Demi Plane grows as the number of tales mortals tell grows thus pushing the fixed points farther and farther apart.
Those that have survived the Demi Plane for some time have figured out what to look for to aid in navigation, certain clues, routines, and cycles of the place. Some have developed a sense for the general direction for specific types of places and/or specific locations, even for some specific types of creatures or beings. However, the best they can tell you are the general directions these things are in.
There are any number of fixed cracks or portals from the Demi Plane to the Mortal Plane. Most are unknown and unknowable to the gods. Around some of these fixed portals in both the Demi and Mortal planes you may find anything from small trading camps to established, bustling towns and cities – all of which are still hidden to the eyes of the gods and their agents both immortal and mortal. Apparently, at some point enough mortals must have thought that the gods don’t need to know everything mortals get up to.
Up Next: How some of the Gods of Malice attract and keep followers and/or The Gods of Ill Desire find another way to reward the damned – “divine agents”
