Since the beginning of recorded history in the Flanaess, the Bright Desert has intrigued and challenged mankind. It is supposedly filled with riches - copper, silver, gold, and gem minerals. The harsh climate, wildly varying temperatures, and hostile inhabitants (Suel peoples) who battle any intruder with ferocious determination and blood lust tend to discourage exploitation. The dervishes rumored to dwell in the bordering Abbor-Alz hills likewise turn away would-be explorers, although if such dervishes actually exist, they are likely to be of Flan extraction and hostile to Suloise nomads. One or two organized forces have attempted to penetrate the Bright Desert, but none have ever returned to tell what happened.
The vast stretches of prairie north of the Sulhaut Mountains and west of the Crystalmists are known as the Dry Steppes. Rivers and oases here are scarcer even than the meager rainfall. Once the are was a fertile, well- watered grainbasket, the home of Baklunish Padishahs and Sultans, but the Inovked Devastation utterly ruined this fecundity. It is said that the central part of these steppes is still pleasant and rich, and many Baklunish nomads roam there still. The so-called Horse Barbarians who roam the northern Dry Steppes are fine riders and warriors, employing composite bows, light lances, and a variety of scimitarlike weapons.
There are, of course, many legends of ruins and buried cities which have great wealth and wonders that survived the Devastation, but the nature of this terrain is such that few seek them. Most noted are the tales of the Stone Circles on the shore of Lake Udrukankar, reputedly sacred to the people of the lands and said to hold powerful magic and deep latent evil within.
back to top
Land of Black Ice:
The few travelers who have ventured north of the Burneal Forest tell an astonishing tale of this land: instead of the stark, white snow and translucent blue-white ice one would expect here, there is an endless landscape of blue-black ice topped only here and there by normal snowfall. Strange arctic monsters roam these fields of ebony ice. Stranger still, the very few who have braved these hazards tell of a warmer land beyond the ice where the sun never sets and jungles abound!
Further, it is said that between the Land of Black Ice and Blackmoor is a "City of the Gods," a place where iron buildings tower and summer lasts year round, yet the snows are piled deep in fields surrounding the city.
These legends are so bizarre that either great weather-controlling magic is at work within these lands, or travelers' brains are affected by illusion, overexposure to the cold, or mind-affecting substances in some weird local flora. Until better explorations are made, it is impossible to prove these stories.
This strange rift in the floor of Oerth is over 180 miles in length and 10 to 30 miles in width. It is more than a mile deep in its most cavernous recesses, and is packed with caves and caverns. Much of its length has been cleared of monsters over the centuries, although some still remain in the deeper cavern and tunnel systems.
The major importance of the Rift Canyon now is its home to some 4,000 bandits who have joined the self-styled Plar and his men, who originally occupied it. Some 6,000 humans now live in the Rift. They are a thorn in Iuz's side, since the Rift is largely barren and the bandits must emerge and raid for whatever they can get. The tremendous natural defenses of the Rift are such that bandits with good knowledge of its passes, slopes, and screes have a great advantage over any pursuers. However, it is likely that the bandits here will squabble among themselves given the preciousness of their existence. Iuz's servants will surely extract accounts of the place from captured bandits, and map key points of ingress for a final clean-out of these pests.
A territory of unknown extent exits west of the Hellfurnaces, south of the Sulhaut Mountains. This bleak desert is the Sea of Dust, the former Empire of the Suel. This was once a fair and fertile realm extending a thousand miles west and south, but its rulers were merciless and haughty, and the Rain of Colorless Fire that the Baklunish mages brought down upon it was a fitting fate for them, if not for their peoples. The terrible, nearly invisible fiery rain killed every living thing it struck, ignited the landscape, and burned the hills to ash.
To this day, the place is a desert choked with dust and dry ash in gentle rises amd shallow valleys that resemble waves in the ocean. It is far less picturesque when the winds howl and tear the surface into choking clouds that strip flesh from bone, making vision impossible and life hazardous in the extreme. Added to this are rains of volcanic ash and cinders blown down from the Hellfurnaces.
Mountain tribesmen from the Sulhaus sometimes scavenge the ruins of old Suel cities along the northern rim of the Sea of Dust, but their pickings are meager after a millennium of pillage. If buried riches exist, they must lie within the central body of the Sea of Dust, a place so inhospitable that survival there is an achievement in itself. The handful of accounts that exist from searchers for the legendary Forgotten City of the Suloise remark on lakes of dust that are magically affected so that they have almost fluid qualities. These dunes of caustic, white ash are so adverse to breathing that after an hour of inhaling without a wet cloth over the mouth, one coughs blood and suffers other strange symptoms. These travelers do not tell of great wealth, although they stress the perils of having to "dive" through layers of dust to explore any ruins below.
There may be some underground springs below the Sea of Dust, as well as places where water tables have risen and seepage into the choked surface has occurred, for there are reports of life below the surface of this terrain: huge tunneling worms: 20-foot insects that look like crosses between a mantis and a centipede; weird shambling fungi with surfaces hard as stone to prevent loss of water by evaporation; and chitin-beaked giant lizards with vast webbed feet that allow them nearly to skim the surface of the dust. Rumors that harpies flock in old ruins and that degenerate remnants of Suel stock survive in some areas are, however, distictly more implausible and are discounted by reliable and wise scholars.
Ancient Suloise documents in Greyhawk mention a magical portal named The Null somewhere in the Sea of Dust - a place that is a universal gate to all known planes. It is said to be guarded by golems, summoned extraplanar creatures, stone sphinxes that test the wisdom of those who would dare travel using its magic, and more.