Wednesday 12 June 2019

Eight Sample Hex Locations in the Bay of Sweetness

Galletue, self-styled Queen of Mist and Rain, a lunatic exile-turned pirate matriarch. She is mostly convinced that anyone who has ever been touched by mist or rain belongs to her, except for rare lucid moments when the horror of her new reality confronts her. She rules over a small band of disaffected and decadent former nobles manipulating her for their own ends, and a much larger band of thugs and killers she believes will help conquer what is rightfully hers.

The Old Man of Bariloche, monstrous inhabitant of a small island lying off the coast. He is a chimera with the rear of an elephant seal, the front of a cave bear, the wings of a huge seabird, and the heads of a red dragon, cave bear, and giant herring gull. His presence is used as a bogeyman to scare children, but he is very real - as is the treasure he has amassed over the years from passing ships.

Long Sands. A stretch of beach on which, for the duration of the gibbous and full phases of the moon every other month, tiny purple jellyfish are washed up in their dead thousands. They are the young of breeding adults who spawn in unison at these times; the bodies of the larva are collected and used for dye, while the adults are caught in nets and dried out to make tough slabs used for armour. The people of the nearby port-states intermittently war over possession of the beach.

The Seal King. A huge statue of an elephant seal, built from granite by a mad exile of long ago. It stands on the tip of a narrow peninsular overlooking the sea all around. Hollow, it has a door in its belly leading to a staircase down to a series of chambers in which the mad exile’s heirlooms can be found - along with his entombed and now-undead followers.

The Kelpie Cult. A religion of death, formed from those who long to find blissful extinction in drowning in the embrace of a kelpie. Each lunar month, one of their number is selected for presentation to a local kelpie in an elaborate ceremony of joyful worship; the kelpie merrily fulfils her part of the bargain. The cult live in a stockade from which they send beggars and thieves out into neighbouring areas to sustain the endeavour.

The Ribs. An ancient sea-elf structure which still partially rises above the sea’s surface not far from shore. It consists of three dozen columns encrusted with barnacles and seaweed arranged in two parallel lines of approximately 150 yards; the first two dozen columns are visible above the surface. Swimming underwater all the way up the route formed by these columns when the moon is full transports the swimmer to the Elemental Plane of Water. This is only known about by the very long-lived and wise. Otherwise the Ribs are described by local people as being haunted and/or the bones of a giant who will one day rise from the dead.

The Flotsam Giant. An ungainly, towering long-limbed figure which appears permanently on the verge of collapse. It is formed from some of the remnants of a wrecked ship which was once carrying a cargo of spirit-beings from elsewhere in Orbis Immobilis - in the aftermath of the wrecking, they escaped and imbued the detritus with their sentient energy. The giant roams a large island attacking all it encounters; it long ago drove away the human inhabitants, who live as refugees in a nearby port-state.

The Broiling Channel of Malalhue. A large whirlpool which forms in the channel between two islands when the tide rushes in and out shortly before moonrise and the high moon. This produces 1d6 sea-spray mephits (treat as mist mephits) who then fly off in search of employment or mischief; they dissipate after one lunar day. There is a 1 in 6 chance on any visit at the specified times that a wizard or cleric is present to try to convince the mephits to join him in some endeavour.

5 comments:

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  2. The Bay of Sweetness is shaping up as such a neat little setting. Are you planning on publishing it somewhere like in the peridot, or are you going to keep it on your blog?

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    1. Thanks! It will be a full release rather than the Peridot - I am working with an artist on it at the moment. The Bay of Sweetness is just one part of one volume of a multi-volume work.

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  3. Old post reply but. Did you happen to visit the southern parts of Chile? I know there are lots of similarities between coastal cultures mythos, but many of this remind me of Chiloé Island.

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    1. No - I have been to Chile but just to Santiago. I would like very much to go to the south one day to explore, especially to Chiloe. The proper nouns in some of these entries are based on Mapuche words if I remember rightly.

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