The Ethereal Ways

The only observable feature of this realm is a single, cylindrical tower of grey marble, 400 feet in diameter, extending apparently to infinity both upward and downward into a bright, blue sky.
When entering via a portal from The Isle of Popkin on the Prime Material Plane, one will emerge inside the tower, into a circular chamber, 300 feet across, with a floor of pale, polished marble.
Evenly spaced around the perimeter of the chamber are five enormous gateways, each consisting of two square marble pillars 100 feet tall and 50 feet apart, topped by a single block of marble placed horizontally.
Beyond the gates is a raised marble ring, creating a wall 30 feet high, which is broken by stairways leading up to the ring; five stairways, 30 ft wide, interspersed between the five gates, each seemingly scaled for a different-sized set of legs.
Beyond that are grey marble walls, stretching up indefinitely, seeming to join in the distance. They are broken by openings, one behind each staircase, 75 feet wide and, again, stretching up as high as the walls. Through them, bright, clear, blue sky can be seen.
In the center of the marble floor is a circle of inlaid platinum 50ft across and 6 inches wide, within which is a stylized platinum dragon foot, surrounded by seven small, gold, four-pointed stars.
One of the five gates appears incomplete. The two vertical pillars are only 4/5 and 2/3 of their full heights, respectively, and a pile of 5 foot marble cubes sits between them. Behind that, one can see the huge crosspiece lying on the floor.
The crosspiece of each gate says in large, carved Draconic runes, "Dawn Egg Isle", and has a flame icon followed by one of five marks.
Up the stairs, the raised ring is a grey marble floor, 50 feet wide. The inside of the ring is a repeating sequence of gold, silver, brass, copper, and bronze squares.   Outside the walls is another ring of white, marble floor, another 75 feet wide.
At two opposed points along the outside of the outer ring, there are platforms where a 30 foot-wide spiraling marble path crosses the level of the ring.
On one side, the path spirals upward to the right and downward to the left. The floor of the upward path has the same pattern of repeating metallic squares down the center. The downward path has a line of solid black obsidian down the center.
On the opposite side, the path spirals upward to the left and downward to the right. The upward path has a line of opal down the middle, while the downward path has the familiar metallic sequence.
At four other opposing points (i.e., 1:00, 4:00, 7:00, and 10:00), paths lead straight outward laterally, seemingly stretching flat toward infinity. One has a center line of alternating sandstone, granite, and basalt. One, opposite to the first, has a center line of clear and smoky quartz. The center lines of the other pair appear to be made of blocks of pure ruby and sapphire, respectively.

Utility

Intraplanar transportation

  Portals on the Popkin floor open at:   Moving upward or downward while circling around the outside of the tower counter-clockwise translates the user to adjacent anchor locations (portal floors) without translation along the positive-negative axis.
  • In other words, if you get to the top of the ramp and want to go back to where you started, you don't just turn around and retrace your steps; you have to cross to the counter-helical ramp, which spirals downward to the left.
  • Interplanar transportation

    Moving upward or downward while circling around the outside of the tower clockwise translates the user along the positive-negative axis while keeping the anchor location constant. For example, from the Prime Isle of Popkin portal floor, taking the ramp that spirals up to the right will lead you to the portal floor anchored to the island's reflection in the Feywild. From there, crossing to the ramp that spirals downward to the right will return the user to the floor where they began. Similarly, the ramp spiraling downward to the left from the Prime floor would lead to Popkin's reflection in the Shadowfell.   Warning: You should never under any circumstances attempt further positive-ward travel from Feywild floors, or negative-ward travel from Shadowfell floors.

    Manufacturing

    Unknown
    Parent Technologies
    Inventor(s)
    From archives in Aaqa: - It was created 18,322 Prime years ago - It’s part of an ambitious infrastructure project undertaken by a consortium of metallic dragon nations, at a time when their civilization was ascendent across the Material and Inner Planes. - The longstanding partnership between Aaqa and the Dragons’ patron deity is why they were permitted to establish the portal where they did.
    Access & Availability
    Access closely guarded, at least from The Isle of Popkin.   Portal between the Prime Popkin floor and the Elemental Plane of Air: - The Air side of the portal is protected by a garrison of Aaqan soldiers - It’s within the Labyrinth Winds, and while not close to The Vale of Aaqa by any stretch, it’s also well inside the zone in which the Vaati forbid any portals from opening or existing.
    Complexity
    Inspired by The Infinite Staircase, the creators built a system of pathways and ramps along a 3-dimensional manifold embedded in 6-dimension Ethereal space, which could be traversed in one way to move between fixed points on the Prime Material, and in another way to move between analogous points on the first-order Material echo planes (Feywild, Prime, Shadowfell). - Being nearly orthogonal to the Elemental Planes, they were also able to extend pathways to them where the manifold crosses its “origin”.
    Discovery
    Rediscovered by the Platinum Elemental Adventuring Company in 4761.
    Related Species

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