The Echoing Expanse
The Echoing Expanse is a haunting, surreal wasteland located at the outer edges of the Obsidian Wastes in Noctavia—a vast, windless plain where sound is devoured, and unspoken thoughts resonate endlessly. While to the eye it may appear as nothing more than cracked obsidian flatlands littered with fractured monoliths and whispering dust, those who enter it quickly discover its unnatural properties: speech vanishes, noise is consumed, and mental echoes become deafening.
This eerie place is avoided by most, yet it is said to serve as a secretive prison of the mind, a domain not of flesh, but of thought, used by the Empress’s most feared servants: the Imperial Inquisitors.
Localized Phenomena
- Sound Absorption:
No noise persists in the Expanse—footsteps, screams, even the wind itself falls silent. Voices are rendered inert, as if they were never spoken. - Echo of Thought:
Mental projections—especially guilt, fear, or defiance—echo across the mind in magnified clarity. Traitors brought here often spiral into madness, caught in recursive loops of their own guilt or rebellion. - Reality Drift:
Time and direction lose meaning. The horizon always appears just as distant, and days blur without sun or stars. Memory becomes unreliable after extended exposure. - Monolithic Anchors:
Scattered across the plain are towering, angular obsidian stones etched with impossible geometry. These may be conduits for mental imprisonment, psychic filters, or relics of an ancient, unknown intelligence.
Fauna & Flora
Most citizens of Noctavia fear the Expanse, though few believe it truly exists. Children are told that if they speak ill of the Empress, their words will be stolen by the silence and their dreams lost to the black horizon. Among dissidents and scholars, the Echoing Expanse is whispered of in fear—a place where freedom of thought is a crime, and silence is weaponized.
Natural Resources
- Mind Prisons:
The Inquisitors of Noctavia—masters of psionic interrogation—use the Echoing Expanse to shatter the minds of dissidents. A person’s physical body may remain in a cell, but their mind is exiled to the Expanse, trapped in a purgatory of isolation and self-reflection. - Trials of Thought:
Some heretics are judged not by sword or flame, but by enduring the Expanse. If they can walk through it and retain clarity, they may be spared—or recruited. - Experimental Ground:
Forbidden psionic experiments are said to be tested here, as the Expanse resists interference from divine and arcane magic. It is a dead zone for gods and ghosts alike.
History
Legends and Superstition:
- The Whispering Moon:
On certain nights, a dark moon hovers low over the Expanse. Its presence is said to steal the last thoughts of those within its reach. - The Hushed Ones:
Phantom-like entities that drift silently across the plains. Some believe they are failed prisoners whose minds unraveled entirely, becoming part of the Expanse. - The Thoughtforge:
A rumored hidden chamber beneath one of the larger monoliths. It is said to be capable of rewriting the identity of a prisoner or creating perfect, obedient duplicates of once-rebellious minds.
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