The Nine Hells of Baator

The Nine Hells of Baator, sometimes shortened to Hell or Hells, and named Baator in Infernal. It was the home of the devils and the plane that embodied lawful evil. It was a plane of sinister wickedness and institutional cruelty, its denizens organised into a strict caste system with a very rigid chain of command. Each of the Nine Hells had its own physical laws or properties of matter, but all were inhospitable or deadly to outsiders.

COSMOLOGY

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The Great Wheel cosmology model placed the Nine Hells in the Outer Planes between Gehenna and Acheron, with additional connections to Concordant Opposition and the Astral Plane. Each Hell was a different infinite layer interconnected at barriers much like a nine-layered cake—the lowest points of one layer manifested barriers that exited high above the surface of the next lower layer. The river Styx flowed through the first layer, Avernus, and also the fifth layer, Stygia, before crossing over into Gehenna.
When the Great Wheel model was overshadowed by the World Tree cosmology model, the river Styx was renamed the River of Blood and it flowed through all the fiendish planes (except for the Supreme Throne and the Demonweb Pits) originating in the Abyss, passing through the Blood Rift—an unusual plane that connected the Abyss with the Nine Hells—bringing the devils even closer to their arch-enemies the demons, resulting in the Blood War. The layers were still described as being infinite but with a central pit of finite size that opened to the next lower layer in a tiered fashion, with a drop of many miles between layers. Cosmologists verified portals between the Nine Hells and the Barrens of Doom and Despair and Clangor and, by agreement with Kelemvor, to the Fugue Plane. The Astral plane connected all of the fiendish planes to the Prime Material Plane, but not directly to each other.
After the Spellplague, Asmodeus consumed the essence of the fallen Azuth achieving (some say regaining) greater godhood and ended the Blood War by casting the Abyss to the furthest depths of the Elemental Chaos. The World Axis cosmology model described the Nine Hells as an astral dominion floating in the Astral Sea, no longer of infinite size nor consisting of layers, ruled by Asmodeus and his eight archdevil vassals. Once again the river Styx flowed through the Nine Hells and the Abyss, but then emptied its pollution into the Astral Sea.

GEOGRAPHY

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Each of the Nine Hells was unique and usually mirrored the malevolent characteristics of its ruler, or perhaps the archdevils were shaped by the domains they schemed to control, no one can be certain. In earlier cosmologies, each Hell was a separate infinite layer rigidly joined to its neighbours by barriers at fixed locations. After the Spellplague, the domains of the archdevils were described as territories (large, but finite) or circles. The relationship between layers and circles is not fully known. What follows are descriptions of the nine Hells reported by various cosmologists working under different cosmological models, gathered, collated, and summarized.
AVERNUS
The first circle of Hell, was also the "topmost" because Astral travellers would emerge from colour pools on this layer and reaching the next circle required descending to the lower depths to breach a barrier to Dis. According to the Great Wheel cosmology model, this layer was also connected by portals to Acheron, Gehenna, and Concordant Opposition. By the World Tree cosmology model, portals connected Avernus to Clangor, the Barrens of Doom and Despair and the Blood Rift via the River of Blood. It was believed at the time that some of the archdukes maintained portals to the realms of Bane, Loviatar, and Talona, but the ownership and location of those portals was unknown. The World Axis cosmology model posits the Nine Hells were isolated with no direct connections, except via the river Styx to the Abyss. Travellers on the Astral Sea who did not follow the Styx likely found themselves falling out of the sky above Avernus to a fiery death.
By all accounts, Avernus was a desolate wasteland with rocky terrain, sparse, twisted vegetation, concealed snake pits, caves and warrens, volcanoes, and rivers of magma. The sky was starless, full of choking smoke and glowed a dark red due to balls of flammable gas that floated about or streaked across the atmosphere, randomly exploding as a fireball. During the Blood War, Avernus echoed with the marching of legions of devil troops preparing for the next campaign against the demons of the Abyss the ground was littered with the detritus of countless battles, and blood trickled out of the ground in vein-like streams eventually flowing into the river Styx.
The most likely beachhead for any attack by demon-kind, it was the primary battleground of the Blood War: legions of devils marched across its plains in continual readiness to repel the hordes of demon invaders that sailed the River Styx into the layer.
Avernus was the largest layer of Baator and one of the most traditionally infernal—a blasted hellscape in the most literal sense filled with rivers of lava, barren hills, and low, rocky mountains as far as the eye could see. To scale the mountains or move too quickly was unwise at best, since obsidian, quartz, and other crystals jutted from the jagged land, cutting clothes and slicing flesh. The ubiquitous presence of rocks and boulders, some of which seemed to resemble tormented faces and shapes of creatures, rendered the terrain extremely treacherous and difficult to cross at any pace quicker than a fast walk. Rubble covered the vast, ashen plains of Avernus's charred wastes.
Fireballs raced across the dark sky of Avernus, seemingly at random (but on closer inspection actively targeted motion), and fell to the scorched earth, leaving smoking impact craters and burnt corpses in their wake. Travellers would need to find shelters, such as a building or cave, lest they inevitably be struck. The acrid air was clouded with pumice and volcanic ash from the foul fumaroles and blighted with swarms of flies. Roiling clouds of red and black flickered with orange flames but the atmosphere had neither sun nor stars, only a constant, blood-red light that suffused the air.
Blood, as it would happen, was the leitmotif of Avernus; it was where the River of Blood ran through Baator, collecting rivulets from every gulch, stream, and pool, from the victims of millions of battles. Practically all of the plane was bathed in a coat of blood and covered with bones and gore, whether devilish, demonic or otherwise, acting as a grim reminder of the regular bloodshed that marked an average day in Avernus.
As with all the lower planes, the River Styx ran through Avernus, with a number of offshoots and falls. Rivulets, lakes, and streams flowed across Avernus's plains and fed the Styx. The Styx, which at one point flowed at the edge of the layer, was later located at its center thanks to a relentless baatezu campaigning and conquering of gate-towns along the layer's edges.
GOVERNMENT OF AVERNUS
Whether for the living or the dead, Avernus was the entry point to Baator and the most commonly visited of the Nine Hells, since Asmodeus forbade any portals opening to other regions. Because of this, damned souls had to come through Avernus before reaching other layers of the Nine Hells and so the layer was frequently inhabited by the servants of other archdevils, such as the barbazus that gathered the forsaken, or imp and spinagon messengers. The primary reason for the magical restriction was that, for a demonic invasion force to access the lower layers of Hell, they would be forced to conquer and claim the layer directly above it.
As the buffer between the Nine Hells and the Abyss, Avernus was incredibly dangerous even without its natural hazards, as baatezu armies trained for future battles. While the layer was once bustling with cities and citadels, centuries of fighting the Blood War ravaged it so that only perpetually rebuilt strongholds and fearsome fortresses remained. It was in a state of constant expansion by military conquest.
The ruler of Avernus was titled the Lord of the First. This position was held by Zariel, who had been betrayed by Bel, before she then supplanted him by the late 15th century DR. Bel, a pit fiend general from Dis, was demoted by Asmodeus and made her advisor. She resided in a soaring basalt citadel. When he ruled, Bel dwelled in his own fortress at the centre of the Bronze Citadel.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• The Bronze Citadel: A huge fortress-city dozens of square miles in extent and ringed by twelve heavily defended walls. It housed hundreds of thousands of lesser devil troops and war machines. It was constantly being added to in the form of new fortifications against attacks. The Lord of the First reigned from here.
• The Great Avernus Road: A massive road leading from Bel's fortress for the purpose of transporting large armies of devils swiftly to battle.
• The Pillar of Skulls: A hideous landmark of trophy-skulls of those killed in the Blood War. It reached a height of more than 1 mile (1.6 kilometres). It was very close to the entrance to the second layer, Dis.

CONNECTIONS
An especially high metal spire of Dis, the plane below, skewered through the haze between layers and emerged in Avernus near the Pillar of Skulls. Its spiral stairwell let devils and petitioners cross on foot between the layers, with many falls, by chance of otherwise.
DIS
The second circle of Hell, when described as its own layer, was a flat barren plane containing little more than black, stagnant rivers, stretching for thousands of miles until it reached some rolling hills. The sky was a cloudy dull green shot through with lightning. In the center of this plane rose the Iron City of Dis, several miles in height and hundreds of miles wide. The foul rivers radiated from a moat big enough to be called a lake surrounding the Iron City. The World Tree view of the Iron City was much the same but bigger, having been expanded by countless minions following Dispater's grand plan. The walls of the buildings and the stones of the streets glowed the dull red of hot iron; more than brief skin contact resulted in severe burns. Prisoners of war, tormented underlings, criminals, and kidnap victims were kept in underground dungeons where their wails of woe could be heard filtering up through small vents in the iron walls. Above it all rose the Iron Tower where Dispater sat and schemed, untouchable. In the World Axis view, the city of Dis was enclosed in a huge cavern accessible from Avernus through a tremendous iron gate in the side of a mountain.
It was almost entirely covered by the city of the same name that stood in a valley surrounded by a ring of spiked mountains. As far as most visitors and inhabitants were concerned, the layer and the city were indistinguishable.
Despite being potentially infinite, the city of Dis always felt crowded and oppressive to anyone inside. The entire city was made of red-hot iron. Every wall and cobblestone burned to the touch. The material exuded a column of smoke that constantly shrouded the layer in a dark haze.
Someone who managed to leave the city could walk away from it, leaving it behind as its valley lay hidden by a ring of mountains. However, very few accounts of the city's exterior were known. On the other hand, approaching Dis felt like a break from reality. A traveller could only arrive at the city by following a road paved with skulls. As the walls approached, one was, without noticing a transition, suddenly inside the city, with no edge or outer wall in sight. The city hosted numerous markets and bazaars whose wares attracted creatures from various planes.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• The Iron Tower, a personal fortress of Dispater, Lord of the Second. It was visible from the entire layer due to its enormous height, as it rose above the haze.
• The Garden of Delights, a facility that offered the illusion of sumptuous meals and pleasures of the flesh for exorbitant fees.
• Mentiri, the great prison of Dis, held those that broke the rules of the Hells. It "reformed" its prisoners by constantly tempting them into becoming evil.

The streets of Dis, were always crowded with parading devil nobles and workers that constantly remodelled the city at Dispater's behest. The most numerous inhabitants were abishai, imps, lemures, nupperibos, and spinagons, but also shades and other planar creatures could be found.
The city's underground dungeons were filled with petitioners, prisoners of the Blood War, and kidnapped mortals from the Prime Material plane. Their tortured screams could be heard on the surface through vents in the city walls.
MINAUROS
Minauros as a layer was described as an endless bog of vile pollution, decaying bodies, and rotting marsh, repeatedly drenched by rain, sleet, and hail storms. The soggy, bone-strewn, disease-ridden swampland made movement very difficult and was only broken occasionally by serpentine ridges of volcanic rock. Nameless creatures even the devils feared inhabited the swamp. Minauros as a realm was depicted as a broad but low-vaulted cavern connected to Dis. Oily water percolated through the roof of the cave and rained down upon swamps, deserts of mud and oozing black soil, pockmarked by bubbling fumaroles and mud geysers.
Minauros was also the name of the city built of black stone by Mammon on the treacherous surface of this place. Only the ceaseless efforts of thousands of minions and slaves prevent the city from sinking and being consumed by the bog. The city of Jangling Hiter, also known as the City of Chains, hung by massive links of chain above the noisome fen and was ruled by kytons.
The entire layer was a single stinking bog. The weather was a constant mix of rain and sleet that left an oily residue after it melted, followed by razor-sharp hail that fell from a perpetually grey sky. Volcanic ridges made of rock and obsidian could be found in several locations along the swamp. The swamp exuded a luminescent mist that provided some illumination.
Temperatures varied enormously throughout the layer. Some areas were cold enough to freeze the bog over, while others boiled under intense heat, forming mud geysers.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• The City of Minauros, the largest settlement in the layer and the seat of power of Mammon, Lord of the Third. It was constantly sinking into the swamp, so expeditions of petitioners and slaves were sent periodically to fetch volcanic rock to shore the city up and replace its streets. It was rumoured that beneath the city lay the ruins of an ancient city pulled from the Outlands.
• Jangling Hiter, a city suspended by chains from the bottom of Dis, the second layer.

INHABITANTS OF MINAUROUS
The primary inhabitants of Minauros were bearded devils, chain devils, imps, and spined devils. However, also quite common here were barbed devils, who were charged with tracking and hunting down petitioners who attempted to escape. Lemures and nupperibos composed the remainder of the population.
Notable dukes that formed Mammon's court included the general's Bael, Caarcrinolaas, and Melchon; Focalor, Mammon's seneschal; and Glwa, Mammon's consort.
PHLEGETHOS
The fourth circle was the Hell that most resembled the stereotype of a fiery world of eternal damnation, filled with active volcanoes, rivers of liquid fire, molten rock, ash hills, smoking pits, unbearable heat, all wracked by tremors and earthquakes. Even the air seemed aflame and thus Phlegethos was considered to be fire-dominant. In the World Axis view, Phlegethos was a cavern several miles below Minauros, where burning lava poured out of fissures in the ceiling. The city of Abriymoch was the seat of power in this realm, built of hardened magma, obsidian, and crystal in the caldera of an extinct volcano which provided visitors with some protection from the elemental environment found throughout the rest of the plane.
The layer's climate resembled the Elemental Plane of Fire. It was dominated by a scorching heat that ignited the air itself, creating seemingly sentient and aggressive flames that leapt at visitors but not at the residents. The ground had fissures that spewed jets of flame that flowed into rivers of liquid fire. It contained numerous volcanoes whose eruptive products flowed through rivers of lava into an incandescent ocean of magma.
In addition to the vast hamatula and cornugon contingents, the layer was inhabited primarily by hell hounds, imps, and spinagons. Other planar creatures also made their home there, but the heavily guarded layer was not welcoming to strangers.
GOVERNMENT OF PHLEGETHOS
Phlegethos was ruled jointly by Fierna and Belial, a partnership that was allowed by Asmodeus as an exception to the typical rule that each layer should only have one ruler.
The layer was the centre of the judicial system of the Nine Hells. All legal disputes involving devils were discussed in the Diabolical Court, an independent institution under Belial's supervision that only answered to Asmodeus. It was also in Phlegethos that the promotion or demotion of devils took place, through a ritual that temporarily made them vulnerable to the layer's flames.
DEFENCES
The city of Abriymoch held a reserve of 5,000 hamatulas under the command of the pit fiend Gazra, stationed there to serve as a line of defence in case demons managed to reach the layer.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• Abriymoch, a city made of volcanic rock, obsidian, and crystal, located on the caldera of a volcano. It was said to have been built on top of the grave of a deity killed by Asmodeus. It contained numerous taverns and places for entertainment.

PIT OF FLAME
The Pit of Flame exemplified Phlegethos and Hell overall; it was a place of pain and punishment but also of pleasure and purification that blurred the lines between the two so heavily that it was difficult to tell where either ended. It was the volcanic centre of Phlegethos, a massive lake of boiling filth that jettisoned columns of white flame hundreds of feet into the air. At first glance, this would seem harmless to the devils, most if not all of which were immune to fire, but not even devils could endure the agonizing flames of the pit.
That was because the flames were not ordinary fire, but hellfire, a kind of unspeakably hot energy drawn from Hell itself that caused even those normally immune to extreme heat to writhe and convulse in unimaginable torment. Suspended above the columns were iron balls held in place by huge, cantilevered beams in which various devils were kept, the maintenance of which was partially kept by all archdevils as a form of paid subscription for using it.
Osyluths, with the exception of pit fiends, could condemn devils that broke Baatorian law to the Pit of Flame, and devils of all layers could send their underlings there for disobedience or failure, Asmodeus himself being known to send those who provoked his ire to years of torture at a time. It was one of the worst punishments in Baator, one of the few threats that could make even most devils stammer in terror. At the same time, many devils, particularly the fierce and ambitious, were known to willingly subject themselves to the pain, either to prove their resilience, gain mental strength, redeem themselves with an act of penance or simply for the highs of ecstasy they somehow received from the torturous, purifying fire.
Barbazus operated the beams, although they had been known to accept bribes to keep prisoners there longer than their stated sentence, while thousands of cornugons ensured that no devil escaped their judgement, forcing powerful devils into cages and making sure they weren't freed before their time was up. The Pit was also used as a method of promotion and demotion for several devils, granting some with greater forms but reducing most to lesser beings.

STYGIA The complete opposite of Phlegethos, Stygia (named after the River Styx) was either a bottomless ocean covered by an ice sheet up to 3 miles (4.8 kilometres) thick, or a frozen sea salted with huge icebergs buried in a cavern several miles below Dis and hundreds of miles away from fiery Phlegethos depending on which cosmological model was in vogue at the time. According to the Great Wheel and World Tree models, the river Styx cut across the ice forming a channel. The older model also suggested the Styx supported small but hardy plants and mosses which, after millennia of decay of this vegetation, resulted in swampy areas along the banks of the river. A few floating islands were the only non-frozen ground in Stygia, their peaks wreathed in lightning arcing from the coal-black sky. Where lightning struck, a strange phenomenon called "cold fire" erupted: white flames of extreme cold that "burned" for a short time and then disappeared without a trace. The great city of Tantlin was built upon one of these islands, in the curve of the swampy Styx, or perhaps on a giant ice floe. Due to the proximity of the Styx, Tantlin was a cross-planar trading post for those brave enough to attempt navigating the treacherous river.
Stygia was a vast ocean of saltwater that was almost completely frozen. Its surface was almost entirely covered in ice floes and icebergs that crowded and completely covered the ocean. The only open body of water was the Styx, which kept its dark, oily water separated from the saltwater and meandered through the layer as if it were crossing a plain.
Some of the ice floes were large enough to support cities. Navigation between settlements was made relatively easy by the presence of the Styx. Small arctic plants grew in some locations, creating vast icy swamps that were slightly warmer than the rest of the layer. Those areas attracted several creatures and wildlife, but were at a larger risk of the thinner ice breaking.
The sky of Stygia was in a state of perpetual twilight and was constantly struck by lightning, which made it extremely dangerous for flying creatures. Thunder swept the land in a continuous rumble.
Stygia was unique among the layers of Baator in that it was almost entirely untamed and wild, with no significant part of its territory devoted to any particular purpose. For that reason, its wilderness was inhabited by several aggressive creatures such as dire wolves, frost worms, krakens, mammoths, polar bears, sharks, and remorhazes, which were used as practice for devils in military training.
In addition to the wildlife that inhabited the layer, tribes of frost giants also wandered across the ice with no fear of the devils. The diabolic population of the layer included abishai, amnizus, erinyes, gelugons, and spinagons. Also uniquely among the layers of Baator, pit fiends were exceedingly uncommon in Stygia. Hamatulas and succubi were also commonly found.
GOVERNMENT OF STYGIA
The layer was ruled by the archduke Levistus, who was kept prisoner deep within a large iceberg known as the Tomb of Levistus in Tantlin's harbour. Levistus issued his commands and gathered information telepathically, as he was able to communicate with any other devil within 10 miles (16 kilometres). Levistus also controlled all of the amnizus, while he secretly planned to conquer another layer of Baator.
Stygia was rumoured to have been originally a world in the Prime Material plane that was doomed to destruction. Its inhabitants then pledged their entire world and their souls to Asmodeus in exchange for safety, which resulted in their world becoming one of the Hells. This hypothesis was based on the unusual variety of creatures native to the Material Plane that inhabited the layer, although no more decisive evidence had ever been found to support it. It remained a topic of speculation whether the original world's riches were still buried under the ice.
The layer was also rumoured to be the headwaters of the Styx, both due to the river's ubiquitous presence throughout the landscape and to the strength of its memory-draining effects there, which were capable of erasing an individual's soul.
MALBOLGE
The sixth circle and layer of the Nine Hells (the Crushing Lands). It served as the prison of the Nine Hells. Malbolge was ruled by Glasya, Asmodeus' daughter. Her court was primarily comprised of erinyes, paeliryons and succubi. She had only one Duke, Tartach.
An extremely inhospitable layer, Malbolge tended to be avoided even by devils. The layer's most numerous inhabitants were erinyes and paeliryons, who were favoured by Glasya. Other devils found in this layer were barbed devils, bone devils, cambions, ice devils, legion devils, lemures, nupperibos, spinagons, storm devils, and war devils. Non-devils dwelt there, including giant centipedes, giant spiders, giant wasps, hell louse, kalabon, and night hags.
There is a significant disagreement between cosmologies on the nature of the sixth circle of Hell. As a Great Wheel layer, Malbolge was a gargantuan tumble of angular black stone blocks, each block ranging in size from a small city to a large metropolis, that formed a pile hundreds of miles thick. The randomly tilted and ill-fitting blocks were honeycombed with angular passages and caverns causing non-flying travellers to frequently need mountaineering skills and risk avalanches. Stinking clouds of vapour rose up from the depths and lit the sky with the colour of blood, causing cosmologists to speculate that the blocks of Malbolge may have rested on an infinite sea of lava. Corroborating reports have been heard of flammable materials left on the ground spontaneously combusting. Most habitations in Malbolge were copper-clad fortresses built from black stone.
The World Tree view of this layer was similar to the Great Wheel plane of Gehenna: a steep, infinite craggy incline often subject to avalanches that crushed most anything that got in the way. The copper-shod redoubts were teardrop-shaped or otherwise engineered to deflect tumbling boulders, but even those could not long withstand a direct hit from a major avalanche.
In the World Axis cosmology view, Malbolge was another huge cavern connected to Stygia by icy canals that ran hundreds of miles before reaching their destination. A former godly inhabitant had shaped the realm into a vast garden with fountains, towers, reflecting pools, and all manner of landscaping delights. With the coming of the devils, Malbolge was still beautiful on the surface but creeping corruption permeated the realm, twisting the beauty, perverting the architecture, and poisoning the pools.
LOCATIONS IN MALBOLGE

• Garden of Delights: A walled garden adjacent to Glasya's palace. Home of the hellwasps.
• Hair Forest: A closely packed forest of massive, scaled hairs.
• Lake of Bile: Despite its name, it was a group of vile, toxic lakes.
• Maggoth Thyg: A mysterious cavern located at the bottom of one of the many rocky slopes of Malbolge. Devils are terrified of entering this cavern and all who have entered have never returned.
• Ossiea: Glasya's fortress, built near Hair Forest from the remains of Malagard's enlarged skull.

MALADOMINI
The seventh circle of Hell described it as having vapour-polluted skies similar to Malbolge but the surface was solid. It was an endless field of ruined and decaying cities, and the centre for all the bureaucracy of the Nien Hells. The post-Spellplague view described Maladomini as a colossal maze of passages each several miles across that eventually led to Cania, Malbolge, and Nessus. All three models agreed that the seventh Hell was filled with ruins of old cities, stagnant rivers, exhausted and abandoned quarries and strip mines, stone aqueducts and lava canals, decaying fortresses, swarms of biting flies, and black pools of ichor that erupted from the ground. The Lord of the Seventh was never satisfied with the construction of his capital and repeatedly built and abandoned city after city. The largest and most beautiful was Malagard, a sprawling metropolis/palace/fortress/arcology with myriad black towers linked by a tangled web of bridges and walkways. Malagard was rumoured to contain a million rooms and to cap an equally complex dungeon labyrinth.
The layer's sky was a shade of black that was reminiscent of venous blood. The landscape was dotted with abandoned cities that served as shelters and hideouts for runaway petitioners, deserters, criminals, and lost creatures from other planes. Between cities, the layer was marked by surface mines, deforested areas, and clogged canals. Rivers were completely covered in sludge, and some areas contained sentient pieces of polluted matter that reached and grasped before dying from the toxic air. The few remaining forests were either in a state of rotting or spontaneously combusted. A black ichor exuded from all matter in the layer.
GOVERNMENT OF MALADOMINI
Maladomini was ruled by the fallen archon turned archdevil Baalzebul. In his obsessive quest for perfection, Baalzebul repeatedly ordered the construction of cities of increasing beauty and magnificence to serve as his seat of power. Invariably, he then grew unsatisfied with it and ordered that the latest city be abandoned and for a new one to be built. As of the late 14th century DR, the latest city under construction was Malagard.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• The Carnival Eternal, a grotesque amusement park created to reward devils for the souls they gathered.
• Grenpoli, the City of Diplomacy. A domed city where weapons and all types of aggression were forbidden, it contained the Political School of the Nine Hells, which offered courses on deceit and treachery to enterprising devils.
• Malagard, home to Baalzebul and the greatest city in the layer. Baalzebul's seat was located in the Palace of Filth.
• Offalion, a training facility designed to instruct devils on matters of political manipulation and bargaining by creating detailed simulations of locations in the Prime Material plane.

INHABITANTS OF MALADOMINI
The layer was inhabited by numerous intelligent devils, such as amnizus, paeliryons, harvester devils, and erinyes, as well as ayperobos, barbazus, cornugons, lemures, and spinagons. The constant production of ichor also promoted the spontaneous generation of oozes, such as black puddings, gelatinous cubes, and ochre jellies.
Baalzebul's council included his consorts Baftis and Lilith, the Herald of Lies Neabaz, the marshal Barbatos, and the generals Abigor, Bileth, and Zepar.
CANIA
It was the eighth circle and layer of the Nine Hells of Baator. It was a relentless realm of seemingly living cold.
Both pre-and-post-Spellplague cosmologies agree that Cania was a bitterly cold-dominant realm of solid ice mountains, titanic, unnaturally fast-moving glaciers, and nearly continuous snowfall that made Stygia seem balmy by comparison. Unprotected travellers were exposed to temperatures of −60 ℉ (−51 ℃) but on the positive side, there were few creatures that hunted in the icy wastes. Earlier lore described the great citadel Mephistar as being constructed of iron but later reports say the Lord of the Eighth's fortress/palace was made of ice. All accounts seemed to agree the tower had a heated, luxurious interior and sat atop a gargantuan glacier called Nargus whose speed and movement was under the control of Mephistopheles himself.
The layer was marked by moving glaciers and icebergs that drifted as fast as a running person, constantly colliding with one another and with surrounding mountains of enormous sizes. Snow avalanches were common and violent. The weather was dominated by snowstorms that howled with incessant winds. Thin layers of accumulated snow often hid deep crevasses that could engulf incautious explorers.
The supernatural cold of Cania was substantially stronger than in Stygia, reaching temperatures of −60 ℉ (−51 ℃), comparable to those in the Frostfell. It could quickly penetrate nonmagical clothing, freezing unprotected creatures within minutes and killing even those wearing gear designed to withstand cold temperatures in hours. Unsheltered creatures ran the constant risk of freezing to death. Preserved corpses were frequently uncovered after collisions between glaciers, while other glaciers seemed to hold unknown frozen creatures at their very centres. Some of the shapes within the ice suggested that they were archons or devas fighting unknown spined creatures, while others seemed like entire alien cities. The layer contained scattered laboratories and libraries within isolated citadels.
GOVERNMENT OF CANIA
The layer was ruled by the archdevil Mephistopheles, Lord of the Eighth. His rule consisted of overseeing endless experiments with arcane magic and the nature of the planes, conducted throughout the wastes of the layer. Government duties were often filled by Hutijin, allowing Mephistopheles more time to focus on his experiments.
DEFENCES
The layer was constantly patrolled against spies that might pry on the secrets of arcane spells, magic items, and magic theory that were developed in its laboratories. Arcane spellcasters and other devils occasionally risked braving the cold wastes in search of knowledge. In particular, spies from Dis were common, since Dispater worried that Mephistopheles might acquire more information than him.
RUMOURS & LEGENDS
The tiefling midwife Destiny Agganor from Nightstone had a set of runes burned onto her front door to ward off unwanted visitors. It contained a prayer that included damning any intruders to freeze for a millennium in Cania.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• Kintyre, an enormous uninhabited city of strange architecture that was buried deep under the ice.
• Mephistar, home of Mephistopheles. A heated citadel was carved out of the ice and located atop the giant glacier Nargus, whose movement was controlled by the Lord of the Eighth himself.
• The Pit, a dark and windy shaft several hundred feet in diameter. It was heavily guarded by ice devils and ended in a lake of frozen slush. At the bottom of the lake, at a depth of 1,001 fathoms (1,831 meters) lay a portal that was the primary access point to the ninth layer, Nessus.

NESSUS
The ninth and deepest Hell was a land of extremes: regions cold as Cania, volcanoes like Phlegethos, a lake of ice, a flaming forest, sheer cliffs, firewinds, and a citadel even larger than Khin-Oin in Hades (later, Khin-Oin became part of the Abyss). The World Tree view did not contradict this description of Nessus but focused more on the blasted and torn landscape out of which rose Malsheem, the Citadel of Hell. It was said that Malsheem could hold millions of devils within its mountainous edifice, from the lowest warrens deep in the trench to the soaring spires miles above the tortured plane. The World Axis model agreed that a progression of rifts, pits, and chasms lead down and down, forming a vertical maze hundreds of miles deep that contained great cities, fiendish armies, and the mighty fortress of the Overlord Asmodeus.
The layer was a featureless plain with jagged edges that extended 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometres) from east to west and 1,100 miles (1,800 kilometres) from north to south, floating in an endless red void. The plains were scarred by chasms and ravines several thousand miles deep and were frequently ravaged by fiery storm winds.
The River Styx trickled down into Nessus through a little-known, small offshoot. It was heavily guarded by devils who slew any unauthorized visitors on sight. The river drained into a shallow pool known as the Forgotten Lake, then continued at the bottom of some of the crevasses before percolating through the earth and continuing its course into Gehenna. The River Lethe also flowed across Nessus, occasionally also falling into its trenches and ravines.
Nessus was inhabited by a majority of greater devils, including Asmodeus's legions of amnizus, pit fiends, and cornugons, among others.
GOVERNMENT OF NESSUS
The layer was ruled directly by Asmodeus, who presented himself as an illusion of a tall, red-skinned, slender man. He was assisted by a court of archdevils that included the Chancellor of Hell Adramalech, Inquisitor Phongor, and several commanders. His pit fiend generals included Executioner Alastor, Asmodeus's majordomo Baalberith, and Constable Martinet.
NOTABLE LOCATIONS

• Malsheem, the largest city in all of the Outer Planes and home to Asmodeus. Located at the bottom of an enormous trench directly below the portal from the Pit in Cania, it was inhabited by millions of devils held in reserve for an unknown cataclysmic battle. Asmodeus's citadel of Fortress Nessus rose far above the plain from the bottom of the rift.
• The Serpent's Coil, the deepest rift of the layer, is said to have been blasted as a result of Asmodeus's fall into the Hells. It was home to his true form as he healed from the wounds sustained by his fall. The bloodshed by Asmodeus's wounds constantly sprouted new devils, perfect specimens of pit fiends and cornugons.
• Tabjari, a citadel made of copper that stood along the walls of Reaper's Canyon. It contained one of the three copies of the Pact Primeval―the other two remaining in Mechanus and Mount Celestia.

INHABITANTS

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The principal inhabitants of the Nine Hells/Baator were the devils, and their offspring in varieties too numerous to catalogue here. See the main article for descriptions of the myriad devilkind. Unlike the demons of the Abyss, the devils were highly organized in their quest for power and status—scheming and plotting power plays, coups, and assassinations.
In addition to the devils, this plane was home to bonespears, gathra, haraknin, hell hounds, imps, night hags, nightmares, and maelephants. Also occasionally encountered were achaierai, barghests, hellcats, mephits, rakshasa, and stench kows.

AFTERLIFE

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Beliefs about the journey of souls to the afterlife changed with the shifting cosmologies and the crystal sphere in which one resided. In some worlds, lawful evil souls were automatically destined for the Hells and arrived as mindless nupperibos or, if they were worthy, as semi-intelligent lemures. For mortals of Realmspace, however, souls first travelled to the Fugue Plane where they awaited escort to their final rest on the plane of their primary deity. While waiting, devils were allowed to bargain with the souls, playing on their fears and doubts to get them to agree that becoming a lemure with a chance for promotion was a better option than their suspected fate. Strong or crafty souls might negotiate a deal that reduced their time as a lemure or bestow a boon or punishment on those they left behind. After the Spellplague, Shar reshaped the Plane of Shadow and folded in what death energy did not get absorbed into the Elemental Chaos and created the Shadowfell. According to the World Axis view, souls on their way to the afterlife started their journey in the Shadowfell. Most made it to the Fugue Plane to await judgment, but a few remained behind or were lost.

REALMS

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The nine circles of Hell were each ruled by an archdevil of great power, but the Nine Hells were also the home of other powerful beings at various points in the history of the Realms. Listed here in alphabetical order are those that directly or indirectly influenced the course of events in Aetheus, and beyond.

• Asmodeus, the Overlord of the Nine Hells - exercising his power from a gargantuan citadel in the lowest rift of Nessus, named Malsheem.
• Baalzebul, ruled the seventh circle of Hell, Maladomini, from his huge fortress Malagard.
• Belial, ruler of the fourth circle of Hell, Phlegethos, based in the basalt palace Abriymoch the "Mount of Leaping Flames", nestled in the caldera of an extinct volcano.
• Dispater, ruler of the second circle of Hell, Dis, from his high stone (later iron) tower in the city of the same name, the Iron City.
• Fierna, daughter of Belial, archduchess of the fourth Circle, fiery Phlegethos, as much as her father allowed.
• Gargauth, once an archdevil, was cast out of the Hells long ago for betrayal.
• Geryon, once ruled Stygia, the fifth circle of Hell, from a castle city called Tantlin. At some point, he was replaced or deposed by Levistus before that archdevil was imprisoned in the ice.
• Glasya, daughter of Asmodeus and former consort of Mammon, the ruler of the sixth circle, Malbolge, after her father removed the Hag Countess.
• The Hag Countess held sway over Malbolge, the Sixth Hell, after giving unwise council to Moloch causing him to rebel against Asmodeus and be defeated. Asmodeus eventually got rid of her and installed his daughter Glasya as Lord of the Sixth.
• Levistus, ruler of Stygia, the fifth circle of Hell, before (and perhaps even while) he was imprisoned in an iceberg floating on the frozen sea.
• Mammon once ruled Minauros, the swampy third circle of Hell in a city of the same name, built on many huge pillars of black stone that were constantly sinking slowly into the sludge.
• Mephistopheles, ruler of the frigid eighth circle of hell, Cania, from his mighty citadel Mephistar overlooking the Nargus glacier.
• Moloch ruled the sixth circle of Hell, Malbolge, as the viceroy of Baalzebul, before it was taken by the Hag Countess, and later Glasya.

Type

Dimensional plane