Map of Rauxes
Ivid still has firm control, politically speaking, in the capital city. His Imperial Regulars (infantry), Companion Guard, and the Town Guard remain loyal to him. But the human troops work for him almost entirely out of fear of the baatezu and evil priests who throng the city.
However, by no means everything Ivid decrees comes to pass. His courtiers have learned that Ivid is now so hopelessly deranged that he cannot tell fact from fiction, and thus simply telling him that such-and-such has been done (even if it hasn't) will keep them alive as opposed to being executed for treason.
The overking's insanity leaves him without any real notion of what is going on in Aerdy. He still believes the Great Kingdom is intact and that his armies are currently recruiting from South and North Provinces, and the Bone March, preparing for another strike against Nyrond.
He plans this for the end of summer, when crops are ripening in the fields, allowing his armies to survive by foraging as they go. However, Ivid sees spies everywhere and daily orders the execution of traitors in his realm. Again, he is told that these orders have been carried out.
From time to time, a public execution is held by the Screaming Column if an appropriate culprit can be found. Since most of the imagined enemies are far away, or even nonexistent, this is obviously not often possible.
Half the population of the city has fled in terror, although now the Town Guard at the five city gates have orders to let no man or woman leave without an imperial pass.
Those seeking to escape must do so through the Under city, braving its terrors, or else try to scale the 25-foot high city walls and avoid the mobats, flying fiends, and imperial mages who patrol the outskirts of the capital. Few are crazy or desperate enough to attempt this. Far fewer still succeed.
The atmosphere in this city is that of the last days of a terrible tragedy. Everyone knows that Ivid's days are numbered, and few believe he can survive the coming year. For most city folk, this is no comfort; they don't believe that they can survive the coming year either—and they are lapsed into utter despair. Some live day-to-day; others collapse into stuporous helplessness.
Obviously, Rauxes is so large that it allows ample scope for the DM to add locations to those listed below, which are simply the most important for adventuring here. Many other places will be deserted or abandoned, of course, but room has been left for DM expansion. Again, since the overking must (surely?) die of his disease before too long, Rauxes will change greatly in the near future, so an over-detailed city plan will be of little use to the DM. For the DM wishing to develop Rauxes, WG8: Fate of Istus gives a map of pre-war Rauxes which can be adapted.
1-5. City Gates
As shown on the city map, these are in order: North Gate, East Gate, Warrior Gate, Old West Gate, New West Gate. Each gatehouse has a detachment of 40 Town Guard who interrogate all-comers regarding their purpose for visiting. The guards extract whatever bribes they can. Simply paying 2d6 gp will get a person into Rauxes, but a bribe of 100 gp+ is needed to get out without an imperial pass. There is a 25% chance at any time that 1d3 spinagon baatezu will be perched atop the walls close by any city gate—and if they are the Town Guard won't dare to accept bribes. The baatezu usually employ stinking cloud spells as a first attack against anyone trying to escape or using force.
6. The Great Way
This major highway around the overking's palace grounds is 20 yards wide, with the central eight-yard strip being made of very large, smoothed stones a yard or so in length and breadth. Only the Companion Guard, aristocrats, and members of the Royal Guild of Merchants and their bearers can walk along these stones. The rest of the population must use the small cobbled stone strips on either side of this central path. Thus, being seen walking the central stones here is a sign of one's social position. Detachments of 1d6+6 fiend-knights goosestep the length of the Great Way at 20-minute intervals, day and night.
7. Temple of Baalzy
This is a new building within the palace grounds, which the overking has staffed by fiend-knights and a sprinkling of assorted minions dressed in lurid purple and-cream robes. The temple is richly ornamented with much gold, silver, and fine woods, and great stained glass windows show the fat form of a grinning richly dressed man seated before a huge meal—"Baalzy" himself. On Stardays the Town Guard is forced to attend services here with as many of the local people as they can drag along with them. Offerings are given up to this fictional power, and prayers are offered in thanks for the prosperity that Baalzy and the enlightened rule of Ivid have brought the Great Kingdom. Everyone knows this is an absurd nonsense, but they participate anyway. In the warren of "priest's chambers" lurk the cathedral fiends who watch those attending using powers such as ESP and know alignment to check for suspicious characters. The "high priest" is actually a mutant cornugon baatezu in the service of Baalzephon, with the additional ability of being able to polymorph itself into human form.
8. Temple of Boccob
This is still standing because while Ivid ordered that only Baalzy's faith would in the future be recognized, Boccob's high priest is known to be so powerful that not even fiends dared to confront him. Since the priest, Rillikandren, remains within his temple with his three acolytes—and has magical sources of food and fresh water, so the four are self-sufficient—he is not considered a danger by fiends, priests of Hextor, or other servants of Ivid. The temple is wholly resistant to magical scrying, teleportation, entrance by plane shifting and the like. No one knows what Rillikandren is doing staying here in these times, but in the past month a magical aurora lit up the cupola atop the temple, and when a detachment of Town Guard came to investigate they were repelled by a wall of force around the building. A few visitors are said by some to have been admitted by night, perhaps to consult the Book of Hours which the high priest is said to possess—a prophetic work said to speak of the decline and fall of the House of Naelax—and who is destined to be the next Ruling Royal House. The House of Darmen is known to have sent negotiators to talk with Rillikandren. But they have come away without being allowed entry.
9. Temple of Pholtus
When Emasstus Carcosa was taken from the temple here to the horror of Ivid's dungeons, the remaining priests were kept silent in the sealed-up building by a Companion Guard detachment. After two weeks of isola tion, it was publicly pronounced that an outbreak of plague had killed all inside. Most folk did not believe it, but none dared investigate, fearing the disease. The build ing is still sealed up, with powerful glyphs of warding on all entrances (many with secondary effects such as hold person and even energy drain cast into them). Not even desperate thieves will venture here.
Inside, unknown to most in Rauxes, the upper level of the temple has been looted, although in secret basement's treasures and a handful of magical items have been carefully hidden. The priests and acolytes all have been slain and raised as undead. A small pack of ghouls enters the Undercity from a secret door in the basements. One priest here stands as a failed attempt to create an animus from him. He has animus statistics, save for an inability to use the command and domination powers. Further, he does not regenerate. This wretched creature is virtually mindless, shambling about inside the temple and vocaliz ing ghastly, stomach-turning howls of fury and despair. Any PC follower of Pholtus granting him the peace of death would certainly receive the blessing of Pholtus.
10. Temple of Hextor
Also within the main palace grounds, this temple is used by Hextor's priesthood, elite warriors, human members of the Companion Guard, and some of Ivid's advisers. Patriarch-General Pyrannden has chambers here, and in addition to church records, monies, and the like, he jealously guards the unholy bloodshield which is the temple's most prized magical artifact. Services are held here on days sacred to Hextor, such as anniversaries of exceptionally bloody battles, and the usual ghastly rituals of Hextor's faith are enacted during them. Especially gruesome features of this temple are four guardian statues made entirely from coagulated blood. They have the statistics of flesh golems, but they never escape priestly control.
11. Temple of Zilchus
When Baalzy's faith was proclaimed by Ivid, this temple was effectively closed down by the priests themselves. While they did not actively oppose Ivid, they simply withdrew their presence. The temple has not been looted, but most of its wealth has been quietly shipped out of Rauxes. Only a handful of acolytes remain to keep the temple from complete ruin. They bribe the Town Guard to leave them alone, and two of them are minor princelings of the House of Darmen, so they are relatively safe from casual attack by militia.
12. Barracks of the Black Legion
These 400 elite Imperial Regulars are all CE in align ment, but they are well-disciplined war veterans led by the brutal General Schinuss, famous for his dancing sword and his magical artificial left eye (granting true seeing and being able to project fear as per wand once a day). The Imperial Regulars put down major civil unrest and act as shock troops in wars.
13a-c. Support Buildings
Location #13a is the armory; complete with small smithy, only mundane (non-magical) weapons are kept here. The larger #13b is another stablery, with a more impressive smithy where the dwarf blacksmith Gragend Klanden can be found. He is as evil-hearted as he is excel lent at his craft. Finally, #13c is a small set of tenement cottages built for palace domestic servants and drudges.
14. Captain's Quarters
This barracks is used by the commanding officers of the Imperial Regulars and the human leaders of the Compan ion Guard. Tension here is great, since Ivid usually has one or two of them executed for incompetence—more or less at random—every week. All are too terrified to oppose the overking, and most are too frightened to try to flee—the last attempt resulted in all the mutineers being caught, turned into exhibits in the Screaming Column, and a half-dozen of those who didn't try to escape being executed because they had not ratted on their fellows.
15. Tower of the Dead
These royal crypts are exclusively for powerful princes of the House of Naelax. Many of them do their best to avoid being buried here, fearful of what Ivid might do with their remains. Strangely enough, Ivid fears toying with his dead relatives—while being quite happy to despatch those still alive with the utmost cruelty. The great iron gates of the crypt complex are protected with antipathy spells against all of non-evil alignment. Magical traps of the truly murderous kind are common place among the passageways and burial chambers. Many of the princes buried here had at least one or more valuable personal treasure or magical item entombed with them—so the potential haul of treasure is great. Still, few would dare brave the traps, brown molds, and other natural hazards, and noncorporeal undead, ghosts, spectres, and wraiths, which are said to haunt the place. Some of the princes' favorite servitors were buried with them, since some believe that those servants will help the deceased reach the afterlife safely. They were usually buried without their permission and, indeed, well before their lives would have ended from any natural causes. Many of them wander the crypts as undead, while others lurk as skulks in the shadows.
Note that Naelax overkings themselves are always cremated and their ashes dissolved in acid to prevent attempts at resurrection, speaking with dead, and the use of other enchantments. Thus, these tombs contain only ceremonial, nominal burial chambers, containing statues, personal treasures and the like.
16. Tower of the Fiend-Knights
Ivid's detachment of some 200 fiend-knights are stationed here. These horrors are feared by all the human troops of the compound. Magical constructs of sinister crafting, these ghastly things have no need of sleep or rest, and neither do the undead mounts stabled elsewhere.
These troops are utterly loyal to Ivid. Unfortunately, they have virtually no independent volition and little creative or innovative capacity.
17. Karoolck's Tower
The stooping, limping figure of Ivid's court wizard has his chambers atop this craggy, mobat-infested tower. His pathetic retinue of goblin servants are on hand to fetch and carry for him—and to suffer the indignity of a swift disintegration if Karoolck is roused to anger. Karoolkc, the rust-robed archmage, is known to have many oozes, puddings and the like within his tower, acting as guards and disposers of waste (such as intruders, though there have been very few of those, and bodies generally). Clutching his bizarre staff, Karoolck is said by many virtually to control Ivid, in the service of Baalzephon (though few know of the baatezu whose servant Karoolck is).
Atop his tower, Karoolck is often heard screaming and ranting at traitors and about treasons which exist mostly in his own imagination. The name "Xaene" is heard over and over—clearly the Archmage is terrified of a possible vengeful return of his predecessor.
Karoolck's political role is further detailed below, but any who attempt to enter his tower might take heed of the obstacles they would face in addition to his guards. His tower has the same magical defenses as the royal palace (see below), and the archmage himself, not to mention the magical items he carries, present a formida ble defense.
Karoolck is known to have a pair of iron golems, one guarding his own bedchamber and one in his laboratory. Ghouls and a vampiric mist are found in his dungeon. The archmage also has a dozen or so trained stirges which he has enchanted to be immune to hold, charm and fear spells and which also deliver a poisonous bite (1d12 damage in addition to normal damage, saving throw for half). Karoolck's apprentice is a neutral-aligned alu-fiend renegade from the Abyss with the powers of a 9th-level mage (Int 18), known to be an expert in the preparation of poisonous gases, armor-corroding acids, and dust of sneez ing and choking.
18. Palace of the Overking
No interior map is given for this huge building. If the DM wishes to use it in an adventure, then it will require a great deal of planning and mapping. Even getting anywhere near it, given the formidable forces in the palace compound, would be a feat in itself. Only the highest-level PCs could hope to enter the Imperial Palace and survive.
The palace building was constructed with magical mortar between stonework, which eliminates all forms of magical scrying, teleporting, dimension dooring, plane shift ing etc. into the building from outside.
Likewise, it is virtually immune to fire- or electrically based attacks, and acid damage.
Surrounding the vast circular palace are eight circular guard towers, each 130' high (some 20' higher than the palace itself). Barbazu and spinagon guards occupy the top levels of these towers, and elite bowmen take up the middle floors. At ground level (there are separate stair cases to higher level rooms), charmed monsters with special magical attacks, including basilisks, medusae, catoblepases, and chimeras, are kept penned up. The doors to each tower can be magically opened from within the palace and the monsters unleashed to wreak havoc on any trying to storm the palace.
The palace houses many people and chambers other than those of the royals, of course. The great chancelleries and treasure houses are found here.
The treasury is largely empty, save for sealed chambers containing icons and relics of ancient civilizations which have great value in normal times but which are almost worthless to the overking now. The treasury is heavily magically warded and has many golem guards.
Patriarch-General Pyrannden of Hextor has chambers here and maintains a royal shrine to Hextor, which is disused since the proclamation of the faith of Baalzy. Minor ceremonial magical items, along with hordes of ju-ju zombies, can be found therein. There are also personal rooms for generals and senior officers of Ivid's armies, a war-room with great magical maps of the Flanaess, and such.
The new spymaster of the Web, the half-elven mage thief Inshalzen, also cowers in his offices here. He has no idea of where his juniors are, since his predecessor was executed and he has simply been expected to know everything without being told. He is desperate to escape, but being only a 6th-level mage he lacks spells such as teleport to enable him to do this.
The Court of Essence is still a majestic chamber, but now is used solely for Ivid to drag forced "confessions" out of people he imagines to be traitors to the crown. The combat mages of the overking deserve special mention; they have chambers and laboratories on many second-floor rooms with direct access to the eight periph eral towers. This allows them to keep watch over the magical monster guards therein. There are some 30 of these mages, of levels 7-14, and they have a fair number of defensive items including rings of protection, cloaks of displacement, bracers of defense, and more. The mages are exceptionally well-equipped with offensive magical items, notably wands. They are under the command of Karoolck, and many of them make few bones about not liking this at all. Those who could teleport to escape do not do so for fear that they would be pursued by fiends and invisible stalkers or because there is simply nowhere they know well enough, or would feel secure at, to flee to. Ivid's own throne room is a 40-yard diameter circular chamber with the great malachite throne set into the north wall. The throne itself casts an invisible globe of invulnerability on the overking seated upon it, and grants him true seeing. Once per week, if the correct command word is uttered, the throne can be used to open a gate to the uppermost of the Nine Hells. But it provides no protection against any being entering through that gate, and there is a 5% chance per use of bringing insanity to the person opening the gate.
Ivid himself wears lurid ceremonial robes at all times—sometimes purple and blue, other times red and gold, or black, yellow and rust. The colors depend on his mood, with the more dismal tones signalling that he is in a very foul mood. Of late, he has taken to wearing a full face white lacquered mask to hide a psoriatic skin condi tion which his wasting disease brings. He always bears his symbols of office, though their weight makes him stooped: the Staff of Naelax (staff of thunder and lightning), Orb of Rax (brooch of shielding which, if used, regenerates 20 hp of defensive value per day), and the Crown of Aerdy (helm of brilliance).
Ivid also has the remnants of the royal family here, save for his second son Prince Konshandin who has fled to Delaric. Almost all of the surviving royal princes have been slain and resurrected as animuses—see the lineage chart for details. They are regularly administered a complex alkaloid preparation by Hextor's priests, which has the effect of dulling their minds and keeping them loyal to the overking (or at least being incapable of rousing themselves to actively strike against him). Ivid has had many of them executed as traitors, of course. The dungeons of the royal palace contain an unknown number of wretches suffering the Endless Death. Here, they are tortured by priests of Hextor, given a ring of regeneration, and then tortured all over again. Such treat ment renders the victims insane very swiftly. The current victims include Spidasa, Censor of Medegia, and it is possible that Chelor, Herzog of South Province, is similarly tormented—though some say he is dead. Some folk believe that Osson of Almor is similarly imprisoned in the unspeakable dungeons, swarming with evil priests, lesser and least baatezu, undead of most kinds, and worse. There may be secret entrances to the Undercity from these dungeons—but the handful of Undercity denizens who believe that also say that these lead into mind-affecting mazes, filled with jellies, molds, undead and worse.
Special Note, Animuses: The Royal Palace also contains a secret chamber within its dungeons where fiends and priests of Hextor work together to create animuses. This creation process is unique, and cannot be quantified in simple terms (no spell description in the AD&D game format fits this). Essentially, the priests use magical energies of a power almost equivalent to a quest spell (Tome of Magic). Meanwhile, a pit fiend in the service of Baalzephon uses its wish power to complete the arcane enchantment. For this reason alone, animus creation is not an everyday event.
The third vital element is the casket of abyssal bone, one of the artifacts granted to Ivenzen by Baalzephon. The ritual used to create the animus involves slaying the victim and a fair number of other souls besides, and it does not bear relating here.
There are no more than 40 or so animus creatures in Aerdy, and Ivid has been told by Baalzephon that he can spare few wishes from his pit fiends to create more.
19. The Screaming Column in Oltary Park
Oltary Park is deserted, save for a few ghouls or necro mancers prowling it by night. This fell place strikes fear into all of Rauxes's folk.
Originally, Oltary Park was a graveyard. By an imperial decree of CY 467, Ivid I ruled that the bodies of who died within Rauxes became the possession of the crown unless a fee of 100 gp could be paid for the purpose of burial here. This ensured a supply of pauper-bodies which could be used for the purposes of animating dead by evil priests. The zombies so created were used as slave labor. The ordinary folk hated this indignity, of course, and many attempted to flee Rauxes to avoid this fate when they grew old or suffered from serious illness.
For those who could afford it, Oltary Park was their burial site. The area is filled with underground catacombs and crypt complexes, although the number of undead here is fewer than one might expect.
Many people were cremated and buried simply in urns set into walls of great crypts, fearing that despite their burial payment, their bodies would be stolen and animated anyway if still intact. More dangerous are the wererats which prowl the crypts from the Undercity, looking for any foolish enough to try tomb-robbing (there is very little treasure here in any event).
Above ground, Oltary Park appears innocuous enough, with its shrubbery gardens, wooden bench seats, and its jalzanda trees which emit a pungent and slightly lethargy-inducing perfume from their purple flowers in late spring. The exception is the Screaming Column, set in the middle of the park.
The Screaming Column was prepared for traitors and others the overking wished to have publicly, and especially unpleasantly, punished. It appears as a 30' tall column some 8' in diameter, made of red-veined marble like stone. All around the column's circumference, faces are frozen in grimaces, screams, and expressions of dreadful anguish.
When a new victim is to be cast into the column, he is publicly beheaded (with a blunt axe, often needing two or more strikes). The severed head is then magically treated by priests of Hextor using a powerful and unique enchantment (the unholy bloodshield is vital to this). The head then becomes alive, sentient, capable of experienc ing pain. The officiating senior priest then plunges the head into the column, where it is frozen into the stony mass (not unlike a meld into stone spell).
The heads so incarcerated are but driven mad by malign magic on the column. If any spell such as ESP or speak with dead is used, the spellcaster has a 25% chance of becoming insane immediately; the heads cannot be resur rected. Horribly, the unholy bloodshield can also be used to stimulate the column for a period of 2d6 minutes once per week, so that the entire structure is filled with writh ing, screaming, gibbering faces. Simply witnessing this does wonders for discouraging treason among the people of Rauxes.
20. Zelizar's House
This house of ill repute has become debauched to an appalling degree. Its most notable resident, a semi permanent guest, is Prince Ishainken of Naelax. A major landholder in the lands north of the Imeda east of Rauxes, Ishainken is important because his lands supply more than over half the food which keeps Rauxes from starvation and utter collapse. Ishainken is a jaded, warped, half-deranged wretch who barely cares whether he lives or dies; he's simply here to see the last act of the tragedy of Naelax played out.
From his point of view, the best way to do this is by indulging himself to the utmost.
Ishainken's money, and that of a handful of degenerate Rauxes merchants with some resources left, keeps Zelizar's establishment going. Somehow, the proprietor manages to stock a good supply of powerful liquor, addictive substances of various kinds, depraved and mostly-diseased doxies, and wretches who fight to the death in the gladiatorial pit in the cellars.
From time to time, a polymorphed fiend might enjoy a little voyeurism here, and a priest of Hextor or one of Rauxes's few remaining mages could attend for some particular indulgence.
In addition to the dubious pleasure of meeting such folk, Ishainken is not without interest; he knows some hidden secrets concerning the Naelax bloodline. Specifi cally, he has carefully concealed at his home castle a text written by Xaene himself. It states that Ivid V was not the biological son of Ivid IV, but rather the son of a union between a tanar'ri and an enchantress. While the claim may be wholly false, the individual who owned the other copy was pursued for years by Ivid's agents and finally slain (Stankaster of Stankaster's Tower; see From The Ashes, Campaign Book).
Ivid is unaware that any other copy of this text exists. Ishainken isn't sure what value it may prove to have, but he considers that if and when it is the right time to back a claimant to the throne, this book might prove very useful.
21. Halfhigh's Mead and Ale
Halfhigh—a male halfling—still somehow manages to provide decent refreshment for those who can afford it. That he has survived is due simply to the fact that he provisions the palace and provides kegs of a dark, porter beer of which Ivid is especially fond. Halfhigh always drinks a sample of each keg before Ivid, to demonstrate that it is not poisoned. The halfling is terrified, of course, but he is no faithful servant of the overking. Should anyone be able to smuggle him out of Rauxes, he could give a very accurate account of the internal layout of the palace—since he not only delivers beer there, but has on occasion cooked for royal banquets and the like and has thus seen many areas of the palace interior.
22. Erthara's Boarding House
This is almost the only general boarding hostelry where residents can hope to be free of harassment and spying by the Town Guard. Erthara is generally thought to have some embarrassing inside information on some of the Captains of the Guard, and is left alone as a result. An accomplished thief and poisoner, Erthara is a senior member of the Thieves' Guild, and guild members hold meetings in her cellars from time to time. Her clientele is varied, with most having a vested interest in keeping out of sight of the Town Guard. Thieves, exiles from Medegia and North Province, mercenaries trying to avoid conscription into Ivid's armies, and others can be found here. Particularly because of the exiles here, this is a good place to learn of events beyond the city walls.
23. The Imperial
This grand theater, though its grandeur is fading as gilt peels from its interior decor, still survives because of Ivid's patronage. Once every two weeks or so, the overk ing sits, wearing his mask, in his private box to watch the resident theatrical troupe re-enact Ivid's great victories as statesman and soldier. Their Villainies of Nyrond was especially well-received by His Celestial Transcendency. The theater is perforce attended by all Ivid's lackeys when he goes there (potentially leaving the palace vulnerable to a sneak entry, though the guards outside are formidable enough). And a full house is guaranteed at such times. Anyone entering knows well enough to cheer the overking madly when he makes his entrance, during the intermission between acts, and as he leaves.
The dubious delights of attending these performances are enlivened by Ivid's occasional commands to execute performers he doesn't care for, which are carried out on the spot. The night is further sparked by well-intended, but hopeless assassination attempts against Ivid—the last, in Patchwall, being made by three thieves armed with glass globes of dust of sneezing and choking which only succeeded in killing 50 or so of Ivid's Imperial Regulars in the stalls.
24. The Golden Grain Tavern
This innocuous-looking place is of note only because it is as close to a mage's guild as Rauxes has. Most mages of any stature not compelled to serve Ivid have long ago fled, and the few who remain use this as a meeting place—though they protect themselves with mundane and magical disguises and guard their meets with homunculi, invisible stalkers, and other magical servitors. If there is any magical sedition in Rauxes, this is the place to find it.
25. The Red Dragon
This tavern has been appropriated by Prince Zamasken of Naelax, who simply marched in with his retinue of warriors, slew everyone in the place, and took it over. Zamasken is an animus with the abilities of a 15th-level fighter, and he appears still to serve his cousin, the overk ing. If Zamasken hates his cousin as so many animuses do, he controls this hatred brilliantly.
Zamasken's 50 elite warriors (levels 4-9) bristle with magical armors and weaponry, with their leader owning a broadsword +3, frost brand and a shield +5. Their shields are embossed with a sinister variant of the heraldry of the Great Kingdom, with a skeletal dragon atop the usual symbol.
It is whispered that a priest of Nerull is among Zamas ken's men, and that bodies have been sealed in crates below the Red Dragon and shipped out of the city to Zamasken's lands northwest of Rauxes. This may be just a tall story. For the most part, Zamasken and his men stay holed up within the Red Dragon, and if a few people disappear from the vicinity and screams of torment are heard from the building at night; well, this is nothing unusual in Rauxes.
More startling are the frequent reports of huge creatures the size of mobats, which fly down to the roof of the building some nights. They appear to meld into the roof tiles and sink down into the tavern.
26. Jipzinker's House
This ordinary-looking dwelling is home to a "sage"; actually a priest of Nerull, the grim-faced and malodor ous Jipzinker. This man is a priest of Nerull, and as a preceptor of Midnight Darkness he and the three Midnight Darkness assassins (two human thieves and a half-elven mage-thief) beneath his roof still seek out targets in Rauxes for assassination. They keep careful watch on Ertharah's boarding house, and they have a network of informants among the Town Guard and elsewhere. The few sewer workers left, street kids, and the wretches of the eastern tenements alert them to any suspicious individual.
This group, having had no communication from the Hidden Sickle for about three months, is beginning to degenerate into killing for the sake of it. And since their funds grow low, they must perforce slay to replenish their coffers.
Jipzinker keeps a meticulous listing of the operations of the cell, which would, obviously, be of considerable inter est to many individuals. He also maintains records concerning the actions of the Valorous League of Blind ness in Nyrond—from messages sent by a spy there. The identity of that spy would be of great interest to many. Apart from these four people, the greatest danger comes from three especially tough ju-ju zombie guards within the house, the touch of which paralyzes the victim for 3d4 rounds unless a saving throw is made to negate this effect.
27. The Royal Guild of Merchants
This relatively small building is the old meeting place for members of the guild, and is currently staffed by only a handful of minions save for Deputy Guildmaster Robann Peniaden. While, from time to time, Ivid issues decrees forbidding usury and the like, the Town Guard know well enough that they might be closer to starvation, or walking around in rags, but for the few remaining merchants bringing food and cloth to Rauxes. So they leave the Guild hall well alone.
Robann is a worldly man who is extremely careful who he talks to and what he says. He needs absolute proof someone is not a spy for Ivid before he will give anything away. He is well-versed in the real state of affairs around the lands of Aerdy, from accounts given by merchants visiting the capital. Having lived in Rauxes for 22 of his 40 years, he also knows the layout of the city very well. This is an obvious first contact for PCs sent on any kind of mission, or adventure, to Rauxes. But the PCs will have to prove their trustworthiness to Robann before he will divulge anything—and he always wants good payment for his help.
City Areas
28. Militia Buildings
This area of the city—separately walled off with its own guard posts—houses 200 Imperial Regular infantry and 800 orc soldiers, and also has some supply and storage buildings.
The orcs have poor morale and are the remnants of army units mostly destroyed in Nyrond and Almor; they have not been effectively reorganized. Priests of Hextor do their best to command them, but many orcs escape through the Undercity and hide in the tenements around Viper Row, from where they ambush any who enter.
29. The Viper Tenements
The houses between Viper Row and Watch Lane (and also eastward across Watch Lane) are especially decrepit and many are half-collapsed, with their cellars and basements flooded or at best half-filled with foul, stagnant water, sewage, vermin and the like. Perhaps as many as 500 wretches live here. They are orc soldiers escaped from their barracks, beggars, people dying of disease, those hunted by Town Guard, and others in similarly dreadful predicaments. No militia enter this area; the risk of disease is simply too great. Because of the water-sodden conditions of so much of the area, two attempts at burning it down have failed (and the risk of the fire spreading elsewhere in the city has mitigated against any further attempts).
The current plan is to use massed ranks of zombies to murder the occupants, although a first attempt at this failed in part because of the stupidity of the undead and their inability to traverse obstacles effectively. Those exiled here are desperate enough to attack anyone and anything entering—and their blows, by weapon or just fists and bites, are 25% likely to cause disease. That this area hasn't been entirely decimated by disease might cause some to wonder, not least because diseased bodies are not found lying in the streets and brick-strewn back alleyways of this area.
In fact, a young priest of Pholtus hides out in a dry basement within this area, curing disease for all he can. He tries to convert as many as he can to the One True Faith. While he has little success with that, the wretches here are grateful to him for their lives. They don't inform the authorities about him for the simple reason that only people utterly terrified of summary execution by those authorities come to live here.
The priest, Elliast Moroneth, dreams of escape to the Theocracy of the Pale, and he has some information he could barter to anyone prepared to get him out and take him there; see his profile details below.
30. The Eastern Slums
The buildings here are small, cramped, built one on top of another in an urban sprawl which guarantees the spread of disease and infection. The roofed-over alley ways are a haven of darkness for thieves and assassins. The lucky folk here sleep two or three in a room, paying a copper or two for a night's rest. Unlucky ones sleep out in the open on roofs, in hammocks slung across alleyways, and even in doorways. Of course, this makes them easy prey for creatures of the night, but there are none to miss them should they vanish.
Every morning, at dawn, large detachments of Town Guard prowl these slums, dragging off all the able bodied men and women they can find for work around the city. Pitiful attempts to repair crumbling buildings, clean stonework, and bale out sewage-filled basements are the usual tasks.
31. Artisans' Dwellings
The artisans of Rauxes have done their best to flee just as most merchants did. But many who provide necessary services for the troops here, blacksmiths, tanners, and bowyers, were placed under virtual house arrest and could not get away in time after the outbreak of war. A small detachment of Town Guard outside a dwelling in this area guarantees that the occupant follows a trade necessary to the militia here. Other houses nearby are often abandoned, occupied by middling officers in the Town Guard, or are simply avoided because they are structurally unsound.
32. Noble Dwellings
The area between North Gate and Strikers' Lane has the greatest concentration of noble mansions, each with smaller houses for servants dotted around. The handful of remaining merchant-princes, none of political note, who are still within Rauxes can be found here—as can be a couple of very distant princeling-cousins of the overk ing who live behind shuttered windows and bolted doors. The princelings are terrified that Ivid will remem ber they are within his city. These minor nobility hail from lands on the eastern edge of the Adri Forest and south of Delaric, and while they have little money left they will certainly offer to pay rescuers well for getting them out of Rauxes and back home.
In other, abandoned, houses, most has been looted—usually by Town Guard who arrested nobles for treason on Ivid's orders and then confiscated their property. However, the occasional exception might be found, where a venturesome thief might find some carefully-hidden item of jewelry (stashed for a last bribe), a diary or account of people and times in Rauxes. For PCs who want to get down to some thievery in Rauxes, this area offers the best chances.
Rauxes Map Locations
1. North Gate
2. Guard House
3. Red Unicom Inn
4. Armory
5* Barry's Gambling House
6* Silverhawks Tavern
7. Mentser the Merchant
8. The Hawthumes (noble line)
9. Tun's Livery
10. Golden Grain Tavern11. Crossroads Inn
12. Pyther's Boarding House
13. Shops
14. The Prancing Dryad (music hall/tavem)
15. Shellbone's Inn
16. Zamara's House of Pleasure17* Houses for rent
18. The Golden Girdle (fine lady's apparel)
19. Bellax's Meats
20. Temple to Boccob
21. Harckoan's Store (dealer/merchant)
22. Warerehouses
23. Kendor's Jewelry
24. Jakkur's Anything Shop
25. East (Watch) Gate
26. The Five Torches Inn
27. The Dancing Fool Inn
28. The Black Stallion (tack* harness, etc.)
29. Warrel's Weapon Shop
30. West (New) Gate
31* Kyree’s Cooler (underground tavern)
32. Sages Guild
33. Telvorthin's (tailor)
34. Nast's Merchant Company
35. Bronzer's Metal Goods (hardware)
36. Ugurah's Furniture (woodcrafts)
37* Opan's Pawn Shop
38* Kathor's Boarding House
39. Tower of the “Gray One" (wizard)
40. The Blue Dog (tavern)
41. The Two-Fister (tavern)
42. NaphaTs Inn of the Empty Room
43. Wrestling/dueling yards
44. Crooked Pye’s Money Shop (lender/changer)
45. Palace compound gate and Guardhouse
46* Temple to "Baaizy"
47. Captain's Quarters (horse, foot, archers)
48. Supplies
49. Palace of Over king Ivid the Great
50. Barracks {archers, foot, horse)
51. Tower of Karoolck. Archmage of the Court
52. Tower of the Knights of Doom
53. Tower of the Dead (royal crypts)
54. Stables, armory, servant houses
55. Blackfort (town guard, 2 regiments of light horse)
56.West (Old) Gate
57. The Lion's Roar (tavern)
58. Morabar's Leather Goods (boots, etc.)
59. Philster's Inn of the Bird Dog
60. The Iron Boot (soldiers’ tavern)
61. House of Arranas (noble line)
62. Palum’s Perfumes and Soaps
63. Balabab's Merchant Company
64. Bathhouse
65. Qltary Park
66. Zelizar's House ... of ill repute (tavern, etc.)
67. Tinkers Row
68. The Plump Hen (restaurant)
69. Goblin-tooth Inn
70. Yar's House of Games (gambling, loans)
71. Flatch’s %apon Shop (all types)
72. Narlond's Tower (alchemist/herbalist)
73. Debenarr, mercenary captain (HQ)
74. The Gilded Goat (best inn and food in Rauxes)
75. Calor’s Roost (tavern)
76. Hibbin's Store (dry goods)
77. The Lance (inn for fighters)
78. Ostel's House of Viands (restaurant)
79. House of Garrych (noble family)
80. Fennym's Warehouse & Storage
81. The Blue Dagger (tavern)
82. The Pit (to settle tavern challenges)
83. Gimmee’s Store (outfitters of demi- humans)
84. Cabbal's Merchant House
85. Marryut’s Inn of the “Helpful Hand"
86. Dark Dragon (unsavory tavern)
87. Tower of Marriock (dark elf wizard)
88. Ertharah’s Boarding House
89. The Lone ttfolf (inn for all comers)
90. "HalfhighTs” Mead and Ale (best beverages in Rauxes)
91. City stores, administrative offices, reserve army units (12 regiments)
92. Military compound; HQ of Town Guard eastern branch
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