Zafer Valley
Achlys colony, the starting point of the campaign, sits at the mouth of the sapphire-blue Zafer river where it opens into the Kochyl Bay, facing west toward the Pyrmar, often called the firesea. The valley is notable for being the apparent confluence of two separate geomantic loci - corresponding to the Forge and Life domains.
The river valley cuts through the western foothills of the Hyperenees mountains to the east as they march down to the sea, and is about six leagues north to south at its wider end near the ocean. Dominating the local horizon are the triune volcanic peaks about fifteen leagues to the east, dubbed the Adelfi or the Three Sisters by the new settlers. Behind these high peaks, the mighty Hyperenees climb to even loftier heights. With its grandest peaks rising even taller than any bird will fly, they can be seen from two days out at sea on a clear day, right as the northeastern-most islands of the archipelago fall below the western horizon. The Hyperenees are heavily glaciated, but the "lowland peaks" such as the Adelfi have only minor visible glaciation, a consequence of the subtropical latitude of the valley.
(For player reference with respect to the "real world," a league is around three miles or five kilometers. As such, fifteen leagues is roughly the average distance from the shore of Puget Sound to the western edge of the Cascade mountains in the "real world" - about 45 mi / 75 km.)
The bay is a highly protected natural harbor, very nearly a lagoon, sheltered by two great basaltic prominences that rise up from the north and the south and curve as if reaching for each other. Each ultimately extends about 40% of the length of the bay, leaving only the middle 20% open to the Pyrmar ocean between the two high cliffs, which descend to the bay in great cascades of strange hexagonal rock plinths, thousands of columnar joints piled in succession. The waters of the bay are relatively clear, blue, and deep, and much cooler than those of the ocean outside. A titanic statue stands in the middle of the bay, grown or shaped from coral into the form of an ophiotaurus; its great head rises above the waters and faces out to sea, an island unto itself. A fog often rises up over the bay, during which time it is unwise to sail due to the present lack of pharos to guide vessels to safety.
A mostly gentle slope rises from the shore of the bay to the first plain of the valley. A lonely, high granite bluff rises sharply from there, roughly in the valley's center, the cliff facing the sea and ascending several hundred feet. A yawning cave opens in the base of that bluff, looking out on the natural harbor. Partially worked by the ancient giants, this deep, wide cavern holds crumbled monuments and outbuildings. These are clustered around a vast and imposing set of doors of some black metal, built into the back wall; even after all this time, this stern gate remains sealed. Great care was taken to decorate the gate and the cliff in which it lies; ancient giantish runes crisscross the walls and ceiling of the cavern in very deliberate geometric patterns. Meanwhile, semi-abstract wall paintings seeming to show a titan forging the very land emanate further across the cliff face outside, faded from their former vibrant hues by long ages of exposure, but somehow still largely intact. The Tykos colony was founded within this cave, as the protective shelter its vast expanse offered could not be ignored. Not only does it protect the colony from most wind and rain, but the temperature is more stable within the cavern as well.
Some great, half-toppled columns surround the mouth of the cave outside as well and proceed some distance around the base of the bluff in both directions. Following them to the north around the cliff reveals a sheltered dell. Shielded from direct sun for much of the day, laurel trees grow here and further shade most the dell. They give way approaching the end of the sunken dell, giving a wide berth to a scraggly, abandoned meadow leading to an expansive hot spring that bubbles at its end, at least fifty meters in extent until it hits a wall of basalt. Toppled giantish statuary lies here and there, much of it partly covered with moss or lichen, and the broken columns leading from the colony's cave mouth finally terminate here by the shore of the spring. A deep pit or shaft seems to lie most of the way into the spring, plunging into the earth to unknown depths.
Atop the bluff is a grassy summit bedecked with pomegranate and fig trees, that then descends in a long slope to the semicircular ovoid field surrounding the bluff. This fertile plain extends out about two leagues both north and south from the bluff and the colony, and three leagues east. It is lush with wild millet and saffron crocus. Tulips grow extensively behind the bluff, and several groves of olive trees stand wild and lonely in the midst of the plain. The trench of the Zafer river itself, about 300 meters wide, snakes across this field, curving gently south to pass about 500 meters south of the bluff and from thence opening into a narrow delta, fanning mostly south into the bay.
The river runs clean and unusually cold, clearly the source of the colder than expected waters of the bay. Reeds, sedge, and iris and narcissus flowers bedeck the riverbanks. At night the Zafer emits a soft glow, as golden motes float up from it or drift across its surface like fireflies or flickering embers. The cold waters promote frequently fog when the air is humid, which drifts across and envelops the entire field and the colonial bluff, the fog itself shimmering at night as it carries the river's glow great distances. The founding party could not find anything overtly wrong with the river, but decided it was safer to set up in the cave than to build directly by the clearly mystical waters, at least until such time as they can be further investigated.
Surrounding this field, from the hills in the south to those in the north, is the Istar Wood, an expansive forest of "Grecian" cypress and poplar, both kinds of trees rising tall and slender. Near the colony, at least, it seems to mostly be a fairly low-density forest. The trees give each other space, and the sparse canopy allows plenty of light to pass through, though from atop the bluff it is clear there are thicker groves within the wood. It appears to always be deep summer within the woods, because what the scouts described in the late Autumn as they returned home to report their findings, and what is visible now in Spring as the campaign begins, correspond and are the same - a warm, sleepy atmosphere, with the foliage at its fullest extent, and the low drone of buzzing insects often audible. What flowering vines and underbrush exist seem to be in full bloom now, as they were several months ago.
However, at the forest's outer edge where it meets the field, a great wooden palisade stands. This extensive wall is 10 meters tall and many leagues long, ringing and defining the ovoid shape of the entire field, and marching all the way to the rising bluffs at the north and south ends of the harbor. The sweet-smelling red wood of the palisade is not that of the trees held behind it but some foreign timber, whilst the structural beams - including six evenly spaced horizontal rows running the entire length of the wall - are of a likewise foreign yellow wood. Its construction is of indeterminate age but long predates the colony, and the wall does not seem to be actively maintained - though so well built and reinforced is it that it remains standing unattended, despite luscious grape vines crawling over great patches of its surface near the river, basking in the eternal summer warmth coming from the other side of the wall. Where the river emerges from the other side of the wall, the wall becomes something like open wicker, but more with the character and thickness of portcullis rods, the gaps wide enough to allow the passage of fish but not much else, with the actual solid wall resuming a couple meters above the water. Occasional gates appear in the wall, each roughly a league apart, and though apparently unguarded, most of them stand closed. The exception is the gate due southeast of the colony, across the river, half of which has fallen into the field and left its partner swaying in the winds that sometimes come off the bay.
This south-eastern gate is, at this time, the only direct access to the forest without climbing over or doing something to tear down the wall. Fortunately for your colony, something yet remains of an ancient giantish bridge across the Zafer, due south of the settlement and a league to the west of the gate. Colossal statues of fanciful beasts stand every 30 meters apart, and appear to have once born a stone bridge across their shoulders, upon their arms, and otherwise bearing and distributing its mass like so many glorified columns. While the bridge is mostly fallen into the river, and parts of some of the monuments as well, enough is still present that the colonists were able to jury rig planks to cross the gaps and join with what yet remains. It’s not pretty, but it’s functional, a foundation for a true bridge that might be reconstructed here in the future.
The "upper" third of the valley, to the east beyond leagues of forest, opens into what appears from the colonial summit to be a vast wetland. Many small rivers flow from the surrounding foothills to the northeast and southeast, the mesa in the north, and the highlands of the south to join together in the upper valley with the river issuing from the Adelfi, forming the Zafer proper here. Indications are that the soil here is probably very fertile, but poorly drained, and may be difficult to manage. Kehinde's scouting team, the Sekhra, the one group that made it through the woods and back again, reported abundant wild chickpea, sorghum, vivid flowers, and colorful, tangy berries. The land starts rising steeply toward the east end of this area, and the "core" river that becomes the Zafer descends from the Adelfi into the main valley here by a series of hanging vales and waterfalls.
Running south of the Istar wood are the great igneous highlands of the Odreinos. These high, dark charcoal gray andesite bluffs contrast with pinkish rhyolite ridges and folds, visible between and behind them. The dark bluffs are bedecked in more ancient semi-abstract wall art of similar style but different context to that present at the colonial mount, these seeming to depict an ancient war of giant versus dragon, a tableau several whole leagues in length visible all the way from the floor of the colonial plain, broken into what look like different "scenes" on the different separated bluffs. Strange monuments top the highest points of the Odreinos, like unto stylized stone heads of fantastical saurian aspect, both reptilian and yet also vaguely avian in appearance. From the vantage point of the colony, they seem like they might potentially be at least partly hollow.
Where they approach the lower flanks of the Adelfi south of the eastern valley moor, though, the highlands give way as the land rapidly descends in elevation into a canyon pass at the southeast corner of the Zafer valley. Kehinde reported what look like a straight shot past the highlands and western mountain ridges here, a land corridor giving access to the middle peninsula to the south. However, the land here is strange and hot. Mounded sheets of glossy obsidian like unto a rumpled cloth form much of the lower flank of the volcano above, and rifts in the earth emit heady fumes. The report continues that mighty formations like unto titanic rib-bones of dark soar and curl over the pass here, and join to a vast upper plate that casts the pass in shadow beneath it; access to the pass is said to be through what looks like nothing so much as a hollow stony "skull" the size of a hill unto itself. The Sekhra refused to enter the pass, and so the colony has no further information on what may lie within or beyond this forbidding trench.
Type
Valley
Included Locations
The valley's characteristics were determined by the players in Session Zero, working through the Campaign Premise document, nominating people to roll on each table then voting on the results! The town was renamed to Achlys. The chief ruins were 7 (catacombs). The colossus was 5 (coral). The useful remnants were 5 and 6 (bathhouse and bridge). The Zafer river was 2 (average width). The river's most notable topographical feature was 3 (confluence marsh). The river's overt mysteries were 1 and 5 (glowing and unusually cold). The woods were arrayed 4 (a ring around the colony, 1-2 hours away). The character of the woods was 1 and 6 (seemingly cultivated, low density forest). The wood's overt mysteries were 1 and 5 (always summer, walled off). The highland composition was 4 and 8 (magmatic and highly elemental). The highland's most notable structural feature was 5 (skeletal topography). The highland's overt mysteries were 1 and 7 (cyclopean monuments and rock paintings). The valley loci were 2 and 5 (Forge and Life).
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