Death's Head Orchard

Situated at the very outskirts of the Black Forest, forming a ring of foggy thicket around the forest proper, the Death's Head Orchard is the beginning of the horrors one must face if they mean to traverse into the damnable woodlands.

The blood-red sheen of the Heart of Hate does not reach the orchard, and instead a pallid fog hangs low here, obscuring the tall gnarled trees. This could be considered a blessing, as the trees grow grotesgue burls that resemble leering, grinning skulls and faces. Perhaps the most disturbing thing about these growths is that they seem to be formed from actual bone. How the trees produce this osseous material is a question not even the most curious of scholars dares to speculate upon for long.

In the Orchard, spectres, shades and other spirits of the dead gather in dangerous processions and terrorize mortals that stray into the melancholic woodland, and the remains of overgrown walkways, graveyards and roads that form the Forlorn Kingdom.

Being the outer ring of the forest, the Orchard has the largest presence of Seekers patrolling it, making sure that nothing gets out and no one goes in without explicit permission from the church of Resounding Truth.

The air is so still here. It's almost serene.

Almost.

–Roderick, former squire of Seeker-Captain Traven

Characters in Location

• Rattlejaw

Inhabiting Species

• Poppet

by Midjourney

_{One of the few surviving paths in the orchard}