The Sludge Engine
A colossal, rusting engine that looms over the flats, The Sludge Engine is a relic of Awarth's ill-fated attempt to industrialize Tarnmuck Reach. Its twisted pipes and fractured boilers dominate the surrounding muck, half-submerged in brine and slowly sinking deeper with each passing season. The remnants of excavation machinery lie scattered around it, forming a hazardous scavenger’s paradise. Despite its foreboding presence, the Sludge Engine serves as a shelter for outcasts and smugglers, its interior offering refuge from the mire—though not without its own dangers.
Alterations
Over decades, scavengers and squatters have repurposed the Sludge Engine’s broken machinery into living spaces and workshops. Crates and rusted barrels serve as walls and furniture, while scrap metal and salvaged wood patch holes in the structure. Crude pulley systems and makeshift ladders connect different levels of the engine, and some parts have been partially drained to create stable ground for sleeping or storage.
History
The Sludge Engine was built during Awarth’s industrial expansion, part of a doomed initiative to extract value from the Reach’s muck. The unstable terrain and corrosive environment quickly overwhelmed the operation, and the site was abandoned after a series of fatal collapses. Over the years, scavengers have looted its outer machinery, while others took shelter inside, giving the engine a second life as a hub for the desperate and the exiled.
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