Geography
The Basalt Citadel is ingeniously built into the base of a rust-red floating mountain. Once a flourishing city, it bore witness to the ravages of the
Celestial War. Today, only the portion sheltered by the protective mountains endures, continuing to thrive in the aftermath of that devastating conflict.
Description
When it is not under the attack of angelic troops, the city's bustling markets and pleasure palaces draw visitors from across the multiverse in search of obsucre magical lore and perverse delights. The
Devil of the Basalt Citadel present a veneer of civility and courtly comity. However, the layer holds as much danger as any other part of the
Seven Hells, and planar visitors can vanish without a trace in its mazelike cities and in forest whose trees have serpents for branches. The city is separated into 3 main arc: The burning ire, the blazing fury, the blistening rage.
The Burning Ire
Here, numerous forges and foundries churn out precious black iron and assemble the shaped metal into elaborate machines that crackle with stored electricity. The Snivelling Mortal, the
Seven Hells Advocacy Services and The Living Armory are found in this sector, along with a heavier Temptress Militia presence.
The Sniveling Mortal
The Sniveling Mortal is a public forum that acts as a social hub for all sorts of events, business deals, fiendish contracts, and other important or casual discussions. Violence is strictly prohibited within its walls, and every fiendish patron behaves accordingly. Keeping order with whip and temper, the erinyes owner Zelura provides comfort and confidentiality as necessary. Though not the establishment’s main purpose, Zelura does keep a few rooms with beds that can be discreetly rented to mortals, succubi, or incubi.
Next to the Sniveling Mortal is the Seven Hells Advocacy Services.
The living armory
The Living Armory is an item-enchanting business. The proprietor Vistara is an unusually talkative and curiosity-driven marilith proficient in haggling. She specializes in binding souls to create sentient weaponry, in part to ensure she always has a large captive audience to chat with. Vistara’s collection is expansive, and as such doubles as a library of sorts—for the right price, she is willing to rent a weapon for the knowledge its soul contains.
The Blazing Fury
The Blazing Fury is an assortment of buildings in various states of disrepair under the control of the Basalt Citadel’s devils. Here, individuals can be hired to accomplish violent services like murder or assassination. The warrens in this area are stalked by the more bestial fiends of the Basalt Citadel, operating on a more primal rule of law that favors only the strong.
Scavenged Sundries
Scavenged Sundries is an all-purpose store run by the grizzled and heavily-scarred daemogoth merchant Irduzal. He negotiated with the Tribunal to obtain sole rights to the property of slain gladiators from the Iron Maw Arena. From his ramshackle stall just outside the walls of the colosseum, Irduzal sells gently and harshly-used weaponry, armor, and any other personal effects looted from the fallen warriors.
The Blistening Rage
The Blistering Rage is populated by fiends of all types. This section is where Planar Delivery and the Temple of Anger can be found, plus many dwellings within the walls. Architecture in this Arc is primarily decorated with the harvested metallic skulls and bones of the city’s flintclaws, kiir, and brimstone drakes, as well as the gilded bones of fallen gladiatorial champions, arranged into eerily artistic patterns.
Temple of Anger
The Temple of Primordial Anger is primarily dedicated to the worship of the
Archdevil of anger,
Aaron. Many gladiators fighting in the Iron Maw Arena come here before their challenge begins to further focus and channel their inner wrath. Although it lacks a formal hierarchy of priests, there are some individuals dedicated to the temple’s maintenance—fiends that found success within the Arena and now pursue other goals. The foremost among them is Duzoth, a cunning and fierce juggernaut-piloting dyra that holds the record for the most kills within the colosseum’s mighty walls.
Planar Delivery
Planar Delivery is a courier service run by the dyra Ru-zeron. Under their mercurial gaze and shrewd calculations, the business’s many imps and kiir flit in and out of the tower’s many windows to deliver their messages across the Basalt Citadel and the planes. Rates vary based on Ru-zeron’s mood, the urgency of the message, and the difficulty of delivery; but they are never cheap.
Love-Spike
The Love-Spike is a towering palace of black iron built upon the magically-strengthened rock in the center of the Basalt Citadel.
Zariel observes and rules over the city from this terrifying structure. It also dedicates a large portion of its space to the Iron Maw Arena, ensuring that all who attend are reminded of the Zariel might within the city’s walls.
The Iron Maw Arena
A magnificent and imposing black structure built atop the city’s central spire above the caldera, the Iron Maw Arena is the literal and metaphorical center of the Basalt Citadel society. The colosseum plays a vital role in the Basalt Citadel’s entertainment, judicial, and economic structure. Daily events here draw the majority of the city population, filling the thousands of seats with shouting and jeering throngs of spectators. Here, the pure voracity of unbridled violence and anger are put on display as both willing and captive gladiators compete against monsters and champions from every corner of the planes, as well as lethal puzzles and survival challenges.
Operated directly Zariel, the Arena is anchored by hundreds of years of enchantments, designed to ensure that the combatants engage on even (or at least approved) footing and are uninterrupted. They also allow Zariel to instantly transform the terrain within, providing an infinite variety of challenging circumstances to keep the fights interesting. Chancelor
Lazivos usually serve as Master of Ceremonies, but other high ranking fiend can sometimes fill the spot, and rarely Zariel herself take this position—Most masters prefers brutal combat against massive, terrifying monsters, Lazivos specializes in moral, emotional, and psychological challenges, and Zariel usually vacillates between direct one-on-one gladiator combat and physical competitions like obstacle courses, races, and other similar events.
There are any number of reasons why a creature might end up facing the dangerous challenges of the colosseum. Many Basalt Citadel devils specialize in drafting contracts that stipulate participation in the Arena, both as punishment for reneging on terms and as an alternative to soul-selling and the like. In fact, some mortals fight as a way to reclaim their souls from the fiends who’ve staked their claim on it.
You can use the following tables to randomly determine what each day’s entertainment is by rolling a d10 and a d6 for the terrain and event type, respectively.
Example Iron Maw Arena Terrain Options
| d10 | Arena Terrain |
|---|
| 1 | Arctic |
| 2 | Coast |
| 3 | Desert |
| 4 | Forest |
| 5 | Grassland |
| 6 | Jungle |
| 7 | Mountain |
| 8 | Ocean |
| 9 | Swamp |
| 10 | Volcano |
Example Iron Maw Arena Event Types
| d6 | Arena Event | |
|---|
| 1-2 | Direct Combat (d20) | |
| 1 | Aberration |
| 2 | Celestial |
| 3 | Beast |
| 4 | Construct |
| 5 | Dragon |
| 6 | Elemental |
| 7 | Fey |
| 8 | Fiend |
| 9 | Giant |
| 10 | Humanoid |
| 11 | Monstrosity |
| 12 | Ooze |
| 13 | Plant |
| 14 | Undead |
| 15 | Angel Prisoner |
| 16-20 | Roll twice more, ignoring and rerolling any results above 15 |
| 3-4 | Competition (d8) | |
| 1 | Obstacle course |
| 2 | Gauntlet |
| 3 | Sprint or Endurance Race |
| 4 | Chariot or Horseback Race |
| 5 | Wrestling |
| 6 | Boxing |
| 7 | Javelin-toss |
| 8 | Shot Put |
| 5-6 | Moral, Mental, or Emotional Quandary (d4) | |
| 1 | Choose between two loved ones |
| 2 | Race against time to save an innocent |
| 3 | Keep moral high ground or destroy evil |
| 4 | Solve a puzzle or riddle |
Sacrifice Engines
Among the most prominent features of the citadel are the two sacrifice engines, each one a 30-foot-deep pit lined with rows of silver blades. The blades can be made to spin by pulling a lever near the edge of the pit. A creature in the pit while the blades are spinning takes 44 (8d10) slashing damage at the start of each of its turns.
The devils herds angels and other enemies into them to avoid prolonged battles.
Society
Law
The city boasts a military forces, the Temptress Militia. Use the Guard Arrival Times table to determine how long it takes for guards to arrive at a location after a crime or similar incident is reported.
Adventure hook
The Basalt Citadel is not always easy for mortals to travel to, given its position in the Lower Planes. Access is usually obtained through powerful spells, or through randomly-appearing portals. These unpredictable gateways are most often found within temples to archdevils, sites scarred by the release of unimaginable rage, or areas with tremendous seismic activity. The conditions to activate these planar pathways can vary greatly: some might require a blood moon, volcanic tremors, or violent bloodshed, while others can be traversed with command words, sigils, or by accidental contact.
Example Adventure Hook Table
| d8 | Adventure Hook |
|---|
| 1 | Fiendish spells require fiendish components, so a powerful wizard offers a large reward if the party is willing to plane shift to the Basalt Citadel to run some errands. |
| 2 | One or more party members have received a crusader’s quest from their deities, asking them to rescue a fellow worshipper who has been abducted and now fights as one of the Arena’s gladiators. |
| 3 | At the behest of a mortal wronged by a fiendish contract, the party has been asked to pursue vengeance against the Lazivos—the chancelor Bof Zariel. |
| 4 | Hearing troubling rumors of a highly profitable casino in the seven hells, the party members’ investigations lead towards the Basalt Citadel. |
| 5 | The party seeks a sentient item made by the legendary marilith crafter Vistara. They might wish to obtain the item’s power, secure an interview, or attempt to free the soul bound within. |
| 6 | A party member or associate made or broke a pact with a fiend from the Basalt Citadel, so their soul was dragged down to fight in the Iron Maw Arena. |
| 7 | A renowned smith has grown bored with common materials, but is willing to waive a portion of their substantial fee in exchange for an ingot of the fabled black iron from the Lower Planes. |
| 8 | The party needs to obtain a vital item, but it’s last known owner went missing while exploring a volcano. Thorough investigation of the area reveals a portal to The Basalt Citadel. |
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