*In work*
An attempt to gather my thoughts on the cosmology and history of the Locastus setting.
I´m not quite finished with it, but I´m throwing it out there anyway
A short story set in the Locastus universe.
Deep in the rugged Thunderhead mountain range lies the valley of Akelor, once a paradise, now a battleground where reality itself struggles to contain an alien, evil infestation
An adventure, Sourcebook and Monster Compendium set in the Locastus universe
"If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one. Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds…."
J. Robert Oppenheimer
"Aye, 'dis here is yer problem, squire. Yer gone and got yerself a Cog Devil infestation in the ol' gear box, haven't ya? Look at the little bugger squirm, eh? Nah, dont be embarrassed, squire. It's better than lice on yer privates, innit? Coz, they're harder to get rid of, they are. And a lot more expensive too.."
Istherm Mild (esq.), licensed steam engine mechanic, overheard advicing one of his customers…
"In all my years of research, perhaps the best way I have found to summarize the Hermit of Wither Tor is the name given to him by the inhabitants of the Grassdancer ghettoes. These unfortunates call him, in their own tounge, An´rah Grun´dar Ahr, which roughly translates into He-Who-Speaks-With-His-Fists....."
From "Locastus and beyond", by Darius Moak
An arcane substance able to convert kinetic energy directly into matter.
All living things must strive. Nature knows no harmony, only war for the privilege to exist. Maug of the Bitter Spirit, the Albatross God, promises no intervention nor advice to His worshippers, just a silent approval of those of you strong enough to help themselves…
The Book of Salts, Ch. 7, verse 12
..and from the heaps of the fallen burst a nightmarish creature, sinuous death, like a snake with legs, the dying fires of the battlefields reflecting in its glittering scales. Mounted on its back, in dark, light-absorbing armour and wielding a lightning-wreathed lance, sat a monstrous knight, the horns on his helmet marking him as a Knight of the Locastrian Heron Guard.
He and his mount fell on me and my unit and from that encounter; I was the only survivor….
Excerpt from A Soldier´s Tale by Sgt. Amonar Trask (ret) of the Home Guard of Akral Tel
The dark wizard of Locastus, now long dead and gone….. Or is he?
An unsavoury character, yet immensely useful to know if you are in need of urgent medical attention, but want to avoid the eyes of the authorities….
The smoke-breathing gnomes of the Thunderheads
A vast, intricate complex of kilns and forges where the low-grade ore from the Thunderhead mines are turned into steel of unsurpassed quality. What are the secrets of the Acibus Foundry?
A gigantic, warped edifice, towering over the dark, soot-stained Witherdowns, where human corpses are turned into Deaders.
The industrial district of Locastus, where huge, cathedral-like factories rise over the low brick houses, and tall ivy-choked chimneys spew out black smoke, day and night.
These are the various races of humans in Locastus, City of Mirrors.
A gigantic insect, native to the arid badlands of northern Aquur, where fierce desert warriors roam the dunes, and the sand storms can flay a man to the bone in minutes.
A cult's theology is binding on the god involved: it is possible for that god to believe (and see, just like Winston Smith in 1984) that other gods are mythical, or jumped-up demons, or failing older spirits, even while those gods actually exist and thrive and act in the cosmos, even while working against him.
3xp
A thaumatechnological weapon, an example of the marriage between intricate technological innovation and sophisticated magic engineering.