The Shadow Plane (also known as the Fugue Plane or the Plane of Shadow) is a parallel version of the entire Prime Material Plane where dark magic has taken control causing much of the plane to be dead or in a permanent state of withering - an overabundance of death. Also serves as a transitional plane between the Fugue and the Lower Planes and serves as the main battlefield in the Eternal War.
Effects[]
TODO Proper Writeup
- Shadow Plane is in a permanent state of dying but not death - this means that while you can die through damage, you will be in a perpetual state of starvation - this is what allows more foreign inhabitants
The Soul Trap[]
Wayward souls are trapped in the Shadow Plane instead of going to their respective Celestial Planes. These souls must then wander and make the journey on their own to try and escape the Shadow Plane - however this leaves them at the mercy of infernals who steal souls for their own ends.
The Red Reapers see themselves as guardians and jailers of those wayward souls. They see sinning souls as more likely to be caught in the Shadow Plane, and conscript the souls they 'rescue' into service in the Eternal War as their penance.
Inhabitants[]
The only true natives of the plane are known as shadows, or living shadows, a type of ethereal undead that comes in many forms and variations. The most common are simply referred to as shadows, cruel and hostile mimicries of their counterparts in life - such as shadow humans, shadow mastiffs and even shadow dragons.
The plane is also home to a great many foreign or interloping inhabitants both living and dead, such as souls sent over after death, ghosts and undead, fiends fighting or deserting from the Eternal War to even lost travelers from the Prime Material.
Politics[]
The most infamous inhabitants are those of its most powerful rulers, who conspire and war across the barren lands of the plane just as warlords do in the Prime Material. These are the shadow liches, the night hags, red reapers and fiends, all four of which are coincidentally outsiders to the plane, with liches being from the Prime Material, night hags being banished from the Feyrealm, red reapers being angels from the Celestial Planes and fiends in form of devil and demon from the Infernal Planes.
Much of the conflict revolves in and around the Eternal War between Nerat and the Red Reapers and the various infernal factions wanting to reap the souls sent to the Shadow Plane. The shadow liches and night hags take both sides in this war, but also come into conflict with each other over their opposing ideology on the Shadow Plane itself: the shadow liches wish to keep the status quo to prolong their life by preventing the Shadow Plane from bleeding further into the Prime Material, and the night hags wish the Shadow Plane to consume the Prime Material and beyond to maximize suffering across the planes of existence.
Fugue Plane or Fugue Demesne?[]
For much of history the Fugue Plane, the personal domain of the Cannorian god of death Nerat was treated as a separate plane or demiplane closely related to the Shadow Plane, but nonetheless separate.
After the explorations of the Ravelian Church in the 17th and 18th centuries it was revealed that demiplanes exist only in the Infernal and Celestial Planes, and the Parallel Planes of the Prime Material, Feyrealm and Shadow Plane do not have demiplanes.
Instead, the Fugue Plane was in fact the places of authority within the Shadow Plane where the Red Reapers (and Nerat, if he ever existed) had authority. This was based in and around the Crumbling City, the parallel of Castonath.
Notable Locations[]
Parallel Locations and Time Flux[]
As the Shadow Plane is a parallel of the Prime Material, most if not all features in the Prime Material, from mountains to houses will feature in the Shadow Plane. Due to the decay of the plane, however, the state of these may be different.
Unlike the Feywild, however, which has been found to have only geographic parallels (e.g. a coursing river or cliff is the same in both, but a building will not), the Shadow Plane has a concept of time of when a place is that is shifting: the same dried out lake may house a ruined boathouse from the days of Castanor one visit, whereas the next it may contain the husk of a great factory from the Age of Artificers.
What is known, however, is that when a place might be is influenced by the chronological origins of the living beings visitng that area: a group of explorers from the Age of Artificers have a greater chance of seeing their Prime Material reflected. This has allowed strange cases when two individuals from different time periods (due to the strange way time can work) can meet in the Shadow Plane, and one individual ends up seeing decaying structures from the future.
The Crumbling City[]
The parallel of the Prime Material's Castonath. Wayward souls live their life here in limbo in servitude to the city and Nerat's armies against the fiends of the Eternal War, as well as living inhabitants like outcasts, lost travelers and even opportunistic mages and merchants. As long as they subscribe under the authority of the Red Reapers they are allowed to stay. It is said that eventually, once a wayward soul has done its penance, it will be allowed to pass to the Celestial Planes.
Despite its name, the Crumbling City is not all crumbling and some parts have been maintained by the Red Reapers. It is also one of the constants to the Time Flux present in the Shadow Plane, resembling Castonath at its height before the Dragonwake. The reason of this is largely unexplained. Most theorize that it is by the Red Reapers' own doing, whilst others believe that Castonath/The Crumbling City is natural planar constant that brings stability in the often shifting planes of existence.
Finally, unlike Castonath, the Crumbling City actually spreads much farther than the original city's extent, and a myriad of settlements and urban sprawl representing all architectures and time periods built by would-be migrants spread from its walls.
The Bleed[]
The main place where the Shadow Plane bleeds into the Prime Material is the Shadow Swamp in Sarhal. The leading theory among archeologists and scholars is that the region used to be the exclusive domain of the Silat genies and their servants, both human and lizardfolk. Sky Domain mythology attributes the ownership of the Swamp to Yrilak, the vile and lazy brother of Amilak. They believe Yrilak sold the Shadow Swamp to the hags of the Coven of Yezel Mora, after being tricked into accepting a bad deal. Historical records show that Hag rule over the Swamp was established around the Day of Ashen Skies.
The hags would actively expand the Shadow Swamp during their rule over it, which they achieved through torturing the Shadowroot Matriarch, a colossal World Tree in the center of the Swamp, that is believed to be the cause of the bleed's existence. This expansion was historically contained by Zenidir Zentirizar "The Shadowslayer" during his rule over Melakmengi, as he burnt back large sections of the swamp at several points of his life. After his death, the Swamp's expansion was mostly unchecked despite several historical attempts, and only stopped with the defeat of the Coven after the Final War of Shadow.