A place of majestic views, amazing life, and hidden treasures. The secrets that the jungle holds in its folds are both breath taking and soul taking. When traveling to Bone Island one must be wary, not of just the tribal inhabitants and exotic creatures, but the secrets that the gods forgot.
Bone Island is a place of majestic views, amazing life, and hidden treasures. The secrets that the jungle holds in its folds are both breath taking and soul taking. When traveling to Bone Island one must be wary, not of just the tribal inhabitants and exotic creatures, but the secrets that they gods forgot. Not its real name but one given to the local inhabitants ages ago when they landed here, banished from their home.
The island is approximately 7 miles wide and 12 miles long and the highest peak in the center of the island is roughly 5 miles high. The island has little beach coastline, instead having near sheer cliff faces almost all the way around the island. It gets its name from those lucky enough to leave the island, as the temples are all ringed with the bones of those the are ignorant and seek the fabled treasures of the island. Mounds of bones surround these temples, offered up as dark gifts to the dark voice.
When arriving from the only accessible landing beach to the south, large overgrown hills can be seen from the bay. Mighty trees reach to the sky, their spindly trunks trying to scratch out life form the sandy soil. Nothing moves on the island without a purpose, except the occasional biting insect and the occasional lizard and wild boar. One of the dangers of the island is the burrow dragons, a large lizard like creature that digs its home in the ground to wait for passing prey. Larger cousin to the komodo dragons of the south, the burrow dragons are more intelligent which makes them more dangerous.
The sweet smell of fruit and budding flowers give this island a false sense of enjoyment as the deeper into the island you go, the more dangerous it becomes. There are plumcords that rival a mans head, purple and juicy and sweet. A form of orange apple that is bitter at first but burns the belly with life and is filling. All different kinds of fruit to make the mouth water at the mere mention of their name or description, yet these boons pale in comparison to the nightmares that stalk the islands interior. Burrow dragons, blood vines, and the cannibalistic tribal peoples, Gretalia, make this island a place the smart and knowledgeable avoid at all costs.
Abandoned temples dot the islands expanse, large stone temples hidden by the overgrowth of the forest as if nature itself has tried vainly to hide their existence. Their ancient writing glyphs marred by vine feelers and tree roots. Once open to the sun and blue sky, now hidden from the world as if the very world itself was ashamed of their existence.
The largest temple on the island was positioned at the top of the centermost peak. Its ground level once opened to the ocean breeze, now clogged with trees, bushes, and vines; making entering difficult at best. Even the foliage, the vines and trees seem to want to stop trespassers as the steel vines, as they are called, are thick and resist cutting but all but the most persistent.
The open layers of the temples are simple and have little in explanation as to who or what they were originally built for. No native still lives here that their ancestors broke skin to lay the stone and brick to build these monuments to the unknown. Their lower levels however, when they can be found, lay testament to the bizarre and the morbid.
Murals on the lower level floors and walls depict scenes of cannibalism and murder, rape and bestiality. Among the easily describable images. Down in the lowest levels, images of demonic hordes fighting over their worshipers, killing each other as much as the mortals that see them as gods. Any intelligent viewer will notice the contempt. A massive set of double doors rests in the very bedrock of the island underground, yet it seems to have never been opened. The horror that the images etched into the stone doors depict threatens to steal soul of those looking at it for too long.
Additional Information
Anyone on the island for more than a day will begin to feel the heavy presence of the Voice, something no one can quiet explain or describe to those who have never set foot on this cursed island. It begins at night, in their sleep. A dark weight enters their mind and soul, corrupting them from within. To some it is nothing more than restless sleep and horrid dreams. But to those who have a loose grasp of their mentality, it can be far worse. The entire nation of the gretalia, what was left of them after their banishment, were completely changed after moving to this dreaded island.
The original inhabitants of the island are unknown, even the gretalia know nothing about them. What they do know however, is that the dark voice tells them their purpose and their path to righteousness, the vengeance on their cousins for their banishment. Others, who begin to hear the voice, know different things but the end result is the same. Anyone traveling to the island and who are able to leave, come back changed. Dark, different, and hateful. Not chaotic or anarchist, all the time, but hateful or others. Quick to temper and faster to brawl.
This information is Hewdamia driven but can be adapted to other settings with little work.
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This article links to 2
- Gretalia Mourngrymn linked by Mourngrymn
- One Hundered Twenty Three Islands! Murometz linked by Mourngrymn
Links to this article 1
- One Hundered Twenty Three Islands! Murometz linked by Mourngrymn
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This information is Hewdamia driven but can be adapted to other settings with little work.
It certainly can be! Nice work Mourn.
A fully fledged island for a group of adventurers to discover and explore! Basically a drop-down gaming session, with the Voice being a nice touch as well.
Ah yes the voice. You must actually read the other subs regarding this to understand fully what the voice is. Hence why I made it clear this was a Hewdamian sub. If you didn't want to delve into specifics just make it up.
It is even better on its own, the voice staying a dark mystery. Ancient evils do not have to come in forms of great monsters, a single voice can be so much more terrifying.
Great atmosphere!
Thanks manfred... the unknown really gets my players. They hate the dark shadow they can never catch.
The horror that the images etched into the stone doors depict threatens to steal soul of those looking at it for too long.
Excellent :)
Nicely done. Well written. Enough evocotive details that make the place come alive. Takes some paws up.
Is there a 'Bone Idol' on the island? Ha ha. 5/5
Not really. I don't even like the name of the island for starters but it was the only thing I could think of at the time I wrote it up.
Very atmospheric, nice work Mourn.
A nice island with lots of potential, fits into the Hewdamia setting quite well. With it being an island it's easy enough to plug into other settings just as quick and with minimal modification.
One could also use this in a space faring campaign as an abandoned grave site of some long dead race, perhaps with bizarre high tech psi emitters to help dissuade would be grave robbers.
This was actually done to add into the 100 island codex and it seemed to explain some of the shortcomings of one of the races that I had and helped flesh them out which was convenient in the end. It wasn't too grand but I liked the end result.