Misery

If the fires don’t take me, the hunger will. If the hunger doesn’t take me, disease will. If disease doesn’t take me, someone else will. Life is nasty, brutish and short. Survival is everything.

PowersMisery (NE)Not a power in the traditional sense, Misery is more a primal force – the epitome of what it means to lack the very basics from which life springs. His world is one of hunger and pain, of desperation and deprivation, and Misery is at his happiest when everybody around him is suffering. Misery has no worshippers (although he does have his own proxy), but many make sacrifices to avert his horrid gaze.

PetitionersThe petitioners of Misery are, as one might expect, a miserable lot. It is said that Misery likes to punish those who have what he does not, and almost all of the sufferers in his realm in life callously built vast fortunes at the expense of the people around them. Humans and tieflings are by far the most common inhabitants, although the realm has taken a number of particularly greedy dwarves as well - It is said that Misery signed a dark contract with Abbathor, promising him power over pain and hunger in return for souls.

Organized in tribes, the petitioners of misery work together only out of need – groups fare better in dangerous Gehenna than individuals do. Competing tribes constantly make war among themselves for the scarce resources of Misery (and in such a harsh land, the bodies of enemies are often the only food that can be found), and woe betide the poor petitioner who grows too weak to be useful. Disease is rampant, and starvation vies with monsters and showers of magma as Misery’s greatest killer. Death is no reprieve. Rather, it is the only method to merge with the energies of the realm – and since melding with Misery is said to let a petitioner feel hunger and pain on an epic level, most try to prolong their lives as long as possible. Unlike most petitioners, inhabitants of Misery reproduce normally - however, they cannot conceive unless Misery has found a new soul it wishes to torment.

Planars

A planar’d have to be barmy to choose to come to Misery – the realm and its inhabitants are much too harsh, dangerous and unforgiving. When misery was first discovered by the Planar Trade Consortium a year ago, the Ring-givers and Sons of Mercy sent a delegation bearing gifts of food and clothing for the suffering petitioners. Before they knew it, most of these naive would-be Samaritans were slow-roasted over a magma river and eaten. Visitors have been scarce since.

That’s not to say that petitioners are Misery’s only inhabitants. The realm is populated by strange fiendish animals called hungers, which live only to kill and eat. All hungers take the form of prime-world mammals half-again as big as they should be (use stats for giant animals), with matted red fur and disturbingly intelligent red eyes. Travelers beware: all hungers are carnivorous (even if they take the form of animals that usually are not), and prefer sentient, terrified meat. They do not often attack groups, much preferring to isolate and terrify single targets. Petitioners of Misery believe (rightly) that these animals are agents of their terrible power, and leave them sacrifices in the form of bleeding people staked to the ground (or meat simply left lying around). In times of need, petitioners try to hunt hungers, but this most often ends badly.

DescriptionTucked away in a remote valley cut into the rock face of Chamada lies one of the most vile Realms known to the planes; a place of hunger, terror, superstition and fear known by the name of the power that rules it – Misery. Showered with magma and prowled by sadistic beasts and sadistic petitioners alike, this realm is all about the denial of the building blocks of life. Water is scarce and usually befouled, the few hardy plants that grow from crevices in the stone are most often poisonous, and the animals of the realm are much more dangerous to hunt than other petitioners.

Eking out a life in this harsh land are small tribes (25-50 individuals) of petitioners, which routinely come into conflict with each other. The tribes have discovered patterns in the mountain's volcanic activity, and they live a nomadic lifestyle, trying to stay one step ahead of the worst flames Chamada has to offer. Unfortunately, the hungers know these patterns too.

Every 25 years, all of Misery is bathed in lava for a full month, except for a plateau sardonically called Respite, roughly 15 square miles in size. Respite is nowhere near large enough for all of the petitioners and hungers of Misery to co-exist, and so this event invariably becomes a bloodbath called the Culling, during which the tribes band together to kill their hunger tormentors with stones, primitive spears and axes, or their bare hands. Then, they turn on each other. Of the million or so petitioners who make it to Respite (most die before they can, waylaid by other tribes or more dangerous beasts along the way), a tenth might survive. The survivors form new tribes, and begin the cycle anew.

The period immediately after the Culling is one of relative plenty – few hungers yet survive, and the petitioners are also fewer in number. Competing for food and shelter becomes easier for a time – at least until Misery finds more unfortunate souls to share his Realm with.

Principal TownsThere are no towns to speak of in this realm – its tribes are small, and compete with hungers to take shelter in the many caves dotting Chamada’s rock face. Caves which rise into the mountain are preferred, as lava will not spill into the entrance. Only fools and visitors take shelter in caves which descend into Chamada’s rock face.

Special ConditionsAny creature that comes to Misery – even one that does not normally require food – will become ravenously hungry within hours. This hunger can never be fully sated, although eating can dull its edge. Spells that create food will never work in Misery, and rations brought from elsewhere are edible, but spoil far more quickly than they should. Also, Misery is a jealous power, and requires all creatures in his realm to sacrifice three quarters of the meat they catch to him. Hungers, being the "collectors" of Misery's tithe, are exempt from this. Failing to make proper sacrifice carries a 10% cumulative chance per meal of attracting Misery’s attention, and by extension that of his loathsome proxy.

Principal NPCsGrin-with-Fangs (Proxy, NE, Barb 20) - Grin-with-Fangs may once have been human, but through the tender ministrations of his Lord has become something else entirely. Grin-with-Fangs takes the form of an emaciated, bald, red-skinned humanoid with exceptionally long and filthy teeth and claws, dressed in rags. He carries no weapons, much preferring to bite and rake with his claws (a successful attack causes 1d6+4 damage, and victims must make a fortitude save vs. DC16 or suffer from a poison which causes 1d10 points of damage per round for 1d4+1 rounds – poison damage is not cumulative, although duration extends by 1d4+1 round for each failed save). Grin-with-Fangs is entirely immune to fire and lava of all kinds, and seems, in fact, to enjoy their embrace.

Grin-with-Fangs is called the Cave-runner, for he knows the cave systems of Misery perfectly, and loves nothing better than to attack tribes which think they have found fleeting safety in their new shelter. The proxy, like hungers, is interested only in slaughter and food, and will immediately attack any creature that crosses his path, retreating only if he is clearly outmatched (usually by way of leaping into flaming rivers, where few pursuers can follow). He never takes part in the Culling, much preferring to lie in the deepest part of the Misery valley and have magma wash over him. When the volcanoes settle, it takes Grin-with-Fangs about a year to burrow out from beneath a veritable mountain of volcanic rock. He emerges ravenously hungry, and at his most dangerous.

ServicesThere are no services to speak of in Misery, but the Realm itself is a haven for those who would cause pain to others. Poisons brewed from the plants of Misery cause excruciating pain to their imbibers, and weapons forged in this cruel realm are powerful and loathsome. Yugoloths, Misery’s most common visitors, enjoy using the Realm as an implement of torture – stripping their enemies of weapons and setting them loose in the valley.

There and Back AgainGetting to Misery is easier than getting out of it. Gehenna is finite, after all, and all a berk needs to do is climb down into Misery’s valley. However, the sheer rock face is near impossible to scale from below, not least because it drips with magma. Portals, flight and plane-shifting magic are the safest methods of escape; note, however, that all the portals leading out of Misery are somewhere deep in the mountain’s caverns, where running into Misery’s proxy is that much easier.