Timil Deeps

Founded during the Second Breaking, shortly after the War of Eighfold Sorrows, Timil Deeps is a hidden city few have ever even entered, and fewer still have lived to tell of the wondrous things there to behold when they arrive. The city is far below the Azure Seas to the South, beneath a High Island formed aeons ago when the Twins still lived in peace. It is a marvel of engineering; houses are hewn from the living rock, luminous flora provide a soft natural light while a much larger crystal sphere is suspended well above the city by massive chains--and likely magic--that provides an artificial day and night cycle.

Completely circular, the streets are divided into rings, starting around the outer wall, and working inward, towards the center, where the Royal Palace sits atop a hill. No house or shop shows any seam of being worked by hand; there are no stray tool marks, no chips, no hammer slips. Each building is a work of art unto itself. Even the poorest citizen of Timil Deeps lives in relative luxury in these miniature marble mansions.

As the circles move towards the center of the city, the distance between buildings grows. Filling the space, instead of trees and bushes one would find on the streets of an above ground city, in Timil Deeps there are luminescent crystal gardens, with crystals that grow for spans in the air. Around their bases are glowing flora--ferns, flowers, fungi--even the earth around these crystalline ‘trees’ fairly glows. Yes, magic fills the air in the Deeps.

The population is divided into castes, the Ungewitt, the ruling class, the Æschere, or military guard, and lastly, the Smipcfæftig, or crafters guild. There is rumored to be two other guilds, though no one has ever seen or heard from them directly--a priest guild that would unify the population in a single faith, and the supposed assassin guild, responsible for the deaths of most senators in recent memory. If you find yourself alone down a dark street, beware the Subtle Knife.

Downfall of the Deeps

Historians agree that it was two main events that caused the downfall of not only Timil Deeps, but that would lead to the Third Breaking of Avalon as an entire plane of existence. First was the exile of the Crown Prince, Draôs. The second, more than a thousand years later, was the assassination of the Pirate King Wantonamo. This caused massive unrest amongst the noble houses, with no heir to the throne, that left Brutæ the Raven--that history would later uncover was the actual assassin--to take the throne.

Under the Raven’s rule, the Laws of Secrecy were abandoned. Trade with the outside world was resumed. The protections and wards put in place to keep Timil Deeps hidden were destroyed. Everything that the Pirate King had stood for was removed.

Soon, the city itself began to change. Where once there were luminescent crystal gardens, now stood cold, black boulders. The glowing flora shriveled and died, instead replaced with rotting fungus. From the earth, poisonous insects and spiders began to creep through cracks in the stone pavement.

The once beautiful marbled houses began to lose their luster. No polishing could bring back the shine. The light of the stone houses dimmed, fading from the vibrant greens and blues and reds to browns and eventually slate. Where once clean, cool water ran in streams and springs, it began to run with sulfur, poisoning those who drank it.

The Great Crystal Sphere, the Light Itself faded, and no amount of magic could reignite it. The chains rusted through, and one by one snapped, the orb falling, damaging a section of the city as it hit. Under the Raven’s rule, the city began to crumble into scale. The light was lost. The city itself was dying, and nothing could stop it.

Ash Solus

Here to learn to draw.

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