Quodeth

Bazaar Quarter


"Eight square blocks of winding alleyways crowded with shops and stalls, open market squares, Counting- Houses, artists’ workshops, wine shops, street vendors selling grilled meat and sweet confections, hookah and opium dens, grocers, tailors, jewelers, and almost any other trade or diversion that one could imagine make up the central part of the Bazaar Quarter.
" - Thule Setting Book


 

The buildings of the Bazaar are stacked on-top of one another with architectural precision. They are tall white stone normally reaching three floors high; high arches connect all the buildings creating near endless walls on each side of the street.Overhead thick wooden rafters cross the street creating a framework for canopies of various materials to shelter away Asura’s golden sun. Under the street canopies and crowded on the sides of the endless walls are merchants to cater to almost any request. Their goods stand proudly out on stands, tables, or cleverly constructed racks that reach far above the busy bustling crowds of the street.



The navigating the Grand Bazaar is not a difficult thing to figure out. Customers know to look to their surroundings to see where they have wandered to and what to expect for prices from a vendor. The more intricate mosaic patterns on the pillars, a finer canopy overhead, or detailed polished sculptures are good indications one is shopping among the fine rich shops; cheaper areas host dark alleys with chipped pillars, unsafe driftwood canopy, and used goods.




The Gorgon’s Breath: Hookah Bar



Outside View: This building is tucked away behind giant vendor booths, passer-bys never notice the hanging obscured terracotta image of a hideous woman’s face with a serpent's tongue above a lonely doorway.



Inside: After opening the inconspicuous black door patrons find themselves in an antechamber of bright red walls, well carved wooden benches, and a very sturdy ornate door with fine brass studs and hinges. There they are greeted by several very large well dressed men posted inside this room. The men enforce a "dress code," which prohibits different street gangs from wearing their colors, and turning away any overly dirty people.

When the guards open the ornate doors lively music and the smells of hookahs invite the guests in. The room beyond is quite large and has many floor tables surrounded by large pillows to lounge. A dias sits at one end of the room to allow a team of musicians to stay above the crowd for unobstructed volume. The ceiling is tall and domed in the center room with shuttered windows hidden in the walls of the upper dome to help with ventilation. Lighting is provided by wooden chandeliers with many glass covered lanterns hanging from them.

Busty attractive women wearing little but select veils belly dance table to table, while equally scantily clad women rush table to table delivering alcohol or fresh hookahs.



Heavy red curtains hang around the walls and can close around select tables in the rear to allow customers privacy. There is a wooden banister that divides these back curtained rooms to the main common area to ensure no casual listeners are in ear shot.


The owner of the Gorgon’s Breath is a dark skinned Kalay human that goes by the name Writ. He dresses in bright flamboyant clothing and wears his long hair in hundreds of skinny braids. He has an infectious smile and often makes rounds going table to table to meet his customers. 


Quick notes
All of the women employees are slaves
Writ pays protection money to the Red Furies and Seven Knives with the understanding that the gangs will not fight in his establishment or target his customers.
This treated as neutral ground for many organizations.
Privacy is important, and renting a curtained room in the back allows for privacy.
It is common for many back room deals to be made here on any given day.
Writ and all the Employees live on the floors above.

Thanks, Please feel free to add your creations here as well.

XHONDOR JAO’S CURIOSITIES




In the semi expensive area of the Grand Bazaar down a side alley, amidst stalls of furniture makers and fine clothiers, hangs a painted sign above a large turquoise painted door. The bright orange sign is adorned with simple but technical paintings of a white mortar and pestle below a simple hieroglyphic eye both outlined in black. Entering the door one can see the painstakingly carved runes which have been painted white that surround the door frame.

Inside the shop lining the walls shelves upon shelves have been crammed past capacity with various tomes, scrolls, regents, carvings, bones, skulls, and a myriad assortment of clay jars all with black painted numbers on their outside. A pair of larger than life bronze men with spears stand guard on the inside of the entrance door and another pair stand guard in the back of the shop guarding a black curtain that leads to the back of the shop. In the center room are several tables of prepared ointments in covered clay pots also numbered in black paint, these pots are grouped together by their numbers. In the back of the shop stands a pedestal with a large heavy ledger on it.

An elderly Lomari man with jet black skin, gray hair and beard both neatly tended, he introduces himself to all customers with a welcoming smile, welcome to "
XHONDOR JAO’S CURIOSITY SHOP".


Quick notes
The bronze guardians can be anything from animated armor, skeletons covered in plaster, or golems depending on how deadly you want them to be.
The ledger in the back is the key to all the numbered covered clay pots, he writes his inventory in a language spoken far in the eastern continent (Chinese or equivalent), Xhondor lived in this country for many years and learnt their healing techniques.
The bulk of the clay pots on the table are false remedies he sells in great quantity: Aloe with other extracts to heal burns, headache remedies of different tree barks and teas.
He keeps a stock of 2d10 healing potions in stock, only 2 on the shelf, and charges an extra 10% for them, siting he gets better quality potions than other alchemists
He also keeps several magic items on hand, he has 2d6 minor magic items (that do not include the healing potions), 2d4 medium magic items, 1d4 greater magic items
The in stock magic items last for a month before some NPC buys them up and he gets new stock, Reroll all available magic items.

Tower of Nephys

Approximately 15 miles from Quodeth stands a tower of superior masonry, looming over the valley with a certain menace. From miles away, the tower peaks over the horizon as a solitary edifice of shadowy stone. Kalay farmers, herdsmen and traders who travel the Quosa Vale have construed tales of the tower possessing a supernatural ring for miles that gives rise to undead and demons. There is truth to these tales, but they have been stretched and have become farce with lies.

Entrance. The tower’s large heavy doors are made of bronze and carved with magical hieroglyphs (the door is affected by the alert spell, which is only deciphered by characters with the alert spell known, or who cast an identify spell on the hieroglyphs). Due to the hieroglyphs, Nephys knows the characters have entered her tower once the doors are opened.

Ground Floor. The first floor has a spacious chamber with murals along the four walls depicting a luscious forest packed with wildlife and elvish tribesmen holding spears and bows. In the center of the chamber is a tall statue of stone crafted accurately in the shape of a man and painted black with mirrors for eyes (stone golem). The eastern wall has a door that is affected by an arcane lock spell represented by hieroglyphs painted in black ink on the surface of the door. If the door is lockpicked, broken, or opened with magic by any intruder, the stone golem attacks.
One of the stones in the floor is carved with a magical sigil. A rhyme which only Nephys herself knows causes the sigil to glow and the stone to loosen from the floor and become removable. Strangely, the stone which would ordinarily weigh a ton, is as light as feather after it's been loosened. Lifting the stone reveals a ladder that descends into the dark, coming to cavernous tunnel sloping toward the world’s core. One wrong step and a character can trip and tumble or slide under their weight scraping themselves on the rock as they go deeper.

Second Floor. This floor has a dining room with a long table and eight chairs with sculpted armrests and cushioned seats. Two doors stand opposite each other in the east and west corners of the dining room lead characters to the upper and lower floors, and a curtain in the south wall opens to a hallway with three doors leading to the pantry, the kitchen, and the servant’s quarters. The Tcho-Tcho servants (Tcho-Tcho watchers) of Nephys rest in the servant’s quarters when they’re not cooking, cleaning, and running errands for their master.
The servant’s quarters has an altar to Nyarlathotep with offerings of bones from vermin that they catch in the dark corners of the tower to sacrifice to their god. In addition to meats, vegetables, grains, delicacies, and water being stored in the pantry, so too are magical ingredients which the Tcho-Tcho sometimes mix into the food for different effects based on Nephys wishes (Ex. some ingredients spliced into the food can charm or paralyze characters upon ingestion).

Third Floor. This floor contains a large hall decorated with murals on both walls depicting a starry sky and elves huddled around fires breastfeeding their children, sleeping, telling stories and pointing to the skies above. In the mural along the north wall is a door hidden behind the images. Behind the hidden door is a hallway with four more doors - three of which are bedrooms and the third being a room of mirrors with arcane lock cast upon its door in the same hieroglyphic fashion as the door on the ground floor. The bedrooms have dressers, mirrors (which Nephys can peer through from the room of mirrors), and beds with magical animal pelts that warm to the liking of the characters.
Despite being a half-elf, Nephys meditates instead of sleeping, much like her Elvish forefathers. The room of mirrors is where she meditates most nights, becoming aware if any characters disturb the mirrors in the rooms or attempt to leave in the night.

Fourth Floor. Four rows of bookshelves stand between each door to the lower and upper floors while another bookshelf stretches along the the south wall and into an alcove with a table and a pair of cushioned chairs with sculpted armrests. Along the northern wall is a mural depicting a dying landscape with a legion of skeletons cowering under swirling black storm clouds. Another Tcho-Tcho (Tcho-Tcho lama) skulks this library alone, draped in robes with a necklace of gold plates and a walking stick with a rat-skull grip. When spoken to, he comes off as an insane old man who speaks in a broken dialect of Low-Atlantean, but at the same time has an intelligence about him.
The books on the shelves follow no logical order, purposely, as the Tcho-Tcho librarian rearranges the the books daily with no pattern, yet astonishingly, he memorizes the name of every book in the library and their locations. Not even Nephys knows the location of the books, so the librarian must fetch them when she comes in search of something, and so the old wily Tcho-Tcho has cemented his place at the sorceress’ side for as long as the library remains. If ever he died by old age or the hands of adventurers, she would have no choice but to raise his spirit to continue his bookeeping in death.
In the alcove is a book that if pulled, opens a secret door to a reliquary with many magical items and tomes held on stone slabs. The majority of the items are infused with necromantic power, but sundry items are touched by other forms of magic. Adventurers who toil in this room are sure to meet their demise, as the items all play some role in Nyarlathotep’s return (Ex. an item may transport the characters to some world where Nyarlathotep rules as pharaoh).

Fifth Floor. Paint across the floor of this single-room level is a confusing mess of intersecting lines, angles, and circles which only the most learned occultist could recognize as the symbol of Nyarlathotep. Scattered over the symbol are bones new and old and splatters of blood. Nethys performs dark rites to her god with the assistance of her Tcho-Tcho servants on nights where Nyarlathotep is able to commune with his cultists and deliver his guidance. But these nights are separated sparsely throughout the year in seemingly no pattern or significance to the mortal mind. Thus the only time the room is used outside of Nyarlathotep’s few nights of the year is to repaint the symbol and occasionally dispose of old bones when the room becomes too crowded with remains.

Cavern. The cavy passage descends for some miles. Surprisingly, the air is clean and breathable to the bottom, but the passage is dark and narrow - sure to insight the fear in claustrophobes. At the bottom of the cave about 10 miles deep, opens a colossal cavern of ebony rock nearly 5 miles wide and 100 yards tall. Water collapses from the ceiling as an underground river enters the chamber. The water collects at the bottom of the chamber in a runoff that falls into the deepest chasms of the world. Some foreboding noise emits from the chasm's depths like a long forgotten god snoring.
Carved into the rocky earth are stairs that ascend to a massive earthen portal that peers a looking glass into a different world and time. Unbeknownst to the characters who enter this chamber, the earthen portal is an elvish world-gate, but it is frozen and impassable. The sight seen on the other side is one of a world in which the sun is darkening and the land dying - a world that if seen today, would be a sunless land of dust under a starry sky from which the Black Pharaoh grins.

Note: I wrote this for an adventure I'm in the process of making, and figured I'd share it. It seemed like it'd be appropriate for the Quodeth section seeing as the Tower of Nephys is near to Quodeth, and nearly all Quodethi know her name. I'm pretty proud of some of the ideas I came up with. They're not really story-points here, but flavorful and useful for people who don't want to detail a tower. I cut the last bit of this section out which details the part of the story where the characters interact with Nephys. I want to familiarize the characters with her so that I can have her employ them in my next adventure. As far as the rooms go, I don't expect them to find all these nooks and crannies this time around her tower.

Thanks for the praise Dicewrangler. Like I said in my previous post, I've been writing for an adventure that features Nephys and figured I'd post it exactly for people like you who could get some use out of it. As for your player, I don't know if I should wish him luck or not. He is going to enter a feared necromancer's tower alone!