Beauty Is Only Skin Deep
Location: Abyss / Layer 8—Skindjur
Welcome, lost soul, to Beauty Is Only Skin Deep. It’s a burg where vanity firmly tips the scales over into barminess, while the Abyss makes sure the perfection berks seek remains forever out of reach. Surrounded by the Cauterising Plain of Skindjur, this town is a grotesque theatre of self-destruction—a place of frantic, desperate reinvention, where the concept of identity is as transient as the flesh it wears. Here, the pursuit of beauty is relentless and hollow—a parody of mortal vanity elevated to an Abyssal extreme.
A Disposible Elegance
At first glance, the town dazzles, like a kaleidoscope of opulence. The buildings are crafted from layers of taut, translucent skin stretched over frames of sharpened bone, fused with obsidian. The skin reflects the flashes of lightning from the turbulent iron skies, suddenly revealing veins, capillaries, and the occasional shadow of something writhing just beneath the surface. Buildings are decorated with vibrant and frequently beautiful tattoos, of animals, angels or demons or anything in between.
The streets are littered with bubbling fountains of unnaturally vibrant fluids—acidic salves and ichors designed to peel, soften, and reshape flesh. Mirrors of warped glass hang from the street corners, their surfaces smeared with dried blood and fingerprints, as if countless hands have previously sought approval from their distorted reflections.
The surreal façade of the burg is ever-changing. Each night, as if by some grotesque magic, the buildings seem to “shed” their old skin, sloughing off discarded layers of organic architecture and growing fresh ones. One day, the buildings may bloom with floral patterns of dyed skin; the next, they might ripple with rows of teeth set into bone-like scaffolding. Imperfection is anathema here, and anything deemed unworthy is surgically pruned away—whether it’s a crumbling structure—or a citizen who has fallen out of favour.
Looking beyond the superficial appearance of the burg however, things rapidly turn disturbing. The place hums with the unsettling symphony of surgery in progress. The rasping of bone saws, the hiss of cauterising wands, and the wet squelch of flesh being rearranged create a macabre rhythm. Overlaying this is a constant murmur of voices, as residents obsessively critique one another’s appearances or whisper anxiously about their next “procedure.” And of course the moans, yelps and dare I say screams, of patients finding their procedures rather more painful than was promised.
Occasionally, the air shatters with the shrill cry of someone who has gone too far—whose body has had one too many incisions. This is followed by the disturbing scraping of the bone carrion collector wagon, gathering the remnants for reconstitution into the town’s ever-hungry architecture.
The atmosphere is pungent and oppressive. The acrid stench of antiseptic chemicals mingles with the meaty tang of wounds and the metallic zing of blood. The smoky aroma of burnt flesh is inescapable, a constant reminder of the town’s obsession with “purifying” imperfection. Beneath it all lingers a faint floral scent, like the ghost of some forgotten perfume, clinging stubbornly despite the rot.
Philosophy of the Burg
The guiding principle of Beauty Is Only Skin Deep is rebirth under the knife—an obsession with self-improvement taken to grotesque extremes. Residents believe that physical perfection is both a duty and a salvation, that to allow imperfection is to invite decay and death. The problem is, their definition of perfection is ever-shifting, dictated by volatile trends and the fickle whims of their ruler.
Cosmetic surgeries are the lifeblood of the town. Every resident, regardless of status, strives to undergo constant transformation, driven by the relentless fear of becoming irrelevant, outdated, or unattractive. Faces and bodies are re-sculpted, limbs are replaced with more “aesthetic” prosthetics, hair removed, added or relocated, and flesh is peeled, stretched, tattooed and dyed in the pursuit of fleeting visions of beauty.
This obsession with outward appearance is a cruel mockery of the vanity of mortals, who have to contend with aging. The tanar’ri and petitioner residents of the burg of course do not age—but neither are they ever satisfied. The town enforces its philosophy with a ruthless hierarchy where those who fail to “keep up” with the latest trends are ostracised, discarded, or worse.
Yet beneath this vain desperation lies an even deeper horror: the loss of identity. Most residents no longer remember their original faces or forms. In their endless quest to become better, they have carved away at not only their flesh but their sense of self, replacing it with shallow imitations of others’ ideals and trending fads. While it’s painted that way, the obsessive pursuit of beauty here is not empowering at all—it is an act of annihilation.
Locations in the Burg
The town’s centrepiece is The Great Reveal, an amphitheatre where daily Reveal Ceremonies are held. Here, residents display their latest surgical improvements to roaring applause—or cutting ridicule. Statues of historical failures, their faces surgically obliterated, stand as grim gargoyles on the walls of the Great Reveal, serving as a cautionary gallery for those who might try to emulate their unsuccessful techniques.
The Fleshweavers’ Spires, rise high above the burg, their organic walls pulsing with life. Within these chambers, the most prestigious surgeons practice their art, experimenting with new techniques and creating templates of beauty that the town’s citizens will then strive to emulate.
Who Rules
Though the town gives the nod towards Volisupula, the lord of the layer, its current local ruler is far more attuned to the burg’s tortured philosophy of relentless reinvention. Madame Incarnadine the Fleshweaver (planar tanar’ri—subtype unclear [she/her] / CE), presides over Beauty Is Only Skin Deep as both queen and the burg’s most celebrated artisan of transformation. She is no demon lord or Abyssal tyrant; rather, she is a grotesquely tragic figure of her own making, embodying the town’s desperate obsession with appearance and its ultimate cost.
Who Really Rules
Though Incarnadine claims dominion, the true power behind the town lies with its elite Council of Chiurgeons, shadowy figures who transform the Marquess’s whims into bloody reality. These macabre artisans hold the destiny of every citizen in their bloodstained hands, their needles and knives shaping not just appearances but the social hierarchy itself.
And then there is the burg itself. Whispered legends claim that the skin-buildings of Beauty Is Only Skin Deep are alive, comprising one enormous organic structure which feeds off the flesh and blood of its residents. The malevolent creature hides in plain sight, encouraging local berks’ obsessive surgeries by whispering into their minds that they must “shed more,” “cut deeper this time,” “become reborn.” Whether the town is an extension of Skindjur’s hatred of imperfection or a living entity birthed by the Abyss itself is unclear—but it demands fresh sacrifices, always.
The Economy
The economy of Beauty Is Only Skin Deep revolves around flesh as a currency. Skin, bones, and organs are traded openly in the town’s macabre market, where “raw materials” are valued by their quality and freshness. Virgin flesh—skin untouched by scars, tattoos or corruption—is the most valuable commodity.
In addition to flesh, residents trade in favours and trends. A surgeon’s reputation can carry as much weight as their skill, and securing the patronage of a respected artisan is often more valuable than hoarding material wealth. Magical salves, tailored prosthetics, designer skin grafts, and rare pigments for dyeing flesh with vibrant or unnatural hues are sought-after goods, as is access to the town’s coveted Rejuvenation Vats—caustic pools that dissolve imperfections, but as a side effect can leave the user in excruciating pain.
Life in the Burg
Life here is a parody of mortal vanity taken to its darkest extreme. The citizens of Beauty Is Only Skin Deep are trapped in a vicious cycle of obsession and inadequacy, constantly chasing perfection but never reaching it.
Social status is determined entirely by one’s appearance, with citizens constantly vying to outdo one another in displays of beauty and excess. The pressure to conform is crushing, and failure often leads to exile—or worse. Those who can no longer afford or bear surgeries or who refuse to participate in the town’s rituals are cast out into the Cauterising Plain outside the burg’s protective walls, where the razor-sharp winds and stinging rains can be string enough to flay an unprotected berk to the bone.
The most notorious punishment in the town however is the Unmasking, a public ceremony in which a resident’s surgically-altered face is peeled away layer by layer, exposing not just the grotesque remnants of their original appearance but the soul-deep flaws that drove them to seek change in the first place. The victim is left faceless—both literally and metaphorically—a walking cautionary tale of what happens to those who fail to embrace the town’s philosophy of reinvention. And then when the folk of the burg have grown tired of the spectacle, the poor berk is cast into the Cauterising Plain as well. It’s these sods who tend to come back after death to haunt the Plain.
The result is a society defined by fear and desperation. Beneath their carefully curated exteriors, the town’s residents are hollow, their sense of self stripped away by years of cutting, carving, and sewing themselves anew. They cling to the fleeting approval of their peers and the elusive hope that one day, they will be enough. The Abyss of course, is cunning enough to ensure that day will never arrive.
Who Would Live Here?
The population of “Beauty Is Only Skin Deep” is a mix of the vain, the cursed, and the desperate:
- Tieflings dominate the population here, their infernal heritage giving them the resilience needed to endure the endless cycle of pain and transformation, and also resist the corrupting nature of the layer itself.
- Tanar’ri walk among the residents, some revelling in the town’s grotesque vanity, others preying on its most vulnerable in search of fresh victims.
- Petitioners can also end up here—they tend to be cutters who died as a result of their own vanity, those who butchered the bodies of others for profit or their own sadistic reasons, or berks who were particularly cruel to others because of their appearance.
- A handful of vain, or desperate, or more commonly desperately vain mortals are drawn here by promises of cosmetic perfection—only to find themselves trapped in an endless cycle of surgeries and self-loathing.
- The Altered are residents so thoroughly transformed that they are no longer recognisably mortal, wander the town with warped, mannequin-like faces, the ultimate cautionary tales of self-destructive vanity.
To live in this place is to submit utterly to the endless pursuit of perfection, despite knowing deep down that perfection itself is a lie. It is a hollow existence, where one’s sense of self is carved away piece by piece, leaving behind only a shell desperate for approval. So will you, wanderer, resist the siren song of the scalpel—will you add your own flesh to the town’s canvas?
Sources: Jon Winter-Holt. Inspired by botched cosmetic surgery, gender reveal parties and the Silence of the Lambs.