Hintersee

The Hintersee

The Sea of Basilia

Location: Outlands / Hinterlands

The Hintersee is a rare example of a landmark in the Hinterlands, and it starts where the gatetown of Glorium ends. The Watergate, Glorium’s primary portal to Ysgard, is found on the shores of the sea. Cold and stormy, it’s not much fun for the sailors who try to cross it. Every time the Modron Procession reaches Glorium, a longship sets out to explore the Hintersee. Or at least, that’s what’s said. It’s more likely to be coincidence than anything else, especially as the people of Glorium don’t keep very reliable records.

The Hintersee teems with life, providing all manner of seafood for the settlements along its coast. Deeper fishing expeditions have turned up miniature kraken, and shark-eels. It’s said that the River Oceanus empties into the Hintersee too, although a cutter would need to be a legendary sailor to be able to find it.

Out in the middle of the Hintersee, a traveller might find the Frozen Reaches, an area which puts bloods in mind of Stygia for its coldness and hostility. But it’s all a perfectly natural landscape, and the Inuit bloods who dwell here seem to cope all right. There may be dry land somewhere beneath the ice cap, but no-one’s ever seen it.

Ruling over the whole lot are three powers, the Sea Spirit, the Moon Spirit and the Air Spirit. The locals here have to be careful, because dire polar bears and other, nastier creatures lurk amongst the ice floes. No-one quite knows what’s beyond the Frozen Reaches, but at least one story says that the ‘Land somehow runs clean into Elemental Water here. It’s likely that’s just screed, but there could always be an Elemental Vortex here.

Ironically, one of the best ways to find your way out of the Hintersee is to get lost in it. Chant goes that the truly lost may find themselves on a mysterious planar pathway called the Seventh Sea. If getting lost in order to find your way doesn’t sound barmy to you, then perhaps you should check yourself into the Bleakers’ Gatehouse next time you’re in Sigil, cutter.

Source: Jon Winter-Holt, Alex and Margery Roberts