Six Tricks
Location: Abyss / Layer 4—Grand Abyss / Lower Vorago [wandering]
Six Tricks is a broad circular platform suspended over the endless chasm of the Grand Abyss by a web of precarious rusted chains. They sway gently in the breeze, as if daring planewalkers to cross. The platform itself is carved from black, jagged metallic stone that seems to hum faintly with latent malevolence. Spaced evenly around its edges, are six empty doorway-gates, each glowing with an otherworldly light that shifts in hue depending on the desires of those who approach. The air here is heavy with a palpable sense danger, and faint echoes of laughter—mocking and cruel—hang in the void. If this place feels alive, as though it is watching and waiting for its next victim—that’s because it is.
The six gates are the defining feature of Six Tricks. Each one displays tantalizing glimpses of realms like the Gaping Maw, the Steaming Fen, Twelvetrees, Pazunia, the Infinite Labyrinth, Smaragd, or Shedaklah. However, these visions are lies woven by the will of Fraz’Urb’Luu, the Prince of Deception. All gates in fact lead to Hollow’s Heart, his twisted domain, where he attemts to trap hapless cutters in a labyrinthine nightmare. The gates themselves possess a minor sentience, able to feel the desires of those who approach, and craft illusions to lure them closer—be they promises of escape from the Abyss, treasure, or vengeance. The gates require no keys to operate and are one-way.
If a non-evil being passes through a gate, minutes later an identical figure steps out of the gate. While it looks almost identical to the original version—there is always some minor deformity hidden—this being is in fact a half-fiendish doppelgänger. These copies are forged from Abyssal substance, and imbued with a singular purpose: to destroy everything their original holds dear. They are relentless predators, capable of wreaking havoc and even travelling across planes, seeking out things their creator holds dear and destroying them. This continues until their original escapes Hollow’s Heart, at which point the doppelgänger changes its mission and pursues its duplicate in order to kill them. If instead the original being is slain, the doppelgänger crumbles to dust.
While the gates of Six Tricks are convincing, their curses are not completely undetectable. Divination magic such as commune or psionic abilities like detect hostile intent can potentially reveal the gates’ true nature before it’s too late. Some cutters come here seeking to exploit the doppelgängers by luring enemies into activating the gates themselves, not only trapping them in Hollow’s Heart but also creating fiendish copies that immediately stat to work against their creators. However, lingering here too long is perilous; the platform’s bridges creak ominously underfoot, and the whispers from the void seem to grow louder with every passing moment, urging listeners to step through a gate themselves, or failing that, to just step off the edge of the platform and let themselves fall…
Six Tricks is an ancient manifestation of Fraz’Urb’Luu’s cunning. Chant goes his original plan was to expand this site’s influence across the Grand Abyss, redirecting even more gates to his own realm. However his imprisonment and binding, couples with the loss of his staff of power, fortunately put paid to this plot. Some whisper that he visits Six Tricks in secret though, watching as his creations wreak havoc on those foolish enough to cross him. Others claim that hidden among the platform’s jagged stones are fragments of ancient spells tied to Hollow’s Heart.
Source: Jon Winter-Holt and Layers of the Abyss — material adapted from the excellent netbook authored by Eli Atkinson, Will Church, Serge W. Desir Jr., Marley Sage Gable, John Harris, Sam Peer, Adam Silva-Miramon, Sean Surface
