Borders of Earth

Border Tunnels of Earth

Core Earth

Core Earth is the infinite bulk of earth, sand and stone that makes up the most of the plane. In this place the most influential elemental rulers—Ogremoch, Sunnis, the Great Khan of Dao—and important races live. It’s also the part of the plane that’s most often pock-marked by elemental pockets.

Deep Earth

Deep Earth, the Protolith, is even less explored by outsiders than Deep Air, Fire or Water. There are no natural tunnels here, and even familiar ways to stop tunnels from sealing up work only infrequently. Additionally, there is no natural air or water, gravity becomes stronger, and earthquakes more powerful. At one time, a troop of dwarves tried to dig deeper into the plane in hopes of finding a large vein of pure ore. Eventually, they stopped, when it became evident that the Deep Earth only becomes more homogeneous and less rich the further one delves into it. The rock gets denser and harder too—granite, quartz—making digging tunnels more and more arduous. If you’re not a rockswimmer then you’re going to struggle to make any headway. For mortals however, I doubt there is anything worth exploring down there—at best you’ll find some gems of wisdom from primal elementals and dharum suhn, but most likely—only your inevitable crushing doom.

From Earth to Magma

If you head lavawards, towards the Plane of Magma, the normally cool surrounding earth becomes more heated and the tunnels like ovens. Eventually hotspots of soft rock start appearing here and there. This is the region called the Furnaces. Watch your step! If you proceed, you can get either lucky, unlucky or very lucky. If you are lucky, heat around you will rise to and unbearable degree and regular stone gives way to the volcanic rock, as you sink beneath the surface of the Plane of Magma. If you are unlucky, you will emerge from the side of an infinitely tall wall of stone, right into a searing atmosphere of toxic gases. And if you are very lucky, you’ll locate the place, where the wall and the ground collide—and enter the forest of basalt spires that’s known as Scorched Wastes, technically part of the plane of Magma but influenced by the cooling properties of the Earth.

From Earth to Ooze

Moving mudwards, the opposite direction to lavawards, you’ll first notice the increase in moisture. The typically dry and dusty tunnels become wetter, first glistening, then dripping, then running with sheets of murky water. Before long, any open space is filled with tiny lakes. Then when the soil becomes more reminiscent of clay and dirt, you have entered the border region of Earth known as Mudhills. Skilled miners find digging here in the fertile earth very much easier than in the rocky substrate of Core Earth, although it’s important to shore up your tunnels against collapse. Continue on, and finally, the surrounding earth becomes viscous mud—signalling you’ve crossed into the border region of the Plane of Ooze known as Muckmire. Tunnelling here is extremely hazardous as the earth loses its cohesion altogether and flows like tar—too thick to swim through, but too liquid to dig. Many a mortal’s come a cropper in these parts, its basically the plane of quicksand. Fortunately, there’s little of value here to attract cutters, so its only the sods who are already lost who become Lost, if you get my meaning,

From Earth to Mineral

Famously, there’s no generally accepted name for the border between Earth and Mineral. Earth just incrementally becomes denser and richer as you move gemwards towards the Positive Energy Plane. Even magic can’t clearly determine where one plane starts and another ends—the border seems to move back and forth erratically. My theory is that the miners and goldpanners here really want to keep others away, so they’re as mysterious asm possible about where the motherlodes can be found. It’s certainly the richest pickings in the Anvil for ores, precious stones and gold.

If you continue on gemwards you’ll eventually get to the Treasury of the Multiverse. The rocks get richer and fancier, and the occasional chunk of gold or silver becomes thick seams of the stuff. That’s how the Seams got its name after all. Now you might think this place would be even more popular with prospectors, and you’d be right that it’s tempting. Trouble is, a berk’s got to pick their battles. On the plane of Earth, the tricky part is the hard work of digging and looking for the good stuff. Once you’ve crossed over into Mineral though, when its borders, your problem changes. Its not finding the stuff, it’s keeping hold of it. Instead of spending your time delving and sifting, you’ll find yourself fighting off angry mineral quasi-elementals, or worse. See, the living crystals are hearty sick of berks tromping in and making off with chunks of their plane. Since most miners are better at digging than fighting creatures that can ambush a berk right out of the walls, the canny ones keep their visits to the Seams very brief indeed.

From Earth to Dust

And at last, near the border with Dust stone becomes brittle and easy to dig through. These are the Sandstones—go and take a guess which rocks are abundant in this region. Here, a berk can encounter all sorts of many aggressive and chaotic creatures such as dust quasielementals and sandknights. Many of them serve Alu Kahn Sang, some don’t, but none of them pay any mind to the Elemental lords of Earth—something which greatly displeases our illustrious rulers. Heading further screewards, when you break the last bit of sandstone separating you from Dust, you emerge into a place called Tumbling Rocks, where huge chunks of stone are ripped away from the Plane of Earth and turned to dust by the storm of abrasive grit.

Canonical Sources: Inner Planes [2e]

Other Sources: Margarita, Jon Winter-Holt