A'RAF

Yet more proof that there is a definite, Old Earth influence that was present here on Anomaly long before our arrival... While we’d have been perfectly happy calling Erebos’ “castle on the lava spit” simply “Hell,” it seems the supreme terror of this world has adopted a more “hopeful” namesake. I doubt the Muties are aware of the quasi-benevolent joke being played upon them…

To all the sentient, normal humanoids or half-sane groups of Anomaly, A’raf is the epicenter of all things evil on this world. More than starvation. More than plague. More so than even endless wars between one another. All told, it is a well-founded belief. After all, the man who calls this place home is responsible for the burning of so many of his own followers the skies were darkened for weeks with the resulting ashes. Certainly, the plague that was decimating his ranks was as good a reason as any for him to burn them. The problem was, most foisted into the pits were still alive when they were fed to the fire. Skeletal remains that miraculously survived the intense heat of the purge were integrated into the finer art deco elements of A’raf. If a place can be said to wear death as a garment, this is it. And she wears it well.

A’raf is clearly designed to intimidate and ensure a frontal assault on Erebos is the last thing anyone might consider on the road to a long, happy life. The lava moat is actually the most charming feature of the place, brimming with some form of light and the only warmth to be found near its earthy halls. Massive stone and bone formed spires, pikes and impenetrable defensive structures are all carved in a nightmarish chiasma as to somehow create more shadowed than illuminated surfaces. It is located at the foot of a live magma corridor and otherwise completely exposed to any who’d dare cross the desert to confront them. Militarily speaking, such a move would be profoundly difficult even under the best of circumstances. The place literally swallows light, even at high noon, in the same way it drains one’s soul of hope. Such is the true power of A’raf.

It is Erebos’ dark, miserable soul in monument form.

Small patrols of Etaniok Runners execute predictable patrols, well outside the range of the best archers and the most powerful bows. Another Erebos taunt. The blowing of a single warning horn from any one of them will bring a sea of Muties from the gaping maw of A’raf like roaches to feast.

Information of the stronghold’s interior is non-existent. What happens in A’raf, stays in A’raf. A Mutie will happily give its life before they offered anything useful of what goes in in the bowels of that sinister place. To see A’raf is to die if you are not a Mutie.