Far from the continent of Rathe, the High Seas beckons the seaworthy and skyworthy. Vast and unpredictable, the waters and islands here offer peril aplenty for even the sturdiest of ships and crew.

The cultures here were built upon the ruins of a long-dead Dhani Empire. Adepts of aether, the Dhani civilization was as wondrous as Rathe during the height of its Third Age. However, the Dhani grew too ambitious and destroyed their own empire in a quick succession of arcane calamities.

Nowadays, only the bravest seafarers sail the wild straits and causeways of the High Seas in search of lost treasure and renown. While settlements do flourish, both indigenous and imported, the lone sea and sky wolves remain fiercely independent. A captain’s ship is their home and their crew is their kin. A pirate’s goal is to find and steal enough loot to sustain their freebooting lifestyle, and for buccaneers bold and true, the future is golden.

The Dhani Empire

Only ruins and artifacts, monsters and arcane anomalies, now remain of the Dhani culture. The descendants of the few survivors have forgotten most of their heritage.

The empire was built upon the arcane arts, the manipulation of aether enabling the creation of potent relics and breathtaking monuments. The ruling class formed a matriarchal aethocracy, overseen by an arcane empress.

Yet aether was to be their making and their destruction. The last empress grew too powerful, and far too ambitious. She unleashed arcane forces that not even her greatest wizard could control, nor contain. Some cities sank into the ocean. Others were wiped out by a necrophage that slaughtered the fortunate and raised the cursed up as revenants and walking corpses. In some rare places, unimaginable powers ripped reality itself asunder.

Trōpal-Dhani

Legend has it that one city survived the Dhani apocalypse, and that it retains the wealth and aetheric glory that the empire once possessed. If it truly exists, no one from the High Seas has yet found it. The only clues to its whereabouts lie in the most dangerous ruins of its former empire.

Picturesque lagoons, white-sand beaches, and waters so clear and warm that they seem to court the sky. Azuro Keys looks like the ultimate honeymoon getaway until a careless carouser notices the littered bones, bleached to a shine by the hard sun. The many longboats and pinnaces jut out of the water like wooden skeletons. They are a sobering reminder of mortal mishaps and scores settled by generations of pirates.

Larger ships are unable to enter the atoll, making naval battles impossible. As a result, it has become a neutral ground, used by pirates of all renown and quality to resolve personal feuds and hide the occasional plunder from prying eyes.

A few piscators, together with reclusive sailors, have built makeshift cabins and even small settlements along the coast. They sometimes encounter treasure-seekers, though most leave empty-handed. Those who stay either have a case of resilient greed or weren’t after gold to begin with. Those canny few know the real treasure of the Keys is the simple life: feet in the soothing water, sun warming the skin, and the finest fishing in the High Seas.

What good is pirate booty without a place to squander it? What good is a grand tale of the High Seas if no one is moored long enough to marvel at it? Whether a pirate’s peddling stolen goods or salty stories, the island of Port Conniver is their harbor of choice. Not so much a single place as it is a great sprawl of hideouts and hideaways, Port Conniver stretches around a craggy island in the southern parts of the High Seas.

The promenade is where pirates spend their hard-stolen gold, with taverns, gambling dens, and brothels as far as the eye can see, all settled on the sandy beach or built into the mouths of caves. Sure, it isn’t as fancy as some of the swanky saloons in Golden Port. And the streets and alleys of Piper’s Pier are probably safer for walking along. But for a true pirate, one with a real thirst for adventure, there is no better place to fill your boots.

When looking to get rid of something, or someone, pirates head deeper inland. That’s where they find what the landlubbers call black markets, but hark, a real pirate hasn’t seen a white one. All pirates know to keep a peeper on the clientele there and, if they still have both, another on their pouch.

Dagger Docks

The Dagger Docks of Port Conniver are where brigands, corsairs, and other sailors of a flexible moral persuasion come to sell off their goods, make repairs to their vessels, and restock the ship with foodstuff and crew.

The docks themselves are a fine mess of intersecting tunnels, hidden reservoirs, and treacherous lagoons where even frequent visitors get lost, which makes shaking off pursuers easy. Entire causeways can be barred off to repel invaders.

A Dagger Docks worker must navigate and endure some messy situations: colorful ‘pets’ breaking out of their crates, sea beasts drawn in by the scent of exotic meats, hostile takeovers in the dead of night, and personal grudges settled at knifepoint.

Kraken’s Barrel

They say there is no greater den of scallywags and cutthroats than the piratical patrons who frequent the Kraken’s Barrel. As if that was a bad thing! These are the people a pirate wants at their side when sailing the High Seas for loot and glory. A rabble of murderous misfits, a cunning crew they can trust to be untrustworthy!

The owner of the infamous tavern runs a pretty tight ship. An alchemist in a past life, Pearl Sandhri still puts her talents for mixing things together to good use, and an even better fortune. Every so often she’ll bring out a new brew for her customers to test. A wise sailor might’ve let their drinking mate have the first sip, but what kind of pirate waits for others?

It’s bad luck to bite the hand that feeds you, and even worse to cross the lady that pours your brew. Keep the peace and you’re welcome at the Kraken’s Barrel; break the code, and you’ll end up in the drink.

Goldkiss Rum

All palates are catered to at Kraken’s Barrel, but the most popular choice remains Goldkiss Rum. Bright with a rich golden flavor, even one drop seduces the staunchest of sailors, the sensation lingering like a sunbathed siren’s kiss. It’s also one of the few things that can unite Port Conniver’s corsairs under a single banner, a round for all buying a moment’s truce.

This port city sits like a clockwork crown upon the atoll of a slumbering volcano. Decades ago, ingenious pioneers from Metrix tapped into the caldera’s reservoirs of heat-pressured water and natural gas, building the network of boilers and pipes that gave the place its name.

Thus thermally powered, Piper’s Pier grew rapidly into a bustling hub of mercantile endeavor and transport ingenuity. While the port’s many wharfs are packed to the gills with sailing ships, it’s the cloud-piercing moorings and launch pads that serve the most elevated entrepreneurs and explorers.

On any day, the sky is filled with airships of all kinds, from bulbous merchant zeppelins to rocket-powered skimmers that paint jet streams across the firmament. And while most of these lofty travelers concern themselves with legitimate business between seafaring settlements and distant Metrix, a nefarious few ply a very different trade. Piracy!

Corsairs of the Skies

Aeronauts

Piper’s Pier is the essential port of call for the most fleet and flashy captains: the Aeronauts. These wind-daring navigators traverse the clouds for exploration and profit. They are the faster couriers and the most exciting option for travelers who wish to reach the giddiest heights and farthest locations.

While the high skies can be even more perilous than the High Seas, with precipitous descent added to the usual hazards of drowning and death by cannon-fire, these pilots let nothing fly in the face of their lofty ambitions. One day they may fall, but until then, they shall enjoy the freedom that only the open sky can provide.

Smugglers, Thieves, and Raiders

Through a web of bribery and blackmail, smugglers and thieves do a prosperous trade under the nose of the Coast Guard. Covered by forged documentation and palmed payoffs, stolen goods can be unloaded and fenced into the city’s bustling black market.

Airborne raiders gather to share secrets and broker deals at the Mechaneer’s Bounty, a tavern blimp tethered to a towering elevator. The mysterious proprietor, known only as Cirrus, has his sticky fingers in so many pies that even the governor must turn a blind eye, else have her dirty laundry aired for all to see. Within Cirrus’ businesses, the worst kind of pirate can wheel and deal in privacy, as long as they pay a portion of their plunder to the crime boss’s coffers.

Governors and Guards

After Piper’s Pier wrest its independence from Metrix in the brief Clockwork War, a governor has been elected every five years from the most prominent and prosperous merchants. Despite Piper’s Pier running mostly on private enterprise, the Governor’s Chambers manages the thermal infrastructure, docks, and Coast Guard. It’s the governor’s job to keep the pipes clear and the populace safe from pirates and other marine menaces.

Governor Practiss has dominated Pier politics for over a decade. Though her last election was stained with scandal and accusations of corruption, Practiss has maintained a copperplate grip on the city by expanding the Coast Guard and filling her office with handpicked cronies.

Suspicion is that Practiss has a clandestine alliance with the crime boss, Cirrus. Lubbers with a penchant for talking bilge claim that Practiss and Cirrus are one and the same. Of course, such notions are best not voiced within earshot of the Coast Guard or the governor’s skywardens.

Corporate Interests

While most companies of Metrix origin were ousted during the Clockwork War, the Cogwerx Conglomerate still maintains a foothold in the Pier. Under contract to the Governor’s Chambers, they run some of the infrastructure, and build and repair the skywardens.

The only company permitted by the governor to own its own docks, Cogwerx receives sailing ships and airships filled with cogs and immigrants from Metrix, and sends them back, packed to the gunnels with raw resources, especially gold.

Upon a desolate island, Graystone Penitentiary stands as a warning to all: sail the straight and narrow, or be imprisoned where not even hope can escape.

The penal colony of Graystone was founded by the first settlers of Piper’s Pier, and continues to receive a steady stream of captured pirates, despairing debtors, and Governor Practiss’s political opponents.

The Penitentiary is organized in levels. Seven floors above ground, and seven underneath, each comprising a cell block and a common area. For prisoners, their suffering is determined by which level they are consigned to.

The upper floors are more hotel than lockup, with secure accommodations provided for well-heeled criminals who can buy quiet comfort while the heat dies down. The cells are light and spacious, and the common areas feature balconies and garden bars.

Anything below ground is less hospitable. The screws dish out pilchard porridge and the shared areas here are mechanized mills where prisoners toil to make fishing nets, sails, and oilcloth. The further one goes, the harsher it becomes. The screws won’t even go down to Sub-Seven. That’s where the blackest hearts are thrown and forgotten.

In charge is the peg-legged Warden Cooder who takes pleasure in pandering to his prestigious guests whilst breaking the spirits of his petty inmates. Once a pirate captain, exiled after mutiny, he has held on to his position for years like a barnacle on a hull, amassing influence whilst secretly building his own grand endeavor: the Kuraghan.

The Kuraghan

In a horned cape nestles the forlorn village of Grayhollow, named after the natural cave that shelters the village’s shacks. To the public, it was a site of rehabilitation where poorer inmates would go to re-acclimate to Piper’s Pier society. There were workshops, fish farms, and even a school. But Warden Cooder had other ideas.

Picking out prisoners with the right balance of nastiness and gullibility, Cooder discreetly populated Grayhollow with a new breed of convict. He named them the Kuraghan after an ancient Dhani cult that worshipped Absolon, god of the great deep. He anointed himself as Absolon’s prophet and led his Kuraghan in building a raiding fleet.

In battle, the Kuraghan are fearless, for they believe that death will deliver them to Fiddler’s Green, where their every immortal whim shall be tended to by demure merfolk. It’s a beautiful lie, and no one tells it better than Cooder.

The accursed archipelago known as Dreadfall Reach looms ever large on the horizon of the High Seas and in the minds of the pirates that sail them.

The Dreadfall’s waters? They’re as treacherous as the isles themselves. Dark clouds give cover to roving bands of heartless corsairs, their tattered sails flapping in bitter winds. Jagged waves throw themselves against broken vessels speared upon saw-toothed shoals. The air is thick with mortal decay.

Buried beneath all that nastiness lies the true face of these islands. The waters here are calm. Serene, almost. A deep silence blankets the sprawl of drowned ruins that cluster like barnacles to the barren rocks. It’s quiet here, yes, but quiet’s not peace.

Dreadfall Reach was once a jewel in the Dhani crown, before it was cursed with undying hunger and condemned to the abyss. Or so the legends say. And the dead are restless. Only fools brave the Reach hoping to learn its fate, only to meet their own.

The Doomed and the Drowned

Many a rum-soaked yarn makes reference to the Curse of Dreadfall Reach. While exact accounts differ, depending on the amount and flavor of grog imbibed during the telling, all agree the fate suffered by the ancient Dhani was a grim one. Cursed with undeath, their ghoulish remains still wander the halls and atriums of the submerged necropolis. Few explorers live long enough to delve into the Dreadfall’s blackened heart, but those who return do so with tales of horror, and also pity. A deep melancholy weighs on them, visions of the Dhani undead and their mournful processions forever etched in their minds.

Alas, the Dhani are not the only undead to stalk the osseous caverns of the Dreadfall ruins. The ancient evil possessing Dreadfall Reach still hungers for flesh, something its many greedy visitors provide in spades. Corpses crawl out from every nook and cranny, eager to bloat the Dreadfall’s morbid ranks. Those plagued with undeath are said to be thralls of Nocetes, death god of the Dhani.

Waters of Wild Death

If ancient curses, undead hordes, and bloodthirsty buccaneers weren’t enough, the Dreadfall shallows swarm with schools of needle-fanged fish, all sharing a voracious appetite for flesh. Their place in the ‘food’ chain is rivaled by lone opportunists: boned eels slick with putrefying seaweed and kneecapper crustaceans whose foot-long pincers ensure a steady demand for peg legs back in Port Conniver. Off the coast swim bigger undead creatures: triple-finned sawmaws and moon-shaped gulpers are both common sights through a trained spyglass.

The air too, is sated with foulness. Flocks of maggot gulls greet new arrivals with gut-wrenching screams, while rotting rocs soar above with vulturine anticipation. It might be bad luck to kill a seabird, but it’s the ones that can’t die that’ll scatter the bones.

Then Dreadfall Reach saves the best for last, and from the deep, it brings the worst. In the drowned halls, great sea beasts, and many-armed monstrosities make their lair. These undying leviathans are seldom seen by mortal eye, and of that accursed group, little accord can be reached. Many a fisher has claimed to have fought off multi-headed skeleton serpents the size of a galley, while others speak of hacking their way through the lesion-riddled tentacles of a lich-kraken. With bellies full of rum, all believe these carnivores are refugees of Teramundr, themselves prey of the even greater predators within that terrible place.

Dusty tomes tell of a great war that ravaged the High Seas. Hate ran deep and the waters ran red. Nowhere was the fighting fiercer than in the area that would become known as Teramundr’s Triangle. Wrath drove even the wisest minds to madness, and such malicious powers were unleashed that reality itself writhed in agony. Like a sail rent by too sharp a wind, the very fabric of the world was torn apart, never to be mended.

What happened next none can say, for neither time nor space has ever been quite the same around the Triangle. These days Teramundr’s Triangle is a wound in the world, a watery grave for sanity, and a maelstrom of madness. Overlong appendages of abyssal terrors thrash among vast ship cemeteries that seemingly flicker in and out of existence, all while terrible storms alternate between freezing time and hastening its passage.

Impassable to traverse and impossible to avoid, the Triangle sits at the center of the High Seas, its three horns stabbing at the relative normalcy that surrounds it. To call it dangerous would be an understatement for the ages. Yet, the appeal is clear as stars for every pirate to see. Beyond the hoards of unclaimed treasure, Teramundr’s Triangle is not just a breeding ground for terrible monsters but terrific stories as well, and that is one thing in constant demand.

Teramundr’s Brood

In hadal zones beyond name or measure, primordial leviathans of tectonic might stir in restless sleep, an age passing with their every yawn. They are spoken of in tales and taverns. Yet such accounts are flawed, for mere words cannot hope to describe or contain the eldritch enormity of these colossi.

Even so, the mega-krakens, multi-hydras, and other residents of the Triangle are often known as Teramundr’s Brood. They were all born within the borders of the Triangle, for surely no other place on the High Seas could breed such carnivorous behemoths.

The amateur biomancers of Piper’s Pier speculate the ancient Dhani played a role in their creation, a theory contradicted by the notable Swiller Saltbeard, who argues that the legendary war of the Triangle was fought not by humans, but by great tribes of prehistoric leviathans.

Whatever their true origin, the danger posed by Teramundr’s Brood remains the same. It is a small mercy that not even the most foolhardy explorer could hope to venture deep enough to witness the full scale of these dread sea beasts.

A Tear in Reality

Teramundr’s Triangle stands as a warning to all who sail the High Seas. But to the few who dare study its origins, it imparts a dire lesson as well: that reality isn’t fixed, but can be bent, bowed, and broken.

The ancient Dhani may well have been privy to this wisdom, even if their actions ultimately did not align with it. Likewise, the Triangle itself is no mere cartographic convenience, but an expression of formidable arcane potential.

Even to this day the air around Teramundr’s Triangle is thick with aetheric echoes. However deadly and unstable, the area beckons not only the greedy and the gold-hungry, but also the introspective and the visionary. Strange, mayhap, that on the surface of Teramundr’s restless sea, travelers see past and future versions of themselves, their lives threatened by dangers and changed by its mysteries.

Many a ship has met its end within Blackwater Strait, a labyrinth of islands and ruins between Azuro Keys and Golden Port. Due to the prevailing winds near Teramundr’s Triangle, the strait’s twisting channels can take weeks off a profitable journey. Yet, its capricious currents can smash a vessel in the blink of an unwary captain’s eye.

Then there are the wreckers who light false beacons or riddle the causeways with chain-snares and mines. Or the Hoikers: giant, acid-spitting scallops that scuttle out of the crumbling Dhani ruins to shoot down seabirds and aeronauts.

Even if a savvy crew makes it through without paying a toll in limb or life, the sirens’ song may yet entice them into a fatal embrace.

Blackwater Strait can be a shortcut to making a quick pouch of gold. The exotic goods of Golden Port, such as sea spider silk and ancient Dhani relics, pluck purse strings and delight collectors whichever direction the compass points. But is the booty worth the bite?

Sirens of Lost Lagoon

To hear them is to have your ears bleed with longing. To see them is a turgid dream come true. The sirens have drifted far from their merfolk origins. Though the Lost Lagoon offers a peaceful place to sleep and sunbathe, the Blackwater is a harsh climate unsuited to gentle aquaculture.

In the straits, the sirens must seduce their next meal from the shore or entice it from a passing ship. Whilst they can survive on fish and crustaceans, even seaweed if they have to, they prefer their food sun-reared and warm-blooded.

Yet the sirens are not without their sensibilities. Song and waterdancing are their pleasures, their saving graces. The ladies of Lost Lagoon will put on their show for any sailor who navigates Blackwater Strait, and all these fishtailed fancies ask for is a handsome gift to acknowledge their beautiful performance.

If they don’t like what’s been offered? Then they’ll have their pound of flesh.

Griefers Reef

Any helmsman worth his salt knows to read the waters carefully when sailing through Griefers Reef. For if they don’t, their ship will wind up caught and strangled by Sailorbane Coral. A predatory species, Sailorbane Coral grows from the rocky banks of channels, remaining submerged to conceal its presence. Over time, opposing escarpments of coral meet in the middle of a causeway to form a sub-nautical arch.

Such is the innate cunning of Sailorbane; it swells to the average depth of a ship’s hull. Boats with a shallow draft can pass safely over top, but any craft of a deep seafaring design will be ripped open from bow to stern.

That’s when Sailorbane Coral shows its truly nefarious nature. Sailors who fall into the water are caught by the coral’s hunting tendrils and dragged under. The reef then feeds off its drowned catch, using the nutrients to extend further into a causeway, or to launch a pod of self-propelled coral that finds and colonizes another channel.

Griefers Reef is the oldest and largest known example of Sailorbane Coral. Its colony spans one of the widest channels in Blackwater Strait and it has claimed dozens of unwary ships in its long lifetime.

As ships approach Golden Port, the first thing sailors notice are the colossal twin arches overlooking the entrance to the harbor. One of the few remnants of a Dhani civilization with a penchant for the grandiose, the arches help facilitate ship traffic in and out of the port.

Once inside, the city is a sight to behold. To starboard, a patchwork of silk canopies shimmer in the sun, shading the markets throughout the day, while the soft ocean breeze cools the alleyways. On the port side, a mosaic of houses and communal buildings sprawl over the Dhani ruins, the building stones salvaged from the once-majestic palace of the three golden empresses.

Golden Port’s sea spider colonies form glistening, gossamer nets throughout the shallows, and barelegged silk farmers wade and weave in the early hours of morning. Sea spider silk is highly sought after by traders, but it’s not the only treasure that Golden Port harbors.

The Golden Bazaar

It may be a place of commerce, but over time, the labyrinthine Golden Bazaar has developed into the beating heart of Golden Port’s social life. From the shaded alleyways to the open plazas, the Bazaar is a feast for the senses. Stalls are decorated with rich cloths, glimmering from gemfish scales embroidered in sea spider silk.

Everywhere the scent of warm, fragrant spices mix with exotic perfumes. Volutes of smoke, sweet and fruity, rise from the haze dens. Everything needed for life’s simple pleasures can be found at the Bazaar for a reasonable price, unless one’s tastes run to the rare and dangerous.

Local antiquarians brave the catacombs of the dead city to search out relics of precious metals with forgotten powers. Browsing the trinkets of Golden Port’s stalls is an act of historical salvage, one that can make the savvy corsair either very rich, or tragically cursed.