The Grave Quarry - Planar Location
What is the Grave Quarry?
Dungeon Master’s Guide, 2014 Wizards of the Coast
Deep within the Plane of Earth, at the base of the very plane itself, lie the roots of stone. None have dug deeper than this realm, as the stone itself is impenetrable. Perhaps the stone is too compressed from the pressure of holding the plane, perhaps it is the strange forces of the multiverse, or maybe it is only a rumor and you can dig deeper with adamantine picks and powerful spells.
This is the site of the Grave Quarry, a type of rest for the dead from across the plane. This realm is ruled over by the earth primordial Sujeira, the Grave Stone. She is responsible for order, nature, and the grave domains, and is often called upon by miners digging into the earth, as well as rangers and druids who are traveling across stones and mountains. In addition, her name is invoked when a cairn is laid, asking that she protects the body resting beneath her stones, ensuring that they don’t become undead.
History
This site is the start of the plane, at least, many believe it to be and it makes some sense as to why. If a creature marks the bottom of a wall, and then watches that mark, they’ll see it slowly rise before it slides past the ceiling and beyond. The stone here feeds the rest of the plane, slowly replenishing the lost stone that rests above it. How the plane replenishes the stone, or from where, remains a mystery, but many believe that as the stone is broken or worn away from above, either by tunneling or perhaps erosion on the outside of the plane, the stone here passes through the plane to replenish it.
Some people believe that the Plane of Earth is a massive mountain or mountain range, and so the realm would be considered the roots of the mountain. It is here that Sujeira found herself when she first formed. Perhaps she slid out just as the stone slides out from whatever is below the roots of the mountain, or perhaps she simply formed into being during the earliest years of creation.
Since then, the place has remained relatively unchanged beyond the dripping pools of black oil that are slowly accumulating into lakes here. Such curious substances have attracted the attention of others, but most think little of this domain. It is said to be filled with ghosts, those too restless to remain dead, and foul creatures of negative energy and dust.
An Outsider’s Perspective
Perhaps for some reason, few know of this location. While it is fascinating to watch the earth slowly rise along the sides of the tunnels, few find the endless rising of the earth to be interesting. While the elementals all seem fascinated by the creation of new stone, outsiders just coming to see the sights rarely bring any interesting news.
This domain is dark, dreary, and leaves many with an inexplicable foreboding, as if you can tell the entire plane is trying to press down on you. While this foreboding isn’t as deep or gloomy as the atmosphere of the Shadow Plane, it is enough to get people to leave the realm quickly. Additionally, the domain is almost constantly experiencing the tremors of minor and major earthquakes, making it difficult to stay on your feet or not be crushed by falling rock.
Those who stay do find valuable things, largely the oil that is accumulating here. Others find veins of ore as it slides into the plane, and while they must be quick in harvesting it, it is an easy source of raw metals for those not wanting to dig through miles of rock. In addition, those who are fascinated by graveyards find a curious energy here. The soil itself is so permeated by death that vampires find the soil quite likable, treating it like they would grave dirt and importing large quantities of it for their coffins and homes.
A Native’s Perspective
All life eventually turns to dust. This cycle of regeneration is what keeps the soil growing crops, what causes new life to take hold after a devastating forest fire, and even for fungi to take root. It is the death of others that allows for the rejuvenation of life. By the decomposition of bodies from across the Plane of Earth, only then can the plane be rebuilt. Bodies turn to dust, the dust accumulates at the bottom of the plane, which is then compacted and pressurized into the stone that makes up the rest of the plane.
The natives of this realm are largely elementals and are made of dust, new stone, and even oil. While many genie, largely dao, have made their way here, none stay for very long. This is thought to be either because Sujeira refuses to host them for more than a day at her palace in the Endless Chasm, or because the stone here is constantly changing, making it difficult to truly claim it.
Dust Mephit / Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix, 1994 TSR Inc. Tony DiTerlizzi
There are other factions within the Grave Quarry, though none are taken very seriously. Dust mephits delight in this realm, making ‘grave angels’ in the dust and generally being a nuisance to the residents and travelers. In addition, a dwarven clan has recently dug down to this realm. They claim they started at the very top of the plane, and after generations of digging, they have finally arrived at the bottom, but they aren’t planning on stopping. They claim they are going to keep digging down.
Undead do pose a challenge in this realm, albeit they are not very common. Most undead fuse earth and death to create sentient clods of grave dirt, petrified bones, bog zombies, and more.
Traits
The placement of the Grave Quarry is not disputed, but the shape of the plane and how it feeds the plane, is. For those who believe that the Plane of Earth is a series of impossibly high mountains, then the Grave Quarry is said to be at the very root of the mountains. Those who believe the Plane of Earth is an endless and infinite expanse of unending stone, find it hard to figure out where to place the Grave Quarry. While it is true that you can just dig down deep enough and stumble across this site, ‘down’ isn’t very well understood. The plane is infinite and sometimes gravity does not function like it does elsewhere.
Those who watch the stone here can watch as the stone slowly ‘slides’ up - some believe that this is evidence of the Plane of Earth growing, while others believe it is simply the plane restoring itself. When parts of the plane are destroyed, the plane ‘creates’ new rock to take its place, a process which takes millions if not billions of years. If it is truly replenishing itself, it may take a trillion years for the stone at the roots to reach the top, if not longer. In addition, no one knows where this ‘new’ stone comes from, though some think the Plane of Fire could have melted rock that feeds into the plane.
Manual of the Planes, TSR Inc. 1987
Atmosphere
This realm acts like much of the plane, though an uneasy sense of foreboding can be felt in the plane like a physical presence. While it is not as overwhelming and draining as on the Plane of Shadow, it is like entering a mausoleum or walking through a graveyard on a moonless night. No one has claimed to succumb to melancholy or anything else, except for the elementals and occasional undead, but it is enough to get most living creatures to leave the realm quickly.
Traveling to the Grave Quarry
Traveling to this realm has the same difficulty as traveling to the rest of the plane. It requires finding places of pure stone to arrive in the plane, though, for this specific realm, some portals in subterranean catacombs are said to lead here, especially if many buried within died from cave-ins, tunnel collapses, and other earth-related deaths.
For those already in the Plane of Earth, it is simply a matter of traveling down. This process could take months or years to excavate a path down, though the dao are said to have secret paths that lead to the roots of the plane. Other people rely on spells like plane shift or make deals with elementals to help them navigate the plane.
Traversing the Grave Quarry
Much like traveling the Plane of Earth, one must be careful of cave-ins, tunnels collapsing, fissures closing, and the almost constant earthquakes that rack the realm. Because new stone is constantly being pushed to the rest of the plane from here, the domain rarely goes more than a few minutes without an earthquake of some size causing the ground to tremble.
Luckily, there are a handful of tunnels that seem to be more or less permanent carved out of marble. While rock may sometimes fall from the ceiling, the tunnels remain largely safe and clear. Who maintains them is unclear, as it just seems like any elemental of earth who sees rocks and stones in the tunnels feels compelled to clean them of the fallen earth.
Shifting Walls
The walls typically rise at about half a foot per day, making for a boring look at an interesting phenomenon. At this rate, it is almost imperceptible to those not tied to the elemental plane, and most who show up here expecting to see the rocks move and slide past them, are severely disappointed.
As the walls shift, some miners are hard at work digging shallow tunnels into the rock, looking for easy-to-access veins of ore or precious stones. While they rarely have success, due to only having a few weeks at most before the rock slides away from the realm, if they hit big only once, they can often leave the plane very wealthy.
Locations
Throughout the realm are key sites, or at least, extraordinary sights that have attracted creatures from across the multiverse to see. While Sujeira, the Grave Stone, is not a popular primordial, and few people even know about her, she still has her followers who try to make the journey down here. Many locations have been claimed multiple times by different elementals, but Sujeira has still retained a strong, stony grasp on the realm.
The Endless Chasm
While the Grave Quarry is in the deepest sections of the plane, at the very roots of the mountain, there are a few parts that go deeper than others. The lakes of oil must be incredibly deep to hold all the oil that has accumulated down here, and there are other chasms, crevices, and fissures that lead deeper. Those who have entered them are rarely heard from again, the deeper they delve, the less likely they are to make it out again.
While none know truly that the Endless Chasm is the deepest, it is believed that it is for this chasm of marble is where Sujeira has made her home. The chasm is made entirely of white marble with streaks of gray and black in massive swirls through it. At the very center of the Chasm is a pillar of pure black marble that juts from the endless bottom below. In this pillar is the home of Sujeira.
It is a strange structure, especially on how earth elementals are supposed to enter it. The pillar has no wall of the chasm closer to it than half a mile, making it quite a leap for anyone to make. The structure itself is dotted with architectural gargoyles, with some even actual elemental gargoyles. The decorations all along the pillar are of twisted and grotesque faces, with fine, powdered marble dust pouring from them the same way that water might pour from waterspouts.
Earth elementals who wish to visit must make a ‘leap of faith’, building up speed before rushing out into the chasm, hoping that their aim is true. If they hit the pillar, they can meld into stone. If they miss, they may fall for a very long time before they can hit stone and meld back into it.
The Graveyard
While none are buried in this graveyard, it is covered in headstones devoted to those who have died. Many who travel here, have lost loved ones to mining accidents, cave-ins, the Plane of Earth itself, along with other deaths related to earth. Miles of headstones stand in neat rows, seemingly dusted every day as no dust or dirt is misplaced within this massive graveyard. When someone wishes to mourn and place a new headstone, all they must do is give a small tithe of precious stone to Sujeira by placing it on the ground and offering a prayer.
While in this realm, all sound is muted, as if the stones themselves are scared to echo in reverence. In addition, that oppressive feeling within the realm is the heaviest here as the weight of all these deaths seem to be placed on the shoulders of anyone in the Graveyard.
Oil Lakes
Within this realm are lakes dripping with a thick, black oil that ignites when exposed to open flame. The lakes are filled from the constant dripping oil that weeps from the roof of the caves and drips down the slick stalagmites made of fouled minerals. Many have tried to dig up into these cave roofs, some to be only engulfed in flame when they weren’t careful enough, but none have figured out the source. As far as anyone can tell, the oil just kind of accumulates from across the plane, slowly oozing and seeping from the peak of the plane down to its roots, seeping through solid stone.
Some sages believe that the oil here is from those who were fossilized for millions of years in the stone, that some sort of transformation due to pressure and heat has caused them to be transformed into this strange liquid. Dwarf mines have been set up around a few of these lakes, but none are really sure what to do with the oil, what value it holds, and how to properly extract it. Regardless, alchemists seem quite excited when they discover this material and begin listing out the possibilities. The fae seems to hate these lakes with almost an instinctual and innate rage.
Creatures
Most of the creatures found in this realm are the same as found throughout the Plane of Earth, though with a bent towards dust, dirt, new rock, and oil.
Elementals
As the largest percent of the population, elementals come in all shapes and sizes. Some are sentient, others are merely just mindless extensions of energy from the plane. They are willing to interact with outsiders, but it has to benefit them in some way. Perhaps they are given gifts of rare metals, sky metals are highly prized since they rarely, if ever, are found on this plane. While the elementals are not cruel for cruel’s sake, they are firm believers that you need to help yourself and not rely on others, making them very standoffish.
Grave Clods
Clumps of errant dust sometimes form into tiny elementals, known as grave clods, and move through the realm, seeking out all life to try and drain it away. They are an inconvenience most of the time, and barely dangerous by itself. The problem arises when they form into a cloud of grave clods. They will attack anything, though mostly leave other elementals alone unless they haven’t fed on life in a week or longer.
While they show some signs of intelligence, they do not talk. That doesn’t stop people from describing them as whispering when they move. While the whispering seems unintelligible, some necromancers swear they can just barely make out the sounds of life within the grave clods. These ‘voices’ are only heard by creatures close to death, so most living creatures struggle to make out any more than whispers.
Sujeira, the Grave Stone
Power: Primordial / Alignment: Lawful Neutral
Domains: Grave, Nature, Order
Worshipers: Druids, Guides, Miners, Rangers
Symbol: Diamond
The primordial of rock and iron-will, she is the name on any miner’s lip when a crack appears in a mine. When supports are placed through a mine shaft, her name or symbol is carved into or next to each one so that it might hold. Druids summon forth the gulag-dur to act as messengers between them and Sujeira, communicating with the rocks that act as her servants. She is known for her stubborn streak and her unrelenting nature as an inspiration on how to live life.
She remains in her pillar within the Endless Chasm most of the time but does journey out when a follower of her is buried within the Graveyard. While there are no bodies within the Graveyard, there is still a funeral procession and a special, large headstone rises in the Graveyard to mark their place. Her exact wants are unclear to most, as she rarely intercedes in the politics outside of her domain, but when she does, it often results in earthquakes, tremors, and the rock opening its maw and swallowing cities whole.
Monster Manual, 2014 Wizards of the Coast
Dao
For a long time, the dao have tried to claim the realm, but even they seem flummoxed by Sujeira. Her grasp on the realm is as strong as a dwarf’s grasp on a lump of gold just pulled from the ground. Why the dao are interested in the realm largely does not extend much beyond mining operations and trying to extract as much material from here as possible, all to decorate their great cities and palaces.
For whatever reason, they are repulsed by the Oil Lakes, perhaps seeing it as not earthen-like enough.
Encounters
Dwarven Goals - After the dwarven clan mined their way from the top of the plane, to its roots, the dwarves aren’t yet done. The Blackrock clan has been digging for untold generations, and while their original ancestor’s goals have been met. They aren’t done yet. They want to dig deeper, the only problem is that their tools can’t cut through the stone in this realm.
Grave Clods - While the Graveyard is a holy place, the restless undead do tend to make their homes here. In fact, an especially large cloud of grave clods has made it dangerous for anyone to enter the Graveyard and is attacking anyone who tries to enter. While no one is buried in the Graveyard, that hasn’t stopped people from dying here.
Dao Enforcers - The party is trespassing, simple as that. The dao are looking for new creatures to join their palaces as slaves, and they aren’t taking a no for an answer. Because the dao ‘claim’ this realm, they have decreed that the party is trespassing and it is now time for them to pay off their debts.
Black Gold - An alchemist has heard about the Oil Lakes in this realm, and they are desperate for a barrel. They are willing to pay a large sum to any who travel here, secure them several barrels or kegs, and bring it back to them.
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