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| [[Image:Sea of Dust00.jpg|500px|thumb|right|The northeastern portion of the Sea of Dust and environs, as depicted on the [[Paizo map]] (2005).]]
| | A territory of unknown extent exists west of the Hellfurnaces, south of the Sulhaut Mountains. This bleak desert is the Sea of Dust, the former Empire of the Suel. This was once a fair and fertile realm extending a thousand miles west and south, but its rulers were merciless and haughty, and the Rain of Colorless Fire that the Baklunish mages brought down upon it was a fitting fate for them, if not for their peoples. The terrible, nearly invisible fiery rain killed every living thing it struck, ignited the landscape, and burned the hills to ash. |
| '''The Sea of Dust''' is a vast desert of ash and dust bound by a number of mountain ranges, including the [[Sulhaut Mountains|Sulhauts]] to the north, the [[Hellfurnaces]] to the east, and a spur of the [[Tyurzi Mountains]] to the south.
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| ==Description==
| | To this day, the place is a desert, choked with dust and dry ash in gentle rises and shallow valleys that resemble waves in the ocean. It is far less picturesque when the winds howl and tear the surface into choking clouds that strip flesh from bone, making vision impossible and life hazardous in the extreme. Added to this are rains of volcanic ash and cinders blown down from the Hellfurnaces. |
| The Sea of Dust is dominated by powdery gray ash immediately west of the Hellfurnaces. More ash is added every year. It becomes less ash-clogged toward the Sulhauts, where ruined fortifications and walled cities of the [[Suloise]] can still be seen. These ruined buildings have the characteristic high-angled look still favored by Suel-descended peoples in places such as the [[Lendore Isles]] and the [[Sea Princes]].
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| The central region of the Sea of Dust is the most alien. Rather than gray ash, the substance of the Sea is a white, caustic powder that blows around and causes those who do not protect their mouths and noses with damp cloths to cough blood. Mixed with water, it forms a strong lye. The light reflecting off the white dunes will blind those who do not protect their eyes with slitted visors or masks. Glassy depressions in the central Sea are said to correspond to former cities of the Suel.
| | Mountain tribesmen from the Sulhauts sometimes scavenge the ruins of old Sue1 cities along the northern rim of the Sea of Dust, but their pickings are meager after a millennium of pillage. If buried riches exist, they must lie within the central body of the Sea of Dust, a place so inhospitable that survival there is an achievement in itself. The handful of accounts that exist from searchers for the legendary Forgotten City of the Suloise remark on lakes of dust that are magically affected so that they have almost fluid qualities. These dunes of caustic, white ash are so adverse to breathing that after an hour of inhaling without a wet cloth over the mouth, one coughs blood and suffers other strange symptoms. These travelers do not tell of great wealth, although they stress the perils of having to “dive” through layers of dust to explore any ruins below. |
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| In the southwest of the Sea of Dust there is a small amount of rainfall, and here various groups of nomads are able to survive. The dust of this region is dry soil rather than an alien alkaline material or ash, and it is extraordinarily productive for a time after the occasional rain.
| | There may be some underground springs below the Sea of Dust, as well as places where water tables have risen and seepage into the choked surface has occurred, for there are reports of life below the surface of this terrain: huge tunnelling worms; 20-foot insects that look like crosses between a mantis and a centipede; weird shambling fungi with surfaces hard as stone to prevent loss of water by evaporation; and chitin-beaked giant lizards with vast webbed feet that allow them nearly to skim the surface of the dust. Rumors that harpies flock in old ruins and that degenerate remnants of Sue1 stock survive in some areas are, however, distinctly more implausible and are discounted by reliable and wise scholars. |
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| ==Ecology==
| | Ancient Suloise documents in Greyhawk mention a magical portal named The Null somewhere in the Sea of Dust-a place that is a universal gate to all known planes. It is said to be guarded by golems, summoned extraplanar creatures, stone sphinxes that test the wisdom of those who would dare travel using its magic, and more |
| The majority of the Sea of Dust is without water on the surface and has no plant life on the surface. In areas where the dust or ash lies thinner above the more stable earth the occasional [[vampire cactus]] is able to survive; their seeds were brought to the area by migrating birds. Deep beneath the dunes, some waters still flow, and burrowing creatures have been able to access it. Thus, certain creatures live in tunnels beneath the dust, including boring beetles, [[bulette]]s, giant centipedes, [[meenlock]]s, [[derro]], [[horgar]], [[jermlaine]]s, [[osquip]]s, [[purple worm]]s, giant rats, [[myconid]]s, [[snyad]]s, and [[ankheg]]s.
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| In the foothills of the Hellfurnaces, [[firenewt]]s and [[fire lizard]]s hunt. In the same region a short, stocky [[human]] people cover their bodies with a foul-smelling wax in order to protect themselves from caustic dust and burning sun. This matches the description of the Hek people from the adventure ''[[All That Glitters]].''
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| Giant snakes and arachnids of various kinds can also be found in the desert
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| ==Inhabitants==
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| The majority of the derro race still dwells beneath the Sea of Dust, having survived the [[Rain of Colorless Fire]] thanks to the protection of hundreds of feet of earth. A major community of them lives in the [[Forgotten City]]. | |
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| Some of the nomads are of Suel descent, but most are a tall, slender, curly-haired people with blue-black skin and slanted eyes with origins to the south. They are rich in gold and gems looted from the ruined cities of the Suel.
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| Stories are told of packs of [[thri-kreen]] roaming the wastes of the Sea of Dust.
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| ==Features and settlements==
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| The nomads move frequently between wells, as they are prone to dry up or grow salty when overused.
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| The dustlakes, or ''Ktosor-hep'' as the local nomads call them, are pools of dust anywhere between half a mile and six miles across that have been made magical by contact with the buried towns and cities of the Suel. While the wavelike dunes of the Sea of Dust do resemble the form of a watery sea, the dustlakes are completely liquid, able to support boats, swimmers, and divers just as water does. Unlike water, they are somewhat breathable for those wearing fine cloth masks, as the fluid somehow permits the passage of air between the grains of dust. The nomads require boys to dive to the bottom and bring back a trinket from the ruins in order to be accepted by their tribes as full men.
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| The Forgotten City, once the capital of the [[Suel Imperium]], lies buried somewhere in the center of the desert.
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| ==History==
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| This great basin was formerly home to the ancient Suel Imperium, a nation of fertile lands extending some one thousand miles west and south, before it was destroyed by the Rain of Colorless Fire in -422 [[Common Year|CY]]. The Rain of Colorless Fire was sent by the [[Baklunish Empire]] to the north, in retaliation for the [[Invoked Devastation]] which destroyed all but the remnants of that empire.
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| ==Publishing history==
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| The Sea of Dust was first described in print in ''Quag Keep'' by Andre Norton, who wrote the book with [[Gary Gygax]] giving her information on the ''[[Greyhawk]]'' setting in which it was set. It was described more formally and familiarly in the ''[[The World of Greyhawk]]'' folio (1980) with the description repeated in the ''[[World of Greyhawk Fantasy Game Setting]]'' a few years later. The Sea of Dust was described in much greater detail in ''[[Sea of Death]]'', a non-TSR novel written by [[Gary Gygax]] in 1987, and in ''[[Greyhawk Adventures]]'', published by TSR in 1988. There has been a little more information published since then in the ''[[Living Greyhawk Gazetteer]]'' and elsewhere. The detail about thri-kreen packs was mentioned in ''Thri-Kreen of Athas'', which had a short section on the thri-kreen of [[Oerth]].
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| ==Bibliography==
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| *Bambra, Jim. ''[[All That Glitters]]''. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1984.
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| *Beach, Tim, and Dori Hein. ''Thri-Kreen of Athas''. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1995.
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| *[[Gygax, Gary]]. ''Sea of Death''. New Infinities, 1987. pp. 129-134 especially
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| *-----. ''The World of Greyhawk''. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1980.
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| *-----. ''[[World of Greyhawk Fantasy Game Setting]]''. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1983.
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| *[[Holian, Gary]], [[Erik Mona]], [[Sean K. Reynolds]], and [[Frederick Weining]]. ''[[Living Greyhawk Gazetteer]]''. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2000.
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| *[[Moore, Roger E]]. ''[[Greyhawk: The Adventure Begins]]''. Renton, WA: TSR, 1998.
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| *-----. "Legacies of the [[Suel Imperium]]." ''[[Dragon (magazine)|Dragon]]'' #241. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 1997.
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| *-----. "Greyhawk Mysterious Places." Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1999. Originally appeared in TSR's America Online folder as a 2nd edition update to ''Greyhawk Adventures'', later moved to its website. No longer live on the WotC website but available from the Wayback Machine: [http://web.archive.org/web/20040222190643/http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Greyhawk/DnDGreyhawkMysteriousPlaces.asp]
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| *[[Andre Norton|Norton, Andre]]. ''[[Quag Keep]]''. New York: DAW Books, 1979. pp. 117-155
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| *[[Sean K. Reynolds|Reynolds, Sean K]]. ''[[The Scarlet Brotherhood]]''. Renton, WA: TSR, 1999.
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| *[[Sargent, Carl]]. ''[[From the Ashes]]''. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1993.
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| *[[Ward, James]]. ''[[Greyhawk Adventures]]''. Lake Geneva, WI: TSR, 1988.
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| [[Category:Greyhawk wastelands]]
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A territory of unknown extent exists west of the Hellfurnaces, south of the Sulhaut Mountains. This bleak desert is the Sea of Dust, the former Empire of the Suel. This was once a fair and fertile realm extending a thousand miles west and south, but its rulers were merciless and haughty, and the Rain of Colorless Fire that the Baklunish mages brought down upon it was a fitting fate for them, if not for their peoples. The terrible, nearly invisible fiery rain killed every living thing it struck, ignited the landscape, and burned the hills to ash.
To this day, the place is a desert, choked with dust and dry ash in gentle rises and shallow valleys that resemble waves in the ocean. It is far less picturesque when the winds howl and tear the surface into choking clouds that strip flesh from bone, making vision impossible and life hazardous in the extreme. Added to this are rains of volcanic ash and cinders blown down from the Hellfurnaces.
Mountain tribesmen from the Sulhauts sometimes scavenge the ruins of old Sue1 cities along the northern rim of the Sea of Dust, but their pickings are meager after a millennium of pillage. If buried riches exist, they must lie within the central body of the Sea of Dust, a place so inhospitable that survival there is an achievement in itself. The handful of accounts that exist from searchers for the legendary Forgotten City of the Suloise remark on lakes of dust that are magically affected so that they have almost fluid qualities. These dunes of caustic, white ash are so adverse to breathing that after an hour of inhaling without a wet cloth over the mouth, one coughs blood and suffers other strange symptoms. These travelers do not tell of great wealth, although they stress the perils of having to “dive” through layers of dust to explore any ruins below.
There may be some underground springs below the Sea of Dust, as well as places where water tables have risen and seepage into the choked surface has occurred, for there are reports of life below the surface of this terrain: huge tunnelling worms; 20-foot insects that look like crosses between a mantis and a centipede; weird shambling fungi with surfaces hard as stone to prevent loss of water by evaporation; and chitin-beaked giant lizards with vast webbed feet that allow them nearly to skim the surface of the dust. Rumors that harpies flock in old ruins and that degenerate remnants of Sue1 stock survive in some areas are, however, distinctly more implausible and are discounted by reliable and wise scholars.
Ancient Suloise documents in Greyhawk mention a magical portal named The Null somewhere in the Sea of Dust-a place that is a universal gate to all known planes. It is said to be guarded by golems, summoned extraplanar creatures, stone sphinxes that test the wisdom of those who would dare travel using its magic, and more