Following the release of the Labyrinth Worldbook by Kobold Press, I’ve been publishing posts sharing more information about my campaign setting, the Lands of Parsantium, one of the core worlds featured in the book. This all-new post describes Cervenna, a large island in the Corsairs’ Sea.
Cervenna
This large island at the eastern end of the Corsairs’ Sea is ruled by the Platinum Knights of Themicia whose cloud fortress headquarters hovers several thousand feet above the island. The Platinum Knights are a fighting order of knights and paladins acting as the “sword and shield” of the Church of Themicia, sworn to protect the god’s clerics and followers from harm, and to mete out justice to evildoers. The island was granted to the Knights by the Bathuran Emperor Iosephus 300 years ago for saving Rezana, the Empire’s capital, from a savage orcish attack.
For several centuries, Cervenna was part of the Golden Horned Kingdom of Keftios, the mighty maritime realm of the minotaurs centred on the island of Phokris that also claimed dominion over Valkyros and the many smaller islands of the eastern Corsairs’ Sea.
Karylessos, the splendid minotaur capital on the island’s southern tip, was razed by an earthquake nearly 1,500 years ago. As the labyrinthine passages under the city collapsed, thousands were buried alive, but some of the inhabitants survived, escaping through a portal to the Grand Labyrinth beneath the royal palace at Phokris. Today, the ruins of Karylessos attract adventurers willing to brave the sprawling network of tunnels beneath the city in search of ancient treasures. However, the minotaurs of Phokris regard Karylessos as a burial site that should be left undisturbed and patrol the labyrinth to deter looters.
Off the southern coast near Karylessos is the sacred island of Barginthos. The isle is riddled with sea caves, the largest of which holds a long-abandoned shrine to Amphetia, goddess of the sea, filled with bovine statues honouring the deity. Amphetia’s minotaur priestesses held their mysteries and made sacrifices to appease the goddess here. These caves are now inhabited by chuuls who prey on visitors to the island; the aberrations have collected a sizeable hoard of valuable offerings to the goddess from the sea bed. The Aqhrani, who conquered Cervenna following the fall of the Golden Horned Kingdom, built a lighthouse on Barginthos to warn ships away from the rocks surrounding the island. The lighthouse is no longer in use, but sailors tell tales of a warm orange glow emitting from the top of the structure on certain nights.
When the Aqhrani took control of Cervenna, they established a new capital on the western coast of the island on the site of an existing settlement. Here, they built a walled harbour with a lighthouse, a fortress, and a mosque dedicated to Amur, the Sky God. They named the city Tajjara and it soon became an important stopover for merchant vessels sailing between the Caliphate and the trading hub of Parsantium.
In the year 678, seven years before he conquered Parsantium, the Bathuran emperor Corandias the Magnificent seized Tajjara and the rest of Cervenna from Aqhran. Following Coriandias’s death, the island remained part of the divided Bathuran Empire, changing hands frequently between the western empire based in Rezana and the eastern empire in Parsantium, until Emperor Iosephus handed it to the Platinum Knights. The order built new fortifications at Tajjara, established an arsenal to support its navy, and constructed a shining cathedral to Themicia, all with financial backing from the Water Lords of Loranto.
Today, Cervenna is governed by a talented dragonkin prefect named Verlodelis, who takes care of civil matters, while Grand Master Baragarr (dragonkin paladin), the leader of the Platinum Knights of Themicia, is responsible for the island’s defence and the activities of the order as a whole. While Verlodelis concentrates on keeping the population (a cosmopolitan blend of Bathuran and Aqhrani humans, minotaurs, and others) happy, Baragarr’s current priorities are to keep the Corsairs’ Sea safe for merchant traffic by dealing with piracy, and to protect the remnants of the Bathuran Empire from humanoid and giant attacks.
Skyshield Citadel
The order’s navy is stationed in the harbour at Tajjara, but Grand Master Baragarr and the Platinum Knights’ Inner Council are based at Skyshield Citadel, a cloud fortress floating several thousand feet above the city. The citadel was constructed on the ground, then raised into the sky by wizards of the Esoteric Order of the Blue Lotus with a powerful ritual that combined cloud giant and djinni magic. Although the fortress remains in the same fixed position over Tajjara, the castle is able to move through the sky, allowing it to fly into battle and drop its elite warriors into the action from above.
Skyshield Citadel is home to the order’s aerial cavalry, nearly one hundred elite knights mounted on griffons, hippogriffs, and – in the case of Baragarr and three of his fellow Inner Council members – silver dragons. These fearless paladins and warriors swoop down to attack pirates at sea and marauding orcs or hobgoblins on land. Platinum Knights can travel between Skyshield Citadel and Truthblade Keep below in Tajjara using a linked pair of teleportation circles; their sigil sequences are a closely guarded secret.
Adventure Hook. Pirate activity is on the rise in the eastern Corsairs’ Sea and PCs allied with the Platinum Knights are sent on a pirate hunting expedition to find out who or what is behind the recent spate of attacks. Some are the work of the Crusading Brothers of the Sword, a fighting order of knights that has fallen on hard times and turned to attacking “enemy ships” from Aqhran and even Loranto en route to Parsantium. Others are Aqhrani pirates sailing out of Ferez and in possession of letters of marque from Sultana Khadijah al-Malik entitling them to attack Lorantine ships. If this becomes widely known, it could lead to war between the Loranto and the Caliphate.
Adventure Hook. Villagers living in the hills at the northern end of Cervenna have been going missing, and the Prefect sends the PCs to investigate. The culprits are capricious fey – dryads, nymphs, satyrs and forest centaurs – that are luring the locals into the woods to take part in their revels. When the villagers wake up, they find themselves lost in the land of Faerie with no sign of their newfound friends and no idea how to return. Can the PCs track them down and bring them safely home?
Lands of Parsantium map by Jared Blando.
If you enjoyed this post, download a free preview of Parsantium: City at the Crossroads to find out more about the setting, or, better still, buy Parsantium from Drivethrurpg.
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Richard Green | Game Designer 