Galatea
(From the Galatea Report - provided by William)
Our knowledge of this plane is limited to a small eight mile strip between two dimensional gates connecting to Alusia. One gate is some 60 leagues east of Seagate in a small forest. The other is 6 leagues north of Calvendar in Karne, 700 leagues north of Carzala. The Valmar merchant family provide guides between the gates for adventuring teams since Galatea is too dangerous for merchant trains.
The known section of Galatea is thick jungle/swampland with bogs, quicksand and a thousand biting insects per square foot. It is also extremely hot and humid like all jungles.
While all this is surmountable by a determined adventurer, there remains the indigineous life-forms. Armour plated, razor claws and poison teeth describe everything on Galatea that walks, swims, crawls, flies, or even just sits and grows. Even the herbivours are armoured as for a tourney. And we're not kidding about the plants. One swallowed an adventurer whole leaving only the head of his glaive to mark his place. Fortunately the plant did not like the taste of elf and spat him out.
Life is an all out war on Galatea. Expect everything to be inconcievably fast, tough, poisonous, and bad-tempered. Fortunately we have no reports of creatures using mana as an attack form.
In comparism to most of its inhabitants, the dominent intelligent life is most genteel and civilisted despite resembling demons with tall, thin, frames, with talons, wings and mouths with razor sharp teeth. Calling themselves the Zalani or 'Civilised Ones', they are a fusion of bird and reptile. They share the planet with the Hydrax 'Tutored Ones' and the Huldice 'Young Ones'. The Hydrax are more reptilian while the Huldice are too bizarre to classify. Of the intelligent races, the Zalani claim to be the oldest but not the Oldest. It appears that there are legends of Eldar (Elves) and something the Ambassidor would not speak of.
The Salamari Empire is both huge and ancient being in it's 5th Dynasty while our races were learning to bang rocks together. Its neighbours are the Koldarian and Bringyorn Kingdoms of the Hydrax and their lesser kingdoms on the eastern continent. War appears to be run along the lines of conventions designed to preserve the civilisations these races fought against the world to achieve. Nla Scielela was horrified to learn that plaque had broken out as a result of a war. He told us we should eliminate such beings of Chaos. Even knowing that a Zalani is physically inferior does not help when one is enraged.
How do the Zalani, Hydrax, and Huldice survive on such a hostile world? Unfortunately the ambassador was very silent on this but we ascertain that the Salamari were around before the current state of affairs.
Galatea is also noted as being the original home plane of the Calamar
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