Porhomok

Baix Pallars, more commonly called the Corsair Coast, is a relatively thin strip of heavily forested semi-tropical shading to tropical land south of Timischburg, home of the Pallaran ethnicity and various city-states dotting the coast, like Razina, St. Haspar, Alcassar, Segria, and most infamously Port Liure. These city-states cling to the coast, though, and the forests, swamps and even jungles to the interior are poorly known, and considered quite dangerous. On extremely clear days from high up on a tower or tree, the Pallarans can see many scores of miles to the east, however, that the forest doesn't last forever; distant mountains that look tiny march in a north-south line, visible from all of the of the city-states, regardless of latitude. While these mountains look tiny, and on most days can't be spied at all, in reality they are massive, and permanent snowfields and glaciers top many of their highest peaks and cirques. Beyond them is a vast rain shadow, and the rusty red deserts of Porhomok, the so-called Land of the Dead. Few except scholars of ancient history and/or the occult know much about this land, although it occasionally features in exotic fairy tales, but the reality is that long ago, before the rise of any of the modern kingdoms, before even the Kin Twilight and the kingdoms that combined to form Kinzassal, the kingdom of Taremu-Atum blossomed in this land. Massive cities of impressive architectural design were filled with splendid estates.

In ancient times, the engineers and mages of Taremu-Atum created vast dams and dikes in the mountains to the west, channeling snowmelt from them and diverting them to the east, where they formed vast reservoirs on the eastern slopes of the mountains, and continued down in massive stone-lined canals to the thirsty cities of Taremu-Atum; a lifeline in this otherwise parched desert, which is characterized by reddish sand so fine that vast clouds of it remain suspended high in the atmosphere, giving the sky itself a rusty color. This sand rarely crosses the mountains because of their extreme height and the prevailing winds that keep them to the east, but seasonally, fine, powdery rust-red dust will rain down on far-away Gunaakt even further to the east.

It is unclear exactly what disaster befell Taremu-Atum causing the collapse of its civilization and it being renamed Porhomok, the Dead Desert, or occasionally the Land of the Dead, but a good bet is that the Heresiarch Shimut the Fleasheater was involved, his name even being in the language of ancient Taremu-Atum, and his proclivity being one of foul necromancy. Vague rumors of his warring against and eventually cursing his entire people persist, and the reality is that today almost all of the land of Porhomok is, indeed, the Dead Desert, devoid of much life. But that doesn't mean that it is quiet. Stirring in ancient tombs, abandoned and half-buried cities still linger the dead of ancient Taremu-Atum, and they do not tolerate trespassers. What is less well known, but forbidden and fragmentary ancient books like the Chalyth Codex, the Nargoth Fragments, and the Annals of the Ashen Cycle suggest that the gigantic, mountain-sized Black Pyramid of Shimut still lurks deep in the desert. If so, none from the Three Realms+ have a reliable report of it.

Shimut as a young prince

A handful of the descendants of the ancient Taremese people still live as nomads in the desert, or in villages on the eastern slopes of the mountains, or even as savage barbarians feuding with the orclings far to the east on the borders of Gunaakt, but their culture is fallen and savage now, and they live only in small, primitive groups. A few remember the tales of their ancient ancestors, and claim that they wuz kangz, although in this case, they're entirely right. And, of course, that's just a joke; these people are nothing like American blacks trying to appropriate the culture of Egypt for themselves; they had copper-colored skin, long-faces like peoples far to the north, auburn hair and green or hazel eyes. Whatever happened to them, their genetics have wandered a bit from their ancient state and blended with a darker haired and darker eyed people, probably the ancestors of the Pallarans. But that blending must have gone both ways, as occasionally a 100% Pallaran is born with features not terribly unlike that of the the savages of Porhomok. Some, at least, must have wandered west of the mountains, but in doing so, they obviously lost all memory of who they had been, and now consider themselves nothing more than Pallarans. Even more occasionally; vanishingly rarely, in fact, an actual Porhomian exile will find his way to the Pallaran cities of the Corsair Coast and make a new life for himself, but to date, those few who have done so have declined to tell anyone much about their homeland to the east.

Of course in just the last generation or so, the genetics of Baix Pallars have been further enriched by increased trade, travel and intercourse with those from the north; Timischers, Tarushans, and even Humbrians and others. But still the evil report of whatever lies beyond the forests, swamps and distant mountains remains. But the bold occasionally attempt to map out the Dead Desert. Few return, and none with anything that significantly further expands the knowledge of what lies beyond. The savage tribes of Porhomok strongly and violently discourage anyone from exploring, plundering or even seeing the Dead Desert, and from those who manage to get past them come only vague reports of more undead than have been seen anywhere else in the Three Realms+, a truly horrifying realm given over almost completely to the dead.