The Realms of Existence

The world of Aithea is but a small part of the sprawling reality that all Realms of Existence are part of. Other realms include the Ethereal Plane and its adjacent realms, the Feywild, and the Shadowfel. There are also countless Demi-planes that float in the Astral Sea as well as the Elemental Wells that form the matter of the Material World that Aithea is created from.

There are spells and abilities that draw power from these realms and even spells that let you traverse these realms. While many parts of these realms are of a pure element or idea and are therefore unsuited for life for a mortal, many of these realms have creatures and denizens that live there.

The Material World

The Material World is where the world of Aithea is. It is a confluence of elemental powers and sprawling ideas that float from the Ethereal plane and Astral sea. The rest of the realms and realms are defined by their relation to the Material World.

Material Echoes

While the Material World is unique and magical it shares space in the realms with the Ethereal Plane and the two counterparts the Feywild and the Shadowfell. The Ethereal Plane is a world of the mind, of visions and dreams. The Ethereal Plane is an echo of the Material World but stands as a vision of what the Material World should look like before the Sundering and other events changed the face of it.

The Feywild, sometimes called the Fae Realm or Realm of the Fairies, is a land of light and wonder. While the Ethereal Plane is a world of the mind and visions, the Feywild is a world of dreams. The wild imaginations of the world, especially the wonder and innocence of children. That is not to say that it is a world free from conflict as the denizens of that world may have been created from dreams, they have had time to grow and adjust to their world and are ruled over by the Seelie Court. The Tuatha, with their long life, and tendency to dwell in a state of sleep has led to the Feywild being heavily influenced by their dreams.

In opposition to the realm of dreams is the realm of nightmares or the Shadowfell. This world is a twisted vision of the darkness of the world and is a place of fear and melancholy. While not evil, there is no true happiness here. It is ruled over by the Unseelie Court who act as both rulers of this realm, and protectors of the other realms from the nightmare creatures that dwell here.

Beyond the Material

Beyond the Material World, the various realms of existence are realms of myth and mystery. They’re not simply other worlds, but different qualities of being, formed and governed by spiritual and elemental principles abstracted from the ordinary world.

Planar Travel

When adventurers travel into other realms of existence, they are undertaking a legendary journey across the thresholds of existence to a mythic destination where they strive to complete their quest.

Such a journey is the stuff of legend. Braving the realms of the dead, seeking out the celestial servants of a deity, or bargaining with an efreeti in its home city will be the subject of song and story for years to come.

Travel to the realms beyond the Material World can be accomplished in two ways: by casting a spell or by using a planar portal.

Spells

A number of spells allow direct or indirect access to other realms of existence. Plane Shift and Gate can transport adventurers directly to any other realm of existence, with different degrees of precision. Etherealness allows adventurers to enter the Ethereal Plane and travel from there to any of the realms it touches—the Shadowfell, the Feywild, or the Elemental Wells. The astral projection spell lets adventurers project themselves into the Astral Sea and travel to the Outer Realms.

Portals

A portal is a general term for a stationary interplanar connection that links a specific location on one realm to a specific location on another. Some portals are like doorways, a clear window, or a fog-shrouded passage, and simply stepping through them affects interplanar travel. Others are locations—circles of standing stones, soaring towers, sailing ships, or even whole towns—that exist in multiple realms at once or flicker from one realm to another in turn. Some are vortices, typically joining an Elemental Well with a very similar location on the Material World, such as the heart of a volcano (leading to the Well of Fire) or the depths of the ocean (to the Well of Water).

Transitive Realms

The Ethereal Plane and the Astral Sea are called the Transitive Realms. They are realms that serve primarily as ways to travel from one realm to another. Spells such as etherealness and astral projection allow characters to enter these realms and traverse them to reach the realms beyond.

The Ethereal Plane is the world as it should be, or rather the blueprint that the Material World was created from. It overlaps the Material World and the Inner Realms so that every location on those realms has a corresponding location on the Ethereal Plane. Certain creatures can see into the Ethereal Plane, and the see invisibility and true seeing spell grant that ability. Some magical effects also extend from the Material World into the Ethereal Plane, particularly effects that use energy such as forcecage and wall of force.

The Astral Sea is a sprawling ocean-like realm that connects the Material World to the rest of the cosmos. It is a great, silvery sea, the same above and below, with swirling wisps of white and gray streaking among motes of light resembling distant stars. Erratic whirlpools of color flicker in midair like spinning coins. Occasional bits of solid matter can be found here, but most of the Astral Sea is an endless, open domain.

Inner Realms

The Inner Realms surround and enfold the Material World and its echoes, providing the raw elemental substance from which all the worlds were made. The four Elemental Wells—Air, Earth, Fire, and Water—form a strange world where they converge, forming a world where all four elements meet, and extend into infinity at the same time. This strange world is known as the Elemental Conflux.

Elemental Conflux

At their innermost edges, where they are closest to the Material World (in a conceptual if not a literal geographical sense), the four Elemental Wells resemble a world in the Material World. The four elements mingle together as they do in the Material World , forming land, sea, and sky. Farther from the Material World , though, the Elemental Wells are both alien and hostile. Here, the elements exist in their purest form—great expanses of solid earth, blazing fire, crystal-clear water, and unsullied air.

The Elemental Conflux somehow acts as the center point for all the Elemental Wells and has created opposites to the four primary elements. These opposites are not opposites in form but rather function. Where the Earth represents stability and solidity, its opposite is the Void where there is no form or substance. Air represents movement its opposite is Gravity which slows and weighs down everything. Fire represents the warmth that sustains, its opposite is the Cold that destroys. Where Water represents life and growth, its opposite is Rot and Decay.

At the borders where the four Elemental Wells meet are what are known as the Confluences, a place where the elements merge together. As Fire and Earth merge to become Lava, lava is then modified by gravity to become Magma and then by rot and decay to be Ash. The mix of Earth and Air is Sand that becomes Snow when touched by cold and Dust where rot and decay change it. Where Water and Air meet, Frost forms, that becomes Mist where there is void, and Ice where the cold affects it. Fire and Water combine to form Steam and add in gravity it becomes Geysers under Pressure, and with void mixed it it becomes Haze where the minds see Illusions. Where the Earth is mixed in with Water there is Mud. As gravity affects it becomes Sludge and with the cold, it is life-sapping Ooze. Fire and Air together form Lightning that then becomes Aurora with the void and Plasma as rot and decay set in.

At the farthest extents of the Inner Realms, the pure elements dissolve and bleed together into an unending tumult of clashing energies and colliding substance, the Elemental Chaos.

Demiplanes

Demiplanes are small extradimensional spaces with their own unique rules. They are pieces of reality that don’t seem to fit anywhere else. Demiplanes come into being by a variety of means. Some are created by spells, such as demiplane, or generated at the desire of a powerful deity or other force. They may exist naturally, as a fold of existing reality that has been pinched off from the rest of the multiverse, or as a baby universe growing in power. A given demiplane can be entered through a single point where it touches another realm.

Theoretically, a plane shift spell can also carry travelers to a demiplane, but the proper frequency required for the tuning fork is extremely hard to acquire. The gate spell is more reliable, assuming the caster knows of the demiplane.

Outer Realms

If the Inner Realms are the raw matter and energy that makes up the multiverse, the Outer Realms are the direction, thought and purpose for such construction.

Accordingly, many sages refer to the Outer Realms as divine planes, spiritual planes, or godly planes, for the Outer Realms are best known as the homes of deities.

When discussing anything to do with deities, the language used must be highly metaphorical. Their actual homes are not literally “places” at all, but exemplify the idea that the Outer Realms are realms of thought and spirit. As with the Elemental Wells, one can imagine the perceptible part of the Outer Realms as a sort of border region, while extensive spiritual regions lie beyond ordinary sensory experience.

Even in those perceptible regions, appearances can be deceptive. Initially, many of the Outer Realms appear hospitable and familiar to natives of the Material World. But the landscape can change at the whims of the powerful forces that live on the Outer Realms . The desires of the mighty forces that dwell on these realms can remake them completely, effectively erasing and rebuilding existence itself to better fulfill their own needs.

Distance is a virtually meaningless concept on the Divine Planes. The perceptible regions of the realms often seem quite small, but they can also stretch on to what seems like infinity. Essentially the Outer Realms are specially created divine demiplanes.

Other Realms

Existing somehow between or beyond the known realms of existence are a variety of other realms. These drift in the Astral Sea and may or may not touch the Material World.

The Divine Conduits

Somehow outside the borders of the Inner Realms, yet touching the Material World directly resides the Divine Conduits, two opposite realms of power and energy, one Positive and one Negative. Many sages see these two realms as the power source that powers the realms, at least many of the outer realms. The positive realm is a mass of divinely sourced energy while the negative realm is an absence of life energy. The realm of the dead is partially if not wholly within this negative realm.

Outlands

The Outlands is the realm between the Outer Realms. It is a realm of neutrality, but not the neutrality of nothingness. Instead, it incorporates a little of everything, keeping it all in a paradoxical balance—simultaneously concordant and in opposition. It is a broad region of varied terrain, with open prairies, towering mountains, and twisting, shallow rivers, strongly resembling an ordinary world of the Material World.

Around the outside edge of the Outlands, evenly spaced, are the gate towns: settlements, each built around a portal leading to one of the Outer Realms. Each town shares many of the characteristics of the realm where its gate leads.

The Far Realm

The Far Realm is beyond the known multiverse. In fact, it might be an entirely separate multiverse with its own physical and magical laws. Where stray energies from the Far Realm leak onto another realm, life and matter are warped and twisted into alien shapes that defy ordinary geometry and biology.

The entities that abide in the Far Realm are too alien for a normal mind to accept without damage. Titanic creatures swim through nothingness, preoccupied with madness. Unspeakable things whisper awful truths to those who dare listen. For mortals, knowledge of the Far Realm is a triumph of mind over the rude boundaries of matter, space, and eventually sanity.

There are no known portals to the Far Realm.