Ardenroots

Geography

The Ardenroots boast truly majestic peaks, despite their dark shrouds blocking their true awe from the general population. The three highest peaks are estimated by the Digir to be twenty-six thousand, twenty-three thousand and eighteen thousand feet in height. The granite titans grow exponentially shorter from the center as the stretch their broad shoulders to the east and west. So complete is their control of the center of the Inis that only one known region boasts a route around them and it is through Súilíneach Péine that its believed the Ardruids and their kin entered the southern Inis.

There are many varying locations in the Ardenroots, despite what their uniform cliffs might suggest. Fertile valleys with crystal lakes filled from glacial fields seed themselves between the grey stones. Green grasses, trees and fruits grow bountifully and are carefully controlled and cultivated by the Digir people. Further up the cliffs glacial shelves cast an imposing visage as the seem to slowly rip their way past the mountains like implacable monsters. Vast cave systems and tunnels, both Digir made and natural, worm their way to the roots of the world below.

History

The Ardenroots have always been. Sometimes referred to as the grandfathers of the land, nothing worth note has gone outside their notice. Wars from centuries long gone to the political feuds of days current, all have transpired under the callous gaze of the Crown of the World. In the Age of Spring the Ardruids came and built their great civilization in the land north of the mountains. There the Ardenroots witnessed their ascension through the Age of Summer where great feats, miracles and wonders were created by the new masters of this land. They watched the fall of the Ardruids at the end of the Age of Summer, and whatever forgotten horrors caused it.

They are the seat that Unknown and the other masters of arcane and material arts chose to forge the Watchtower. Upon their brow were the first of the Digir realized. On their shoulders were the Digir empires built and sustained. They saw up close The Wounding of the Good Son, the treachery at the Waning Gate and Hall of Stars. They looked on in careless vigilance as the children of the Ardruids fled south at the beginning of the Age of Autumn.

Beneath their feet did come the Huldufolk and Boggarts, fleeing the wrath of their Unseelie masters. Deep down in their roots do gnaw things dark, monstrous and forgotten. Within those dark catacombs are said to be doors to places evil, worlds cold and bitten by the dark fey of the frigid Otherworld regions. They are at once the entire history of the Inis from the first of the fey to cross from hither to tither and the loss of knowledge when the world fell apart.

They were here when the Fwoarians exalted their first chieftain, when the world was new and cold and brutal. When the age of mortals finally ends, when the land is blanketed in ice and shadow, they will still look down unflinching at the world.

Ecosystem

The ecology of the Ardenroots varies greatly from location to location. The verdant valleys are home to blooming plants and well cultivated farms. The natural wildlife here consists of song birds, lynxes and massive goats known as Montejacks. In their peaks roam the vicious saber-fangs hunting stranger, more alien beasts and their montejack prey. Glintwings sweep through the skies feasting on the remains of the saber-fangs' kills or prying precious metals out of open veins in the mountains peaks.

Down at the feet of the mighty mountains the climate is more temperate in the low slopes and the hinterlands. Elk and deer roam here with voracious packs of wolves and small prides of Saber-Fangs chasing them. The apex beast, however, is the bevulf. Among the shrubs and pines it roams, almost as tall as the trees themselves.

Their is a very slight summer in the valleys and hinterlands, but it swiftly gives way to winter which locks the land in dark and frosty ice. They are a harsh season, where famine and freezing temperatures drive the natural creatures to throw themselves at any and every scrap of food they can.

The Ardenroots are filled with precious resources and materials that the Digir constantly combat with those of the lower Inis for. Iron, silver, copper, tin, gem stones and crystals all can be found in the crevasses and caverns hoarded by mortals and monsters alike.

Spring arrives and glacial waters flood the streams and rivers that come pouring down the mountain slopes. Animals and plants flourish, grow and provide the new cycle for the short summer before winter once again eclipses the Ardenroots.

Flora & Fauna

In the highest reaches of the mountains great apes and saber-fangs make war on each other in the ways of nature. There is not vibrancy, just cold stones and ice shelves. Ice teeters precariously ready to barrel down the slopes and crush whoever may be below.

In the valleys crystalline lakes filled with strange mountain fish are wreathed in blossoming green forests. Flowers are vivid and wild. Birds of every color known to the mortal races streak from tree to tree. The mighty montejack fends off the saber-fang while the steely glintwing soars overhead to pry precious metals from the stones to add to their diet. 

In the hinterlands and lower slopes the bevulf towers over the houses of man. Whole caern-hearths empty at their approach; so mighty is this bruin. Packs of wolves harrow deer and elk. Strange rocky fey of the earth like spriggans pick through the shallow caves for mushrooms and lichen.

Localized Phenomena

Memories of the Sun - Digir do not traverse past the clouds, their dark and foreboding mantle hovers around many of the peaks here. Instead they elect to construct great tunnels to the summits where they construct elaborate observatories and temples. This is because of a phenomena that ravages the mind of any who pass through the clouds; eliciting memories of carnage and devastation that ended a golden age. These glimpses into past events that were wiped from the minds of the Inis cause men and women to weep, rage and ultimately go mad from the loss of whatever haunts the roiling firmament.