Smaragd

Smaragd’s jungle canopy blocks out all natural light, replacing it with an eternal dim glow, an iridescent green shimmer that filters through thick mist and steam. The realm is oppressively humid and teems with slow-moving rivers of bile-colored water, fungal overgrowth, and grotesque flowers that reek of carrion.   The deeper one ventures into the jungle, the more the terrain warps, trees twist into serpentine shapes, vines pulse like veins, and ancient ziggurats loom half-dissolved in the swamp. The very flora seems to resist passage, and paths rarely stay the same for more than a day.   Below the surface, a web of caverns and stone pits house serpentine horrors and remnants of long-fallen cults. Somewhere within this endless coil of tunnels lies the Chamber of the Pit, Merrshaulk’s lair. No explorer has ever returned from it, those who reach it are either devoured or consumed by the god’s presence, joining his dreams for eternity.  

Notable Locations

The Ziggurat of Hissing Gold

A sunken ruin whose walls are inscribed with hypnotic glyphs. The structure supposedly houses a gate to Merrshaulk’s dreaming mind, where travelers may bargain with the slumbering serpent. but must pay in memory or identity.  

The Pools of Ramenos

Once sacred, now stagnant and bloated. Occasionally, bubbles rise from below, and ancient voices murmur through the mist. It is said that Ramenos stirs when forgotten names are spoken at these waters.  

The Emerald Spiral

A natural formation deep within the jungle that coils downward in a perfect spiral. At its center lies a half-formed eye of living jade that never blinks and watches all.  

Petitioners

Souls drawn to Smaragd are those who wallowed in sloth, decay, or domination in life. They drift through the realm half-awake, muttering forgotten prayers or lounging in stagnant pools, slowly losing shape. Some are swallowed whole by the jungle and reborn as beasts, plants, or things in between—each one reflecting a facet of their spiritual torpor.

In earlier eras, the bullywug deity Ramenos was also said to slumber within this realm, his divine presence drowned in apathy and dissolution. Whether he still lingers beneath the murkmire is unknown, his temples now stand half-sunken and choked with vines, attended by silent, swollen figures who neither pray nor move unless disturbed.