Antediluvia: The Necropolis of Voor (Overview)

    No one truly knows the extent of the Necropolis of Voor.  It has never been fully delved.  It began as a mountaintop cemetery for the ancient and now extinct Voori people.  As their civilization grew they eventually colonized the sides of the mountain and surrounding hillsides with their dead.  When that space ran out, they began to hollow out the mountain itself, creating the Necropolis of Voor, and even moving their living royalty to the very top level of the complex.  They dug deep and discovered forgotten things in the depths below, in the places light never touched.

    The Voori found beings in the dark that taught them new sorceries and technology.  They were corrupted by their newfound power, turning to the worship of forgotten gods in the blackness beneath the mountain.  The beings they uncovered soon became their new masters, and the Voori, over time, degenerated to a primitive state over the course of ages.  While at first existing as slaves for these new masters, they gradually also became their food source, save for an exceptional handful of individuals given the curse of everlasting life in the form of undeath.

    All accounts of recent exploration into the Necropolis have fallen far short of success.  It is a dangerous, deadly place, and the undead rule its depths.  No one has survived to investigate the deepest reaches or to bring back any proof of the continued existence of the unnamed beings that became the rulers of the Voori.  However, the upper levels, near the top of the mountain, are thoroughly carved with hieroglyphics depicting these awful creatures.  They appear to be humanoid, but with various strange features.  

    Some scholars believe that the creatures depicted in these hieroglyphics are not the masters of which the legend speaks.  Instead, they believe them to be demonic servitors summoned by the magics the Voori learned.  No one can truly know.  The place is inimical to natural life and studying the almost endless walls of glyphs was the very last worry of all the adventurers who have attempted to plumb the mountain's depths.

    One group that has had some limited success in Voor are the Necromancers of Naat.  They're searching specifically for the ancient knowledge of the Voori people, and of any single group of explorers, they have discovered the most about the secrets of the Necropolis and its former denizens, owing not least to their considerably powerful sorcery and almost endless supply of their own walking dead retinues as protection.  However, they've had no success in gaining control of any areas of the mountain complex.  As soon as they find a foothold, the Necropolis seems to come alive with activity, and these "colonist" groups are usually never heard from again.