This Hollow World: Lokir Overview

Lokir is a realm that has a dark void in its center.  Surrounding the void are three layers of a world.  The first layer is made up of five great, floating continents of stone with great chasms to the void instead of oceans.  The second layer floats ten miles above the first and blots out light from the seven stars surrounding Lokir.  The first layer is mostly shrouded in darkness with packets of starlight where the layers above do not block out the stars.  The second layer is much like the first, seven floating continents that have no oceans between them.  There is no day and night cycle on the second layer.  Just moments where the layer above does not block out the stars and moments when it does.  The third and final layer is made up of four great islands which float fifteen miles above the second layer.

The First Layer is commonly called the Dark Sphere.  The Dark Sphere is a cruel and harsh place to live.  Most of the inhabitants live in a tribal society with little along the way of technology or advanced civilization.  The exceptions are the fortress cities erected in the starlight packets.  The continents of the Dark Sphere are connected by enormous stone bridges that were built by those who dwell in the fortress cities.  The five continents are named Markath, Joor’sooth, Karnack, Kor’nish, and Vankir.  The fortress cities are home to the Grey Towers, enormous buildings that stand ten miles tall and exist as paths to the second layer.  The terrain of the Dark Sphere ranges from blasted wasteland, rocky mountains, frigid tundras, dangerous jungles of bio-luminescent fungi, and even a continent almost completely covered in water.

The Second Layer is often called the Gray Sphere.  While the Gray Sphere is not without its dangers, it is many times more hospitable than the Dark Sphere.  The Gray Sphere actually contains plant life over the majority of its surface.  The people who live there are advanced in technology and there are several kingdoms with smaller towns scattering the areas between them.  There are several well-guarded and well-maintained towers that lead to the sphere below to allow for easy travel between the spheres.  There are a few constructs known as the Gates of Light that lead to the layer above, but they are well guarded and only a select few are allowed to access them.  The seven continents are named Vale, Holdenmere, Bladeholme, Kra-hold, Greisburg, Vor, and Kreig.  Each continent is diverse and contains lakes, rivers, forests, deserts, mountains, swamps, and plains.
The Third Layer is called the Golden Sphere.  Each of the twelve islands are giant cities.  Each island has been completely replaced by a cityscape of gold, silver, marble, and glass.  Each city is ruled by its own governing body and each is particular in who they allow into their cities.  All of the cities are utopias in their own rights, their philosophies are glorified and take up the majority of everyday life for the populace.  The Cities are named Romulus, Didicit, Puritas, and Napredok.

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Humans are the most populous race on Lokir.  They are the most average and well-rounded of all of the races.  Anything any of the races can do, the humans can do, albeit not as accomplished.  They have a diverse range in appearances, sizes, and shapes.  They have a solid grasp on technology and can make complex mechanical creations and simple gunpowder weapons.  Humans also have a large population of magic users.  Of all of the magic using races, humans experiment the most with it and humans are responsible for many complex magic techniques.  They can be found on every continent on every sphere.


The Kra are an unusual race who mostly live on the Grey Sphere.  They have a sprawling city on Kra-hold where the majority of their population resides.  There are also tribes of Feral Kra on the Dark Sphere.  The Kra are a diminutive people, with an average height of about two and a half feet.  The Kra often have large heads and exaggerated facial features (large eyes, mouths, small noses, etc.) and animalistic ears that show a lot of expression.  Their fingers and toes are tipped with small claws and they have pronounced incisors.  Their skin colors range from a pale pink, to a deep red, to a greenish-blue tinge.  Their small size hides an almost unnatural strength that allows them to lift objects many times their size and weight.  The Kra are an inventive race and are the most technologically advanced race on Lokir as a result.  They are known for their prowess at inventing gunpowder weapons and mechanized vehicles.  They have a small population of mages, but the few mages they have devote their studies to enchanting objects in such a way where the vast majority of the Kra population can use magical objects.  The Kra are a tight knit and strong society.  Every Kra works to help his or her fellows and every Kra in their capitol has at least some military training, creating a sizable militia.  There are many regiments and specialized units in the Kra military.  A new regiment is created every time a Kra figures out a new way to fight and then trained to fight that way.  Even with all of this military training, the Kra are a peaceful race.  They live by the philosophy of “we aren’t going to throw the first punch, but we as sure as hell are going to throw the last one.”  The Kra are proud, happy, foolhardy, and creative.  They are quick to make friends and quick to fight people who harm their friends.


The Fomorians make up the bulk of the population of the Dark Sphere.  They have long life spans and strange life cycles.  Fomorians are born as helpless infants who grow to adulthood in the span of a week.  Fomorians that just hit adulthood stand at four feet tall and are rather frail and weak.  As a Fomorian ages, it grows in size, strength, toughness, and intelligence.  Younger Fomorians are usually tasked with taking care of the infants.  Fomorians have gray complexions that vary in shade.  Males often shave their heads and females keep their hair long.  They have large jaws and tusks that jut from their lower jaws.  Their skin is thick enough to make bows and arrows relatively ineffective against the middle aged ones and completely useless against the ancient Fomorians.  The more commonly seen Fomorians stand at six or seven feet at the shortest and the largest recorded Fomorian was twelve feet tall.  Most Fomorians live in tribal societies in the Dark Sphere, but there are a few more civilized Fomorians that live in the Gray and even the Gold Sphere.  In the Dark Sphere, Fomorians are warriors and hunters.  Much of their food and supplies they gain either by hunting and gathering, or raiding other tribes.  There are no roles defined by gender, strength is the only deciding factor.  This usually leads to the oldest Fomorian being the leader of a tribe.  At any point in time, a challenger can attempt to fight the chieftain for rule over the tribe.  Occasionally, a tribe will gather several other tribes together in an attempt to conquer a fortress city in order to gain access to the Grey Sphere.  They have been known to fight bare knuckled against steel weapons and win.  Anyone from any race can impress a Fomorian by either winning a fight with them or at the very least putting up a good fight before losing.


Colossi are the inhabitants of the fortress cities.  They discovered agriculture before the Fomorians and were forced to erect defenses and learn how to fight in order to survive the constant raids from the Fomorian tribes.  The Colossi stand at around eight to nine feet tall.  Their skin has the texture and hardness of stone, but they have blood, bone, and muscle under the stone.  Their eyes are protected by clear crystal.  Their hair is relatively similar to that of other races, albeit stronger.  They have an appearance similar to humans and can easily be mistaken for stone statues.  The appearance of their stone skin varies from individual to individual.  Some appear to be granite, others marble, and others quartz.  Colossi are stoic, strong, and serious.  They are proud warriors and farmers who follow a code of honor.  Colossi are often cold to strangers until they manage to impress the Colossus, be it through strength of arms, wit, courage, or strength of will.  If a Colossus believes an individual to be a good man or woman, they will treat them like a brother or sister.


Archons are the architects and lords of the Golden Sphere.  Archons are beings of pure magical energy.  They take the appearance of humanoid lightning bolts.  Shimmering energy in the shape of a human.  They wear ornate suits of gold, silver, and crystal to give them physical form.  Their suits can be made of anything, but anything less than the shimmering precious metals is seen to be disgraceful.  The higher ranking Archons have elaborate crests on their helmets and intricate designs on their suits.  They often omit leg pieces and hover off of the ground.  Archons have a strict code of conduct they follow as if life depended on it.  If an Archon were to deviate from the code, they are exiled and cast from their city.  Any failure of a subordinate to a superior Archon leads to a similar exile.  Exiled Archons are rare, their golden suits confiscated and replaced with lesser metals such as iron or even stone.  Exiled Archons completely abandon their codes and often take on the conduct of the other races they find themselves living with.  Archons are not physically strong compared to other races, but using magic comes as easily as breathing to them.  Their suits often are enchanted to allow them greater strength and speed than their energized forms would normally have.  Archons are intelligent and calculating.  They require no food, water, or air to survive.  While the suits give the Archons physical form, they also keep their energy contained and in one piece.  If an Archon’s suit were to be destroyed suddenly, it would take all of their willpower to stay in one piece and not disperse, effectively killing the being.


Demons are beings who crawl out of the void within Lokir.  Each is horrifyingly unique and monstrous in its own right.  Some merely have the appearance of a giant beast, while others seem to defy reality in their appearance, ignoring gravity or the realms of space and time in mind bending ways.  All demons emerge from the void relatively small and weak.  They prey on anything with a pulse nearby until they can grow older.  When they first emerge, they are nothing more than beasts.  As they mature they gain a sentience and an ambitious hunger to control, destroy, or sometimes simply be left alone.  Demons will mutate and change in appearance as they grow, retaining the same general appearance as when they first emerged, but becoming more fearsome as the ages pass.  They are fully capable of speech and reasoning.  Many of them take control of tribes of Fomorians, posing as gods to be worshiped.  Others simply rampage as destructive monsters.  Still others have no desire to control or destroy and simply follow their own agendas.   Each demon has its own unique powers, abilities, and skills.  Some craft weapons, others are weapons in their own right.  Some manipulate magic while others are living conduits of magic energy similar to the Archons, but on a larger scale.  Since demons are formed in the core rather than being born, demons are sterile and cannot reproduce themselves.  They are functionally immortal to offset this fact.  The formation of a demon is random in when it occurs.