Celestial

Mountains of light, gardens without weeds and cities of white stone where the servants of good gods live and sing. Pain fades, food is plenty and every guest is welcome, so long as they come in peace. One arrives by spell, by invitation, by a holy gate or as a soul at the end of a good life; leaving is easy, the hard part is wanting to. Fiends and the restless dead burn in its light.

Light
Lit
Going
Easy

Hear it

Hazards

  • Blinding glory. The light is so strong that newcomers can barely keep their eyes open. D&D 5e (House rule): For their first day, visitors have Disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.
  • Sweet staying. Every day here seems better than the last, and the mission waiting at home seems smaller. D&D 5e (House rule): Each dawn, a creature that means to leave makes a DC 13 Wisdom save. On a failure, it happily decides to stay one more day.
  • Searing light. Fiends, the undead and those sworn to them find the light painful. D&D 5e (House rule): A Fiend or Undead, or a creature bound to one by a pact, takes 1d6 Radiant damage at the end of each hour under the open sky.
  • The high peaks. The holy mountain climbs far above any mortal peak, and the air is thin on its terraces. D&D 5e: Above 3,000 m (10,000 feet), each hour of travel counts as two when working out how long a creature can travel. Thirty days at that height acclimatise it; above 6,000 m (20,000 feet) only natives ever do.

Adventure hooks

  1. A mortal’s brother died a year ago and lives here now, happy, remembering nothing of his old life. The mortal wants him to come home, and the brother is too polite to refuse outright.
  2. A winged horse has fallen out of the sky into a farmyard, a wing broken. The farmer wants to keep it; its riders want it back, and a horse dealer wants to buy it from whoever wins.
  3. A fountain here answers any one question truthfully. A pilgrim has walked ten years to ask it something, and on the last step forgot what it was.
  4. An angel asks the party for a favour: to carry a message to a fiend in the pits, an old friend from before the fall. The message is a single word, and the angel will not explain it.

What may happen

  1. A choir sings somewhere out of sight. Wounds stop hurting while it lasts.
  2. An old soul in good health walks out to greet the party, smiling, and asks whether any of them has someone among the dead they would like news of.
  3. A winged white horse lands near the camp and lets one of the party touch its mane.
  4. A guardian with a lion’s body asks the party one question about its purpose before letting it pass.
  5. An orchard where every tree is in fruit and blossom at once. The fruit keeps a week and feeds for a day.
  6. A tall winged figure watches the party from a tower for a long time, then nods.
  7. At dusk, a procession of lanterns climbs the mountain. Anyone may join.
  8. A fountain in which nobody can see their face if they have just told a lie.
  9. A golden feather as long as an arm lies in the grass, still warm.
  10. A messenger of light asks the party to carry a small sealed box back to the mortal world, and not to open it.
  11. A gate of pearl will not open for one of the party, though it opens for the others.
  12. A spring runs gold. Any scar washed in it fades away.
  13. A scribe in white records the name of everyone who enters. She asks one of the party for the name of someone they have forgiven.
  14. Lions sleep among lambs in a meadow. One lion lifts its head, yawns and goes back to sleep.
  15. A bridge of light spans a gulf. It holds for as long as the one crossing it does not doubt.
  16. In a great hall, heroes of old feast and wrestle, and call on the party to tell of their deeds.
  17. An angel back from a battle against fiends, one wing torn, asks a stranger for help: the healers are busy.
  18. A mortal woman who prayed so hard she was carried here alive tends a herb garden and asks for news of her village.
  19. At dawn every blade of grass holds a drop of light. Gathered in a flask, it glows for a month.
  20. A guardian bars the gate until one of the party carries a stranger’s heavy load up the steps, and will not say which of them it should be.
  21. At noon every voice on the mountain falls silent for an hour of prayer. The party’s own words suddenly sound loud and rude.
  22. Golden bees make honey from light. Their keeper, a cheerful old man, offers a piece of comb.
  23. A city of white stone on a terrace, every door open. Pilgrims are fed at long tables in the street.
  24. An angel politely takes a poisoned blade from one of the party and promises to return it when they leave.
  25. Among the blessed walks a man the old tales name as a villain, and he greets the party warmly.

Creatures

To bring back

Angel Perfect Feather, Couatl Tongue, Empyrean Tongue

Other planes

Feywild, Shadowfell, Ethereal, Astral, Elemental Fire, Elemental Water, Elemental Earth, Elemental Air, Infernal, Abyssal, Hades

This work includes material from the System Reference Document 5.2.1 ("SRD 5.2.1") by Wizards of the Coast LLC, available at https://www.dndbeyond.com/srd. The SRD 5.2.1 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, available at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode.

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