Region 4: The Raveling Flat

A desert situated in the rain shadow of the mountains to the east (region 5), this flat, dry coast is the only known habitat of the Three-Leafed Crown, a ground-hugging shrub.

The plant releases a fibrous mass that carries seeds with the wind, clumps of which can be harvested from rocks or other obstructions that snag the strands. Weavers then spin the strands into 'desert linen'.

The root system of the plant, dominated by a tap-root that burrows deep for ground water, can be harvested to create 'desert silk', though doing so risks killing the plant, and so the silk is highly coveted while its source remains a guarded secret.

Region 5: The Marching Forest

The only two stable points in this region are the Crown and the Crest, the two mountain peaks (north and south, respectively) that mark the western edge of this erratic landscape.

This hilly forest, stretching from the inland sea on the east to the hilly edge of the Raveling Flat to the west, is marked by its lack of permanence more than anything. More than one would-be town has been swallowed up by the wandering hills. Stable for a month, but wandering year-to-year, the land lulls would-be settlers into a sense of stability.

But make no mistake: the hills will move. The forest is hungry.

And whatever you build here -- from hut to castle -- will be consumed by broad-leafed trees and their hilly steeds.

Region 6: The Long Tallcorn

This grassland prairie (or maybe steppe) is home to a natural crop plant!

Imagine if maize, instead of several large corns, sprouted dozens of wheat-sized corns up and down it's length - and now cover a seemingly endless landscape with that tallcorn, ten feet tall in the growing season (which is still quite cool here), broken only by occasional large rocks, gentle streams, and rare clumps of trees.

There's animals here, in plenty - but most of them are either burrowers or with dens in the occasional woods, to survive the autumns that brown the landscape (and sometimes come with wildfires), and hunker down in cover for the winter.  A person could walk for days and see nothing but the tallcorn.

Region 2: The Soul-Eater Wastes

This is a "cold desert" or semi-desert temperate region with sparse sagebrush vegetation. Most of the rain it sees comes in winter, and there are large salt beds in the depressions along its coasts. 

The crags in the northwest and south provide nests for a terrifying predator: a colossal twenty-five-foot spirit viper with translucent, diamond-colored scales and a transparent body that glitters under direct sunlight but can be hard to track in the wide expanses of the Wastes' rocky terrain. The spirit viper's venom does not infect the blood: it infects the soul, convincing the target that there is no hope in this world and no choice but to give up, whereupon they succumb to lassitude and are consumed by the immense serpent at its leisure.

Rumor has it that a flower grows here that can counteract the spirit viper's venom. The trouble is that it's only visible to the pure of heart.

Region 8: The Prairie of the Enchanted Canals

This prairie region appears to be supernaturally fortified against the infiltration of the tall corn to the west.

Mighty herds of herbivores graze here, including Rainbow-Coat Deer, Checkered Horses, and Trumpeting Hornbeasts in their thousands, whose mighty horns have a gorgeous silvery patina. They track back and forth across the grasslands, but there are certain barriers they do not cross, and that sequester one species from another.

Those barriers are artificial canals that crisscross the landscape. The canals don't just contain water: they contain water spirits who are bound into the canals by magical glyphs carved into the stone tens of thousands of years into the past by parties unknown. The canals all converge at the heart of the prairie in what would form a natural gathering site.

Region 7. The Chills 

The Chills (believed to be named via the words ‘chill’ and ‘hills’ combined) is a tundra-like shrublands biome. 

Many rivers from the Alshar Prairie meet here, zigzagging around low hills. Here the water is freezing cold. Here is where the water spirits float when they die. Some say the two are connected. 

In many places grows the Crow Plant, so called for the thin twin stems like legs, that flower in one bush. The Crow Plant grows on the highest ground it can find, often on top on the hills of [name]. In Spring, small fruits brave the still-cold temperatures in the shape of goofy smiles - though their size is that of a smile a small rodent might give. The fruit of the Crow Plant gleams silver, as if a snail has travelled over it, and tastes surprisingly sweet. It’s good for a boost on a long walk.