Plateau of Sung

The Plateau of Sung (AKA Plateau of Tsang, Sung Region, Alaozar) originates in August Derleth's "The Lair of the Star-Spawn".

Description, Geography, History, Landmarks

Modern Era: The Plateau of Sung is a desolate Burmese highland which the Tcho-Tcho People once called home. The ancient Tcho-Tcho city of Alaozar stood on the Isle of Stars, in the Lake of Dread, where the gods Lloigor and Zhar were entombed. Sometimes called the Sung Region, the area is shunned by the non-Tcho-Tcho natives, and few men have penetrated the jungles to approach the plateau. The dry and dusty plateau is dotted with strange ruins, with only a few still populated by a handful of decadent Tcho-Tcho People who have remained to maintain certain ancient rituals of their people - the rest have been scattered by the winds to the four corners of the Earth, where they have been uneasily integrated into modern civilizations.

Gaslight and Jazz Age: The Lake of Stars has not yet drained, nor the trees and fields that covered the plateaus yet been lost. Many Tcho-Tchos still live on the Plateau, maintaining a curious mix of sophisticated technologies retained from antiquity, privately used behind the scenes of a deceptively "primitive" tribal culture.

Lake of Dread

The Lake of Dread lay in the heart of the Plateau, possibly artificial, serving as a reservoir for the plateau's water, and a moat for the island in its center.

Isle of Stars

The Isle of Dread is an apparently artificial island in the center of the Lake of Dread, where once a grove of sacred trees stood, concealing the stairway entrance to the Forbidden City of Alaozar below from even the abominable Tcho-Tchos that populate the rest of the plateau.

Alaozar

Alaozar is a lost city built beneath the Isle of Stars in the Lake of Dread on the Plateau of Sung, where the entrance was said to have been hidden from common view by a barrier of trees in antiquity, though today the island and the plateau are barren, and the Lake of Dread turned to dust, drained away into some unseen grotto of the Hollow Earth following an upheaval of the earth at some point in the past. Zhar and Lloigornos lay buried and entombed here, in the dead, pre-human underground city, where these Great Old Ones were once attended with nameless rites by Miri Nigri priests.

Lelag-Leng

A city disturbingly near the base of the Plateau of Leng, apparently bordering on the Dreamlands. This city is inhabited by the Tcho-Tcho people, who are rumored to have unwholesome dealings with the sinister beings from Leng, sometimes trading a lovely and voluminous type of silk, but many people fear to deal with Lelag-Leng's silk-traders, for all know that no mulberry trees of any sort can be found anywhere near the city. Lelag-Leng is ruled by a high sorcerer.

Heresies and Controversies

• Possibly a region of the Plateau of Leng?

Associated Mythos Elements

• deities: Zhar and Lloigornos
• race: Miri Nigri
• race: Tcho-Tchos

References

• fiction: August Derleth's "The Lair of the Star-Spawn"