At some point the characters are likely to pass through or near the Chaotic Mist. Where the creatures of the Deep Forest are dangerous, the creatures of the Mist are dangerous and alien. The chaotic mist is largest on nights of the full moon. If the characters left Hightown during the waxing moon, the moon is most likely full now, resulting in a three or four day journey through the mist. On a new moon, the journey through the mist will take less than a day (unless, of course, they get lost).
The old road to Kristagna goes into the mist. The mist has grown since the road was built; it would have been easy to build the road around the mist’s full moon border.
If the mist rolls in on their camp:
A deep mist rolls in from the south during the evening as you unpack and build your fire. The twinkling stars slowly fade from view. The moon’s white light filtering through the mist lends an eerie feel to your camp.
If they encounter the mist while walking:
A fog slowly builds as you move east. Tendrils of mist block your view and then clear, and then finally turn deep and thick. You see barely ten paces in front of you. The sun is a mere brighter white area in the (eastern or western, as appropriate for time of day) sky. Water condenses on your faces and your clothes.
When fully within the mist, at night:
Within this thick fog, the darkness is complete. Sound has a strange hollowness within the fog, and you hear faintly the sounds of squeaks, clatterings, and thumps from a great distance. When the moon rises, you see only vague outlines of trees and hills, and occasionally of strange, moving shapes along the ground or in the air.
Mist encounters
When traveling within the mist, encounters occur 20% of the time each day and each night. Because of the thickness of the mist, it may be possible for careful groups to avoid detection by these strange and dangerous creatures.
| 01-15 | Fire Spider (1) | 15% |
| 16-30 | Beaked Sweeper (1) | 15% |
| 31-45 | Crazy Crabs (d2) | 15% |
| 46-60 | Pink Horrors (d6) | 15% |
| 61-75 | Toves (d3) | 15% |
| 76-84 | Giant Venus Flytraps (d4, see below) | 9% |
| 85-90 | Mushroom Walker (1, see below) | 6% |
| 91-96 | Giant Leeches (d8, see below) | 6% |
| 97-00 | Mist Wraith (1) | 4% |
Flytraps, mushroom walkers, and leeches will often (75%) be encountered in a chaotic grove, a wild collection of alien plants, growing like clumps of green blades coming out of the ground, with red or purple flowers; trees with brush-like red appendages hanging down from strand-like branches resembling weeping willows; trees with flowers like yellow trumpets that smell of dung; creeping weeds with purple flowers that tear down larger trees.
