Tapoa Island

Tapoa
Discoverer	Asara, Genwin, Arica, Inuad, and Trevize

Tapoa is an untamed island of scrub desert in the furthest southwestern reaches of the known world. The oppressive heat of the desert overwhelms the wild beauty of the sandy beaches of this distant shoreline. A strange and fearsome monster known as the Vultubus awaits any hardy traveller who climbs to the peak of Tapoa's lone mountain.

Geography

Tapoa is located in the Sefyric Ocean west-southwest from Shala-Khulia. The island rises steadily out of the shallows that border the southern shore, reaching a central plateau of packed sand surrounded by shifting dunes. The hard ground permits only the most stubborn of plants to grow, except where fine crystals of sea salt have collected in blinding-white mounds. To the northwest and above the plateau, a dark mountain looms ominously. In the shadow of Mount Tapoa, a sandy valley supports a bit more plantlife, fed by a single freshwater spring. A shallow inlet near the northern end of the eastern shore of Tapoa provides the only safe natural harbour.

History

The history of Tapoa is unremarkable. The island has remained uninhabited by sapient life throughout all of recorded history. Only recently have sailors landed here, and many have never returned to tell their tales. The remains of ships dot the southern shallows, and the bones of lost sailors mingle with the desert sands. A single, deranged sailor remains camped on the gentle eastern beach in a ragged tent of sailcloth.

Fauna

Though remote and unexplored, Tapoa does support a thriving population of scavengers. Blue sand crabs skitter across the beaches, a pack of wild dingoes makes its home on the edge of the desert, and ravenous black vultures hop across the sands looking for edible scraps. A colony of giant sandworms burrow beneath the desert sands, waiting to swallow their prey in massive sinkholes. The southern shallows are full of blackfin sharks, and a venomous specimen of giant jellyfish inhabits a sunken vessel off the southern shore. In the valley beneath Mount Tapoa, a tribe of red apes flourishes beside the freshwater spring. In a cave on top of the mountain itself, the Vultubus, an oily-feathered two-headed monster picks flesh from the bones of its victims, as it awaits the satisfaction of another grisly offering.

Inhabitants

• Matteo, a marooned sailor