The Red Waste (concept)
Biozone: The Red Waste
The Red Wastes are a blasted wasteland stricken with potent, magical energy that once devastated the land. Powerful, crimson dust storms, said to carry toxins that burn the lungs, blow through the empty ruins of towns and villages. The ground is barren, and the husks of trees are little more than burnt twigs. What little life remains here is a mutated shadow of its former self, and travelers should be warned to avoid the region at all costs.
Crossing from the golden sunflowers and rocky hills of Western Opakhasia into the burnt landscape of the The Red Waste did not damper our moods, at first, but it did not take long for our eyes to dry, and our throats, burn. The air chokes, tasting of hot smoke and burnt flesh. With every step we take further into this harsh hellscape, part of me questions are choice to come here.
We reach the top of a cracked and barren hill that can see into a dried lakebed below. I almost did not notice the crumbling ruins that might've once been a town beside the lake; all that remains are bricks and rubble. An ominous howl echoes from across the horizon as a violent dust cloud rises from the lake's center, and my companions look to me. We're drained by the journey so far, and the path ahead will only be more treacherous.