Atlantis is an enormous city, covering around 1200 square miles. It is about 50% land and 50% water. It is impossible to say with certainty whether it is a huge lake with islands, or a huge peninsula with small lakes.
To the west of Atlantis there is the ocean. Atlantean ships fish the ocean to provide food for the city.
To the east and south-east of Atlantis there is land. Large numbers of carts travel from this land to bring food for the city.
To the north-east of the city, there is the mighty Many Demons River, which provides fresh water for the city. Parts of the city are built on the Many Demons River delta.
Atlantis is a peaceful society, and there is little call for adventurers. This does not mean that natives of Atlantis cannot become adventurers. They can, and many do. What it does mean is that their adventures take them out of Atlantis.
All native Atlanteans may have any of the optional abilities listed for newly-created characters, including Limited Magical Skill, Limited Granted Power, and Psionic Wild Talent, for the listed character point cost.
Except as noted below, Atlanteans are poor linguists. They speak Atlantean fluently, and understand the Common Tongue, which is a form of pidgin Atlantean. They sometimes find it difficult to speak to people who only understand the Common Tongue, mistakenly using figures of speech or complex grammatical constructions which their listeners do not understand.
There are a number of plausible backgrounds:
Soldier: You might be a mercenary soldier, in which case, although you are a native of Atlantis, you do not start from Atlantis. You are on the wrong page. You probably start from Havdazar.
Spy: You might be a spy working for the Atlantean Secret Police. If you are, your first mission takes you to Omnatia. You have a choice: you may either role-play this mission, or assume that it succeeds and start from Omnatia with 500 experience points.
Until now, you have been working as a filing-clerk in the offices of the Atlantean Secret Police. It is boring, and you welcome the opportunity to do something active. You might be a young aristocratic female, filling in time before your family finds you a husband, in which case see below. Or you might be a student of magic at one of the Atlantean Institutes, and you earn the cost of your tuition fees by working for the Secret Police. In this case, you combine the spy kit with any specialist wizard character class, and there are no alignment restrictions or preferences. The only additional benefit you get is knowledge that there is an Atlantean Secret Police, where its offices are, and what its secret signs and recognition symbols are.
Aristocratic Male: You are male, from an impoverished aristocratic background. Your uncle is a baronet and owns a small island or two on the outskirts of the city. Your family lives off the rental income.
Like all other aristocratic young men in Atlantis, you are proud, arrogant, boastful and quarrelsome. Although you carry a sword, you hardly ever use it, since Atlantis is a peaceful city. Instead, you make stupid wagers. Perhaps you have made a wager that you can live as an adventurer for a year, or perhaps you have recently lost a wager and the forfeit is that you have to live as an adventurer for a year.
Despite your pride, arrogance and boastfulness, you are much more likely to be good than evil. You have a strong sense of honour. You may be lawful, neutral or chaotic. You think necromancy is disgusting, and regardless of alignment feel that it is proper to slay necromancers on sight.
You think foreigners should learn to speak Atlantean. If you speak any other language, it is because you learnt it to win a wager.
If you want one of the pre-existing kits, you may be a Noble, a Cavalier or a Swashbuckler.
Alternatively, if you do not want one of the pre-existing kits, you are a fighter (not paladin or ranger). Your pride and determination to win give you a few advantages over other adventurers. You have maximum hit points at first level, and when rolling for hit points at other levels, all 1s and 2s rolled are counted as 3s. Once per level, you may automatically succeed in any one die roll (announced beforehand). You do not wear armour, giving you 15 character points to spend on much more interesting things. All of your equipment is of good quality and carries the family crest (outside Atlantis, your family is unknown and the crest will not be recognised except by you and your adventuring companions). Just before you leave Atlantis, your favourite uncle gives you a gift, a pair of Bracers of Defence, AC 8.
Aristocratic Female (1): Everything in the previous section applies, except as follows. Until a week ago, you were an aristocratic male. Either you have made a wager that you can see the inside of an oriental harem, and your uncle's wizard turned you female to give you some chance of winning your wager, or you have recently lost a wager and the forfeit is that you have to live as a female adventurer for a year.
Aristocratic Female (2): You are female, from an impoverished aristocratic background. Your uncle is a baronet and owns a small island or two on the outskirts of the city. Your family lives off the rental income.
Although you are nearly as proud and arrogant as your brother(s), you show it in different ways. You do not make stupid wagers. However, when you choose to do something, whatever it is, you expect to succeed at it.
You have chosen to go adventuring. This may be because your brother is going adventuring (for reasons, see above) and you want to keep him out of trouble. Or it may be because your brother went adventuring a year ago and has not returned, and you want to find out what sort of trouble he has got himself into, and perhaps even rescue him. Or perhaps you have a mission for the Secret Police.
Despite your pride and arrogance, you are much more likely to be good than evil. You have a strong sense of civic duty. You may be lawful, neutral or chaotic. You think necromancy is disgusting, and regardless of alignment feel that it is proper to slay necromancers on sight.
You think foreigners should learn to speak Atlantean. If you speak any other language, you learnt it to show off.
If you want one of the pre-existing kits, you may be a Noble, a Swashbuckler, a Spy (for the Secret Police) or a Diplomat (you are too young to be a diplomat yourself, but could plausibly attach yourself to an Atlantean ambassadorial mission in a junior capacity).
Alternatively, if you do not want one of the pre-existing kits, you may be of any character class except specialist necromancer. Your pride and determination to win give you a few advantages over other adventurers. At first level, you roll hit points twice, and get the higher result. When rolling for hit points at other levels, all 1s are counted as 2s. Once per level, you may automatically succeed in any one die roll (announced beforehand). You do not wear armour (and, depending on your character class, may get bonus character points for this). All of your equipment is of good quality and carries the family crest (outside Atlantis, your family is unknown and the crest will not be recognised except by you and your adventuring companions). Just before you leave Atlantis, your favourite aunt gives you a gift, an amulet which enables its wearer to cast one fixed first-level spell (your choice, but not necromantic) six times. The amulet may be recharged, but this can only be done in Atlantis, and you expect to be away from Atlantis for at least a year.
Mariner: As Atlantis is a seaport, there are many mariners in Atlantis (but as it is a peaceful seaport, there are no pirates). Player characters wanting to be mariners may start from Atlantis. If you do, the only additional benefit you get beyond those of your kit and character class is that you are fluent in both Atlantean and the Common Tongue (you do not have the problems other Atlanteans do when speaking to people who understand the Common Tongue but not proper Atlantean).
Others: There are, of course, many merchants, scholars, jesters, pugilists, and anything else you can think of in Atlantis. It is an enormous city. Player characters wanting any of these kits may start from Atlantis. However, there is nothing particularly Atlantean about them, so they gain no additional benefits beyond those of their kit and character class.
Xukry's Illusionist Show in Atlantis
With minor variations, the five weeks you spend in Atlantis are much the same as the five weeks you spent in Rajeya. The minor variations are these:
1. The Common Tongue is actually a pidgin version of the Atlantean language. Everyone in Atlantis speaks it. You find that spending five weeks in the city improves your knowledge of the language considerably, and you yourself now speak the Common Tongue as well as anyone else (except for native Atlanteans, of course).
2. The name of the theatre where you perform is just The Comedy Theatre. It is an old building which has clearly been a theatre for many decades.
3. You are not staying in an inn. Instead, you and Nylchrinie share a room on the premises of the Comedy Theatre. The room is rather small and stuffy, but well-equipped for stage performers. The other dancing-girls also have rooms on the premises, but there is so much to do in Atlantis that you seldom see them. There are several restaurants in the Comedy Theatre, and the food is really tasty (and Xukry is still paying for meals!).
4. Your room does have a bath, but it is very small. Now that you and Nylchrinie no longer have inhibitions about undressing in public, you visit various public bathhouses in and around the city centre during your free time.
5. There are shops everywhere in Atlantis. You cannot afford much of what they have to sell, but you and Nylchrinie enjoy window-shopping.
6. As a city, Atlantis is rather less friendly than Rajeya, but it is entirely peaceful. There is no violence whatsoever. Several young Atlantean men clearly want to go to bed with you, and some of them are insulting enough to offer money, but they accept your rejections politely and never get angry.
At the end of the five weeks, Xukry informs you that the show is moving on, to Megalopolis. He asks you and Nylchrinie whether you want to go with the show or remain in Atlantis.
Click here if you wish to remain in Xukry's company and go on to Megalopolis.
As you are leaving Xukry's company, you have to hand your working clothes back to Xukry. That includes the earrings. Suddenly, you find that your fingers have no trouble removing them. In their place, Xukry gives you a jewelled brooch. (If Nylchrinie chooses to stay in Atlantis, he gives her a matching brooch.)
Before leaving, Xukry warns you to have nothing whatsoever to do with the Disgusting Society of Sorcery and Diabolism.
You have various options in Atlantis, but I have not yet written many of them up:
Some of you will have seen an advertisement in Atlantis, asking anyone seeking adventure to be at the teleport tower at a particular time.
Others of you will have seen the same advertisement in Megalopolis, and have just been brought to the teleport tower in Atlantis by Quentin or Zaqqiya. (Quentin and Zaqqiya, their part in the proceedings being over, wish you all the best of luck and vanish into thin air.)
As there seems to be a temporary hold-up, those of you from Atlantis and those of you from Megalopolis take the opportunity to compare notes.
It transpires that the cause of the hold-up is that more people than expected have answered the advertisement. The wizard, Jemonzo Jebristar, who had been hired for the next stage of the journey cannot take everyone, and for reasons of his own is not prepared to make two trips.
Finally, things get sorted out. Rallexia Lahape, a wizard from the Atlantean Institute of Conjuration, turns up and agrees to take half of the people present. It is clear that she detests Jemonzo Jebristar and resents having this problem dumped on her. She explains that she does not want troublemakers hanging around Atlantis, and also makes it clear that she regards the assembled would-be adventurers as troublemakers.
Nevertheless, her presence seems to reassure those who have lived in Atlantis for some time. Whatever the adventure is, it must be respectable. No-one had heard of Jemonzo Jebristar, and no-one knew anything about him, but Rallexia could not possibly be involved in anything dodgy.
Jebristar and Rallexia prepare to teleport everyone on the next stage of the journey. Unless you choose to back out at the last moment, click here.
The Caliph of Agvhazar has arrived in Atlantis looking for adventurers to act as his bodyguard. He might be alone, or he might have an adventurer from Xenby with him.
The Caliph will, when he has recruited enough adventurers, return to Agvhazar by flying carpet. His flying carpet seats four, so he is looking for three adventurers (two if the adventurer came with him from Xenby).
You, as a player character, might be the adventurer from Xenby or you might be someone currently in Atlantis and looking for adventure. If you are adventurer from Xenby, the Caliph will follow your advice.
You ask around, and receive the following suggestions:
Having made your choice, you (the Caliph and up to three others) fly back to Agvhazar via Xenby and either Thoqmaxar or Omnatia.
I haven't written this up yet. Consult your DM.
From time to time, the long-distance stagecoach network hires lookouts. The lookout will be paid to travel on the stagecoach, and all meals and overnight accommodation will also be paid for.
The stagecoach network makes it plain that they are only hiring one lookout. If you have associates or henchmen, they can travel free on the stagecoach if there is room, but paying passengers take priority. They will probably receive free overnight accommodation en route but they must pay for their own meals.
If you take the job, there may or may not be encounters en route. I haven't written this up yet. Consult your DM.
Stagecoaches leave from the south-east corner of the city. You can either make your own way there or meet the gondola which collects stagecoach passengers at the gates to the Temple of Frark the Controller near the city centre. Whichever you choose, if you are not on time, it will leave without you.
The three routes which may need lookouts are:
You have various options in Atlantis, but I have not yet written many of them up: