While few outside very select mages and certain scientists even consider the Cosmology of Celestia and the realms that touch it. Those who do come away with an understanding that for all practical purposes most things are found through the ‘Astral Plane’. Even our material world exists alongside the Astral!

The Astral Plane

The Astral Plane exists alongside our world, looking at the Astral from our Realm shows the world in an odd dark and almost smoky realm as buildings and most of the ground appears in dark greyscale colors. People, creatures, and and plants, things full of life and mana, appear in color. Things in the Astral plane are intangible and invisible to those in out material world.

he part of our material world that exists alongside the Astral Plane is known as the ‘Near Astral’ or even ‘Ethereal’. However, much more of the Astral Plane exists and this is all collectively referred to as the ‘Deep Astral’. The Deep Astral is a foggy multicolored near void with no visible world. It’s just open space besides the ‘clouds’ of Ectoplasm that makes it up. There is no ‘up’ or ‘down’ and is very confusing for the mortal mind.

Very few creatures exist within the Astral Plane itself. For a simple reason that the Astral Realm is a plane of thought, ideas, and dreams. In fact every person has a dream castle within the Astral that mimics their internal thoughts and dreams. However, living in the pure Astral plane itself is very difficult. To even travel their ‘physically’ is difficult. Mortal creatures have found ways to enter the Astral by simply leaving their bodies and sending their mind and spirit into the Astral as that is easier. Doing so creates a thread of energy that connects your mind and spirit to your body.

When you move in the Astral there is no need to move your legs, moving is by thought. As is finding your way. Distance is meaningless. What matters is how well you know where you want to go. This has made it very dangerous to travel through. If you don’t know very well where you are going or are just exploring you could very easily get lost.

Dream Castles

Every living being seems to have a place in the Astral, these places are built on the subconscious mind and memory that forms our dreams. These are not true Astral realms, see below, but instead an echo of our internal self that is visible on the Astral. People with the talent for it have been known to be able to enter these Dream Castles and use the echo to find out secrets

Realms in the Astral

Strong thoughts and will will gather together what little matter exists in the Astral into a Astrally solid form. These are termed ‘Astral Realms’. Mortals with sufficiently strong will can create small realms, but so have many many other powerful creatures. The owner, or collective owners, of a Realm are basically all powerful within their Realm. Since their will creates it they can alter even the perceived ‘laws’ of physics in their Realms.

The Fey retreated to the Astral Plane from the Ashura and they established chaotic realms called ‘Fey Realms’. These places are insanely dangerous for any mortal to enter. Not every Fey will be hostile when visited, but they do not think like mortals and things like deciding your skin color offends them and so they remove your skin are recorded to have happened during otherwise peaceful encounters.

Even before the Fey, a few creatures did form or at least live in the Astral. These are collectively known as ‘Old Ones’ or ‘Great Old Ones’. Both Dagath and Summanus are actually of this type, though both chose to involve themselves in the War of the Gods. It is said others of this sort exist and just are generally unconcerned with mortal affairs.

With that thought in mind, each Deity has their own Realm in the Astral. These were formed before the War of the Gods, and as such one can find Realms devoted to dead gods that still retain lingering traces of their creators thousands of years later. Some of these actually hold the ‘corpses’ of dead gods or are the gods corpse themselves.

Demons who cannot get to the material world often build Realms for themselves. The same is true of the Djinn and one assumes The Shadows as well. A few elder Dragons have secluded themselves here as well.

What is beyond the Astral?

While there are few to have ever done it, one can travel ‘beyond’ the Astral to enter other Material Worlds. These worlds are filled with what we would think of as ‘demons’ and getting to them is nearly impossible. Finding your way back to our world is even harder yet. No one knows how many of these other worlds exist or where they are precisely. That said some have tried to explore these places through devices called ‘Dragon Systems’ as they mimic the power of Ancients Dragons to pierce into the Astral and navigate it. While those dragons had an innate ability to navigate, these systems attempt multiple ways of trying to mimic the natural Dragon ability. However, most of it is guess work as no Ancient Dragon has ever offered any real glimpse into how their navigational ability work and even the core of the Dragon System is guesswork based on energies around a Ancient Dragon using their own innate power.