Scrabania

Scrabania is a harsh desert environment in Mudos’s southwest, the natural environment of the Scrab, and once home to Mudokon tribal cultures. Though industrialisation of the country has eliminated both populations, Scrabania is not as barren a wasteland as it first appears. Life prospers everywhere. Xerophytic, weathered cacti have grown out of all proportions, supporting large stone masses, hollows in their succulent flesh sheltering desert wildlife. Bats, bees and buzzards have all adapted to the hot, dry climate. Sand‐covered walkways are held high aloft the ground by towering, red rock formations, the product of millennia of erosion. These clusters of rock also provide shelter in numerous enclosed caverns and fissures.

Signs of a once great Mudokon society of superior technological knowledge are seen everywhere, from lifelike stone sculptures of Scrabs perched on inaccessible ledges to simpler pulley platforms and bells for long‐distance communication. Power comes from wind devices, inflated bladders lit with a candle. Inconspicuous rocks and pits prove to be elaborate sand‐powered traps. Gaping holes in the ground can only be passed by those with an Elum, now rarely seen in a desert where care is not taken of it.