The Nexus Crossroads

 

The Crossroads reside in a small bubble in a central pan dimensional nexus, where all realities and timezones touch. Most worlds have gate points or soft locations where transitions can occur through minor rips in reality. These lead to points inside the nexus. These transitions and gates are not always active. Some activate only when various planets, stars, cosmic flows are met. The Crossroads is an important centre of multiversal commerce and much of the Nexus's government is geared toward maintaining favourable trading conditions. The total crossroads size is 69 metres wide x 96 metres long x 15 metres height. What can be seen outside is total darkness, no stars, and no lights. The culture is a strange mishmash of elements from other worlds and various timezones. Somehow the village provides mystical knowledge of the required languages of each lifeform encountered.

Alternatively this tiny village may be used as a location that moves from place to place (or time) at will or at random.

1 - The Seven Fates Inn

This is a nice medieval styled pub with dark wood walls, a few tables, and that "pub smell" of people and old stout. It is possibly the greatest eatery in the cosmos. It is a three storey building with several entrances into the various areas where different food and drink, ranging the gamut from simple bread and meat to sublime artistic creations to pleasure the pallet may be obtained. The second floor has lodgings for those wishing to stay awhile while the third floor is storage and where the owner and his family reside. There is a balcony on the northern side stretching to shop 9. The cellar is where the alcohol is kept.
2 - What You Need Apothecary
The interior of the upper shop is well appointed and what one would expect of such an establishment. Many pigeon holes line the back walls behind a long counter. All manner of oddities overflow from these compartments as well as hanging from the ceiling in boxes, cylinders, cages and various other containers. The smell can be inadequately described as ‘exotic’. In addition to a wide range of legal alchemical wares, one can purchase supplies and raw materials, though at what one would consider somewhat high prices. A notice is placed prominently advertising coin for the remains of magical creatures, as well as a price list for the remains of other rare creatures. Most normal potions and alchemical substances as well as poisons are available, but carefully presented. The above-ground store is physically well built and protected. Building materials are laced with powdered silver and cold iron. The owner will bring out various wares from numerous locked compartments which line the back wall. Each of these compartments is double locked, trapped and magically held. The second floor is where the owner and family live. The cellar meanwhile  is where most of the work occurs. It is fitted with a powerful forge (magical - heat is generated via pure elemental fire).
3 - Crossroads Dunjeon

Bar fights, petty thievery and "causing a public disturbance" are often enough to attract the attention of the local constable, who will "invite" you to spend the night in a cell before the mayor decides your fate come morning. The small dunjeon consists of an office on the ground floor and a cluster of five cells on the second floor. The constable gets few prisoners here, as most of the shop owners are more than capable of dealing with would be trouble.

4 - The Runic Hand
This is a smithy who specializes in crafting artifact weapons, armour and shields of anywhere from +1 to a +5 value. It is rumoured that those with enough money can gain even greater artifacts.
5 - Ka Pow Training Centre

The training consultants offer on site training in the use of any martial art or weapon from any reality. They are not cheap but their trainers are world class and often are highly known. To be taught how to use a weapon by a master is prestige beyond anything.

6 - Transtravel Tourism Centre
This business offers gateway teleport to any world or dimension. They can arrange transport, holiday packages, cruises, hotel deals, travel insurance, vehicle hire, cruises, visas, traveller's cheques, and money conversion.
7 - Second Storey Library
Any book can be found here. First, it takes payments to search for items and their holders. They have guards and wards everywhere blocking spells of finding and discovery, and each wears a circlet that prevents their own minds from being read. Also, no book appears any different than any other book. The books re-shelf themselves the moment someone lets go of it. Paying for their services makes the task possible.  The rate they charge is negotiable: they may want more gold at 100 ounces of gold per day of research per Librarian hired, or they may want a specific item from the person, or they may require a service performed first. Once the price is set, however, they will not renegotiate.
Second, the Head Librarian occasionally commissions a group to go and collect a certain item of great value. The Library actually has several valuable items in store and does a good business selling these. They even have a "gift" shop which stocks many small items that no longer have holders.
Treasure hunters from all around come to the library seeking information that will lead them to great wealth. They open a book, find where a magical item is and what holds it currently, weigh the risks that they know (the books record the holder, but not their allies or other defences), and if the chance looks good they head out. Soon their attempt to take the item is recorded in the book and the cycle continues.
Upon entering the library, each person passes through the great arch and over the great seal. This binds them to the rules of the library. Should a person attempt to circumvent the rules, their memory is erased. Typically this just means that they forget what they were about to do such as steal a purse. They won't even know that they have forgotten it. If their intention is very strong, the forgetting is even stronger, possibly causing them to forget the past year of their lives. And in very rare cases where the library feels threatened directly, the curse causes the person to forget everything, even how to breathe. Since this is passive, very few even know it exists. It is not uncommon to see someone who was coming to the Library to steal standing just over the great seal with a blank look on their face wondering why they are there. So, despite the Library's great wealth and rather dangerous crowd it attracts, it is generally extremely safe.
One of the most common uses of the Library is for a person to come and find out what their new acquisition can actually do and how to make it work. By finding themselves in the books, a person can find their item and its full history including major uses of the item, key words spoken, and so forth. While much of this can be determined by a wizard's magic, the Library is far more complete and reliable. Showing an item to the librarians will allow them to find its book within an hour. While the item is within the library, all books containing mention of it will glow with a coloured light that will also glow around the item itself.
8 -  A Safe Place
This seemingly tiny building serves as a individual self storage facility through the use of pocket dimensions of varying sizes. Anything the character wants can be stored in one of these units, for a price. There have been several attempts to rob the business, none have ever been successful. None have ever survived.
9 - The Crossroads Bizarre Bazaar
This is a massive indoor flea market. It is full of tents, long hallways divided into stalls, and the occasional free standing shop. Those locations are full of people from so many realities each bringing their own goods to sell. The babble of languages continues on all day and quiets slightly when it cools slightly at night. All manner of strange, unearthly, forbidden, and fantastic items can be found here.
10 - Xeno's Weapons and Armour
Xeno's Weapons and Armour is a pawnshop for the poor and the desperate. It carries weapons, armour, holy and unholy symbols, ammunition, and more. A few are magical or at least of superior workmanship. And more than a few are from different dimensions and time periods. Anything can be found here at any given time from +2 chain mail to power armour, +3 broad sword to M69 pulse rifle. The prices are reasonable and negotiable, however no warranty is given. The owner is a xenomorph.
11 - The Crossroads Auction Hall
The amount of junk that gets left behind in a crossroads that borders multiple realities is phenomenal and the variety of it mind-boggling. Naturally the authorities are very keen to keep the streets clean of menacing and/or dangerous nick-knacks but equally keen not to offend tourists. So over the centuries the Lost Property Office beneath Auction Hall has grown and grown. Every month there is a Grand Sale of unclaimed property. Things that have not seen the light of day for decades are brought up to the square outside Auction Hall and bidding can be fierce.
12 - Dill Doe's Parlour of Countless Delights
Sitting right in the middle of a business park district this fancy art deco building has plenty of secrets. On the outside, and even the inside to those of the acknowledgeable, Sings is a place for enlightenment, peace, and tranquility. Quiet reading, conversations with beautiful ladies and attractive men, and physical relaxation are all on the menu. To the members who have access to the inside however know the truth. Any appetite of the flesh can be found within the walls, and people pay handsomely for it. The most exotic women, and some exotic men can be found here in an anything goes environment. If the allure of a half-elf, half dryad, or vivacious she-orc aren’t to the client’s liking, the staff sorcerer is adept at the summoning of incubi and succubi, for a price though.
13 -  Smoke and Mirrors Magic Emporium
This is an alchemist shop unlike any other. Not only does it stock any standard magic item found in the books, there is a nearly limitless number of items that you won't find anywhere else. The stuff you can find at this shop can range from the strange but useful to the downright ridiculous (though still useful in its own odd way). The main items sold here are potions, scrolls, magic tomes and magical equipment (anything non weapon).
14 - Absolute Trust Bank of the Multiverse
This is the main bank of the various wizard worlds. In addition to storing money and valuables for magic users, one can go there to exchange one world's currency for another. The staff have a code that forbids them to speak of the bank's secrets, and would consider it "base treachery" to break any part of that code. The centuries-old bank is run by a previously unidentified supernatural race, and they alone know the secrets of the twisting underground passages and the enchantments and creatures in place to defend against intruders. Just through the entrance is a vast marble hall long counters stretching along its length with doors leading off to the vault passageways with around a hundred clerks sitting at them. The vaults extend for miles under the crossroads and are accessible through rough stone, complex and interconnected passageways by means of magic carts that are operated by the clerks. Dragons and other mysterious beasts lurk in the depths as additional security devices. In contrast to the grand marble of the entryway and the main hall, the passageways to the vaults are stone and dimly lit with flaming torches. They slope down to a track, upon which run little carts controlled by the goblins. These carts take visitors deep beneath the surface of the earth, through a "maze of twisting passages," to the vaults. The vaults themselves vary in size and security. The largest, most well protected vaults belong to various entities and lie deepest beneath the surface. Those vaults closer to the surface seem to be smaller and have fewer security precautions surrounding them — they use keys, for example, rather than requiring the touch of a clerk to gain access. Another security measure is the Thief's Downfall: a charmed waterfall that the goblin carts must pass through, it cancels all enchantments and magical concealments, and throws the carts off their tracks.
15 - In The Red Casino
The primary material manifestations of the Roman Gods. This beautiful white marble and mirrored glass edifice towers above all the various buildings around it. Inside this three hundred listed floor space are classic table and stand up casino games, high end shops, pools, bars, lounges, clubs, spas, and above it all, lots of hotel rooms and suites. It is all beautiful and elegant, with a Roman Flair, full of marble, frescos, and gold trims. Several floors are "open areas" (several stories tall) where it seems to be an open area with "sky". There is one restaurant that seems to be in a forest, and one lounge that seems to be a sandy white beach (always in twilight/ night time). The structure seems to be of "standard physics", but it is really as big/small, ordered, as the "owners" want it to be. There are "back areas" that are more "underground" than most of the building, for a wilder and darker crowd (or for those that just want to dance on the wild side). Hades tends to run these areas (and much of the "back end"). The staff is comprised of mythicals, but beautiful nymphs, fauns, and satyrs seem to dominate. Scarier creatures tend to be security. Lower Management tends to be "named mythicals". Most of the areas require either a membership, guest status (hotel rooms), or a door charge. Most of these are money, but they will take heartfelt faith in the Gods and a touch of the soul (which is fairly rare). Oh don't take too much credit here, as repayment could be much more mythical than most want to deal with. After all, then they will borrow on your soul and you could end up being a slave in the back of the building.
16 - A. Hole's Livestock Hall
The hall specializes mainly in domesticated animals, but also other creatures that people wish to eat from around the verse. There are dozens upon dozens of various pens filled with beasts. They are kept together, fed and watered, before they are moved to kill points or places to move them to other places. Most of the animals are kept in pens made of heavy metal piping. There are patches of corrugated metal used as pen walls, gates, shields (to nudge beasts), impromptu sun shades, and other things.
17 - The Crossroads Multiversal Clinic

The Medical Clinic is one of the oldest continuously operating/ inhabited locations in the Nexus. Some say it was one of the original buildings. The Medical Clinic Compound is a large building complex with eight levels and eight sections inside each level. They range from magical to ultratech. Any race or entity can be healed here.. for a price.
18 - Transdimensional Express
The Express hire out to clean, move, or haul anything. No matter what it is, how dirty it maybe, or how long it’s been dead they remove it and dispose of it quickly. When the rains pour and the sewer water rises, they are called down to remove the rubbish and the dead bodies that clog the drainage pipes so they don’t back up onto the streets.
19 - Nexus Town Hall
The chief administrative building of the Nexus. It houses the town council, its associated departments, and their employees. It also functions as the base of the mayor.
20 - Many Happy Returns Traveller's Supplies
This store combines a large convenience store with a small department store (imagine a kmart or target). The shelves are packed with everything you might need such as food (bread, dairy, good candy, some grocery and some prepack), clothing, components, batteries, and so on from various different eras and technologies. The store is open all hours. Except for the obviously cheap things, the prices are a bit higher than normal.. but you are paying for the convenience of the single stop location and odd hours.
21 - Sargon's Exotic Pawnshop
If anything can be legally sold it can be obtained here. The store has been in business for over four hundred years. It is a diverse mix of goods, basically whatever people need quick cash for. The proprietor will loan money to those who want it, taking their items as collateral. If they default on the loan (do not repay it in 3 months), he will then sell said goods. The amount of the loan is based upon 40-50% of the worth of said item. The item is then sold in the store for approximately the item’s worth. Some people do not take the loan chit, only wishing to unload merchandise.
In The Back is where the "exceptional merchandise" is displayed, items of great worth or historical significance. You can only be invited "in back" if they believe you have both the inclination to buy and the money. For certain items, he will hold auctions in back for a handful of buyers.
22 - North Entrance
This gateway is how everyone enters and exits the Crossroads.
23 - South Entrance
This entrance is no longer used, and has been walled up with some unknown, apparently indestructible material inscribed with ancient magical wards. However in the wall is a hole, thinner than a human hair; which allows enough energy to escape to sustain and power the entire crossroads, with room to spare. As for what's on the other side, those that know wont say, only looking fearful at its mention.
24 - West Laneway and 25 - East Laneway
These 2 laneways are simply the main streets of the crossroads which connect with all the shops in the Nexus. At random times though there will be an open air flea market with merchants from all over the realms bringing their wares. Traditional items such as clothing and antiques combine with art, jewellery, candles, and crafts to make this a market of diversity and a community of culture. The market can be present at any time of the day or night but usually only for D6 hours.
The Sewers Below
Where does all the poop go? It goes away, which is good enough for most people. Beneath the Crossroads is a maze of sewers of equal size to the village above. Once the sewerage reaches the end of the sewers, tiny portals dump it onto other worlds. The sewers have also become home to numerous creatures that dislike or can't handle sunlight.

 

 

Beyond Heroes Map Index