Off the jagged cliffs of the south-east coast of Lustria lies the submerged, golden city of Chupayotl, the Sunken City. The most southern of the Lustrian Temple-Cities, Chupayotl slipped beneath the waves during the ancient Age of Recovery, some four thousand years before the rise of Sigmar. The golden city lies far below the surface of this turbulent sea, in a vast, sheer-sided channel that drops for thousands of feet into icy darkness. Here dwell all manner of terrifying and vicious predators with glowing eyes, pallid flesh and massive gaping maws filled with millions of curved teeth. It is said that an undersea empire now occupies the ancient city, an ancient, baleful race that occasionally makes forays to the ocean surface in the dead of moonless nights to drag unfortunate sailors to their doom.[2a]
Previously it was an inhabited city located on the surface, an important link in the Geomantic Web. Thanks to it the Slann of Lustria could communicate with their counterparts in Zlatlan, located in the Southlands on the other side of the Great Ocean, and vice versa. With the sinking of Chupayotl that connection was severed.[1a]
History[]
In ages past, the High Elves sent their fleets to every corner of the globe. Malekith the Great befriended the Dwarf King Snorri Whitebeard, and the Slann pondered the meaning of these events. Meanwhile, a long-perceived threat was manifesting to the south. The city of Chupayotl had started to slip inexorably into the sea during the war against Chaos. Whether this was part of the Great Plan was a subject on which the Slann had meditated for some time, and had yet to reach a consensus.[1a]
Whatever the cause, it was on the eve of the alignment of the Fire Stars that a great tremor struck the eastern coast of Lustria. The ocean receded, exposing the seabed as far as the distant horizon. Vast leviathans not touched by sunlight since the creation of the world thrashed upon the steaming mud flats.[1a]
Even as the seas drained, the skink priests announced that the city was to be abandoned. It fell to the Temple Guard to lead Chupayotl's Mage-Priests to safety. It took many hours to rouse them all and to disinter the mummified bodies of the Relic Priests. It is written that the Mage-Priests would have preferred to meditate upon events, but the Temple Guard simply hefted their ruminating charges' palanquins upon their broad armoured shoulders and bore them away from the city.[1a]
As the last of the Mage-Priests left, a mighty wall of water arose to block out the very sun. The waters that had receded now returned as a tsunami many hundreds of yards high. The seas broke not only upon Chupayotl, but the greater part of its population too. The waters carried many miles into the jungle, flattening a vast area before its force was spent. As the waters swept back to the ocean, the sea level finally equalised and Chupayotl was gone, swept into the ocean along with thousands of its former occupants. Tragically, the Mage-Priests of Chupayotl fell too that day, dashed against the ruins of their own temple-city.[1a]
The sinking of Chupayotl heralded one final disaster. The city had served as a nexus in the Geomantic Web. Communion with those few outposts beyond Lustria was now impossible. Those distant Mage-Priests who had survived the Great Catastrophe were cut off. Henceforth they would be left to their own devices to pursue the Great Plan as best they might.[1a]
Chupayotl, it is said, now sits upon the seabed, having come to rest at the bottom of a deep, stygian trench. Perhaps otheres now occupy its temples, to creep ashore by the moonlight and devour the unwary with mouths filled with row upon row of shark-like teeth. Many and strange tales are still told of sunken Chupayotl.[1a]
The sinking of Chupayotl caused great consternation amongst the Mage-Priests, for it introduced into their unknowable thought patterns something akin to self-doubt. Surely, the Old Ones could not have intended the death of the Mage-Priests of Chupayotl? If they had not, then had the Slann themselves somehow erred in their mission? Perhaps previous realignments had been carried out incorrectly, infinitesimal errors in the calculations having been amplified over time with tragic results. The Mage-Priests saw that entropy had somehow crept into the cosmic order of the Old Ones.[1a]