The Uchronic Mediterranean is the sea between Europe, Africa and Asia Minor in Antiterra. It is the setting of the imperial-age quest for Pablo’s Book around Alexandria in the year 270, and of the voyage from Nice to Bucharest in Uchronic Paris.
| Type | Place (sea) |
| World | Antiterra |
| Spanish entry | Mediterráneo (Ucrónico) |
The imperial Mediterranean (270)
The Roman Empire is in crisis: distrustful co-emperors, legions that proclaim and kill generals within weeks. In Alexandria, the Great Port receives grain barges for Rome and the Port of Happy Return receives ships from the open sea; Greeks, Egyptians, Romans and Jews live there in tense balance. The city’s lighthouse burns 160 meters above the sea.
The Book. A sealed, ciphered treatise of elemental astrology that grows when someone who understands it opens it, like boxes within boxes. Only Paulus of Alexandria, scribe and astrologer, can read it, and the heavens have ruled that he must receive it.
Marcos the Mage. Marcos the Mage, a necromancer of Alexandria spoken of in the alleys of Kibotos, sails a metal-framed ship full of creatures. He means to descend to the Seventh Circle of the underworld, steal the Book, return and destroy Alexandria.
The descent. The group descends into Avernus with safe-conducts that expire after twenty-four hours, through seven circles of punishment. King Minos lets the living pass disguised as condemned weapons. They meet flies with children’s faces, a red-haired elf in a narrow canyon, and an Infernal Library in the Seventh Circle. They emerge by an underground river between the Pillars of Hercules, inscribed Nec Plus Ultra, to find that ten years have passed; Marcos has become counselor to the Roman Emperor.
Deaths. Earlier, on a hill in Greece, a curious youth with a treasure map is killed by a leucrota; his companions bury the remains. Neferu, who strangles enemies with her hands and was Marcos’s wife, dies alone against a small dragon.
The Serapeum. The Serapeum has seven chambers, secret doors and terraces over the water. Inside, Pablo is chained and gaunt, copying; a master demon bears many chains; twenty-four hooded, child-sized copyists transcribe in silence. Roman soldiers surround the building shouting “Thieves!”
Unknown to all, Antiterra is draining toward the Band of Dissolution. The Angarian Pantheon had been locked in the Abyss centuries earlier, and the portal from Iron Mountain pointing to the year 428 already exists.
The voyage of Uchronic Paris
The group sails from Nice toward Bucharest for a secret landing, a trip of an estimated four to seven days along the Italian coasts, the Tyrrhenian and the Adriatic, avoiding main ports and continuing by river, perhaps the Danube.
A water naga, a large serpentine creature with hypnotic powers, attacks. Corvino is charmed while Swan, Claude, Philippe and Aby fight on deck. After a decisive shot they win and preserve the body and head in brine. Later a lunar naga rises from the Black Sea.