Sorry for the lack of articles everyone. It turns out that coming up with names for things is a real pain and I was tired of writing “my setting” all the time. I think I have a route to naming some of the elements of the world, but it is still a work in progress to find ones that I like, fit the setting, and are actually pronounceable. In the meantime please enjoy this article about an underground highway.

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A strange whistling sound floats past you in the narrow ancient tunnel. Looking ahead you can see some dim flickering light in the distance. As you approach you find that the pre-imperial road you have been traveling along is suddenly bisected by a ruined highway, strewn with the remains of crashed vehicles. Every few moments a dim light suddenly appears on the ceiling, illuminating the lanes and ancient tunnels leading away, but disappears before you can get a good glimpse of the source.

After the fall of the empire ancient, pre-empire, subterranean roads were some of the safest routes to travel on. They are not very common; they were only built to connect the largest pre-empire settlements, or smaller settlements that were close together, and many of them were destroyed over the centuries in earthquakes or construction. Those tunnels that remain were typically created by using short tunnels to connect natural caverns. These connecting tunnels are typically only wide enough for a couple of people to walk side by side, or maybe for a small cart sledge.

Many of the tunnels that are still in use connect to the basements or subterranean highways of surface cities built during the empire. These crossovers are the most dangerous spots of the pre-imperial roads because of the dangerous magical devices and direct access to the surface that can be found there, but this also makes them the most attractive spots for treasure hunters and archeologists alike.

This particular crossing consists of a narrow rough hewn tunnel which intersects with a much larger concrete lined one. where the two tunnels meet on either side of the imperial highway are some small alcoves with dirty plaques describing the history of the ancient passages, several of which are still covered in the remnants of graffiti. The remains of metal vehicles float a few inches above several lanes of an odd, asphalt like substance filled with small flakes of twinkling metal.

The roof of this chamber is hidden in the gloom about twenty feet above your heads and the source of the lights is initially unclear, use the following table to determine where the lights are coming from.

D8	Description
1	Large insect like creatures are crawling along the ceiling, periodically lighting up their abdomens to attract their prey. These blinks are sometimes followed by a small squeal and a crunching sound.
2	Ancient ventilation shafts are malfunctioning and opening erratically. Each opening is proceeded by a short beeping sound before the shaft clicks open and then immediately shut again letting in a brief smell of sulfur.
3	It appears that there are small holes that are being covered by either a large heard of creatures or a single ginormous one moving around on the surface. A sucking sound accompanies each appearance of light.
4	A strange mist is swirling along the roof of the tunnel causing magical energy conduits to spark when it touches them. The mist seams to be searching for a way out of the maze of conduits.
5	Ancient light fixtures of alternating colors are still trying to flicker in a pattern to signal drivers that there is an emergency. Many of the vehicles appear to contain perfectly preserved individuals locked in a look of horror.
6	There is cat-like creature hiding in crashed ancient truck bed, playing with a small construct that keeps shooting a small laser at the ceiling in an attempt to distract it and escape.
7	The sparkling floor is covered in some form of thick liquid that appears to be slowly oozing through the ceiling. Whenever a drop of it drips down, static energy in the air causes it to spark briefly.
8	A magical artificial intelligence is attempting to use the broken traffic signalling system to communicate, but there is not enough energy left to power any particular sign for more than a moment.

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That is all for today. I should be starting a short star wars adventure soon using a system agnostic mini-setting I developed one point. I hope to write articles about the different places and NPCs my players find in the coming weeks.