The figure slipped into the Beheaded Fiend Inn almost unnoticed, so quickly the door opened and closed. It seemed to be a human female dressed in ragged black clothes. She did not carry any weapons and there was no place to hide spell components on her body. Still people inched away from her unconsciously, as though they where afraid of being near the creature. Tandra looked at her guests puzzled and ask softly: "Why are they afraid of her?" Elandra said: "She is associated with Death in a way I do not understand." Tandra said gently: "They do not react to you that way." The winged female said: "It is more the promise of dark secrets revealed that makes them shy away. I think she is one of the Deathspeaker fey clan, but do not blame me, if I am wrong."
The figure crossed the distance between the doorway and the counter, followed by an unsual hush. Chatter was slow to pick up after the female had passed. She faced Tandra, who returned her gaze without blinking, not comprehending the fear the stranger had generated. "You want to tell me something?", she asked. The stranger nodded and said: "I wanted to talk about planar pathways and one you most likely do not even know." Her voice was only a whisper, just below creating real tone. When Tandra walked to the stranger to lead her to a remote table it seemed as though the stranger was only half the size of the imposing fiendslayer. The whisperer was slender beyond the point of being thin and more than a full head smaller than Tandra.
She almost seemed to glare at the fiendslayer, when she started to speak: "Planar pathways, a planewalker's lifeblood and a record keeper's nightmare, the fabric of the multiverse is strewn with them. Portals riddle reality like holes, shortcuts of direct transports anchored between two archways somewhere. Conduits line the astral plane like veins of a living being, while vortices channel primal elemental power into the prime from places of high concentrations of the respective element. The infinite staircase connects to places of creativity and art. Conduits seem easiest to keep track of, as they slowly appear and slowly disappear again, while portals form and disappear randomly, while the staircase connects only to places of creativity."
The stranger paused a moment. Tandra wanted to say something, but the stranger already spoke, before the fiendslayer managed to open her mouth. "I will tell you about the Infinity Web, the most dangerous and elusive of pathways. Arranged in nice categories, guvner style, the way mortals like hearing things.
1. What is the Infinity Web?
Portals, Conduits, Votices and the Infinite Staircase are four pathways and as everyone with an idea about cosmology knows, four is a bad number for anything. There has to be something else. Indeed, there is a fifth pathway, maybe the most present of all, yet at the same time the hardest to reach and use. The Infinity Web can transport you to any place in less than an heartbeat and it is said, it can even zap you to any time you want to visit, if you know how to navigate within this world. I do not think that you are suprised to hear, that the Web is heavily guarded, especially the dangerous time tunnels, only very few may access.
"One therory says that Infinity Web has been installed by the True Nameless with the help of other fey elders, after their incapability to communicate led to a multiversal near-disaster. (Do not even try to think about it.) Most say that it has always been there, but only later it was shaped and modified by the fey elders for their use. The truth has been lost to the passing aeons. The only important fact is, that anyone who manages to translate him- her- or itself into the Web can reach any place in the multiverse, where they want to go. Intended for use only by the faery elders, beings so incredible and powerful that even the gods fear them, travelling the Web is a tremendous risk to mortals and paramortals alike.
"See, the Infinity Web does more than only connect everything, even though this is already unusal enough to begin with. It also collects information and stores it in a mysterious way still not understood, making some think that it was never supposed to be a place to travel. Canny fey elders not knowing this found a way to translate themselves into the Web and travel space and sometimes even time by using the paths of the Infinity Web. A long time passed until mortals, top-shelf mindbenders and spell-slingers all of them, found a way to travel within the Web. Of course they have always been far more limited than the fey, who understand the nature of the Web.
"Some claim the Inifinty Web is without any hirachy and organisation, just spanning all of the multiverse. Most say that the Web is more like a spider's cobweb centred in Sigil. The Lady of Pain is the spider in the centre of the Infinity Web processing all Information entering the Web to redistribute it throughout the multiverse to communicate with the other true nameless and give information and orders to the lesser fey. No mortal can ever understand any part of these thoughts. Come to think about it, a single thought of someone who can process an inifinte amount of information in virtually no time will shut your brain-box down and as a backlash anything else too. (Sounds familar, doesn't it? - the Bard)
2. How to find it
"Finding the Infinity Web is tricky to say the least. An unusal spot at a wall, a hair somewhere, almost everything can be an entry point into the network. There is a simple spell called Network Contact (3rd level space spell; divination) that senses the presence of an entry point of the Infinity Web and makes it glow for a dozen or so heartbeats. Mindbenders have a similar ability, called Network Information (4th level telepathy/link power; telekinetic devotion) that makes the psionicist instantly aware of the presence and location of any link into the web in an radius of ten steps surrounding her current location. (The same range goes for the spell.)
"For bean-counters (and DM's - the Bard) there are always 2d8-4 links in the area of effect on any given place in any plane. (Negative results mean that there is no link in the area.) In metropolitan areas (Palanthus in Krynn before the age of dragons, Waterdeep or Silverymoon on Toril, Stargarr on Aslaniar for instance), the chance increases to 2d10-4. In the City of Doors, the chance is highly increased to 2d12+4 links in any given situation. Guess why it is called the Infinity Web?) As a completely unrelated side note the access points are always within solid matter.
3. How to get into the Infinity Web
"Once you have found the Web, which is actually ridiculously easy if you know the dark of it, the tricky part begins. Obviously no-one fits into a space as small a human's hair is thick. Even if you managed to shrink to the according size, using top-shelf magic or psionice, you would find that the area is as solid as rock. The Infinity Web cannot transfer matter, only information.
"There is a top-shelf spell called Infinity Translation doing the trick. (9th level mind and body spell; alteration school) Mindbenders can use the Infinity Meld power to do the same trick even more smoothly. (10th level telekinesis/link power; telekinetic science). Both the spell and the psionic power can only be learned from fey of intermediate or higher level, and it is unlikely that they show it mortals for any but the most important reasons. Faeries and changelings can enter the web at will, but even for them ravel ranges are usually quite limited.
4. Navigating The Infinity Web
"The way you navigate the Infinity Web depends on your status. Mortals can only go to places they are familiar with, i.e. their own home or an often frequented tavern. All you will see is swirl of more colours than any mortal can name changing into a tunnel. Spacefarers have likend it to the sight of the World Ocean or Phlogiston. A few confusing moments later you will become aware of solid surroundings. When this happens, you have arrived at your destination. Any spectators will think that you have teleported. If you would arrive in area to small for you (because it is crowded or caved in for instance), you are bounced back and reappear at your starting place, as though you phased out for a moment.
"If the end where you started is also occupied or barred for some reason, you will feel a confusing (and possibly frightening) sensation of being bounced through weightless envirnments for several heartbeats, rebounding from soft rubbery, almost translucent walls. Finally you will be dropped in an area adjecent to your original destination. Least fey and changelings have a little more control over their destination. They may enter any place where they already set foot by conentrating on this place while being part of the Web. Sometimes they might see a few lines of incomrehansible text or fragments of highly advanced mathmatical formulae. When these beings enter the web they can become a rainbow swirl sucked into an opaque part of the wall, but usually they just disappear the way mortals do.
"Lesser fey can occasionally see crossroads in the tunnels of swirling colour and stay for a few moments to decide where they want to go. If they do so, instead of just letting the current carry them, they are instantly aware, of the names of every possible destination, but not necessarily of their meaning, or what expects them there. Of course they can re-enter the web at any point, where they meet unfavorable conditions, if they aren't instantly killed by the environs or the inhabitants.
"Intermediate fey are the least beings able to percieve a part of the network structure. They can tell crossroads from minor data nodes and access the latter. The minor nodes contain some recent information about everything in this area of the web. Intermediate fey can travel vast distances of the Infinity Web, but crossing the borders of crystal spheres or planar pathways is still near impossible for them, because the architecture seems quite two-dimensional to them, so they are missing some important relations and links.
"Greater fey have full travelling access into the net and can go, wherever they want to. Also the greater fey have access to medium nodes, that store the information of a crystal sphere or an equivalent portion of a plane. They may also distribute this information into minor nodes, where their inferiors are able to access it. In addition they are fully aware of the net's three-dimensional structure and can traverse it into all spatial and planar directions.
"True faeries, the most ancient and powerful of their kin are the only people with full access to everything that is stored within the web, its temporal dimension. It is possible for them to read and process information from every part of the Network and redistribute it for everyone below them to access. The amounts of information these fey work through on a regular base is so staggering, that even the most advanced mortal systems would break down trying to store even a tiny fraction of it, not to speak about analysing and working with it. True faeries are the only fey, who may traverse the temporal connections of the network in heavily limited ways, and no-one has ever been known to break these rules.
"Naturally the True Nameless have unrestricted full access to every part of the network. It is also belived that sometimes beings, who should be unable to traverse the Infinity Web in more than the simplest ways get 'upgrades' to higher positions, so that they can do something that is important for the fey or maybe even the multiverse. Of course it might just be barmy talk. As long as no higher fey are around people can rattle their bone-boxes about the Infinity Web as long as they want to, because there are only very few, who know the dark of it.
5. Conclusion
"You can use the Infinity Web to get somewhere or for a quick escape, but it is not necessarily a nice journey. I only wanted you to be aware, that this option exists." Tandra nodded and looked at the female. It is nice to know that it exists, but it is of little help for is, if we cannot translate ourselves into the Web. The female nodded and said: "I fear that you will need it." She handed the minotaur a scroll and looked at Elandra. You know how tricky unfamilar psionics can be, but your turn will also come. The winged woman nodded and looked at the faerie intently. Tandra asked: "It is said that you can see anyone's dark secrets. I would like to know mine, just in case the fiends have something they can use against me."
"The amazing thing about you is that you know your own dark and dirty secrets, so you where not afraif of me", the faerie said, suddenly speaking with a gentle and pleasant voice. Tandra asked: "Is there anything you can tell me about Tarsheva Longreach? I promised to help her." The faerie nodded slowly and said: "I will talk to you in some private chamber, where we are undisturbed." Tandra nodded her agreement and looked at the dwarf. The Deathspeaker shook her head and said: "No, he already knows himself. He is in those spirits, because he tries to forget."
Someone else walked to her and asked for some dark secret or another. The faerie shook her head and said: "I see only what I see and most of it is in your own eyes." The man insisted and realised a moment later that he had made a horrible mistake. The female's voice rose, but everyone wished it had not. It was unpleasant and cold like unmelting ice. For the man it seemed as though the same ice was burning on his bared nerve-strings. "I said no. Get lost." The man stared at he for a moment and fled in panic, even forgetting to close the door. A few turnes later he realised that he had missed a turn somewhere and ended up in the hive. Then he collapsed. Dead.
A DM's Miscellany
"I am telling this for only one blood, the one you call Dungeon Master. If you are none of these then get lost. What are you still doing here? Am I supposed to become very unpleasant? No? Good, then we can begin with the chant.
"Cyberspace and the Infinity Web: Some might be reminded of a concept mortals call cyberspace, a place of virtual reality in many ways similar to the mindscape, but not as all-encompassing. Some of the most advanced systems (SilverNet comes to mind) have links into the Infinity Web, but using them is at least risky. When a decker (a mortal mentally connected into the artificial reality of cyberspace) makes the transition from the virtual reality into the Infinity Web, all of her is translated, which means that the body fades away. She will also notice, that the space around her reacts differently from the VR she is used to.
"Being used to this type of network, they can usually work at the level of intermediate fey. Of course the real surprise comes when they either face the Network's guardians, which are sentient and strange creatures instead of artificial intelligence programs, or when they leave the net and find themselves somewhere else than the room where they started decking. (Note: There is a 50% chance that they return to their original place, because of the strong neuronal connection to the cyberdeck.)
"Adventure Hook (Generic): The adventurers have a faerie or changeling friend, and are not necessarily aware of their friend's nature and even less of the Infinity Web. Their Friend takes a shortcut and is "sucked" into the web. While trying to find out what is going on, all types of strange things might happen, they might have to deal with an incredible number of various fey. If they find out or not isn't really the point here, more the possibility. Having the fey appear and disappear in this way several times might add to the mystery and strangeness, both of their friend and that which they are trying to find out.
Adventure Hook (Shadowrun): Deckers disappear into the matrix. No, they don't get their brains fried, they simply vanish completely, not leaving anything behind. Maybe the PCs even watch a hacker vanish in a diplay of rainbow colors in some cyberspace cafe. Has someone found a way to use magic in the matrix? What does it mean? Why do some of those who disappeared return in completely random positions all over the world, a few still sane most in a state of absolute confusion, talking about concepts no-one ever heard off, many of these highly complicated?"