The Positive Energy Plane
The Positive Energy Plane, often shortened to the Positive Plane, is a fundamental reservoir of positive energy associated with vitality, restoration, growth, and radiant power. It is not the source of anima or of life itself, though its energy can strengthen and sustain living creatures throughout the multiverse.
The plane is an open expanse without a surface, filled with light intense enough to overwhelm mortal sight. Positive energy permeates every part of it, forming shifting currents and concentrations that continually expand, disperse, and reform.
Despite its association with healing and vitality, the Positive Energy Plane is extremely dangerous to mortal travelers. Living bodies can contain only so much positive energy before the same force that restores them begins to overwhelm their physical form.
Structure and Environment
The Positive Energy Plane has no conventional ground, horizon, or permanent surface.
Travelers entering its open reaches find themselves suspended within an expanse of white radiance with few reliable landmarks. The light does not come from a sun or other identifiable source. It is produced by the plane itself.
Color is difficult to perceive beneath the surrounding brilliance. Objects can appear washed out or reduced to stark outlines against the light.
Most of the plane consists of open space and concentrations of positive energy. Solid matter is uncommon and generally originates elsewhere, carried into the plane through portals, planar travel, or other disturbances.
There is no breathable atmosphere. The plane contains energy rather than conventional air, and creatures that need to breathe must provide their own supply or use magic that removes that requirement.
Movement and Travel
Without a surface or conventional terrain, movement through the Positive Energy Plane requires some means of self-propulsion.
Magical flight, planar vessels, teleportation, and similar forms of movement can function, but ordinary winged flight is of little use without air to push against.
Direction is difficult to establish. The uniform radiance provides few visual reference points, and there is no natural horizon by which travelers can orient themselves.
Fragments of foreign matter, permanent structures, and recognizable changes in the surrounding energy can serve as landmarks. Even with such references, travel is limited by the amount of time most creatures can safely remain exposed to the plane.
Access to the Plane
The Positive Energy Plane lies outside the ordinary transit networks of the Ethereal and Astral Planes. Reaching it generally requires direct planar magic, a permanent portal, or another controlled means of crossing.
Reliable arrival points are especially valuable because of the plane's extreme conditions. Travelers who enter without knowing their destination may find themselves suspended in open radiance with no shelter or recognizable landmark nearby.
Portals opening into unusually intense concentrations of positive energy can be fatal even to creatures prepared for planar travel. Most expeditions therefore aim for known Edge Zones, protected structures, or other regions where conditions are comparatively stable.
Positive Energy
Positive energy can strengthen living creatures, but exposure does not remain beneficial indefinitely.
Initial exposure may accelerate natural healing, restore vitality, and reduce the effects of exhaustion or injury. Continued exposure forces increasing amounts of positive energy into the body until the creature can no longer safely contain it.
At that point, the energy becomes destructive. An unprotected mortal body may rupture under the accumulated force, releasing the excess in a burst of radiant light.
This danger is not simply a form of radiant damage. Resistance to radiant energy may protect against some manifestations of the plane, particularly intense eruptions, but it does not by itself prevent positive-energy saturation.
Creatures that do not rely on ordinary biological processes may respond differently. Constructs, elementals, and other unusual beings can possess very different tolerances depending on their nature.
Positive energy is closely associated with radiant power, but not every source of radiant magic draws directly from the Positive Energy Plane. Divine magic, the Weave, and other forms of supernatural power can produce radiant effects without requiring a direct connection to the plane.
Edge Zones
The concentration of positive energy is not uniform throughout the plane.
Regions commonly called Edge Zones contain lower levels of positive energy than the deeper reaches and provide the closest thing the plane has to comparatively safe territory.
Foreign matter tends to accumulate more readily in these areas. Travelers have reported fragments of stone, ruined structures, planar debris, and other material suspended within the radiance.
Some permanent structures have been established in Edge Zones because the reduced intensity makes longer occupation possible with sufficient protection.
Even these regions remain dangerous. They are safer only in comparison with the rest of the plane.
Radiant Eruptions
Some regions contain concentrations of positive energy far greater than the surrounding plane.
These concentrations can flare suddenly, producing radiant eruptions capable of overwhelming unprotected creatures almost immediately.
Such regions can expand, contract, move, or disappear over time. A route considered relatively safe during one expedition may therefore become unusable during the next.
The most intense areas are generally avoided even by experienced planar travelers.
Inhabitants
Life within the Positive Energy Plane is poorly documented.
Any native creature must be capable of surviving concentrations of positive energy that are fatal to most beings from Eldareth. Some entities appear to be composed partly or entirely of the plane's energy, while others possess natural adaptations that allow them to endure prolonged exposure.
Creatures that do not depend on ordinary biological processes may also survive for longer periods, though their ability to function within the plane varies considerably.
Because most expeditions are brief and remain close to Edge Zones or established portals, knowledge of anything inhabiting the deeper plane remains limited.
Natural Hazards
The greatest danger on the Positive Energy Plane is positive energy itself.
Natural resilience and ordinary healing do little to solve the problem because prolonged exposure continually forces more vitality into a living body than it can safely contain. Radiant eruptions can increase this danger dramatically and turn a previously stable region lethal without warning.
The absence of breathable air creates another immediate hazard. Travelers who need to breathe must carry their own supply or rely on magic.
There is also little natural food or drinkable water. Supplies must usually be brought from another plane.
The combination of overwhelming radiance, few landmarks, no atmosphere, and limited safe exposure makes becoming lost particularly dangerous.
Survival
Survival on the Positive Energy Plane requires extensive preparation.
Protection against positive-energy saturation is essential for prolonged visits. Defenses against radiant energy can provide additional protection against some of the plane's manifestations, but they are not sufficient on their own.
Travelers who need to breathe must provide their own air, while food and water normally need to be brought from elsewhere. Expeditions are therefore usually kept short and planned around known portals, Edge Zones, or protected structures.
Even with these precautions, the Positive Energy Plane remains hostile to ordinary mortal life. The energy that can restore strength and vitality elsewhere exists here in concentrations far beyond what most living bodies can safely endure.