Temple of the Worm

A manifestation of the god of death has been summoned within this relatively minor temple to its worship. Someone managed to break one of the seals of death and a massive death worm, a demon of the dead, now squirms in the main fane.

The temple itself is not a major one in the city or of the faith in question – a small structure (for a temple) of brown stone with a polished copper roof. The temple is significantly asymmetric, and in a roughly horseshoe shape with a wall enclosing the small courtyard that contains sixteen massive pillars each inscribed with the catechism of the lord of death.

The southern portion of the building is where the scribes work – accepting petitions from townsfolk, and working through the appropriate paperwork for the funeral rights of the deceased. These scribes reside in their clanhouses, coming to the temple to work. The scribes have a secret door that opens behind the small shrine outside. The door is only 3 feet by 3 feet, and is intended for the collection of offerings left at the shrine, not for actual egress from the building. Behind the scribes are three windowless cells belonging to junior priests (connected by a narrow secret passage) and the ramp down to the crypts below the temple (where much of the paperwork is stored regarding the histories of the dead and where their bodies can be found).

The northern portion of the temple includes the multi-tiered main fane (currently hosting the avatar of the Lord of Death), a smaller private shrine, and some libraries containing documents that are considered important enough not to stash in the crypts below.

Since a massive death worm may not be what you want in this temple, I’ve included versions without it.

The 1200 dpi versions of the map were drawn at a scale of 300 pixels per square and are 9,600 x 7,200 pixels (32 x 24 squares). To use this with a VTT you would need to resize the squares to either 70 pixels (for 5′ squares) or 140 pixels (for the recommended 10‘ squares that make sense with the design) – so resizing the image to 2,240 x 1,680 pixels or 4,480 x 3,360 pixels, respectively.

https://dysonlogos.blog/2024/08/12/temple-of-the-worm/