Arcane Tower

The Arcane Tower, also referred to as the Enchanted Tower or simply the Ruined Tower, was an underground magical research site and the former home of the Mystran cleric L. De Hurst for a time during the late 15 century DR. The structure exemplified the perfect blend of technology and arcane, demonstrating how the pair were best utilized for the ease and comfort of those capable of wielding them.

Location
The tower was situated in an area roughly beneath the Sunlit Wetlands of the Western Heartlands. It was built on the shores of a subterranean beach within the Underdark near the lower reaches of a ruined temple of Selûne.

Structure
The Arcane Tower was unlike many others of its kind built aboveground. Its structure was built from stone in an architectural style that was not out of the place in the Realms but held many features not often seen elsewhere. Metal piping wound around and within and around the tower's exterior, seemingly serving as a conduit for a central power source within its core.

Interior
The primary entranceway and entrance chamber was found on the tower's fourth floor. While its stately appearance featured beauteous decorations it was rather cold and impersonal. It held no remarkable features, save for the pair of arcane turrets aimed at the front doors. Within its center was an impressive magical elevator emblazoned with the holy symbol of Mystra that like the rest of the tower, was powered by the magic of the natural world.

The interior chambers of the tower were illuminated by glowing bulbs that radiated white-blue light, the same color often associated with the power of Mystra. The energy flowing through the tower's infrastructure of conduits was released in magnificent chandeliers that decorated the ceilings of several of its larger chambers.

Upper Floors
The fifth floor of the tower held its primary residence, personal study and library. It was perhaps the most intimate place in the Arcane Tower, most resembling a 'normal' home found in the world above.

The top floor served as the tower's workshop. It housed a forge and anvil, granting De Hurst a place to carry out repairs or tinker with his clockwork constructs. Pieces of machinery were strewn across the numerous desks and tables and all across the floor.

Lower Floors
"...endeavor to explain how I myself created items with both antimagic properties, and ones using the magical absorption of the Sussur Tree Flowers as a power source."

- Excerpt from The Antimagic Properties of Sussur Tree Flowers, by L. De Hurst.

The floor beneath the entranceway served as the storage and primary research area for the myriad fungi that De Hurst studied. All manner of fungal specimens were found within, including some that nearly reach the ceiling above.

The ground floor and first basement of the tower were built within the same chamber, one large enough to house the core of its arcane engine. Large casks, storage crates and unidentified machinery lined the walls of the room, surrounding the massive engine in its center. The device was a cylindrical, glass-lined chamber large enough for any man to step through, with pipes extending out to the rest of the tower. Within it was a pedestal on which the blooming flowers of sussur plants could be placed. While sussur blooms held profound anti-magic properties, De Hurst's experimentation and inventions demonstrated how they could be used to power magic-based technology.

Beneath the two-floor engine room was De Hurst's secret, hidden away study. It was within this chamber that the insightful cleric kept their most prized possessions, personal diaries, accounts of profound excavations, and fittingly, more space to conduct additional studies.

Activities
For at least three years, the Arcane Tower served as the site where De Hurst conducted their study of magical properties of plants in the Underdark, specifically those surrounding the sussur tree, its use as a magical power source, and the creation of enchanted items.

Defenses
Within the tower's entryway and just beyond the bridge outside was a battery of arcane turrets. These non-intelligent constructs shots blasts of arcane energy against any being they detected as some manner of threat.

The true protectors of the Arcane Tower however were the handful of constructs led by a unique automaton built for precisely this purpose.

History
De Hurst was believed to have left the Arcane Tower for the final time on Alturiak 2 in the, during a return trip to Baldur's Gate. They left behind their magically-constructed companion, which remained alone in the tower for over a decade.

Inhabitants
Aside from De Hurst, the tower housed one additional semi-intelligent being: the arcane construct named Bernard. The erudite automaton did not appear to have free will but could be given set instructions by reciting lines from one of De Hurts's favorite plays, The Roads to Darkness.

Four sets of animated armor remained within the top floor of the tower alongside Bernard. Unlike him they were unable to communicate aside of the squeak of their joints or clunks of their movements.

Appearances

 * Video Games
 * Baldur's Gate III