"It is a land of red-litten vaults and immense cities of cyclopean stone, lying far beneath the grassy mounds of the Great Plains." — H.P. Lovecraft
In 1930, H.P. Lovecraft penned the novella The Mound (ghostwritten for Zealia Bishop), telling the tale of a mysterious prehistoric mound in Oklahoma guarded by phantom sentinels. Beneath it lies a colossal subterranean empire of high-tech immortal humanoids known as the citizens of K'n-yan.
Having migrated from the stars before the Earth was fully formed, the people of K'n-yan mastered physical sciences, conquered disease and death, and perfected telepathic communication. Yet this absolute mastery brought decadent boredom. They retreated into their red-lit caverns, dedicating their immortal lives to cruel gladiatorial spectacles, dark biological mutations (the Y'm-bhi slave dead), and the worship of alien deities.
The game's exploration spans three distinct levels of descending cosmic horror, each with its own light anomalies and gravity distortions.
Illuminated by a strange, magnetic red bioluminescence. This level features immense cities of cyclopean stone, telepathic immortals, and shrines to the Great Beast Tulu (Cthulhu) and Yig (the Snake God). Highly vertical with grand bridges.
Deep beneath K'n-yan lies Yoth, a shadowy cavern of black basalt ruins. Once home to a highly advanced reptilian race who worshipped the toad-deity Tsathoggua. Their civilization was wiped out in a forgotten cosmic war, leaving only cold ash and ruins.
Below Yoth lies the absolute bottom of Earth's crust: N'kai. A pitch-black abyssal realm of liquid mud, where light cannot penetrate even with mechanical lamps. It is populated by formless, gelatinous black ooze entities that speak only in telepathic whispers.
Trace the discoveries and tragic expeditions that mapped the gateways to K'n-yan.
Spanish explorer Francisco de Coronado leads a grand conquest seeking the golden cities of Cibola. Panfilo de Zamacona, a young Spanish hidalgo, joins the cavalry.
Guided by native rumors of a sacred mound, Zamacona slips away from Coronado's trail, finds the hidden gate in Oklahoma, and descends into the red-litten vaults of K'n-yan.
Zamacona lives among the immortal citizens, learning their telepathic tongue and documenting their terrifying architecture, Cthulhu worship, and the liquid black ooze of N'kai.
Zamacona attempts to escape with his manuscript. He is captured by K'n-yan guards, who amputate his legs and neck-veins, turning him into a brainless, immortal Y'm-bhi slave sentinel.
Archaeologist Alvah de Spain unearths Zamacona's silver cylinder pack saddle containing the manuscript, triggering the modern-day scavenger expeditions seen in the game.