Hill pulled out a three-dimensional map of Faerûn and traced the long route with his finger... Was William's destination really Imbutu, or somewhere else along the way?
At the mention of the Starfall Sea, the first thing anyone thought of was the Cult of the Dragon... Even now, plenty of Dracoliches remained in the surrounding area.
Of course, the Starfall Sea had once been home to more Metallic Dragons than anywhere else, especially Gold Dragons.
Unfortunately, the Gold Dragon King had been too confident in his own abilities to heed the other Gold Dragons' warnings and leave Toril. He had gone mad during the Dragonrage and been killed by his own kind, leaving the Metallic Dragons with an aversion to the place.
So even though they knew the Dragonrage was over for good, those who returned to Toril mostly moved to sparsely populated places... especially the High Desert.
After all, the Zhentarim had reached the end of the road, and even the Phaerimm in the desert had been hunted to extinction by the frenzied mages of Ghost City.
Ghost City had no interest in finding slaves to mine for it anytime soon, either... The prince who had stolen that Nether Scroll was still on the run!
Even during the Spellplague, when the Arcanists had all emerged to fight for power, the Netherese Princes remained focused on catching him.
They were too powerful to care much about worldly authority. If they wanted something, how many places would dare refuse them?
It was precisely because of that arrogance that the High Desert's rich metal and gemstone mines belonged to whoever claimed them first. That held considerable appeal for the Metallic Dragons.
The Metallic Dragons had left, and the true Dracoliches of the Cult of the Dragon had little fondness for the human-populated