The Wine Sea

South of the Western Belt mountain range and north of the Broken Tusks, the crescent-shaped Salted Sands Desert provides over 800 leagues of coastline for the Wine Sea. Named after the extremely-salted, dark purple waters along the coast, the Wine Sea connects to the Do'Lean Strait, the Crystal Gorge, and the Sea of Keeping. When The pink salt of the Salted Sands Desert dissolves into the naturally blue waters of the Wine Sea, the concentration of liquified salt turns those waters a deep purple which fades gradually back where the sea meets the Do'Lean strait and the waters of the Crystal Gorge.   Despite the high salinity of the water, the Wine Sea supports a vibrant marine ecosystem. Many species of fish, mammals, reptiles, and birds call these waters their home. The seaweed and kelp that grows there are nutritious and a staple food for the Areian people of the desert and the Nomadic tribes of the spiced peninsula. There are a handful of fish and animals that should be noted due to their predatory nature. The most notorious is a ray-like species of shark called the Sand Slit that lies in wait to ambush anything foolish enough to swim directly over it or step on it. Another is the Salspray eagle, which has a wingspan of over 14 feet on average and dives at its prey from extremely high altitudes to reach a velocity that enables its mass to sever organs from arteries upon impact. Then there is the Salted Krait which is both poisonous and venomous. It is a species of snake that can live in the water and along the sandy coast. It is a 20-foot-long master of camouflage that can change its appearance to mimic a piece of floating driftwood or to disappear completely by matching its color perfectly to the waters it swims through or the sand it lays on.   Like the Salted Sands itself, the Wine Sea is beautiful, but it can also be deadly. The deep water currents are incredibly strong and occasionally form maelstroms in the center waters between the north and south coasts of the desert. The preditors are ample, and the appearance of calm, glass-like waters allows people to be lured into a false sense of peace which for the ignorant allows for complacency, which invites misfortune.