The City Of Sand And Glass

Enter a new world beneath the Chaldean Desert Chp. 1

Ras Shamra, the ancient home of the Nippar lay buried within the shifting sands of the Chaldean Desert. One would think that it might be nigh impossible to create such a thing as a city beneath a land wrought from a structure of change. Ras Shamra is a testament to the patience of the people who called this place home. Once a nomadic people, the Nippar found a home among the peaks to the East that formed a natural boundary for the Chaldean. It was in those caves that Ras Shamra was truly built, for it is unique in being the only city that was planned completely before the first piece of sand moved. Once complete, it never changed. No new houses, shops or even property was ever added for that was not within the original plans.

Though Ras Shamra is unique in many facets there is one other item that truly sets it apart from all others. It remains the only city to ever be constructed in complete secrecy. Many generations ago these people began to tunnel. First when they made their homes in the shallow caves among the foothills. Then later when they ventured into the stony crags of the great Eastern mountains. For many years the Nippar lived in those mountains in quiet seclusion, until the day the Great Architect came to their dark abode. It was this outsider who first spread the seed that would one day be a city of unparallel construction. The appearance of this now mythic figure is one that has been muddled with the passing of time. Though the Great Architect has yet to be raised to true God status; he is as close as any figure has come within the Nipparian society. Even the introduction to the idea of Ras Shamra is now a matter of myth and conjecture, but one thing is never questioned. The Nippar owed their existence to the Great Architect. It was his plan that led the Nippar out of their mountain homes and into the great desert. His voice that instructed the generations to follow in the methods of construction, which would some day allow the impossible to come true. Only the Great Architect had the foresight to know that the Nippar would perish if the stayed within their mountain holes. A prophecy that later fo-filled itself in the spectacular fashion of a volcano within the very mountain where the Nippar once lived. And finally, it was the Great Architect who taught these people that the secrecy of Ras Shamra must be the first and most effective defense against the world outside. None but the Nippar even knew it existed, and that was a secret, which the Nippar kept at all costs.

Generations of Nippar devoted themselves to Ras Shamra's construction. So many infact that there is no surviving record of when the initial construction began, but the how is well known to all. The Great Architect started with a small sketch on the wall of the great common cave. That sketch becames a rough layout, which became a blueprint laid out on a type of paper scroll made from the stock of a tough vine that grew wild amoung the mountains. As the idea took root within the heart of the community this first scroll seemed to breed of its own accord until there was a copy in every household under the mountain. It was then that Ras Shamra began to flurish. Parents sent their children to apprentice with the Great Architect. Help that he accepted gracefully and used to the point of exhaustion. While he worked on designing first the city and then each individual buildings; he put these youth to work mining the coal that could be found in the mountains. Just how the Architect knew about this energy source is unclear, but once it began to flow the Nippar civilization began to prosper. In the early days they used it both as a fuel and as an item for trade. But, neither of these were designs that the Architect had for coal. While a large percentage went to the populace, he insisted that great storage caves be assigned. Here the Nippar deposited one bucket for every two that went to trade and use. During this time the Architect designated locations for the continual expansion of tunnels. Picking specfic areas he assigned miners to dig for depth rather than more usable grades. As the depth increased strange rumors circulated among the people that the Great Architect audaciously planned to tunnel all the way to the Chaldean, and in fact he did.