14 April 2023

I was mostly just trying to get a sense for what the setting is, what kind of city it is, for Tirian and Gwen’s story. I haven’t fully decided yet, but even if I don’t use this visual for this story, it does seem like a cool aesthetic.

As I enter through the city gates, I am struck by the verticality of the city. It is built on and into the cliffside, sprawling up past the summit, like a strange fusion of Minas Tirith and the old Pueblo cliff dwellings.

Featured prominently almost a thousand feet above me, at the highest point of the city, sits their temple, dedicated to the worship of the light. I’ll probably have to dive deep into that soon-ish. What exactly do they worship? What are their beliefs? Traditions? Holidays? That’s for later, though. Hopefully by then, I’ll have established more of a plot.

In the meantime, I stroll through the city, here at the base of the cliff. It’s ever so slightly to the north of the cliff face, meaning it sees marginally less sun than the rest of the city; that’s why, in this culture that celebrates light, it’s been shunted off onto the poor. This section seems covered in dust, at least as I currently envision it; it’s actually really similar to the undercity in the movie Alita: Battle Angel, though without the sci-fi elements. I’m having trouble being certain of the environment outside the city, though; is it desert, or does life thrive, like a forest or jungle?

There are various ladders and stairs up to the various cliff dwellings, along with a gated stairway heading to a large terrace that makes up the middle layer of the city. Who lives here? What kind of jobs do they do?