Flying City Sulla Sabbia

Nyaha has had yet another idea for a new location in Felarya! This one I've had for a while but it kinda' took a back seat to the Navroze Mountains, but with that place more or less cemented I feel it's time to really get to the grindstone on this one.

The basic idea is this: a city suspended over the sands of Akaptor Desert on a huge moving platform, supported by giant fans which kick up the sand beneath the city and make it look like a natural sandstorm from any distance more than a certain number of feet away from it (number to be determined).

The platform would be octagonal in shape, and the city would be built with smaller buildings closer to the edges of the platform. The tallest building, in the center of the platform, would be city hall, which also serves as the 'bridge' of the city. The city moves throughout the desert, stopping at key points, like oases and trading posts. Anyone within the city must wear special goggles which filter sand out of their line of sight, allowing them to see and not get sand in their eyes. The place would probably be zoned into three parts consisting of two sixths of the entire city, for industrial, residential, and commercial use.

This is all I have so far, but I'd like to think it's a good base to build on. I want to see other people's thoughts and ideas before I write up a rough draft of the article for it.

I have a question, three in fact. First question: where did they find the giant fans in the middle of the desert? Second question: where did they find the engines to make the fans work in the middle of the desert? Third question: where did they find an energy source strong enough to power said engines in the middle of the desert?

Balloons would be several orders of magnitude more practical.

Shady knight wrote:

I have a question, three in fact. First question: where did they find the giant fans in the middle of the desert? Second question: where did they find the engines to make the fans work in the middle of the desert? Third question: where did they find an energy source strong enough to power said engines in the middle of the desert?

In a more personal way I would say nyaha. Is that where is the fluff behind such a thing appearing? Something like that sounds like it deserves a little bit more of a background story in it's own right. You have a wild imagination, i'd like to here how this thing came about, was it other worldly? Is it an aweken construct that people built upon that autonomously repairs itself with unknown energies or a deeper secret. I'd really like to know   .

Shady Knight wrote:

I have a question, three in fact.  First question: where did they find the giant fans in the middle of the desert?  Second question: where did they find the engines to make the fans work in the middle of the desert?  Third question: where did they find an energy source strong enough to power said engines in the middle of the desert?

Well, realistically, nobody just finds giant fans in the middle of the desert, but I realize that's sarcasm. It's just that stupid questions deserve stupid answers. Xp Now, for serious, I think it would be practical to have had the city, or at least the platform, fans, and energy units, built somewhere else, then flown/transported to the desert. No I don't have a set idea why or how. This would also be my answer to the second. For the third, solar energy seems like it would be the best idea here. Ideally, the city would be covered end-to-end in energy-gathering panels, gathering enough energy during the days to keep airborne through the nights.

parameciumkid wrote:

Balloons would be several orders of magnitude more practical.

While that may be true, I don't know where the sandstorm effect keeping the city hidden from predators would come from if balloons were used. If you can help me come up with that, I might be more inclined to give your idea further consideration.

ravaging vixens wrote:

In a more personal way I would say nyaha. Is that where is the fluff behind such a thing appearing? Something like that sounds like it deserves a little bit more of a background story in it's own right. You have a wild imagination, i'd like to here how this thing came about, was it other worldly? Is it an aweken construct that people built upon that autonomously repairs itself with unknown energies or a deeper secret. I'd really like to know   .

Hmm...Well I was thinking about this after Shady asked his questions. Here's my current version of the story - nothing is set in stone yet.

Several years ago, some faction in Felarya (maybe the Vishmitals?) funded an ambitious project - to create a weapon able to fly above the land of Felarya and rain destruction down on whoever they needed to, to achieve their goals. The construction of this weapon took place on a different world rather than Felarya, as it would be too vulnerable if done there. The idea was to complete construction of the weapon on that world using the combined engineering and labor abilities of that world's native inhabitants and individuals sent from Felarya by the controlling faction itself. However, one of that world's native workers, a charismatic man, did not like the idea of building such a massive and destructive weapon, especially when he couldn't get assurance from those above him that it would be used for altruistic purposes. Thus, he swayed others working on the weapon one by one in secret, garnering their support for a plan to launch the weapon into Felarya before its completion. Once he had amassed a large enough number of trusted people, he set the plan into motion: fooling the Felaryan faction's administrators on their world into thinking the incomplete weapon was being attacked by other forces and that it had to be moved immediately, the man's coalition of workers got them to command their mages to open the portal to Felarya, through which fell the weapon, which at that point consisted of almost everything it needed to be complete, including much of its weaponry, fans to hold it aloft, a control bridge high in the center with a 360 degree view, and a huge array of high-output solar panels. It landed in the sands of Akaptor, along with most of the workers' coalition, used the weapons to keep local predators at bay while they got the platform's flight capabilities working. Afterwards, they re-purposed the weapon by dismantling most of the weapons, leaving only what they needed to survive in this harsh new world, and used what they could salvage to build shelters on the platform. This marked the start of the flying city Sulla Sabbia under the leadership of the very man who led the revolt against the faction paying for it, who became the mayor and captain of the city.

I'm just going to say this sounds like a terrible idea from the ground up. Fans are going to have a great deal of difficulty supporting and stabilizing an entire city. The sand the fans whip up is going to rasp any moving parts to nothing if it doesn't jam them up first. The citizens would choke to death on the swirling sand unless they had special protection. As shady said, you are going to have a very hard time finding materials to construct, either the original, or any necessary replacement parts. Food would also be very hard to come across. Last but not least the city itself would be very easy to bring down if it ever actually lifted off. The idea is creative, but all in all, seems fractured.

While I do think you raised some good points, I'd really prefer to see people like you at least making an effort to help make the idea work before shooting it down. If you're going to point out problems, take the time to at least try to think of a solution or two.

One of the most practical ways a floating city or country might work is if it was magic-based, like the Kingdom of Zeal in Chrono Trigger, minus harvesting magic from a giant planet-eating space tick that's sleeping in the center of the planet. That way, stuff like big machines to keep the city afloat is largely a non-issue and you could chalk it up to something like Protoss crystal pylons. Otherwise, it's probably going to need immensely advanced tech like Cloud City in Star Wars As a tidbit, if it's only the size of a city, even something the size of Negav, and not the size of a country or continent that could hold its own ecosystem, then it's going to need a way to connect to the surface, like some kind of teleporter, so they can look for food or some kind or go to some kind of farm down there that provide them with that kind of stuff. As another suggestion, I recommend such a city to be incredibly ancient, like maybe the Sagolian era, and mostly be seen as a myth by modern-day Felaryans, and just a personal suggestion, I suggest the city is located high above the clouds so they don't have to worry about avian predators cause they can't naturally fly that high. You could chalk up being able to breathe up there again thanks to the Not-Pylons as creating a bubble of breathable atmosphere around the city.

I suggest powering the giant fans with slaves.    Shady's suggestion for a super-ancient, magical cloud city would work, but then you'd be just makin' a rehash o' Jallas Amar, the city of genies, just without genies. BTW, do you mean fans as in ducted fans, or as in paper fans? I thought you'd have the city flyin' on paper fans: just the kind of silly camp I favor.

You could also make it float on giant solid balls made of lead. Lead is the heaviest element you can afford sensibly, so obviously anything made of lead will float in midair. And since it's so heavy, it should take a lot of weight to drag the lead down once it's floating: floating balloons are for losers (Sorry, para    ), real men fly with their BIG BALLS OF STEEL!

If you know what I mean...:

Then there's dimensional twistin' stuff: if the city uses portals, it can put the ground level anywhere it wants, simply by opening a portal whose exit lies at ground level. You could even power the city using portals and BIG BALLS OF STEEL!

I object to the current origin story, though, because you don't make weapons until one day you decide they aren't made for altruistic purposes. If that were the case, you wouldn't be making weapons in the first place. Besides, if the people you make weapons for are out to make weapons, you don't run off on them to the one place you know they're gonna look. They could find you, and be carryin' weapons they made without you. That'd end up putting everyone in an awkward position- starting by your internal organs. You wouldn't do that unless you had BIG BALLS OF STEEL!


Now for a more radical objection... you're gonna need to give this city some more charm. It flies, a'rrite. It's protected by a sandstorm, we're good. Now what do we do with it afterwards? Is it a place where preds eat people? What kind of people? Do they have anything to sell, food, glass, guns, vodka, chihuahuas, t-shirts, guns that fire vodka chihuahua t-shirts? Do they magic? Any local industry we would be hearin' of, how' the market for BIG BALLS OF STEEL! How are they doing with their neighbors? Land prices?

Asking rather than offering in the last part, 'cause I can't think of anything here. :B

@Shady: I'll consider magic, and the time-era, but there is one point that I didn't directly mention that I won't change, or my idea will be fundamentally different: the city only floats several feet off the ground. Like, probably not even two digits. I want it to be fairly easy to access and disembark from, so that, as you said, they can hunt and gather through the desert. I was also thinking they might trade with Kelerm, which is somewhere west of Akaptor. But the main idea is a city that moves around the desert, kicking up a sandstorm around itself to hide. I don't know about portals - that might be a little too high-tech for what I'm going for.

@Stabs: Ducted fans, Stabs. Though your paper-fan city idea could be used for a magical tiny settlement. :p I'll think about that one later. Also, I'll look into the adlevite. But everyone who has suggested an alternate form of keeping the city airborne keeps neglecting to find another way to generate the sandstorm effect - the secondary purpose of the fans. I can't accept any of these alternate ideas until I know that the sandstorm can be generated without having to place mages around the perimiter or the city to generate a sandstorm all day and/or night. You do raise a good point or two about the origin, though, so thank you. I'll keep thinking about that. As for the last part, I have been thinking of their relationship with the Akaptor Nomads, who also inhabit that zone. I don't know how they would get along, though. Also, I'm thinking the city might be kinda' steampunkky, to be honest, with magic thrown in here and there, which might make more sense if we make it be from way back when like Shady suggested. Heck, we could say the city produces Mecha-Grunties for the children of Felarya. XD I was thinking that it would be a semi-safe city, though the citizens would probably have to defend themselves from time to time from desert preds so yeah.

Nyaha wrote:

Nyaha has had yet another idea for a new location in Felarya! :DThis one I've had for a while but it kinda' took a back seat to the Navroze Mountains, but with that place more or less cemented I feel it's time to really get to the grindstone on this one.

The basic idea is this: a city suspended over the sands of Akaptor Desert on a huge moving platform, supported by giant fans which kick up the sand beneath the city and make it look like a natural sandstorm from any distance more than a certain number of feet away from it (number to be determined).

The platform would be octagonal in shape, and the city would be built with smaller buildings closer to the edges of the platform. The tallest building, in the center of the platform, would be city hall, which also serves as the 'bridge' of the city. The city moves throughout the desert, stopping at key points, like oases and trading posts. Anyone within the city must wear special goggles which filter sand out of their line of sight, allowing them to see and not get sand in their eyes. The place would probably be zoned into three parts consisting of two sixths of the entire city, for industrial, residential, and commercial use.

This is all I have so far, but I'd like to think it's a good base to build on. I want to see other people's thoughts and ideas before I write up a rough draft of the article for it.

Why have I not seen this before? It's awesome! Firstly I say ingore science and make it all purely magi-tech. Seriously flying cities have a better track record with magic than science. Say don't we have a material that creates anti-gravity fields? Also in order to preserve the "sand storm smoke screen" effect while the city travels why not use a simple dome of crystal, diamond-like substance or simply use a magi-tech force field. Also if you're not dead set on having it be a functional "Negav"-like empire you could make it more interesting and have it be derelict and have traveled to Felarya from another world. In fact one could add anti-grav or teleporter-like beams to allow it to "save" people by stranding them inside it's walls. It would give it more of air of mystery. In fact I can see archaeologists and bandits alike flocking to the city to try and unlock it's secrets. Oh and in Doctor Who: The Robots of Death I think it was there was a huge sort of sandcrawler-like city that ATE sand. Took it in and refined it. If you say this flying city is from another world and have it move around sucking up all that sand and maigicaly converting it into usable things, even near impoosible things liek food and water by extracting base elements and re-combining them. Hope that helps! Really great concept Nyaha!!

So I've been thinking about it a little more and I realized, sheepishly, that nobody said that the city could only use one system. Even if the fans aren't ideal for keeping it aloft, perhaps they'd still be useful for creating the sandstorm effect in conjunction with another method of flight. With that in mind, I'd like to properly go over each idea for vertical lift that's been suggested so far, as well as other points raised.

parameciumkid wrote:

Balloons would be several orders of magnitude more practical.

Personally, I think balloons would be too vulnerable. If the whole city relied on balloons, if any one of them is damaged, the whole city is in trouble.

Shady Knight wrote:

As a tidbit, if it's only the size of a city, even something the size of Negav, and not the size of a country or continent that could hold its own ecosystem, then it's going to need a way to connect to the surface, like some kind of teleporter, so they can look for food or some kind or go to some kind of farm down there that provide them with that kind of stuff.  As another suggestion, I recommend such a city to be incredibly ancient, like maybe the Sagolian era, and mostly be seen as a myth by modern-day Felaryans

I always planned for the city to sustain itself this way. I'm sure there's some natural resources buried under the sand, as well as things that can be salvaged from areas adjacent to Akaptor, like the Great Rocky Fields. I'm not sure if teleporters are quite the way I want to go, though. If I may, I always imagined that the city would be quite open, without walls surrounding it like Negav, and people could just jump off the edge if so inclined. I think that would be a pretty characteristic way to disembark from the city, but returning would be a lot tougher. I could imagine, though, the city producing artifacts that teleport users back to a specific building in the city, like 'return' items so many RPGs like to use, each with one-time use. So workers could jump from the city, gather what they need from the environment, then teleport themselves and their loads back onto the city whenever they want/need to. Also, I rather like the idea of it being like a myth - it would serve with it being a hard-to-find, moving city.

EvilGenius wrote:

I'm just going to say this sounds like a terrible idea from the ground up. Fans are going to have a great deal of difficulty supporting and stabilizing an entire city. The sand the fans whip up is going to rasp any moving parts to nothing if it doesn't jam them up first. The citizens would choke to death on the swirling sand unless they had special protection. As shady said, you are going to have a very hard time finding materials to construct, either the original, or any necessary replacement parts. Food would also be very hard to come across. Last but not least the city itself would be very easy to bring down if it ever actually lifted off. The idea is creative, but all in all, seems fractured.

Again, a little more effort into helping with those problems would have been appreciated, but I'll see what I can do here. Everyone seems to think that the fans would be a bad idea for supporting it, so as I said I'm just going to use them for the sandstorm effect, unless anyone else can come up with something better. I'm sure there's technology/magic capable of sand-proofing things in the city, and the people in the city can wear their goggles and scarves/special breathing masks for protection from the sand, too. And if these ideas don't fit, we could decide instead to incorporate a system that makes the sand blow around the city without actually getting into it, like a dome. Again, the city wasn't constructed in the desert, and replacement parts can either be built using resources from surrounding zones or items obtained by trading with neighboring areas like Kelerm or Kortiki Town or even somewhere offworld. The city itself would have defenses in place in the event that a predator actually makes it through the surrounding sandstorm, which could include but not be limited to gunners, mages, and/or artillery positioned on towers and/or platforms in and/or around the city.

Stabs wrote:

You could also make it float on giant solid balls made of lead. Lead is the heaviest element you can afford sensibly, so obviously anything made of lead will float in midair. And since it's so heavy, it should take a lot of weight to drag the lead down once it's floating: floating balloons are for losers (Sorry, para    ), real men fly with their BIG BALLS OF STEEL!
Actually, it's adlevite that can make even tank-sized tanks float in midair, with a cubic foot being able to negate that much weight, but I couldn't resist saying BIG BALLS OF STEEL!

Then there's dimensional twistin' stuff: if the city uses portals, it can put the ground level anywhere it wants, simply by opening a portal whose exit lies at ground level. You could even power the city using portals and BIG BALLS OF STEEL!

I object to the current origin story, though, because you don't make weapons until one day you decide they aren't made for altruistic purposes. If that were the case, you wouldn't be making weapons in the first place. Besides, if the people you make weapons for are out to make weapons, you don't run off on them to the one place you know they're gonna look. They could find you, and be carryin' weapons they made without you. That'd end up putting everyone in an awkward position- starting by your internal organs. You wouldn't do that unless you had BIG BALLS OF STEEL!


Now for a more radical objection... you're gonna need to give this city some more charm. It flies, a'rrite. It's protected by a sandstorm, we're good. Now what do we do with it afterwards? Is it a place where preds eat people? What kind of people? Do they have anything to sell, food, glass, guns, vodka, chihuahuas, t-shirts, guns that fire vodka chihuahua t-shirts? Do they magic? Any local industry we would be hearin' of, how' the market for BIG BALLS OF STEEL! How are they doing with their neighbors? Land prices?

Asking rather than offering in the last part, 'cause I can't think of anything here. :B

On the adlevite; I read the wiki article about it and it states only that it can lessen the effect of gravity, not that it can completely negate it. That's not to say that it couldn't work for this idea, but it would have to be used in conjunction with something else. Unless the article on the wiki doesn't give all the information about it, which tends to be a running theme. Now, I have no idea how you would power the city using portals and adlevite, you'll have to explain that one better. Now, I'm not sure what gives you the right to say what a person's motivations for making weapons should be. I think a weapon maker could be an idealist at the same time, even if it is a bit of a stretch. Inversely, he could be not a weapon maker at all, and just didn't realize what it was he'd been working on until it was halfway done? ....Okay yeah, even my willing suspension of disbelief is wearing thin. ^^; And you do raise a good point about running to the place they'd be most likely to find you. I'll think about the story a little more. Now, as for the charm part, I think Jedi had a few good ideas so we'll move on to my reply to him.

jedi-explorer wrote:

Why have I not seen this before? It's awesome! Firstly I say ingore science and make it all purely magi-tech. Seriously flying cities have a better track record with magic than science. Say don't we have a material that creates anti-gravity fields? Also in order to preserve the "sand storm smoke screen" effect while the city travels why not use a simple dome of crystal, diamond-like substance or simply use a magi-tech force field. Also if you're not dead set on having it be a functional "Negav"-like empire you could make it more interesting and have it be derelict and have traveled to Felarya from another world. In fact one could add anti-grav or teleporter-like beams to allow it to "save" people by stranding them inside it's walls. It would give it more of air of mystery. In fact I can see archaeologists and bandits alike flocking to the city to try and unlock it's secrets. Oh and in Doctor Who: The Robots of Death I think it was there was a huge sort of sandcrawler-like city that ATE sand. Took it in and refined it. If you say this flying city is from another world and have it move around sucking up all that sand and maigicaly converting it into usable things, even near impoosible things liek food and water by extracting base elements and re-combining them. Hope that helps! Really great concept Nyaha!!

First, thank you for showing the appreciation that I totally deserve. ^_^ Second, I think you had an interesting idea about the city 'saving' (and by that I assume you mean kidnapping) people from the desert and trapping them inside. It's an interesting idea, but I'm not sure it fits with the vision I had for it, so I'm either going to need to think about it more, or be convinced that your idea is more interesting than my own. Now, I wanted this city to not work on magic like Negav does, to be honest, but based on the feedback I've been getting, it's looking a lot less likely that'll come to fruition. Zephyr, when I spoke with him, also suggested anti-gravity, which I think would keep the city aloft at a specific but controllable altitude several feet over the sand, and also keep it level with the surface of the sand, meaning it might tilt if there was a dune under it. I'm honestly warming up to the idea of the city flying by negating gravity. As for your idea for the sandstorm, I have no idea what you're talking about, or how it's going to create the sandstorm. To be honest, I was kind of dead-set on having it be a functional city where people could come and go as they pleased, though as I've said, your idea might just be more interesting to implement than my own. Which makes me oh so jealous grrrr. XD The idea that it could create things from sand is also interesting - Akaptor is absolutely lousy with sand, and it would make sense for the city to make use of it somehow, even if it is just to make cool things out of glass. :]

So to sum it all up, it looks like the fans won't be used to lift the city - that will most likely be done by some spell or material that allows the city to float by negating gravity. The fans may yet stay, though, if only to provide the sandstorm cover for the city that, if you all haven't noticed by now, I am dead-set on keeping as part of this idea. That said, if it would make more sense, the sand, instead of blowing all through the city, might simply form a dome around it instead somehow, or alternatively the city could have a dome around it to protect it from the sand or...something. Sulla Sabbia's backstory will likely be changed, possibly drastically - instead of being a populated city and safe haven like Negav, it could be a mysterious, autonomous machine that steals people from the desert and seals them inside itself for some unknown purpose. I feel like I'd like to leave that up to everyone else, because though I find the idea interesting, I'm biased towards my own original concept. If we decide to keep it as an inhabitable safe-zone, some things that could give it some charm might be its glass ware industry, wherein sand from the desert is turned into unique glass items and artifacts that look beautiful and maybe, due to the temporal effect of the desert sand used to create it, maybe have more to them than they seem...

Okay, I've finally put together a real article for this potential location! Most things are subject to change, and I certainly don't have experience with establishing governance or anything like that, so if you have any thoughts or criticisms, please post a reply! ^_^ By no means is this the finished product. Unless I get a bunch of people stating it's perfect as is, but that's not what I'm hoping for.
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Flying City Sulla Sabbia

Danger Level: Very Low
Inhabitants: Humans, Nekos, Elves, Etc.
Population: (undetermined)

At one time several decades ago there existed a 'graveyard' of wrecked airships and other vehicles somewhere in Akaptor Desert, a phenomenon brought about by a particularly sandstorm-plagued area of the desert. Wrecks piled up, eventually reaching into the dozens, with what few survivors there were battling against the harsh climate and terrifying predators. Subject to this harshness was one Sorrel t'Avisa, an engineer aboard one such wreck. After several days of battling against the elements, the idea came to him to take whatever salvageable from every wreck in the graveyard and use it to construct one single airship, intending to escape from Akaptor, and managed to convince the thoroughly exhausted group of people he'd been stranded with despite his mediocre public speaking ability. Though a dangerous and difficult task, his idea eventually came to fruition, resulting in a surprisingly large and well-equipped craft, with the ability to create a weak force field around itself which prevented sand and weather from affecting it made from damaged barrier drives of previous ships. However, its airworthiness was questionable, as it could not lift more than a good several feet over the sand. Thus, the ship was christened Sulla Sabbia, a.k.a. "Over the Sand" in one of the crew members' native language. Supplied with every armament the graveyard of ships had to offer, Sulla Sabbia made her way through the desert, effectively using the sandstorms which had resulted in its eventual creation as a means to hide and escape from predators. However, the crew's discomfort with flying out of sandstorm cover compounded with the overall lack of knowledge of the zone caused issues with navigation, resulting in Sulla Sabbia never venturing far from its point of creation.

Over time, more airships and vehicles became wrecks became of the sandstorm-ridden area of Akaptor. Sulla Sabbia often encountered these wrecks, and took them and their crews into herself, slowly becoming larger and more populated. Over time, the ship was built into the grand flying city it is today, expanded both outward and upward. From salvaged wrecks, the city expanded physically; around the hull was built the wide, octagonal platform which now supports the city; more armaments were added to the outsides of the city, allowing for greater threats to be warded off if need be; large propellers were added in order to simulate the effect of a sandstorm, allowing the population comfort in traveling farther distances over the desert. The increase in travel distance led to several other innovations which allowed the city to grow, such as trade relations with desert-dwelling tribes of people, and a large well at the edge of the Great Rocky Fields which would collect storm water that could be salvaged by the city. The influx of different people rescued from wrecks or being stranded in the desert also brought about new things; unique magic scrolls were created by alchemists, which would allow someone who left the city to trade, collect water, hunt animals, or any other reason, to warp back to one of the city plazas; architects began to design and decorate buildings, giving them a pristine and artistic yet simple feel. As more buildings were constructed, a tower was erected in the center of the city, allowing for full three-hundred-sixty degree view around the city and over the buildings. This became known as city hall, as well as the bridge of the city where the captain/mayor, helmsman, and many other members of the crew operated, keeping the city aloft and safe from danger.

Nowadays, Sulla Sabbia is a bustling city which flies a predetermined route through and around Akaptor Desert, making stops near the edge of the Great Rocky Fields and close to Kelerm, among others. The architecture of the city has a very traditional air about it, though various conveniences like plumbing and electricity (solar power) have been implemented to provide comfort to its inhabitants in the harshness of the desert. Having been built as a haven of safety in the harsh extremes of Akaptor Desert, the city provides much for its people, so they aren't charged for use of these utilities either. People can also get free healthcare and food from licensed city businesses, but these do tend to be of considerably lower quality than what is offered in markets and businesses owned by inhabitants of the city. Because of the caring governance, the people of Sulla Sabbia are generally amicable and respectful to others, as most share the founder's mindset of wanting to keep Sulla Sabbia as pleasant a place as it can be for people who've had to endure surviving in the desert. Because many of those who created and were rescued by Sulla Sabbia came from Negav in the east, the city uses a currency system very similar to it, and skevols are generally accepted, however being able trading goods or services for other goods or services usually allows one to afford much more.

Because the safety and comfort of the inhabitants of the city are, naturally, Sulla Sabbia's first priorities, most living homes are built closer to the center of the city, with the intention of putting them farthest from the reach of potential threats, save for city hall itself, which in addition to being the bridge of the city, also contains the central power plant which converts solar energy into electricity and spreads it out to the city, as well as the reservoir/water treatment plant, which cleans and contains the water from the Rocky Fields well and other places and controls the city’s overall plumbing. These buildings tend to be the tallest, many being apartment buildings with the residents being tenants of the either the city or the owner of the apartment building (the former are less costly, naturally, but also not as high quality), though there are smaller, single-family homes around the outer edge of the residential district that are usually bought and owned by those who live in them. Outward from the residential district is the commercial district, where most types of businesses are situated. There are several outdoor marketplaces in this district where goods are traded and sold, and most of the buildings in the district house some sort of place of business, from convenience stores to law offices to martial arts dojos to stage theatres. Sulla Sabbia is known for producing exceptionally exquisite glasswear, which can also be found for sale or trade in this district. In particular, pieces made using Akaptor Desert’s unique ‘temporal sand’ are often praised as being incredibly beautiful, though few glassblowers are skilled enough to make use of it. Emergency services like police and fire stations and hospitals are also located in the commercial district.

Around the outermost edges of the city is the industrial district. This is where most heavy production is done by independent businesses in the city. Things like glassblowing factories, metal refineries, and smithies can be found here. This is also where residences for defense personnel employed by the city are located, so that they can get to their posts quickly in times of emergency. The outermost parts of the city are surrounded by walls several dozen feet high, lined with armaments specifically designed for the various predators of Akaptor, especially those that can use the sand to their advantage. Sonic cannons in particular are very well taken-care of, as their usefulness in confounding and even harming sand-diving or burrowing predators is of great use to the city. The walls also feature several net-firing cannons to ensnare flying enemies. It’s worth noting that these armaments are for warding off or incapacitating predators smart enough to find the city through the shroud of sand so that the city can escape. They are not designed for taking predators head-on. Another weakness of the city is the fact that it has few options when night falls or on cloudy, overcast days, as the solar power built up won’t keep the city afloat forever in these conditions. To compensate, the propellers can be repositioned and used as wind turbines to create enough power to keep the city airborne, but while they are in this position, the city can’t move from one spot. Thus, it is usually piloted into a forecast sandstorm area to be concealed naturally.