The Slag Tower

In the early nights of Sanctuary, when the city was new and the memories of the World Above had first begun to fade, the popular imagination was captured by the surface world. Half-remembered through stories and songs, a growing urge to know the truth of things up above bubbled up in the city's people. And so it was that a few people, the brightest minds of the budding Ascender movement, took it upon themselves to try and asceratain the truth. They would build a device, they claimed, which could see through the rock overhead, and view the surface for what it is. It took four long years to build the structure, an observatory tower of iron and stone, out in the caverns near Sanctuary. Dozens of crystal lenses, intricate nests of gears, and a mystical engine of faith and Fungalite which powered the entire assembly, came together into a grand "lithoscope" nearly 300 feet in length.
Its first test was its last. The exact cause of the Lithoscope's failure is unknown. Some claim it was mortal error, others call it a divine punishment for the hubris of the act. Still others believe that it worked as intended, and the radiant mangificence up above was simply too much for the machine to handle. All that is known for certain is that all twenty-six of its builders were lost on that fateful day, and all that remains of the grand observatory is a leaning tower of slag, cracked bricks, and charcoal. Few are willing to go near, but the potential for salvage inside tempts some.
They rarely return.

RUINED STRUCTURE
134

Founding Date

130

Alternative Names

The Ruined Lithoscope

Parent Location

The Near Reaches

Owning Organization

Splinters of the Sun