The City

The City is the name animals give to the still-standing remains of human constructions: concrete-and-steel tower blocks, tarred roads, industrial sites rusting in the rain. The streets are silent, sometimes disturbed by the clatter of hooves as a wild doe flees at the slightest noise. At night, neon signs suddenly crackle and light up, giving this empty place the look of an abandoned funfair.

Animals cross the City, but rarely stay: it is grim, tarred all over, unnerving. Even so, it holds passages down into the depths of the Kingdom of Rats and the VRI.