Pax
Settlement
First appears: Timeless (Book 7)
Controlled by: Earth avatar territory (Bk 7) → Jointly administered by Jason and Cady (avatar… (Bk 8)
Pax begins in Book 7 as a decaying, poverty-stricken underground city under earth-avatar rule, its stone streets scarred by golem attacks and water damage until Cady’s time manipulation restores it to a thriving metropolis. By Book 8 it has become the primary travelers’ hub — an overcrowded cavern-city of concentric rings centered on Cady’s castle, buckling under refugee influx and infrastructure attacks until the avatars devise a carousel-based layering system to relieve the population crisis.
History
Book 7 — Timeless · Ruined underground city restored
Pax is introduced as a decaying subterranean metropolis built into a vast crystal-lit cavern, with winding stone streets, sinkholes, water damage, and residents living in poverty under earth avatar rule. Golem attacks tear through the city, collapsing buildings and exploding walls as Cady’s clones fight. Over the course of the book Cady uses time manipulation to reverse the decay, restoring collapsed buildings and returning the city to a bustling, well-constructed state populated by satyrs, zombies, angels, and other non-human races. The throne room in Cady’s castle becomes a recurring hub for her clone-gathering and eventually the site of the hall monitor massacre, and a nearby alleyway is left blood-soaked from Cady’s own death.
Changes: Water damage, sinkholes, and golem-caused building collapses early on, reversed to a restored, fortified state by Cady’s time manipulation later in the book. Introduced: Pax courtyard, Pax throne room, Pax underground city (main cavern), Pax streets, Pax alleyway
Book 8 — Crucible · Overcrowded hub strained to layering
Pax is now the major travelers’ city, a vast underground metropolis in a crystal-lit cavern divided into concentric outer, middle, and inner rings, centered on Cady’s spired, waterfall-covered castle. Chronic overcrowding from refugees fleeing other elemental cities and escalating infrastructure attacks (destroyed shops, damaged buildings) push the avatars toward a layering solution using Cady’s hourglass relic, which is unlocked in the throne room and nearly causes a catastrophic continuity error. The castle courtyard and throne room are later devastated by corpse explosions during Jason’s stream takeover, collapsing load-bearing columns and destroying waterfalls, while a citywide PvP flag plunges the entire population into carnage. By book’s end the carousel device is completed and activated, temporarily collapsing the layers back to one and triggering a violent traveler surge before layering is restored, with Cady’s clones, Frank, and Riley left managing a stabilized but avatar-less city.
Changes: Multiple middle-ring shops destroyed by guild raids; castle courtyard and throne room area heavily damaged by corpse explosions and collapsed columns/waterfalls; outer-ring gravity-well pylons smashed and carousel-launch crowd surge leaves mounds of corpses; ongoing repair and rebuilding by Cady between incidents. Introduced: Fortification wall (outer/middle ring divide, carousel mount), Cady’s castle (exterior/stairs, terraces, courtyard, throne room), Alley (bone room), Outer layer/district, Earth district, Fire/Khamsin district, Dark district (twilight throne imitation), Middle ring shop, Carousel