Story:Invisible Cities/Jacobina

Its natural state ever since its founding, Jacobina is surrounded by hostile neighbours, be it because of its riches or because of its inhabitants, whom, despite having been so for many a century now, have never ceased to be regarded by their neighbours as unwelcome foreigners, conquerors, oportunists, occupiers, the sort of undesirables that should leave at once, by any means. To remedy this, the old population erected the first foundations in the midst a small valley, famous itself for its many chasms and sinkholes, with the purpose of using the very mountains surrounding them as impregnable walls that, having never been man-made in the first place, would naturally never be man-unmade as the ages went by. But this plan has come at the cost severly limiting the cities's growth outwards, and while being near the borders of the city was once being at the place of greatest danger, it also became the place of greatest valour and honour, reserved, eventually, for lords and ladies and important vassals, the first line of defense against the unintelligible hordes surrounding them. And even though these hordes have all but ceased to be a real danger, content with an occasional blasphemy against the very soil that craddles the city, still to this day the outskirts of Jacobina are populated by the rich and powerful and their servants, while, the deeper you go into the the city, the filthier and filthier the streets and alleys become. The slope of the valley is ever increasing, though it is neigh impossible to notice at short distances, and one must be careful not to accidentally wander into one of its innumerable sinkholes, which, having nothing but empty space and free accomodation, have been turned into wretched homesteads of stink and misery. The greatest sinkhole lies at the center of the valley, the crest of a massive cascade of human filth and waste that drains into the as-of-yet uninhabited bottom of its largest chasm.

But every now and then, a man comes to a fortune by means of trade, murder, marriage or government appointment, and is thus able to move out towards the outer parts of the city. For such is the dream of all who are born in Jacobina, to be able to say 'I live near the border, as did my father and his father before him', and while it is true that the inhabitants are many things, like snobbish, mirthful, fat, and talented vasemakers, squanderers they are not. Thoughtful and cautious care for riches is a very common trait amongst the population, such that if any of them happens to reach the outermost circles of the city, they may be content in the fact that it is likely that there they shall remain, and their children, and the children of their children. But since they cannot expand beyond the limits of their impregnable wall of rock and volcanic ash, the new rich can only but build up, and up, and up.

Thus, if you happen to cut your way through the dense black forests inhabited by the wild and the uncouth and if you happen to brush away a poisonous tree branch and thereby come across Jacobina, at first you might mistakenly think you have found the greatest, widest, tallest and most glorious tower ever made by man, a veritable column that scrapes the soles of God above. But you soon learn, as you cross its gates, that the only thing that rivals its size and girth is its hollowness.