Chapter Text
The city was a mouth, and it cut the sky open. Buildings of silver concrete reached so high that from the uppermost floor, you felt as if you could see with your own eyes every surface detail of the moon. From a distance, the skyscrapers stood in a visage of tall spikes like a crown, the lower buildings acting as the surrounding foundations that brought it all together in an equilibrium.
Yet when you lived in the city, stark silver became stone grey, and the buildings seemed bleak as they rose like ghosts from the heaps of trash that polluted the streets like an epidemic. At the bottom, amongst the low ceilings and double stories, the roads stank, and smog sat heavy in the air. Dank plastic bags spilled out of alleys and rusty signs creaked from where they hung, words weathered and faded from the passing of time; you could only guess what would be inside.
It was like a graveyard. Citizens wandered like zombies, stepping through the dirt with vacant eyes, masks pulled up to their ears. They were robots, mindlessly going from one place to the next, the only thought in their heads was to get to work and back, make enough money to survive and don’t look at anyone too long, for the risk of erupting conflicts ran too high when the underlying tension never ceased.
Poverty was rampant, you had to be satisfied living off the bare minimum, or you wouldn’t survive at all. Any attempt to speak out against what was set in stone was a sure-fire way to get yourself killed. The officers that stood guard in squares and on street corners were so quick that you wouldn’t even feel the moment the bullet went through your head. They were used as examples of what would happen if anyone else tried to do the same, bodies left behind as a warning to others.
At least in the lower districts.
In the lower districts, life was grey. You couldn’t walk a metre without seeing the bitter faces of those on the brink of destitution. You couldn’t take a single step without breathing in cloying smoke, without passing overflowing bins and black bags, without kicking cans across the concrete. The skyscrapers from the wealthier parts of the city cut off most of the sunlight, leaving only the harsh, fluorescent neon to provide adequate lighting.
On the other hand, the wealthier districts were opulent; life was golden. Streets were cleaned regularly, and they sparkled: spotless, stainless, sleek. If you lived up high enough, you could watch the sunrise from a large balcony, prime-quality restaurants and boutiques were plentiful, you could find whatever you desired on every street corner. The paving was even and smooth, everyone was dressed to the nines, and the sunlight glinted on the shiny surfaces of expensive cars as they went past.
You can’t have the elite wealth without the scrounging poor. Societies thrive off of a balance. At least that’s the message they want you to believe.
The City Miroh was formed after the Major Drought of 2043. The world descended into a wild, vehement chaos as the globe dried up: deserts grew rampant, plant-life withered and died before their eyes, animal species dwindled and became extinct in mere days. It became too hot to leave shelter, water supplies evaporated, vanished. The unbearable scorch of the sun burst the world into metaphorical flames as leaders and cities tried desperately to reverse it to no avail. The planet dehydrated, civilisations collapsed and died out. It was the end of the world as they knew it.
Survivors were few compared to the eleven billion that had inhabited the planet before, cities became shells, streets became desolate, buildings neglected. Thousands of cities became none in a single breath.
Until Mr. Park built Miroh.
A man of great wealth and splendour, he replenished the broken remains of his home city, building skyscrapers from the ground, clearing the debris, giving the survivors shelter, a home. Miroh rose from the dust like a phoenix, a glittering silver beacon of hope in the dark, dead deserts.
However, he was lustful for power, harbouring an intense, insatiable greed for control. Mr. Park was a hungry, self-serving man with an unmatched arrogance and sharp serpent’s tongue. He was exactly the kind of man who you never quite knew was lying or telling the absolute truth. He grabbed the reigns of his new city and burned his mark into the skin of the earth, branded the meat of the land with his law. If his own hand served him, he must have bitten it hard enough to leave a scar.
Survivors once sung the man’s praises; he was worshipped as their saviour, as a God who graced them with new life. But the man was cruel, his pointy hand prodded at the weak lambs that blindly followed him as he trapped them in their fence. Once they were left with the bare minimum, his streams of wealth changed their course and went straight back to him. He raised himself up on a pedestal of solid gold, gave himself everything, for he was the hand of God.
He split the city into nine districts. The people that were beneficial to him got to live in the wealthier parts, they were provided with satisfaction, a pleasant life of riches and desires, living to work, clothes threaded with silver. They ate from the palm of his hand, and they ate well.
Those that were redundant to him? They were thrown into the slums, into the poverty-ridden lower districts to slither like snakes amongst the rats and the dirt. These people worked the jobs no one else wanted to, underpaid to do the dangerous or tedious tasks that the rich wouldn’t bother themselves with. They ate scraps from the bottom of Mr. Park’s shoes, trailed after him in case he dropped any crumbs. They lived paycheck to paycheck, worked to live - barely. They had enough to survive, but not healthily. They were pale spectres, perpetually in a state of undead.
Mr. Park had no care for these people, only paying them mind when it came to the increase in crime rates, when his security had opportunities to cull them when their protests became too loud. They were the example of what happened when you went against his authority, a reason to spark obedience and fear in the higher classes. It kept everyone in order, so they abided, working all of the labour for the wealthy, providing for those who stared down at them like they were insects. Mr. Park was The Hand, and he chose who was fed and who was swept aside.
That is how it had been ever since. Miroh hadn’t changed in the twenty-five years since its formation and its unrelenting rule under Mr. Park’s thumb.
Until Levanter.