Phoenix (city)

The City of Phoenix, once Carthag, was an ancient city in Raurin, which was known for its luxurious resorts, houses of rest and restoration; this led to its later renaming. As the desertification of Raurin continued, the city was first protected with an enchanted dome, and then finally abandoned; the archmage Martek chose to hide the prison of the djinni vizier Aeraldoth there.

Location
Though only east-northeast of the Oasis of the White Palm, the City of Carthag was separated from it by a chain of rocky mountains. The City lay in a low-lying bowl, at least in diameter, where no wind could reach; this made the temperatures stay frightfully high during the night and outright deadly by day, from  to  at times.

Structure
The city of Phoenix had some structures visible from the tops of dunes away. Most who entered would do so through a pitfall, which would deposit them somewhere in the streets below. Some of those pitfalls led into glassy smooth tubes, which had been created by a beholder in service of Khalitharius, aiming to find victims to capture and convert to the cause amongst those who were caught in Phoenix's pitfalls.

The city itself was silent and still, save for the sand still filtering through gaps in the magical dome; it had accumulated too high to see the tops, as there was just about no light in there. Most of the visible buildings were white marble. Buildings still at least partly standing in the city of Carthag included the house of Khalif Mubrek, the Secret Maze of Kharan, the home of Chininsk Ambar , and the Baths of Garimsharr. A nonfunctional sewer tunnel connected the baths to the Statue of Set. The Baths of Garimsharr made for an improvised road to a statue of Set, where the djinn Aeraldoth was bound in a bottle hidden within the statue.

Defenses
The heat was outright deadly during the day in a radius of forcing most travelers to make do by night; even then, the superheated sand remained painful to walk on, and it was so fine that it created a risk of sinkholes even then. A radius dome protected the city, only the tops of the highest towers poking out through; the dome was broken in places, and the gaps could function as sinkholes for unwary travelers.

History
The city of Carthag soon came to prominence in the times of the Pharaohs, before the drying of the River Athis, as a place with magnificent care for those who needed rest, a city whose healing waters revitalized the spirit. It became so notorious for its houses of rest and recovery that it eventually came to be known as the City of Phoenix, and embraced this by changing its name. The wealthy and powerful were catered to quite intensively during this period, and the city collected their follies, coming to abound in jokes, tricks, puzzles, and even mazes with magical hazards, which were carefully watched to keep people from dying.

After the river Athis dried out around it became necessary to raise a magical dome around the city to protect its gardens, streets, and buildings from the encroaching sands. The dome eventually covered the entire city; it was several feet thick and very strong, capable of taking the weight of a camel and a man anywhere on it. Its strength ensured the city remained hidden, even after all the inhabitants abandoned it: the sands continued to encroach, eventually covering all but the tallest towers.

Around the year, the wizard Martek imprisoned the djinni Aeraldoth in the then-abandoned city of Phoenix. By the mid-14th century DR, the City of Phoenix was only an occassional hazard to the travelers who broke through the dome. Most of their fellows mistook the gaps in the dome for sinkholes, leading to avoiding the area. In, adventurers released the djinni, which triggered the rise of the city back from under the sands.

Inhabitants
The area around Phoenix was uninhabitable by day. All life in the area emerged by night to hunt, including purple worms, giant rocs, krite snakes, centipedes, huge trap-door spiders, hyenas, jackals, giant ants and giant beetles. Spectral apparitions like those in Southern Raurin existed as well, and they led travelers towards the center of Phoenix.

The fauna was very different inside the city. There were a number of permanent residents, including rust monsters, red spiders, desert ticks, fire ants, carrion beetles, krite, and strangely enough, the skeletons of adventurers who cursed their gods as they died here. After the release of Khalitharius, a beholder under his orders had come to sift for possible servants in the ruins.

Appearances

 * Adventures
 * Desert of Desolation