Big picture – We all know the basic story – in 830 after many years and preparations, Pavis and his companions snuck deep into Dagori Inkarth and animated the Faceless Statue. He and his companions rode atop It as it strode to Dragon Pass. There they met with Joraz Kyrem who sought to reestablish the Horse People in Prax. The new allies attacked the old site of Robcradle. The giants were driven off by the magic of the horse priests, the nomads were confounded by the magic of Pavis and his friends, and Waha engaged in combat with the statue, but was injured, and had one of his hamstrings torn out. Waha fled to the Paps and his armies fled with him, abandoning the useless walls to their foes. The giants withdrew to the mountains and never returned.
After the battle, the Faceless Statue collapsed, all magical energies exhausted. Its body made the great quarry whose stones built the city’s interior. Construction was swift, thanks to the statue’s stone and dwarfish craft. The dwarf aid was voluntary, although Pavis gifted them with some headstone, bowelstone, and marrow dust. They came because they wished to honour the Faceless Statue.
Five general types of stone came from the statue quarry. The Headstones were used exclusively in the creation of the original King’s Villa, later called the Temple of Pavis. The stones were radiant crystalline growths and included the most exotic of the Organstones built right within the structure of the temple palace. Armstones were used to construct walls for the city, while ordinary buildings’ walls were made from Bodystones. Legstones were used for streets, steps, and bridges. The bowelstones made plumbing, dungeons, and sewers.
Now this story might sound familiar to those steeped in draconic lore. It certainly parallels the story of “The Six Dragons and the War Against Chaos”, although in that story creation is made out of the body of the enemy Orxili instead of out of the body of the dragon. But the basic theme is the same – Pavis fought with the enemies of civilisation and order and built a new world out of body of his champion.
The purpose of creating a city was not to “revive the Green Age” – the purpose was to create a new world of possibilities within the walls of Paragua. An orderly place, with areas set off for magical purposes. This has been done before – the Harmonious Realm of Yelm, or Orlanth’s defeat and dismemberment of Sh’karazeel, immediately come to mind – and is done any time a city is founded. But this was on a great scale, with great magic involved.
Around 850, the city was complete. In 860, Pavis himself retired permanently to the King’s Villa. His children were unsuited to rule, and rather than move control to the Empire of the Wyrm’s Friends, the city leaders met and selected a new king from among themselves. Pavis approved, and the Arrowsmith Dynasty took rule of the city.
There’s a tie in with the giant cradles as well. The tools, toys, and magical items intended to instruct the baby giants during their millennia-long growth to maturity were part of the foundations of the city. The Old Mint, the Art Gallery, the Painting Room, etc., all likely had their origins in this. The God Learners speculated that the Elder Giants were a dying breed, without women. So they made those boats and sent their costructs away, into the womb of the world, to grow and learn to be great giants. That might have been key to the city’s remarkable growth and magical potential.
Others whisper that there was Chaos artefact within the walls of Paragua, buried beneath a pasture or deep within the earth. This is said to give the chaos creatures in the area their power and continually draws them back. Perhaps that might have also been a byproduct or a source of the city’s magic. Perhaps that explains the demigod priest Labrygon’s interest in Pavis and why he spent so much resources on the Puzzle Canal?
And after Pavis retired, he let his magic run its course. Others grew and developed their magic potential within the walls of his city – not just heroes like Joraz Kyrem and Balastor (and Dorasar and Argrath as well), but also adversaries like Jaldon Goldentooth, Toras Joran, and Gerak Kag as well. Maybe that was the purpose of the city all along – to create a place with great magical potential and see what we did with it.
Now pedants might say “but the Green Age was filled with magical potential” and “isn’t making a city parallel to the Green Age of making”- and they’d be right. But I doubt anyone would view Pavis’s construction of a city, of buildings, sewers, streets, and bridges as being the purpose of the city. See that is the “Green Age” stuff – the making of things. Pavis did that AND after twenty years, proclaimed it was done. And ten years later, he set down his chisel and retired.
The process of making is necessary to have a place where things can be done – but it is the first step, not the goal of the whole project.
We must remake and pass through the Green World in order to make our new world of possibilities.
We move on from the First Making to the Golden Age of Being.
Of course it never lasts for ever, but if it was Made well, the Golden Age of Being can come again. But never the First Making.
And even the later destruction was needed so we could get a little lightning from the House of Sartar.
Please note that reviving the Green Age is not a project. The Green Age is always over the moment you have made it.
Pavis built a city to last. He made sure it had tremendous magical potential. He did the city-building rites perfectly, and even made the city itself out of a magical artefact of tremendous power. He build a civilised cosmos – all within Paragua’s walls. As with other city builders like Sartar or Arim hoped their kingdoms would endure, or that whoever founded the Machine City hoped it would endure. That’s part of the ritual and almost always a goal. And of course he built to last. But to say that was what he “really intended to do” is probably off the mark. He intended to found a city. He intended it to last. And he it intended it to be remarkable even by those standards.