- "First is Thule, plunging to fathomless depths.
Seconds comes Ra, the great golden city.
The third, Atlas's mighty citadel, holds back the ocean." - —From the Mystery of the Cities
The Three Secret Cities are a trio of ancient cities which are crucial components in the Trial of the Cities.
History[]
Early History[]
When the Super-Ancient Beings began creating a series of trials for a later race of sentient people, they constructed the Three Secret Cities of Thule, Ra and Atlas to serve as central points in their fourth trial, the Trial of the Cities. Within each city, a mysterious blue gem was set deep with each city's vault, which would need to be collected and added to the three Immortal Weapons of a sword, helmet and mace in order to empower them for the trial's final ceremony.
To make the Trial of the Cities more of a challenge, the Super-Ancients also created sets of bronze and silver guardians to act as obstacles, which were left to rest in silver coffins set along the Great Avenues into the Cities. The Ancients also linked the altar at Thule, which was set to be the city that initiated the trial and the City's defending guardians, with Ra and Atlas so that they would activate their defences at the same time, therefore making it so that whoever undertook the trial required companions at all the other Cities.
Eventually, the Super-Ancients would pass on some of their knowledge to the group of humans that would become known as the Four Legendary Kingdoms; among the things they shared were the locations of Thule, Ra and Atlas, and their importance in the fourth trial for humanity. The Four Kingdoms assigned three men to watch over each City, who would come to be called the Trismagi. When one of the Trismagi neared the end of their life or service, the Four Kingdoms would assign someone to take their place watching over the Cities to ensure they were not disturbed before the trial. Though the Four Kingdoms vowed to maintain the necessary knowledge for the Trial, they knew most of the relevant information for the final two trials would be revealed to the King of Kings who received the Mysteries at the conclusion of the Third Trial, and that the knowledge of the Mysteries were also contained within the Cities' vaults.
Over the millennia, even as each of the Three Secret Cities remained hidden from the greater human population, through various myths they became infamous, albeit with their locations mis-identified and their names changed (such as Ra, which became known to the Spaniards as El-Dorado, and Atlas, which was called Atlantis in subsequent legends after it's flooding), and so scholars, thieves and fortune-hunters spent lifetimes trying to locate even one of the Cities.
During her reign, Queen Elizabeth I assigned Sir Francis Drake the secret mission of seeking out the Three Secret Cities and confirming their locations. Drake succeeded, but shortly after leaving Ra he fell deathly ill, and so sent his Queen a letter to confirm he had succeeded in his mission and that the coordinates of the Cities would be buried with him at sea.
By the early 21st century, the locations of the Cities were known to few other than their present Trismagi guardians (Sir Bjorn, Sir Inigo Defenestra and Lord Hardin "Sphinx" Lancaster) and a handful of people within the Four Kingdoms.
The Four Legendary Kingdoms[]
During the fourth Great Games of the Hydra that precluded the completion of the Third Trial, Cardinal Ricardo Mendoza noted to Jack West Jr the importance of the Three Secret Cities to the remaining trials.
When the Games concluded with the upheaval to the Four Kingdoms, Jack prevented King Orlando Compton-Jones from receiving the Mysteries, and King Anthony "Hades" DeSaxe noted that meant that all of the ancient knowledge regarding the remaining trials would have to be re-found. As the various groups fled the Underworld, Hades discovered that Orlando and Mendoza had survived, realising that they would soon be heading for the Cities to prepare for the next trial.
The Three Secret Cities[]
A few days after the conclusion of the Third Trial, the mission to begin the Trial of the Cities began in earnest. Orlando quickly obtained the Helmet from Hades's penthouse to go with the Sword he already possessed, and after returning to the Hall of Royal Records at St. Michael's Mount, set out to the Cities while also tasking Sunil Malik with finding the long-lost Mace.
However, Jack and Lily West managed to view a full rubbing copy of the tablet of the Altar of the Cosmos, discovering that activating the defences at Thule would activate the defences of all of the Cities. As Orlando was unaware of this and in a hurry to complete the trial, Jack's team set about trying to locate all of the Cities and the "Trident" so that they could help to ensure the Trial of the Cities wasn't failed.
Indeed, unaware of the mistake he was making, upon his arrival at Thule, Orlando prematurely initiated the trial and left Mendoza and his Swiss Guards to empower the Sword. However, the uninformed Cardinal and his men soon found themselves caught between the Bronze Guardians as they slowly marched down to the cupola with the Silver Guardians that barred their way to the vault. Ignorant of his error, Orlando sent Chloe Carnarvon with the Helmet to Ra, where she and her Brazilian special forces troops were caught in a similar predicament to Mendoza's.
After Jack's team retrieved the locations of the Cities from Sir Francis Drake's coffin and recovered the Mace from Poseidon's tomb, they made their way to the Cities, with Stretch and Pooh Bear headed to Thule, Iolanthe Compton-Jones, Nobody and Mae Merriweather continuing on to Ra and Jack and Aloysius Knight made their way to Atlas.
With Sphinx threatening Lily's life, Jack agreed to empower the Mace and return it to the Trismagi. As each group from Jack's team came up against the Guardians, Jack realised the Weapons were the key to getting past them, and so his people were able to do what Orlando's people had failed to do and reach the inner vaults of the Three Cities. However, as soon as the blue gems were added to the Weapons, Sphinx, Mendoza and Chloe each forced Jack's people to hand over the Weapons, wherein they made their way to the Altar of the Cosmos to fulfill the Trial of the Cities.
The One Impossible Labyrinth[]
After the Omega Event was averted, the world learned of the ancient trials, leading archaeologists and historians to head to the ancient sites such as the three secret cities to study them. Though they became a popular tourist destination as a result, Thule, Atlas and Ra were recognised by the world being as crucial and in need of preservation so that they could be used for future runs of the trials and Omega Events.
Purpose[]
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The Three Cities[]
Thule[]
The first of the Secret Cities, Thule was built within the middle of a high cliff-side in what would later become Iceland, and designed in the shape of a funnel with a deep pit leading down to the city's vault. Over the millennia, Thule became the least well known of the Cities by mankind overall, though it did persist in some legends as Ultima Thule, and would be mentioned by scholars such as Plato, Geminus and Virgil.
Once Orlando set the Trial of the Cities into motion at Thule, he left Cardinal Mendoza to empower the Sword of the Rock there, but the unexpected difficulties Mendoza encountered forced Stretch and Pooh Bear to defeat the silver automatons and empower the Sword themselves.
Ra[]
Second of the Secret Cities, Ra was constructed almost entirely out of gold within what would later become Venezuela, and designed in the shape of a squat pyramid with a deep chasm between the city and its vault. In the years up until the rise of humanity, the jungles around Ra began slowly encroaching on the ancient gold city, while the City itself was discovered by the native South Americans, who were later forced to reveal the knowledge of the city's existence to the gold-loving Spanish conquistadors, who gave it the name El-Dorado. By the modern day, Ra had become so tangled in vines and weeds that inadvertently helped to hide the otherwise lustrous city from the outside world.
After Orlando inadvertently set off the defences at Ra, the team led by Chloe to empower the Helmet of Hades found their way blocked by the silver guardians, meaning Iolanthe and Nobody had to find a way past them automatons and empower the Helmet.
Atlas[]
The third of the Secret Cities, Atlas was constructed at the bottom-most level of a five-level dam within what would later become the Mediterranean Sea, and carved into the shape of an hourglass out of a rock formation. Around 10,000 BC, the two top-most dams of Atlas broke, allowing the ocean to flood into the spillways and drown the ancient city. Over the millennia, Atlas became known in legends for the Great Flood that buried it beneath the sea, although the world had come to know the city as Atlantis.
Though Orlando had unwittingly set off the defences at Atlas, Jack and Knight were co-opted by Sphinx into empowering the Trident of the Sealords on his behalf by holding Lily hostage, though Jack managed to figure out the Immortal Weapons were key to getting past the ancient automatons, thus empowering the Mace.
Trivia[]
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