The Spires of Vainlight

Rising stubbornly from the elegant skyline of the city of Zhia in Amaraexal, stands a skeletal colossus of white stone and silver that locals refer to with a mix of awe and barely concealed sarcasm: The Spires of Vainlight.

Or, as the locals now call it: The Tall Regret of Vainlight.

"Ah, the Spires of Vainlight—towers taller than a giant’s ego and twice as crooked. Climbing them’s a fool’s errand, but the view’s worth every broken bone. Just don’t ask me how I know."

— Udolf Gin - The Bad Bard and Occasional Survivor

Commissioned a century ago by High Aetheri Belatheir Vainlight - a man of great power, greater ambition, and very little patience - the Spires were intended to be the tallest structure in all of C’Naelia. Not just towers, but a monument to magical supremacy.

A gleaming citadel of white marble, moonstone, and starlit towers that would pierce the heavens themselves. It would house archives to shame the Aetheri Citadel, observatories that scraped the stars, and a grand throne chamber designed solely for dramatic monologues. Belatheir envisioned scholars weeping at its beauty. Instead, it’s been weeping scaffolding and shame for seventy-three years.

Construction began with great ceremony. The city’s finest masons, enchanters, and scholars were conscripted. Elegant scaffolding wound around its growing frame like a silver ribbon. Magical wards ensured safety and order. The city of Zhia watched expectantly.

Walls were imbued with aether, enchantments and wards placed into every golden veined stone of each Spire erected.

Then came the third spiral. It was never meant to curve. It does now - drunkenly and with increasing boldness.

"I took a bet that I could climb the Third Spire...I was gone for 6 months. Came back naked and no lute. Bruffle had not even noticed I was gone.

— Udolf Jin - The Bad Bard.

Belatheir insisted it was an “experimental architectural flourish.” The masons muttered about “cursed stone” and left en masse when the eastern stair began leading people somewhere else. Where, no one quite knows. They roped it off with warning runes and a polite sign: "Do Not Ascend While Unsure."

The work never quite recovered. Funding mysteriously vanished (as did Belatheir’s wife, and half the treasury).

The remaining workers unionised briefly, then left entirely after the gargoyle-infested library annex started reciting people’s secrets aloud. It now sits abandoned, shrieking gossip at passing seabirds. Today, the Spire stands unfinished - fifty-seven stories high, open to the elements, crooked as a drunkard's cane. Sometimes, it glows blue for no reason. Sometimes, it laughs.

Vainlight himself vanished into the highest level thirty-nine years ago. He’s presumed either dead, ascended, or sulking in a dimension of his own making.

Despite all this - or perhaps because of it - the Spire has become something of a pilgrimage site. Adventurers, mad scholars, and bored nobles endure long journeys to gawk, poke, and...occasionally vanish.

It is said that the right spell, the right moment, and the right amount of foolishness might awaken the Spire’s original purpose.

Or collapse it entirely...

Either way, the world watches with amused wariness, wondering whether the Spire of Vainlight is a miracle in waiting… or just the most expensive magical mistake ever made.