The slum is situated in the lower city, barely elevated above the old town, which is now submerged underwater.
These marshy waters are toxic and continue to become more so each day as they receive the techno-chemical waste from Polis. The vapors emanating from these waters form a thick mist that envelops and suffocates the slum, depriving the inhabitants of direct sunlight (which struggles to penetrate through this thick and opaque mist).
The neighborhood once known as the Pleasure District retains only the name. The damp mist emanating from the flooded basements has made any walk perilous and chilling.
Though a few windows still offer glimpses of a reddish glow, once a signal to potential patrons that the place was open and ready to warmly welcome any traveler, it is now just a routine habit without real significance.
Step into these houses and you will find only sleepy bodies most of the time. Meanwhile, the denizens of the slums have lost interest in seeking amusement, believing in the Eternal Sleep, turning further away from earthly and carnal frivolities.
The night and the day have been blending together for far too long, so wandering has become a regular activity. You may witness canoes gliding to the rhythm of the breaths of the sunken old town. The inhabitants move from house to house along the waterways. Although the water is polluted and toxic, it remains the lifeblood of the slums, flowing between each building, setting the pace. Some sleepers with extraordinary immune systems occasionally bathe in it and venture to explore the remnants of the old town.
The only thing that makes us believe that life still exists are these few dull glimmers that windows reveal from the outside. Sleeping has become the most practiced activity of the sleepers. Although it may seem gloomy at first glance, it would be clumsy to think that sleepers do not fully live their lives. Lucid dreaming is increasingly mastered, and sleepers now use dreams to live, train, learn, and evolve. Having broken the boundary between wakefulness and sleep gives them incredible strength. Playing with time, they are capable of living more adventures in a second than you could in a day.
The living temples have flourished since the Nightmare Fuel. The Sleepers do not believe in dominating nature; they simply accompany it. That is why many temples are weathered and breathe to the rhythm of nature rather than the whims of the proud and aesthete eye of the vigilant.
Meditating allows them to remain in a semi-awake, semi-asleep state, attempting to achieve full consciousness. It also enables them to better hear the murmurs of the First. The path to knowledge here lies in this porosity between dream and wakefulness.
Sleepers, devoid of doping pills or implants, lead a much more modest and leisurely lifestyle compared to the Vigilants. Sleeping also enables them to minimize their vital needs to the bare essentials.
Many sleepers have forsaken the luxuries of modern life and now content themselves with little. Loose, simpler-to-make, and more comfortable attire has become the standard.
Masks made from natural materials allow the most fragile sleepers to avoid exposure to direct light or to breathe more easily.
Paper remains an endless source of ancestral knowledge for sleepers. Requiring neither power source nor recharge, they are both remnants of an ancient world and the future of sleeper knowledge. They are more precious to some Sleepers than their own lives. When time ceases to exist, getting lost in readings becomes comforting and warm. Sleepers forget their condition and escape for a moment.
In the Slum, activities are severely limited. Any action that is not essential or vital has no place to exist. Trades have been reduced to the bare minimum. This is how craftsmanship, for example, can endure. No middleman, no subcontractor, the creator finds himself facing his creation, in a deathly, soporific silence. His art resonates and keeps him awake. Each hammer blow distances him from the sleep that constantly threatens to engulf him.
Working with the material has become a means of fighting against eternal sleep.
The dojo, once vibrant with life, have become deserted. However, there still emanates a mystical aura, and energies continue to converge there. Some sleepers still come to exchange blows from time to time, as it is through the blade that they find their salvation.
Drink to forget, forget to sleep. Many sleepers believe in awakening through sleep. Daydreams are the promise of a better future, so it's not strange to see residents sleeping at the counter.
Sleepers don't renovate; they've abandoned material, superficiality that has no place when sleep prevails. Why clutter with these trivialities when once asleep, anything is possible? The material world is dull and suffers the ravages of time, whereas the dream knows no time. A life in a second - that's a quote one can find in many dilapidated houses.
