Work Text:
When a visitor approaches the city of Dacite they must stop at a guest house to change shoes. There are many guest houses set up at all the city’s gates and thoroughfares, and also at plazas and major places of commerce within the city, should an outsider need to replace these peculiar shoes or seek other assistance during their stay.
City locals and residents of the surrounding countryside do not need to stop. They come prepared with replacement shoes of their own. Some have the elevated, stone-soled shoes of a similar design to those given to visitors, though made sturdier so as to last many uses. Others don long stilts and pick their way carefully along the city's thoroughfares, or invest in even stranger contraptions to elevate themselves above the streets. Carts and cargo get transferred to a comprehensive system of tracks and pulleys threading throughout the city, so that they may be shuttled along to their destination far over the pedestrians’ heads. There are no draft animals allowed within city limits.
Buildings, too, are raised, built on dense stone block foundations, with a large open crawl space between ground and the floor. Basements are entirely unheard of in Dacite.
And why all this trouble? Why the careful building practices, sophisticated freight transport system, the peculiar customs of footwear that extends even to transient guests? It’s simple, reader. You don’t want to burn your feet! The floor is lava.