Mertra, imagined this time as a city beyond time, where lost souls, forgotten ideas, and fragments of broken worlds come to rest.

Mertra: The City at the Edge of Time

There is a place, unreachable by ship or sky, where all things lost are gathered.

Its name is Mertra.

Some say it floats in the space between seconds, a city built on the cracks of collapsing timelines. Others believe it lies just beyond death, not quite the afterlife, but a refuge for unfinished stories. No one finds Mertra by searching for it. It finds them.

Arrival in Mertra

People arrive in Mertra not by roads or portals, but through moments of rupture—when their world breaks and there is nowhere else to go.

• A woman who walks away from an explosion and finds herself in a city she’s never seen.

• A soldier who vanishes mid-battle and awakens on a quiet stone bridge over an endless river.

• A child who falls asleep under rubble and wakes up beneath glowing trees.

These are not hallucinations. These are entries. And once inside Mertra, there is no clear way out.

The Architecture of Fragments

Mertra is a city unlike any other. Its buildings are stitched together from the remnants of forgotten civilizations: crumbling ziggurats, shattered skyscrapers, wooden huts that hover over neon streets. Gravity does not follow rules here. Time flows unevenly. One corner of the city may host endless twilight, while another pulses with chaotic flashes of distant suns.

The sky above Mertra is always shifting—sometimes black and filled with stars, other times gold like an autumn memory. Winds carry whispers in unfamiliar tongues. Music plays with no source.

And in the center of the city stands the Mirrorgate, a towering ring of obsidian and crystal, said to reflect not your face, but your fate.

The People of Mertra

Those who live in Mertra are known as Drifters. Some have been here for centuries, others only moments. Time is relative; it is said Mertra holds souls that were once kings, rebels, inventors, or simple wanderers—all displaced by their own destinies.

Each Drifter arrives with something they have lost: a loved one, a purpose, a truth. In Mertra, they do not age. They are not trapped, but suspended—given space to find what they are missing, if they choose to seek it.

Some become Watchers, guiding new arrivals. Others choose isolation. A few have gone mad, unable to accept the unreality of their condition. But many build lives here—quiet, strange, and beautiful lives. Because Mertra, for all its strangeness, is safe.

The City’s Purpose

What is Mertra? No one knows for certain. Some believe it is a sentient city, a living dream built to protect what the universe discards. Others think it is a cosmic flaw—a tear in the logic of reality where stories that should have ended continue to echo.

Ancient murals in the Vault of Silence speak of the First Dreamers, beings who once built Mertra to preserve the memories of countless worlds that had vanished. Whether they are gods or extinct species is unknown.

Whatever the truth, Mertra remains: timeless, patient, watching.

The Return

Rarely, a Drifter disappears. It is said they have found what they were meant to find—and are allowed to return to their world, sometimes centuries before they left, sometimes into new timelines altogether. Most never remember their time in Mertra… but they are different.

Wiser.

Stronger.

Haunted.

Final Reflection

Mertra is not a place of endings, but of in-betweens. It is the pause between one heartbeat and the next. The breath before a leap. The flicker of thought before decision.

It is the city of second chances… for those who never knew they needed one.