Citan Sky-Cities

In the 460th year of the Age of Mortals, a titanic storm blew in from the Triton Sea. It landed on Northern Ceren, and raged across her shores for ten days and ten nights, before dying out within the Bay of de Deux. During it's rage, the small communities that dotted this vast area of grasslands and foothills either fled in advance or were swept aside by the massive floods and unyielding winds. Within a matter of days, the area known as Ceruleon had been reduced to a barren, abandoned landscape.
However, those who survived what became known as le Rage Cielmer did not immediately return to their homes, for the storm had a magical nature that covered the land in a kind of magical radiation, making most areas impassible. After waiting for fifty years, the survivors and their descendants were shocked to see the radiation subside, with creatures emerging from the desolation. These creatures, who appeared to be pale and dark-haired gnomes, claimed to be all that remained of a society that hailed from flying cities of great size and power, all of which had been drug in and destroyed in the massive storm half a century prior.
Leading the natives inward, the gnomes revealed a staggering surprise: the entire region had been dotted with peculiar ruins of a foreign design. These ruins, built of grayed stone and orange metals, contained advanced magical artifacts of various kinds, many of which the gnomes knew how to salvage and operate. Folk of all persuasions flocked to these new ruins, scavenging the powerful items and working with the gnomes to return them to working order. Advanced weaponry, sentient constructs, ships able to sail on air and water alike were all recovered.
In the centuries that have followed, the groups that have come to govern Ceruleon have surmised that there were ten great sky-cities, each focusing on a particular kind of magic research and technology. These cities were battered by le Rage Cielmer, resulting in huge sections of each being cast off by the storm and flung to the ground before the city proper crashed into the earth. This has resulted in each current "city" being described as only a section of the original settlement, with the thousands of smaller ruins across Ceruleon hailing from one of the larger sections. In any case, the ruins remain mostly unexplored, as a mixture of unstable magic and arcane creatures continue to bar entry to their vast riches. However, this has done little to stem the flow of scavengers and adventurers, all of whom risk life and limb to find their arcane fortunes.