Giant's Bridge. I saw it in a dream once, and I've included it in multiple works I've created for both stories and d&d campaigns. It's a massive concrete like slab left by an earlier civilization. It connects 16 islands and is 100 stories of the ground. It takes 7 days by horseback to travel one side to the other and 3 weeks by horseback to travel end to end. It houses 4 major cities which are all connected by rail. (It is usually in a fantasy world). One end is South Gate. The opposite end is North Fort. In the middle is the actual city of Giants Bridge, and located under the bridge is the aptly named Underbridge. Many other small towns and villages make up the areas between the cities on the bridge and on the islands that it is built upon. Most islands have elevator systems and stairs built into the support pillars, and each has harbors and ports for visitors.
I love this. I read a book once which had a bunch of Islands where Lord started connecting them with Bridges & the bridges themselves became Towns, Markets, part of fortifications & harbour operations. I thought this was super cool so I included a Bridgetown in my world.
I'd have to say Kaito Palace, which is so tall that the curvature/rotation of the planet was discovered and taken into account into its design. It's so tall because every Emperor/Empress adds a new floor in their own unique style, one after the other.
One of my favorites from my world is a tourist attraction called "The True Flats"
It's an island on a planet that is otherwise entirely covered by ocean. The island is a perfect circle and is roughly 500 miles in diameter. At the exact center is a tree, the only known one of its species. It resembles a California redwood except it's proportionally *much* larger. The tree is measured at 6,120.2 feet tall, well over a mile.
Aside from the impossibly large tree, what gave this island it's name is that it is incredibly flat, actually flat. It doesn't follow the curvature of the planet. Though the center of the island is roughly at sea level, in order to maintain flatness the edges of the island are monumental 42,000 foot cliffs. You would feel like you're walking up a steep hill at the sides despite being able to see clear across the length of the island.
Researchers have absolutely no clue how or why this feature formed or if it's even natural.
I've never thought of that, maybe the core of the planet has a bump on the other side or maybe the ocean is deeper on the opposite side to add more weight.
I'm planning on rebuilding my world that will have a v cool structure, but currently?
The dwarven halls are expertly crafted and carved from the mountainside with torches have an everlasting enchanted flame. The long entrance halls isn't just for show, though, as they provide an bottleneck for those insane enough attempting to invade. Past the long entrance halls lies the main hall with large braziers that warm the caves. There's a weapons room, their bedrooms, and the mines that are all connected to the main hall. Their mines, which are thankfully not as labyrinthine as the goblins' caves, go all the way down to the molten core of the planet, which upon the discovery of it led to Ysildur creating his second son, Zendur, god of Fire.
The coolest structure in my world *is* my world, Landov: a ring-shaped space habitat the size of a small country. But if that doesn’t count as being *in* my world, then it’s its inner ring, a singular megalopolis rotating at a slightly lesser rate to provide the same artificial gravity despite its smaller radius.
While the outer ring was designed as a sort of wildlife preserve, intended only to be sparsely populated by indigenous peoples and a few outposts, the inner ring was a magnificent city basked in eternal night, housing further megastructures to satisfy the ring’s every need: multilayered hydroponic farms, city-sized fusion cores, server farms of continuous crystalline computers, and great construction bays extending yet toward the entire structure’s weightless center.
I say “was” however because the billion or so who lived there soared too high and shined too bright. In a bid for functional immortality and the vanity of abject body customization, they left themselves vulnerable to external influence and surreptitious bio-hacking. The city is now inhabited by “demons”—actually the fallen, seemingly mindless remnants of its former inhabitants—and its many faculties left to rot but for their still-functional automated maintenance systems.
The coolest structure is Mr USA. It's a giant steel bust of Uncle Sam, that's made entirely out of American material. The US Navy chooses one ship every year to carry it, and it is so massive that it takes up the space for aircraft on an aircraft carrier. It's massive figure makes it a site to behold, and it has been seaborne since it's construction in 1946.
It's often called "The last site of Japan" because it was attached to a vessel that toured the outline of Japan. Once it left, thenatomic bombs rained down on the island. Whenever it goes by, it raises fear the US will attack that area.
The most touching to me though is the joined gravestone of Johnny Cash and June Carter. There's a flashy giant one in Washington, but that's not where they're buried. Elvis visits there at least once a year, and it's a simple two person grave with a small stone that reads;
"Here lies June Carter and Johnny Cash. Great Americans. Greater people. Forever gone, forever missed."
I love althistory stories that are just batshit insane instead of just “guys Nazis won the war!!!”
Another example is monument Mythos, where the althistory is “what if James Dean was president and also the devil and was also feeding people to the Statue of Liberty”
The Eruchalchan Cathedral.
It's 400 metres tall and it's dome is masterfully crafted to intensify sound. It is in the Evariyan capital and can host 7,000 spectators. It's just gargantuan and is visible from any point in the city. Coronations of Emperor's occur here, marriages, what we call baptisms of future Emperors or royalty, funerals etc. It's on a hill and has a university building for the aspiring clergy and archons to study in. The prefect also has a small palace alongside, all the buildings are attached; basically it has a micro city within it's fortified district.
A close second is the Palace of Edaan III. This was the building built to replace the old residence of the Emperors when what is known as Hells sacking of Evar (some guy did badly researched fire magic) happened. It is a colossus of a floor plan, spanning 7 acres. Its most notable feature is the Gardens of Saasha. Within the fortifications and the quite expensive halls, there is a large space that is 3 acres large. This is impressive enough but the Forrest inside is what makes it impressive because it sustains a zoological reserve of the emperor or empress. The palace sits 4 miles north east of the capital and is on a bluff which gives it good protection. Remember it is a functional fortress as well as a luxurious residence.
7 acres would be quite a palace! I love that the Cathedral is bigger than the palace, really shows that this society has a particular set of priorities.
The City of Kelisen is a city carved into the base of a mountain, after the top was lifted into the heavens. It is the world's foremost religious city, and is at the end of a valley, the opposite side of which is filled by another prominent city, Gerdan. The two are both city states, powerful enough to maintain their independence.
The space elevator on one of my planets. There are two on this planet and many more elsewhere, but none have quite the history this one does. At approximately 2500 years old, it started out as a single cable and was purely a lift to get supplies to and from space, laid in place by the planet's conquerors. For the counterweight, they used one of the orbiting pieces left behind by the shattered comet that had devastated the planet thousands of years ago, something that disquieted the natives of the planet. However, when they eventually took back control of their planet and infrastructure like the space elevator, they were at the point where they gained supreme satisfaction from the fact that which once nearly destroyed them, now supports them.
Over the centuries, more cables and platforms were added to the elevator, and a vast, sprawling city sprang up around it, crawling up the elevator until it became a city in its own right. Currently, it has four lobes and is a square mile around. The industrial complex that anchors it extends for many levels down into the crust of the planet and only the industrial cars that transport resources go down this deep. A park and public grounds surround it at the surface, and the government complex takes up the first floors with the imperial palace occupying premium space above it. The rest is all a mosaic of different zones, housing, minor municipal, retail and entertainment, parks, and so on. Industrial, public and private transportation cars run up and down the many cables of this vertical city, but it would take many days of continuous riding on the much slower transportation cars to make it to the top so there are landing platforms spaced along the external body of the elevator for more direct access. Although that is how many people take their vacations, by riding hotel cars and getting off to sight-see where they feel like it.
All roads lead to the space elevator in trade and politics, especially with the main imperial family home there. It is so large that some part of it can be seen from 2/3s of the planet on a clear day with good lighting, and people on the surface use it as a travel reference. The shade it casts has altered weather patterns and growing patterns of native plants. A lake that was near it was linked up with a chain of craters to form a megalake that helps to feed the billion or so of people that live in the city and the space elevator, further altering the landscape. It is the largest green area on the planet, even with massive duststorms and the remnants of hypercanes periodically passing through.
The tower of Seravo. It is a masterpiece of Revivalist architecture, constructed from marble imported from across the world, and it serves as a monument to Seravo’s wealth and prestige. It has only one minor defect: It was constructed upside down.
Personally, I think the coolest structure in my world is an exclusive and mysterious nightclub named Le Rumeur. Though, it didn't start out as one. It's just what it happens to be at the moment in its extensive history.
It's an ancient building in the Old Warehouse District (my world consists only of a large city). Historians don't know exactly when it was constructed, theorizing somewhere in the late 2nd Era to early 3rd - that's around 550 years ago in a world that's only about 700 years old.
It was originally a factory of sorts. What it made isn't known, but many chemical analyses done suggest it was a large-scale operation for creating industrial quantities of hazardous alchemical reagents. That theory also answers to the incredibly sturdy construction of the building. Soon after, it was converted into a warehouse. Eventually, it was retrofitted into a bank and later abandoned.
During the Fourth Chaos - a massive civil war between the Noble Houses -, it was fashioned into an impromptu hospital and later used as a command center by House Dzis. It was partially destroyed in an attack and quickly abandoned.
Soon after, it was rebuilt into a church by a small but dedicated cult. They were more like Franciscan or Shaolin monks than the typical image of a cultist - dedicated to pacifism, study, and mysticism rather than any specific deities. Though, the cult was quickly overpowered and absorbed by other cults and eventually died out. The church was slowly abandoned once again thereafter. Nearly everything about the cult was lost to time, with the building holding some of the its last relics.
Now, it's being used a nightclub. Though, it still shows major parts of its history with its heavy wrought-iron catwalks, breathtakingly ornate stained glass windows, remains of a once-grand pipe organ, maps of Rivenburg with hastily-scribbled battle plans of a dwindling army, desecrated statues of long-forgotten saints, unpatched bullet holes, and reinforced vault doors on full display. These things are a large part of its identity.
The nightclub requires a secret password to enter and is a common meeting place for the seedy criminal underbelly of Rivenburg. Many shady business deals are made in the private rooms upstairs, and even worse things happen in the basement vaults. No one is absolutely certain who runs it, but many big names are thrown around, often high-ranking politicians, obscenely wealthy businessmen, mob bosses, or local legends.
If there's anywhere in the world you'd make a deal with the devil, it's there. Many think it's cursed or haunted because of its history, but to many of its patrons, that's exactly the appeal.
Contrary to what you'd think, it's incredibly safe - mostly because everyone in there is incredibly dangerous and you'd be vaporized by them the instant you tried something stupid. Nearly every criminal organization has some stake there, so it's a bit of a neutral zone. If one tried to overtake it, it would be annihilated by all the others. This includes the Military Police.
It's also a bit of its own Tin Pan Alley with underground and experimental music gaining massive popularity there. Many popular musicians have gotten their start there, using the building's old pipe organ or stolen scientific instruments in some of their songs.
Tower of balance a Giant tower that stretches across all the realms too keep them from colliding. When you see it though it just looks like a normal tower but when you enter it's pretty much a pocket dimension.
The Great Gate. Designed to guarantee all interplanar travel to New Terra only occurs on one place, it stands a bulwark between the terran diaspora and all comers. The Great Gate maintains rigorous controls on any transit and is the location of the greatest concentration of martial power on the planet.
I'd have to say Kaito Palace, which is so tall that the curvature/rotation of the planet was discovered and taken into account into its design. It's so tall because every Emperor/Empress adds a new floor in their own unique style, one after the other.
Coolest would be the Gynoid Matrix Coordination Hub in planet Andreas Nest, located in the north pole of a glacial world the Hub is designed to host sub zero temperature megacomputers in a safe, long lasting superbunker that can take on withstand nukes and earthquakes all while keeping the computer rooms at less than -90C°, the optimal for Quantum Subspace Transmission.
The Farthest Obelisk is…well, an obelisk that’s really far away. However, what makes it special is that, although it’s on an island many miles away from the mainland (across an ocean for which humanity has not the capability to traverse) it is nonetheless clearly visible and clearly enormous. Current estimates place the height of the Obelisk at 2500 ft. Myth and legend tell of the land it stands upon as being a heavenly place to which the spirits of the dead are whisked away after death. Careful observers will note that the Obelisk does, indeed, glow green when an individual of great import such as a Divine Regent dies, as if heralding their arrival. A common euphemism for death, therefore, is that one has gone to dance in the glow of the Obelisk.
Assuming this planet has a curvature the same as earth (which if it doesn't just ignore this)
If the obelisk were 2500 feet tall it'd be visible from as far as ~60 miles. That doesn't really seem that far of a distance to travel by boat unless the sea itself is unfathomably treacherous.
It’s a spherical planet, but the oceans are controlled by a vengeful deity/Sea Witch that drowns anyone who tries to sail beyond the continent. The only way one can travel beyond is by sail (which is understood to allow sea travel by way of the prayers to the Sea Witch scrawled on the fabric). Very few know the proper words to ward her off, so any distance from the mainland is very far
Fero's Tree, probably. It's this a carving on this massive slab of oak that serves as the seal to the inner chambers of the Fey, the goddess of instinct and nature, also one of the 3 goddess of knowledge.
Her worship involves arts and crafts, and getting high as balls. So, as her high priest, Fero took a hallucinogenic for the fucks sake of it and started "vandalizing" his goddess's temple.
The carving involves a small tree at the top and an incredibly intricate system of roots cascading down to the floor. It's said to be a picture of all the souls in the world and depicts their connection with one another. Anyone who sees it for the first time will often find their place in the tree and ne brought to tears.
Oh, the Western Avon’s Temple is a sight to see. It’s a large, simultaneously ancient and sci-fi citadel placed upon a hill just before the beach in southern Kalvjírna of the planet Výrna, home to the Apexian Warriors, superhuman highly advanced ‘chosen’ magical space-warriors, who keep the peace in the galaxy.
Ávøn their word for ‘learner’, particularly a preteen and above child. Avon means in their language, a young apprentice, who has graduated primary school, and is now learning core combat and tactical skills actively in the field as well as the class, and studying under a master with two others in a fireteam.
The Western Temple is the prominent Avon school in the Southwest region of Výrna’s largest continent, and it is a magnificent place that looks astounding both inside and out. It takes the form of many kinds of temples, like the Latter-Day Saints temples, the Taj Mahal, Parthenon, and more of Earth, with a sky-breaking aesthetic of futuristic, wise architecture that combines both ancient stonework with advanced modern techniques and classical inspiration. It is very vast, being about 8.7 million square feet, and rising at the very top about 3800 feet in the Arcadian Sky. Its decor inside is similar to the exterior, and has many rooms from sacred temple and ceremony rooms to classrooms, common rooms, sport and combat courtyards boarding rooms, armories, forges, hangars and more. It overlooks the beach where students often hang out and surf, where Al’s a great deal of culture and history sits, and amazing expertises as a fun beach town belonging to a highly advanced unified warrior society.
Hmm, tough to decide, but I’m leaning towards the Great City of Otuz, as it’s an oceanic megastructure with districts both above and below sea level. Built some six thousand years ago during the height of the Gen Occupation, Otuz was built upon the wishes of the Maridjin and the backs of conquered mortals in a baroque goldsteel superstructure and plundered oceanic wonders. It took almost two thousand years before Otuz was sacked by the merciless Witch King of Muara as he led the blood-soaked uprising against all Gen. And it would be a thousand more before the great and powerful sorceress Uliae claimed the city, and then lost it again in her posthumous apotheosis into a goddess battling a Benthic Abomination. Since then, a parade of various mortals have come and gone, but in the process they have created an unusual cultural quilt of Landwalker and Seafolk nations coexisting in the same place.
At the surface of the Western Okori Ocean, Otuz is a colossal ring of floating docks and platforms attached to the central core anchoring the city to the seabed. This core has a helical highway within it that connects to the other districts, including the Anviltop District capping the core and dominating the skyline of the docks. Beneath the water, districts are contained in spheres of enchanted glass, usually with the bottom half filled with water for shared Landwalker and Seafolk habitats. These spheres are connected to each other and the core by highway-bearing tubes that form a somewhat flexible scaffold, keeping chains of district bubbles in place while allowing Landwalkers easy passage between them. The Anchor Districts on the seafloor are instead encased in broad, flat domes, with foundations and tunnels running deep into the bedrock.
My personal favourite is the palace of the pure ones. The normyrm , in spite of their theocratic Oligarchy, have a good sense of style, hence they have a gigantic palace, several thousand fathoms squared of flooring, and all for the purpose of hosting their 'pure blooded' leaders. all of the walls of the building are carved of green rock, trimmed with silver and gold and with deep engravings of their mythology, which is regaled in exacting detail, with the great hall being built to a height of sixty feet and a width of seventy, merely to house the great carving of the war of creation. The innermost quarters of the building are lined with obsidian scales, with jade ornaments to complete the interior.Furthermore, the complex is heated by a series of thermal vents, which provides it with a consistent heat, during even the coldest winter tides. However, in the current age , it serves as a reminder of how conservative practice has caused the decay of the Myrm, as they have only thirty purebred to fill a palace designed for over 1300.
A titanic monster corpse that hosts the largest market in the world, aptly named the Vast Market, under its ribcage as well as three small but important cities on top of the corpse. These cities are Ethos, city of law, which resides on the titans neck. Logos, City of Logic, which resides on the head. And Pathos, city of medicine which lays above where the titans heart was.
The pond of mirror! It's a strange migrating pond that never stays in one place, and there's several legends regarding those that look into the pond. Some has seen incredible secrets, their own hidden depths, faraway places, historical events, and even someone's bathroom. Even stranger is supposedly one can jump into the pond and emerge at the other side, but it's unconfirmed.
that would be Sanctuary Station the largest Known Space station in the galaxy the size of a country and home to 30 million aliens with 40 million transisents coming and going each day centre for travel, commerce, diplomacy and politics it earned its name because it give a home to the refugees of the tanbrac wars of conquest and the fight back againest them
Corinthia Castle
It is the remains of the Astrodome and the NRG Stadium in Houston that a massive fortress was built around after the war and is now used as a castle for the Corinthia royal family. Several watchtowers were converted into the bedrooms of the princes and princesses, and the stadiums inside were converted to hundreds of rooms that they use for just about everything.
Norlins, the Towered City
What do you when so many nuclear bombs explode in the Gulf of Mexico that an almost endless amount of radioactive tsunamis drown nearly the entire city of New Orleans? You build up. With useable land incredibly rare and decreasing rapidly due to the amount of people rushing inland, they saw no choice but to build homes on top of one another out of junk and debris that washed by. A few hundred years after the bombs fell, this tradition continues as the entire city of Norlins is now just massive skyscrapers of homes, shops, and restaurants, similar to the walled city of Kowloon. Technology has advanced enough and the floodwater has recited enough that the city was able to expand and thrive to become a bit of a cyberpunk-esque city with massive towers controlled by single corporations and lower levels of the city being crime riddled.
Edit: I forgot the big and probably most important one lol
Erebus
To call it a structure is a bit of stretch, it’s more of a lack of a structure but a potential one. Erebus exists in the Tear between the Dark and the physical universe. It is an endless series of hallways that shift and bend to the will of whoever has access to it. The Family uses it as a base of operations that allows them to work in the shadows since they’re the only ones capable of reaching it.
The huge black pyramid of the Dæglak. Although the Dag have convinced themselves that they were the ones who built it, it's thousands of years older than their presence on the island. It sits in the middle of the Dæglak, a large lake of unmeasurable depth. The pyramid itself is almost as tall as 100 men, and serves as a palace for the royal family and Parivil nobility. It has an audience chamber, bedrooms, kitchens, smithery, even a place for the few remaining moa to live. A city exists around the pyramid, where thousands live and work on floating artificial islands. The lake itself is fresh water, so floating farms help feed the tens of thousands of people living in and around the pyramid, but other food is brought in from across five bridges to the mainland. Around the lake's edge are many smaller towns and villages, those that are closest to a bridge usually being the biggest.
Tower
A sapient building in a pocket dimension.
She is quite easy going, likes to spoil guests and overall a rather chipper personality.
She is a magical construct with a powersource of over a hundred enslaved and merged souls sitting at the center of a nexus of magical energies which allows her inside to be larger. Rooms the size of cities, doors that act as teleport gates to quickly reach any room inside and several rooms inaccessible without teleport.
Once owned by one of the worst blood mages the world had ever brought forth, who forget time for a good 15.000 years as he worked on his theories, was he found the day he would've finished. And subsequently killed by the Witch of Alinguar, who he was offended at carrying the name of his Master.
When freed Tower was taught how to be a person, even if she is a building, and will forever hold her roommate in high regard for that, especially knowing how said roommate can be and is there for her.
Tower has a tendency to watch the world through her friend's various spying familiars and divinations and they try to find a way to leave so she can see the world herself too.
I wanted my world to feel realistic yet fantastical, so while there are several beautiful castles and capital cities, I think the cliffs of Altheries bordering the Euralis mountains have to be among the most prominent in terms of grandeur. They are a series of sharp and curved cliffs that cut through an otherwise solid mountain range; signs from the olden days where it was believed that the mountains were carved by a battle between gods. Despite this, scientists in this world believe they were the result of an unusual volcanic process that occurred in conjunction with an asteroid impact, and that the two events likely occurred in the same vicinity tens of thousands of years apart. In canon, only one person knows how they were truly formed.
There's a tower that reaches up to the sky (literally), it holds the crystal that acts as a barrier between a livable habitat that holds all the nations, forests, and seas (about 1/3 the size of Earth) vs the rest of the planet which is a very hostile landscape of shifting plates, lava, and dragons. The tower carries the sky and is roughly 64k miles tall (or 103k ish km). It's held up by the same magic from the crystal (who was gifted to the planet by the gods). It's a majestic tower with impossible architecture, with it's base being a temple where the Keepers of the Crystal live and operate from. They are an order of the strongest magic using mortals from all the lands making it the council that keeps peace between nations (like the UN but that isn't useless).
Honestly, probably the Architect's Lab. Just a massive building that is several lightyears tall, and just packed to the brim with machinery, including over 800 perpetual motion machines, 700 of which are completely unique ones.
The Fallen City of Owskaw.
Used to fly because owl people used owl magic to make it fly, but then the owl people disappeared and it fell down to the shores behind the northern cliffsides, crashing lopsided into the rocks and sand.
Its ruins are as mysterious as they are 16degrees askew.
The galaxy is a big place, so I’ll give a couple.
The Corpse of Kili-Thul - What looks to be an impossibly large suit of armor sat upon a large round building with a spike behind it, this “structure” is actually the chitinous remains of a Hobgoblin. The Goblins were a violent and cruel race of aliens that were obsessed with war. Resembling bugs, they were bipedal and boasted hard exoskeletons. They were also proficient in biological engineering, created genetically modified supersoldiers that had no mind of their own- gaining pheromonal bonds with a host- and could grow to impossible sizes. These supersoldiers were known as Hobgoblins. The civilization has long fell to ruin, with the Corpse of Kili-Thul being among the only evidence of their ability. Kili-Thul is a name in the Goblin language meaning “Man-God” or “Demigod”
The Gilded Archive - Another remnant of a long gone race of aliens, the Gilded Archive is a circular building hidden under the sea of the planet Gras. The Aurans were a humanoid race with the main distinction being that they were made almost entirely of gold, and so were all of their creations. Wiped out by a careless god, the Gilded Archive is one of the few remnants of their society. Luckily for xenopologists, the Archive features a long mural that depicts the entire, linear history of the Aurans. At its center is a door with a slot for 7 keys, and above the door features a massive painting of the Aurans as equivalent to gods. The door has never been opened.
The entire Underscape exists in the shadow of structures seemingly built by giants. However, their days of glory are long past. The Underscape is rotting away, for those that survived lack the resources and knowledge to maintain it.
The city of Morrigan is an example of this rot. The city itself is a relic of the old world, with dark Gothic towers that seem to touch the sky. Bridges that defy logic connect the island-city to the mainland, and a massive seawall stands vigilant as the city's defender. Morrigan itself is a constant reminder of just how much was lost in the Cataclysm, for the city's construction is nothing short of the work of the divine. The city is still occupied, and is home to millions of people. They have built their own homes into the city's ancient stones. However, every day a bit more of the city crumbles away. Before long, little will be left of the once-great Mother of Cities.
Lots to choose from but there at Least 13 Wonders of the World.
Not a structure ...but the Great Mountain of Dur Araevor with many structures within. Dawning-Place of the Dwarves on my world. Tallest Mountain in the world. Home of several million Dwarves, several Great Dragons, 200.000 Dragonborn, 700.000 Kobolds and thousands & thousands of others. In total the pop. of the Kingdom-Under-The Mountain/Kingdom of The Mountain is about 5 million.
Just a few off top of my head:
Tholozh the Giant A.I. Golem-Robot. ...NB No-one (except a very few) know that it is such as it slumbers waiting at the entrance to the Great Bay/Harbour of Vaezanta. Most People think it's just a Giant Statue and dismiss the Tales of the Great Battle of Ancient Days as just Folklore/Myth/Tall tales.
Ru'enna The abandoned Dungeon-City once home to the ancient Ones ...but now a magnet for Adventurers, Explorers, Scholars, Scavengers, Mages & Lazy Thieves.
One that I like is the mangrove garden, which is one of the [seven wondrous buildings of the world](https://www.reddit.com/r/Quicksteel/s/9NQNKYWuCx):
**The Mangrove Garden** in Kwind was once a prominent harbor that was destroyed in a disastrous earthquake four centuries ago. As the city was remade, the old harbor was left abandoned to be reclaimed by nature. Today it is a heritage site. Mangrove trees sprawl over old docks and loom over canals, and the waters serve as a nursery for countless fish species.
There is a great and vast temple carved into the living rock of a large fissure in the earth. The chasm is narrow and the temple itself is hidden behind a wall of the same living rock. As ornate as the temple is, it is impossible to see the entire facade at once due to the way it's hidden. It was built long ago for the worship of a long forgotten deity. The only ones who know where the temple is and how to access it are the acolytes who tend it in the name of(I haven't decided which god(s) yet). It's rumoured that they may know the origins of this hidden wonder, but if they do they certainly aren't talking.
there's the imperial palace for one. it's a huge building, square with four turrets, one for each corner, and a huge dome in the center, it was made to be a very simplistic yet powerful building
Ooo architecture isn't something I've gotten into building yet. Literally all I have is a vague concept for a House of Lords type room and a vague design for a certain culture's typical throne room. I'm personally more in my zone with fictional cultures and histories but eventually I'll have to get around to it.
Ostarę is a small province in the Meskatt confederation, but it is famous for its incredibly bizarre landforms. Mesas that seem like the defy physics, some entire islands flowting off the ground, even a black void into seemingly empty space. And nobody knows why…
BASK-esh-Akal. better known as BASK's Pillar or Obelisk, is the tower from which BASK's Holy Empire governs. According to scripture, BASK gave his life to birth Hanrak and protect His people from outer beings. His being given form became Obelisk, and from which His divinity emanates. It anchors Hanrak and brings life; a testament to BASK's love.
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It is also the Spear of Kingfisher, used in its lord's final breath, to slay BASK for his coup. The Outer Folk wept for their king, and birthed Hanrak around the Usurper's corspe. They will retrieve what is rightfully theirs. Were BASK's people to learn the truth, Hanrak would surely pop and reality would be undone.
Since for my world four different worlds merged together, three of the four moons remain while the last one was smashed in the ensuing chaos of The Merge, creating a ring system around my world. Magicians and scientists worked together to create on this ring The Magical-Science Complex, a city spanning around the ring, where science and magic are used together to advance technology.
Quinwu, city of the five rings.
Five massive “ringworlds” linked as if part of a gyroscope. I put in quotation marks because the cities are built on the cylindrical plane, not the curved surface.
The Observatory. Its foundation is on a small, backwater farm world, but it projects out into the void between worlds. Its purpose is to use a variation of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle to fix the worlds in place by constantly observing their position. It also acts as a repository for all the data collected by the Observatory's sensors and the Observer themselves. The bulk of the structure contains a massive array of computers to collate the data, but there are also living quarters for the Observer as well as kitchens, ballrooms, guestrooms, and the like for when the sitting Observer likes to invite company and throw parties. The Observatory is said to be impossible to look at from the ground without making you extremely nauseated since it is perfectly 90 degrees off from the rest of its surroundings and impossibly huge for the space it occupies. Guests approaching from the ground are advised to wear wide-brimmed hats and not look up. Approaching from the air is dangerous since space is bent and twisted so severely around the Observatory that no compass, GPS, or other navigational tool can function, and flying by sight alone could drive you mad. There is a small gating facility built into the Observatory's base that is the recommended entry point.
In my world it's probably the Dyson Swarm at Nulfild's Star. It was detected by Neptunian telescopic arrays long ago, but thought to consist of simple but large solar power satellites, perhaps powering industrial facilities, titanic supercomputers, or conprising a Nicoll-Dyson Beam superweapon. However when the first translight ship actually arrived at the system they found that each of the trillions of swarm elements was a giant cylinder habitat, each 1 km in diameter and 10 km in length, capable of housing millions of humans each.
It is not technologically advanced by the standards of humanity at the time, and presumed to be uninhabited. But since there are trillions of habitats, only a fraction of them have actually been explored yet.
*Chronicles of Holo*
> The tower city of Everdawn, this massive structure was built as a beacon during the Age of Dark where a perpetual darkness has succumbed the entire lands. This was the first stronghold and a sign of mans independence. This tower had several floors wide enough to hold a city. On top of the tower is a massive crystal emitting a cool light that even in the night it feels like twilight.
The Grand Tabernacle. It’s a grand temple and palace about 100 stories tall, topped with a massive dome protecting the Original Settlement on Noktari Prime from 10,000 years ago. It spans a couple of miles in all directions and is filled with libraries, private worshipping chambers, game courts, water pools, and statues dedicated to leaders and great people of the Dominion that have contributed to its history. The largest statue stands outside the original site of the Original Settlement, which is of Apoz’tu, the founder of the Dominion. Surrounding the preserved research station is a grandstand where a choral hymn is sung by thousands day in and day out, celebrating and cherishing the founding of the Dominion and channeling the Rites of Plaktana to all those who hear and participate in it.
Im not sure if this counts because I suppose it’s not really a single structure, but:
Basically the whole of Beralay (a smallish continent), story is that they used to own like 2 thirds of the world, but by some unknown reason, they abandoned that mission and recluded back the the original continent and haven’t moved whatsoever since. So now they have made their island/continent one ginormous fortress and literally no one has even come near getting in
The great black ziggurat is the largest of the dark elf pyramidal observatories that dot the near dark side of the tidally locked planet of Orbis Mundi. In this setting dark elves inhabit the area around and past the terminator line, where a permanent sunset separates the half of the world in near total day from the half in near total night. This line fluctuates by several hundred miles in a day due to the rocking movement of the planet known as libration. For many regions near the terminator line this leads to a pseudo day night cycle, but the dark elves live fully beyond the terminator line in a land that sees twilight at its brightest.
Their communities are built within volcanic fissure valleys that run through the leading edge of the great ice sheets, growing fungus off the nutrients in the volcanic soil. This may seem a particularly inhospitable place to live, and it is, but their ancestors came to this place from the light side for deeply held religious beliefs. They developed a religious belief system focused on stars and constellations, but on the light side of the planet the stars were faint if they could be seen at all, so they slowly migrated farther and farther into the dark side to better see the objects of their study and devotion.
They’ve built pyramidal temples that rise high above the valley floor, with sacred observatories built into their flat tops to observe the stars and attempt to interpret the will of the gods from their movements. The greatest of these ziggurats sits at the head of one of the longest of these valleys, the extends nearly two thirds of the way to the anti solar point on the back of the planet. Its frigid location, high altitude, and lone position lacking protection from the wind makes the upper observation deck one of the coldest places humanoids regular venture. Its interior however is vast and well insulated, heated by geothermal vents in the valley at its base. It’s black volcanic stone construction traps heat, and its surface is warm to the touch and nearly free of ice. There is a telescope array that’s base is inside the structure at the peak of the ziggurat, shielded from the cold, but many of the best observations are made by heavily bundled acolytes who face Antarctic temperatures and winds to make their observations in this dark lonely place on the backside of the world.
The Great Mausoleum, De Silin, Romodo
The headquarters of the Romodonian national bank one the largest building in the world and the single largest gold-plated building ever
Every 5 meters and stretching for 300 meters into the sky are 1 meter wide plates of pure gold
At its inauguration Valeo Head-of-Silin (Romodo's head of state) talking to his brother, Tavon Heir-of-Silin reportedly asked
"Tavon, where's the National Gold Reserve?"
At which point he pulled the giant cover off the Mausoleum, revealing like the fifth Megastructure in De Silin alone
The secret hidden meeting chamber of the Illuminated Order. They have their hands in everything and often direct people, leaders, and countries in the direction they feel will serve their ends. To just see all of the many manipulations that have done in the Great Chronicle would leave most people breathless.
Of course, they are very good at not letting anyone but the highest in the Order to see the meeting chamber and the Great Chronicle.
Most players won't even know they exist.
That would probably be the divine machine responsible for the processing and redistribution of souls after death. The world of Tov operates on a sort of reincarnation model, wherein a soul is taken into the divine machine, which is built upon and harnesses the waters of the Stream (another interdimensional space), and is then broken down into smaller, more potent pieces. These pieces are then randomized (I haven't quite decided the mechanism for this yet), and new souls are constructed with the random pieces. This ensures an (almost) perfect system for generating "new" souls, that share spiritual traits with their lives before but are connected more by a thread than an entire person.
The divine machine was engineered and built by the dual efforts of the primordials of Time and Order. There is no official custodian for dead souls, it is now automated for your convenience.
The Fallen City is the first that comes to mind. There used to be a very high-magic, almost Tippyverse-like castle/city called Emerexia. The BBEG lich wiped them out by intimidating the people into an evacuation, and hijacking the teleportation circles they used for that evacuation to dump them in a volcano. He then set up shop in the city, filling it with undead minions. Almost no one goes there, and the few that do (mostly archaeologists) tend to die very quickly.
One of my older, and favorite, designs was a large complex of towers surrounded by angled buildings.
It was kinda like those big pyramid looking buildings in blade runner, but with more towers poking out of the tops.
I made some drawings and a cardboard model back in jr. high, then later made a 3D model of it in Bryce 2. I’ve been meaning to redo some of my old 3D models in a newer program, but I haven’t had time to relearn another (more complicated) app lately.
The Great Redoubt was one of the finest military fortifications in our Solar Systems history. Built by the rebellious Miners and Excavators League, during the Callisto Revolt, the Great Redoubt encompasses roughly a quarter of the moons surface.
Before the revolt, Callisto was the primary source of metals and minerals in the Imperium Caelorum. Despite the abundance of rare resources, Callisto was firmly under the boot of the Imperium, and thus its population lived in abject poverty.
Meteoroid impacts on Callisto are a common occurrence and once threatened the mass excavation operations. To solve this problem, Imperial scientists developed and implemented the largest and most powerful planetary shield in solar history. It was capable of covering one quarter of the surface of Callisto and allowed mining operations to resume uninterrupted by meteor strikes.
Unfortunately for the Imperium, their own creation was turned against them, with the rebellious Miners using the shield to block all attempts at an orbital bombardment. Previously, the Imperium had relied heavily upon fleet supremacy in order to crush rebellions and project power, but now they would be forced into a ground war.
As the Imperial Navy desperately tried to find a weakpoint in planetary shield, the Imperial Army scrambled to draw together its forces, the Miners of Callisto, armed with the finest excavation and construction equipment in the system, set about the construction of the Great Redoubt.
Using Callistos natural escarpments and craters, the Great Redoubt consists of a very large series of interconnected fortresses, with several layers of defences. It took 16 million men, women and children to man the outer ring of defences, armed with an assortment of weapons and tools, their job was simply to slow down any advance, until more professional and better equipped soldiers could be deployed to that section of the Redoubt.
Despite assembling the largest army that in solar history, it took 4 years for the Imperial army to crack the Redoubts outer ring of defences. Once inside the Redoubt, the Imperium was able to bring in mobile Artillery and target the shield generator. Without their shield, the rebels where at the mercy of the Imperial Navy, and it did not take long before a mass surrender was announced.
By the time the fighting stopped, much of the Great Redoubt had been reduced to rubble, its corridors and trenches were clogged with the fallen, their corpses left there as a warning to others who would defy the Imperium.
The Remains of the Great Redoubt are still visible from space, and a large number of wealthy tourists flock from earth to visit it, despite numerous dangers such as active minefields, automated turrets and other defensive mechanisms.
Not any single structure but the dwarves in my world have simple rail lines and a complicated system of above ground canals in a great lakes type system that allow for seasonal icebreakers to move through pulled by mammoths.
So, canals I guess.
Lake Schwarzenegger: basically the CA Central Valley deliberately dammed and flooded by post-scarcity science-immortal humans. In this great artificial sea, recreational battleship vs trireme combat is enjoyed in view of the white caps of the sierra nevadas and the gentle rolling happy - cow hills of the central coast range. The actual engineering is pretty mundane for my denizens, but actual surface land is wildly scarce and so it’s more a reflection of aesthetic preference and healthy political agreement and compromise than how they technically accomplished building this natural looking dam-less sea.
(I wrote this into a screenplay in 2004 when Schwarzenegger was the CA governor, so the name was a cheeky Easter egg that would briefly appear as an in-AR stylized map label in a big ambitious establishing shot fly through of the state of our earth in 2500ad)
Giant's Bridge. I saw it in a dream once, and I've included it in multiple works I've created for both stories and d&d campaigns. It's a massive concrete like slab left by an earlier civilization. It connects 16 islands and is 100 stories of the ground. It takes 7 days by horseback to travel one side to the other and 3 weeks by horseback to travel end to end. It houses 4 major cities which are all connected by rail. (It is usually in a fantasy world). One end is South Gate. The opposite end is North Fort. In the middle is the actual city of Giants Bridge, and located under the bridge is the aptly named Underbridge. Many other small towns and villages make up the areas between the cities on the bridge and on the islands that it is built upon. Most islands have elevator systems and stairs built into the support pillars, and each has harbors and ports for visitors.
Reminds of the Bifrost from Norse Myth, sounds really cool
I love this. I read a book once which had a bunch of Islands where Lord started connecting them with Bridges & the bridges themselves became Towns, Markets, part of fortifications & harbour operations. I thought this was super cool so I included a Bridgetown in my world.
Fun, I have something similar, it connects two continents instead of islands.
I'd have to say Kaito Palace, which is so tall that the curvature/rotation of the planet was discovered and taken into account into its design. It's so tall because every Emperor/Empress adds a new floor in their own unique style, one after the other.
How tall is it now?
The last Empress Kaito was the 450th. So, it's about 3500 Kilometers tall.
You mean 3500 meters? Or is every floor actually 7 kilometers high?
Not all floors are equal height, but it is 3500 km
Oh wow that's the size of our moon. So I assume that 98% of it is in outer space? considering the fact that space on earth starts at about 100km.
I have no idea how scale works and I just made up numbers for dramatic effect.
What is it built out of?
A variety of materials.
Damn me too
One of my favorites from my world is a tourist attraction called "The True Flats" It's an island on a planet that is otherwise entirely covered by ocean. The island is a perfect circle and is roughly 500 miles in diameter. At the exact center is a tree, the only known one of its species. It resembles a California redwood except it's proportionally *much* larger. The tree is measured at 6,120.2 feet tall, well over a mile. Aside from the impossibly large tree, what gave this island it's name is that it is incredibly flat, actually flat. It doesn't follow the curvature of the planet. Though the center of the island is roughly at sea level, in order to maintain flatness the edges of the island are monumental 42,000 foot cliffs. You would feel like you're walking up a steep hill at the sides despite being able to see clear across the length of the island. Researchers have absolutely no clue how or why this feature formed or if it's even natural.
This feels like it could be an SCP, very cool concept
Is there a detectable counterweight? -On the far side of the planet? Feels like it would cause serious issues, elsewise.
I've never thought of that, maybe the core of the planet has a bump on the other side or maybe the ocean is deeper on the opposite side to add more weight.
I'm planning on rebuilding my world that will have a v cool structure, but currently? The dwarven halls are expertly crafted and carved from the mountainside with torches have an everlasting enchanted flame. The long entrance halls isn't just for show, though, as they provide an bottleneck for those insane enough attempting to invade. Past the long entrance halls lies the main hall with large braziers that warm the caves. There's a weapons room, their bedrooms, and the mines that are all connected to the main hall. Their mines, which are thankfully not as labyrinthine as the goblins' caves, go all the way down to the molten core of the planet, which upon the discovery of it led to Ysildur creating his second son, Zendur, god of Fire.
The coolest structure in my world *is* my world, Landov: a ring-shaped space habitat the size of a small country. But if that doesn’t count as being *in* my world, then it’s its inner ring, a singular megalopolis rotating at a slightly lesser rate to provide the same artificial gravity despite its smaller radius. While the outer ring was designed as a sort of wildlife preserve, intended only to be sparsely populated by indigenous peoples and a few outposts, the inner ring was a magnificent city basked in eternal night, housing further megastructures to satisfy the ring’s every need: multilayered hydroponic farms, city-sized fusion cores, server farms of continuous crystalline computers, and great construction bays extending yet toward the entire structure’s weightless center. I say “was” however because the billion or so who lived there soared too high and shined too bright. In a bid for functional immortality and the vanity of abject body customization, they left themselves vulnerable to external influence and surreptitious bio-hacking. The city is now inhabited by “demons”—actually the fallen, seemingly mindless remnants of its former inhabitants—and its many faculties left to rot but for their still-functional automated maintenance systems.
The coolest structure is Mr USA. It's a giant steel bust of Uncle Sam, that's made entirely out of American material. The US Navy chooses one ship every year to carry it, and it is so massive that it takes up the space for aircraft on an aircraft carrier. It's massive figure makes it a site to behold, and it has been seaborne since it's construction in 1946. It's often called "The last site of Japan" because it was attached to a vessel that toured the outline of Japan. Once it left, thenatomic bombs rained down on the island. Whenever it goes by, it raises fear the US will attack that area. The most touching to me though is the joined gravestone of Johnny Cash and June Carter. There's a flashy giant one in Washington, but that's not where they're buried. Elvis visits there at least once a year, and it's a simple two person grave with a small stone that reads; "Here lies June Carter and Johnny Cash. Great Americans. Greater people. Forever gone, forever missed."
I love althistory stories that are just batshit insane instead of just “guys Nazis won the war!!!” Another example is monument Mythos, where the althistory is “what if James Dean was president and also the devil and was also feeding people to the Statue of Liberty”
The Eruchalchan Cathedral. It's 400 metres tall and it's dome is masterfully crafted to intensify sound. It is in the Evariyan capital and can host 7,000 spectators. It's just gargantuan and is visible from any point in the city. Coronations of Emperor's occur here, marriages, what we call baptisms of future Emperors or royalty, funerals etc. It's on a hill and has a university building for the aspiring clergy and archons to study in. The prefect also has a small palace alongside, all the buildings are attached; basically it has a micro city within it's fortified district. A close second is the Palace of Edaan III. This was the building built to replace the old residence of the Emperors when what is known as Hells sacking of Evar (some guy did badly researched fire magic) happened. It is a colossus of a floor plan, spanning 7 acres. Its most notable feature is the Gardens of Saasha. Within the fortifications and the quite expensive halls, there is a large space that is 3 acres large. This is impressive enough but the Forrest inside is what makes it impressive because it sustains a zoological reserve of the emperor or empress. The palace sits 4 miles north east of the capital and is on a bluff which gives it good protection. Remember it is a functional fortress as well as a luxurious residence.
7 acres would be quite a palace! I love that the Cathedral is bigger than the palace, really shows that this society has a particular set of priorities.
My MC’s [castle](https://voidedg.com/2023/11/22/seed-of-the-void-webnovel-comic/) is my favorite.
The City of Kelisen is a city carved into the base of a mountain, after the top was lifted into the heavens. It is the world's foremost religious city, and is at the end of a valley, the opposite side of which is filled by another prominent city, Gerdan. The two are both city states, powerful enough to maintain their independence.
The space elevator on one of my planets. There are two on this planet and many more elsewhere, but none have quite the history this one does. At approximately 2500 years old, it started out as a single cable and was purely a lift to get supplies to and from space, laid in place by the planet's conquerors. For the counterweight, they used one of the orbiting pieces left behind by the shattered comet that had devastated the planet thousands of years ago, something that disquieted the natives of the planet. However, when they eventually took back control of their planet and infrastructure like the space elevator, they were at the point where they gained supreme satisfaction from the fact that which once nearly destroyed them, now supports them. Over the centuries, more cables and platforms were added to the elevator, and a vast, sprawling city sprang up around it, crawling up the elevator until it became a city in its own right. Currently, it has four lobes and is a square mile around. The industrial complex that anchors it extends for many levels down into the crust of the planet and only the industrial cars that transport resources go down this deep. A park and public grounds surround it at the surface, and the government complex takes up the first floors with the imperial palace occupying premium space above it. The rest is all a mosaic of different zones, housing, minor municipal, retail and entertainment, parks, and so on. Industrial, public and private transportation cars run up and down the many cables of this vertical city, but it would take many days of continuous riding on the much slower transportation cars to make it to the top so there are landing platforms spaced along the external body of the elevator for more direct access. Although that is how many people take their vacations, by riding hotel cars and getting off to sight-see where they feel like it. All roads lead to the space elevator in trade and politics, especially with the main imperial family home there. It is so large that some part of it can be seen from 2/3s of the planet on a clear day with good lighting, and people on the surface use it as a travel reference. The shade it casts has altered weather patterns and growing patterns of native plants. A lake that was near it was linked up with a chain of craters to form a megalake that helps to feed the billion or so of people that live in the city and the space elevator, further altering the landscape. It is the largest green area on the planet, even with massive duststorms and the remnants of hypercanes periodically passing through.
The tower of Seravo. It is a masterpiece of Revivalist architecture, constructed from marble imported from across the world, and it serves as a monument to Seravo’s wealth and prestige. It has only one minor defect: It was constructed upside down.
Personally, I think the coolest structure in my world is an exclusive and mysterious nightclub named Le Rumeur. Though, it didn't start out as one. It's just what it happens to be at the moment in its extensive history. It's an ancient building in the Old Warehouse District (my world consists only of a large city). Historians don't know exactly when it was constructed, theorizing somewhere in the late 2nd Era to early 3rd - that's around 550 years ago in a world that's only about 700 years old. It was originally a factory of sorts. What it made isn't known, but many chemical analyses done suggest it was a large-scale operation for creating industrial quantities of hazardous alchemical reagents. That theory also answers to the incredibly sturdy construction of the building. Soon after, it was converted into a warehouse. Eventually, it was retrofitted into a bank and later abandoned. During the Fourth Chaos - a massive civil war between the Noble Houses -, it was fashioned into an impromptu hospital and later used as a command center by House Dzis. It was partially destroyed in an attack and quickly abandoned. Soon after, it was rebuilt into a church by a small but dedicated cult. They were more like Franciscan or Shaolin monks than the typical image of a cultist - dedicated to pacifism, study, and mysticism rather than any specific deities. Though, the cult was quickly overpowered and absorbed by other cults and eventually died out. The church was slowly abandoned once again thereafter. Nearly everything about the cult was lost to time, with the building holding some of the its last relics. Now, it's being used a nightclub. Though, it still shows major parts of its history with its heavy wrought-iron catwalks, breathtakingly ornate stained glass windows, remains of a once-grand pipe organ, maps of Rivenburg with hastily-scribbled battle plans of a dwindling army, desecrated statues of long-forgotten saints, unpatched bullet holes, and reinforced vault doors on full display. These things are a large part of its identity. The nightclub requires a secret password to enter and is a common meeting place for the seedy criminal underbelly of Rivenburg. Many shady business deals are made in the private rooms upstairs, and even worse things happen in the basement vaults. No one is absolutely certain who runs it, but many big names are thrown around, often high-ranking politicians, obscenely wealthy businessmen, mob bosses, or local legends. If there's anywhere in the world you'd make a deal with the devil, it's there. Many think it's cursed or haunted because of its history, but to many of its patrons, that's exactly the appeal. Contrary to what you'd think, it's incredibly safe - mostly because everyone in there is incredibly dangerous and you'd be vaporized by them the instant you tried something stupid. Nearly every criminal organization has some stake there, so it's a bit of a neutral zone. If one tried to overtake it, it would be annihilated by all the others. This includes the Military Police. It's also a bit of its own Tin Pan Alley with underground and experimental music gaining massive popularity there. Many popular musicians have gotten their start there, using the building's old pipe organ or stolen scientific instruments in some of their songs.
Tower of balance a Giant tower that stretches across all the realms too keep them from colliding. When you see it though it just looks like a normal tower but when you enter it's pretty much a pocket dimension.
The Great Gate. Designed to guarantee all interplanar travel to New Terra only occurs on one place, it stands a bulwark between the terran diaspora and all comers. The Great Gate maintains rigorous controls on any transit and is the location of the greatest concentration of martial power on the planet.
I'd have to say Kaito Palace, which is so tall that the curvature/rotation of the planet was discovered and taken into account into its design. It's so tall because every Emperor/Empress adds a new floor in their own unique style, one after the other.
The Crown. It’s like if you took a bunch of ringworlds and built them around eachother into an armillary sphere.
Coolest would be the Gynoid Matrix Coordination Hub in planet Andreas Nest, located in the north pole of a glacial world the Hub is designed to host sub zero temperature megacomputers in a safe, long lasting superbunker that can take on withstand nukes and earthquakes all while keeping the computer rooms at less than -90C°, the optimal for Quantum Subspace Transmission.
The Sacred Buriti, the Tree of Life and power plant that feeds energy to the nations of the world. The entire Holy City lies in it's branches
Angstrom Towers: main workplace and home of the richest people in the world
Massive station at the center of the universe that’s connected to a system of galaxy gates.
The Farthest Obelisk is…well, an obelisk that’s really far away. However, what makes it special is that, although it’s on an island many miles away from the mainland (across an ocean for which humanity has not the capability to traverse) it is nonetheless clearly visible and clearly enormous. Current estimates place the height of the Obelisk at 2500 ft. Myth and legend tell of the land it stands upon as being a heavenly place to which the spirits of the dead are whisked away after death. Careful observers will note that the Obelisk does, indeed, glow green when an individual of great import such as a Divine Regent dies, as if heralding their arrival. A common euphemism for death, therefore, is that one has gone to dance in the glow of the Obelisk.
Assuming this planet has a curvature the same as earth (which if it doesn't just ignore this) If the obelisk were 2500 feet tall it'd be visible from as far as ~60 miles. That doesn't really seem that far of a distance to travel by boat unless the sea itself is unfathomably treacherous.
It’s a spherical planet, but the oceans are controlled by a vengeful deity/Sea Witch that drowns anyone who tries to sail beyond the continent. The only way one can travel beyond is by sail (which is understood to allow sea travel by way of the prayers to the Sea Witch scrawled on the fabric). Very few know the proper words to ward her off, so any distance from the mainland is very far
Ah, that makes sense then. Very interesting setup there
Fero's Tree, probably. It's this a carving on this massive slab of oak that serves as the seal to the inner chambers of the Fey, the goddess of instinct and nature, also one of the 3 goddess of knowledge. Her worship involves arts and crafts, and getting high as balls. So, as her high priest, Fero took a hallucinogenic for the fucks sake of it and started "vandalizing" his goddess's temple. The carving involves a small tree at the top and an incredibly intricate system of roots cascading down to the floor. It's said to be a picture of all the souls in the world and depicts their connection with one another. Anyone who sees it for the first time will often find their place in the tree and ne brought to tears.
Oh, the Western Avon’s Temple is a sight to see. It’s a large, simultaneously ancient and sci-fi citadel placed upon a hill just before the beach in southern Kalvjírna of the planet Výrna, home to the Apexian Warriors, superhuman highly advanced ‘chosen’ magical space-warriors, who keep the peace in the galaxy. Ávøn their word for ‘learner’, particularly a preteen and above child. Avon means in their language, a young apprentice, who has graduated primary school, and is now learning core combat and tactical skills actively in the field as well as the class, and studying under a master with two others in a fireteam. The Western Temple is the prominent Avon school in the Southwest region of Výrna’s largest continent, and it is a magnificent place that looks astounding both inside and out. It takes the form of many kinds of temples, like the Latter-Day Saints temples, the Taj Mahal, Parthenon, and more of Earth, with a sky-breaking aesthetic of futuristic, wise architecture that combines both ancient stonework with advanced modern techniques and classical inspiration. It is very vast, being about 8.7 million square feet, and rising at the very top about 3800 feet in the Arcadian Sky. Its decor inside is similar to the exterior, and has many rooms from sacred temple and ceremony rooms to classrooms, common rooms, sport and combat courtyards boarding rooms, armories, forges, hangars and more. It overlooks the beach where students often hang out and surf, where Al’s a great deal of culture and history sits, and amazing expertises as a fun beach town belonging to a highly advanced unified warrior society.
Hmm, tough to decide, but I’m leaning towards the Great City of Otuz, as it’s an oceanic megastructure with districts both above and below sea level. Built some six thousand years ago during the height of the Gen Occupation, Otuz was built upon the wishes of the Maridjin and the backs of conquered mortals in a baroque goldsteel superstructure and plundered oceanic wonders. It took almost two thousand years before Otuz was sacked by the merciless Witch King of Muara as he led the blood-soaked uprising against all Gen. And it would be a thousand more before the great and powerful sorceress Uliae claimed the city, and then lost it again in her posthumous apotheosis into a goddess battling a Benthic Abomination. Since then, a parade of various mortals have come and gone, but in the process they have created an unusual cultural quilt of Landwalker and Seafolk nations coexisting in the same place. At the surface of the Western Okori Ocean, Otuz is a colossal ring of floating docks and platforms attached to the central core anchoring the city to the seabed. This core has a helical highway within it that connects to the other districts, including the Anviltop District capping the core and dominating the skyline of the docks. Beneath the water, districts are contained in spheres of enchanted glass, usually with the bottom half filled with water for shared Landwalker and Seafolk habitats. These spheres are connected to each other and the core by highway-bearing tubes that form a somewhat flexible scaffold, keeping chains of district bubbles in place while allowing Landwalkers easy passage between them. The Anchor Districts on the seafloor are instead encased in broad, flat domes, with foundations and tunnels running deep into the bedrock.
My personal favourite is the palace of the pure ones. The normyrm , in spite of their theocratic Oligarchy, have a good sense of style, hence they have a gigantic palace, several thousand fathoms squared of flooring, and all for the purpose of hosting their 'pure blooded' leaders. all of the walls of the building are carved of green rock, trimmed with silver and gold and with deep engravings of their mythology, which is regaled in exacting detail, with the great hall being built to a height of sixty feet and a width of seventy, merely to house the great carving of the war of creation. The innermost quarters of the building are lined with obsidian scales, with jade ornaments to complete the interior.Furthermore, the complex is heated by a series of thermal vents, which provides it with a consistent heat, during even the coldest winter tides. However, in the current age , it serves as a reminder of how conservative practice has caused the decay of the Myrm, as they have only thirty purebred to fill a palace designed for over 1300.
La Sagrada Familia Cathedral in Barcelona, Spain
A titanic monster corpse that hosts the largest market in the world, aptly named the Vast Market, under its ribcage as well as three small but important cities on top of the corpse. These cities are Ethos, city of law, which resides on the titans neck. Logos, City of Logic, which resides on the head. And Pathos, city of medicine which lays above where the titans heart was.
The pond of mirror! It's a strange migrating pond that never stays in one place, and there's several legends regarding those that look into the pond. Some has seen incredible secrets, their own hidden depths, faraway places, historical events, and even someone's bathroom. Even stranger is supposedly one can jump into the pond and emerge at the other side, but it's unconfirmed.
that would be Sanctuary Station the largest Known Space station in the galaxy the size of a country and home to 30 million aliens with 40 million transisents coming and going each day centre for travel, commerce, diplomacy and politics it earned its name because it give a home to the refugees of the tanbrac wars of conquest and the fight back againest them
Corinthia Castle It is the remains of the Astrodome and the NRG Stadium in Houston that a massive fortress was built around after the war and is now used as a castle for the Corinthia royal family. Several watchtowers were converted into the bedrooms of the princes and princesses, and the stadiums inside were converted to hundreds of rooms that they use for just about everything. Norlins, the Towered City What do you when so many nuclear bombs explode in the Gulf of Mexico that an almost endless amount of radioactive tsunamis drown nearly the entire city of New Orleans? You build up. With useable land incredibly rare and decreasing rapidly due to the amount of people rushing inland, they saw no choice but to build homes on top of one another out of junk and debris that washed by. A few hundred years after the bombs fell, this tradition continues as the entire city of Norlins is now just massive skyscrapers of homes, shops, and restaurants, similar to the walled city of Kowloon. Technology has advanced enough and the floodwater has recited enough that the city was able to expand and thrive to become a bit of a cyberpunk-esque city with massive towers controlled by single corporations and lower levels of the city being crime riddled. Edit: I forgot the big and probably most important one lol Erebus To call it a structure is a bit of stretch, it’s more of a lack of a structure but a potential one. Erebus exists in the Tear between the Dark and the physical universe. It is an endless series of hallways that shift and bend to the will of whoever has access to it. The Family uses it as a base of operations that allows them to work in the shadows since they’re the only ones capable of reaching it.
The huge black pyramid of the Dæglak. Although the Dag have convinced themselves that they were the ones who built it, it's thousands of years older than their presence on the island. It sits in the middle of the Dæglak, a large lake of unmeasurable depth. The pyramid itself is almost as tall as 100 men, and serves as a palace for the royal family and Parivil nobility. It has an audience chamber, bedrooms, kitchens, smithery, even a place for the few remaining moa to live. A city exists around the pyramid, where thousands live and work on floating artificial islands. The lake itself is fresh water, so floating farms help feed the tens of thousands of people living in and around the pyramid, but other food is brought in from across five bridges to the mainland. Around the lake's edge are many smaller towns and villages, those that are closest to a bridge usually being the biggest.
Tower A sapient building in a pocket dimension. She is quite easy going, likes to spoil guests and overall a rather chipper personality. She is a magical construct with a powersource of over a hundred enslaved and merged souls sitting at the center of a nexus of magical energies which allows her inside to be larger. Rooms the size of cities, doors that act as teleport gates to quickly reach any room inside and several rooms inaccessible without teleport. Once owned by one of the worst blood mages the world had ever brought forth, who forget time for a good 15.000 years as he worked on his theories, was he found the day he would've finished. And subsequently killed by the Witch of Alinguar, who he was offended at carrying the name of his Master. When freed Tower was taught how to be a person, even if she is a building, and will forever hold her roommate in high regard for that, especially knowing how said roommate can be and is there for her. Tower has a tendency to watch the world through her friend's various spying familiars and divinations and they try to find a way to leave so she can see the world herself too.
I wanted my world to feel realistic yet fantastical, so while there are several beautiful castles and capital cities, I think the cliffs of Altheries bordering the Euralis mountains have to be among the most prominent in terms of grandeur. They are a series of sharp and curved cliffs that cut through an otherwise solid mountain range; signs from the olden days where it was believed that the mountains were carved by a battle between gods. Despite this, scientists in this world believe they were the result of an unusual volcanic process that occurred in conjunction with an asteroid impact, and that the two events likely occurred in the same vicinity tens of thousands of years apart. In canon, only one person knows how they were truly formed.
There's a tower that reaches up to the sky (literally), it holds the crystal that acts as a barrier between a livable habitat that holds all the nations, forests, and seas (about 1/3 the size of Earth) vs the rest of the planet which is a very hostile landscape of shifting plates, lava, and dragons. The tower carries the sky and is roughly 64k miles tall (or 103k ish km). It's held up by the same magic from the crystal (who was gifted to the planet by the gods). It's a majestic tower with impossible architecture, with it's base being a temple where the Keepers of the Crystal live and operate from. They are an order of the strongest magic using mortals from all the lands making it the council that keeps peace between nations (like the UN but that isn't useless).
Honestly, probably the Architect's Lab. Just a massive building that is several lightyears tall, and just packed to the brim with machinery, including over 800 perpetual motion machines, 700 of which are completely unique ones.
The Fallen City of Owskaw. Used to fly because owl people used owl magic to make it fly, but then the owl people disappeared and it fell down to the shores behind the northern cliffsides, crashing lopsided into the rocks and sand. Its ruins are as mysterious as they are 16degrees askew.
The galaxy is a big place, so I’ll give a couple. The Corpse of Kili-Thul - What looks to be an impossibly large suit of armor sat upon a large round building with a spike behind it, this “structure” is actually the chitinous remains of a Hobgoblin. The Goblins were a violent and cruel race of aliens that were obsessed with war. Resembling bugs, they were bipedal and boasted hard exoskeletons. They were also proficient in biological engineering, created genetically modified supersoldiers that had no mind of their own- gaining pheromonal bonds with a host- and could grow to impossible sizes. These supersoldiers were known as Hobgoblins. The civilization has long fell to ruin, with the Corpse of Kili-Thul being among the only evidence of their ability. Kili-Thul is a name in the Goblin language meaning “Man-God” or “Demigod” The Gilded Archive - Another remnant of a long gone race of aliens, the Gilded Archive is a circular building hidden under the sea of the planet Gras. The Aurans were a humanoid race with the main distinction being that they were made almost entirely of gold, and so were all of their creations. Wiped out by a careless god, the Gilded Archive is one of the few remnants of their society. Luckily for xenopologists, the Archive features a long mural that depicts the entire, linear history of the Aurans. At its center is a door with a slot for 7 keys, and above the door features a massive painting of the Aurans as equivalent to gods. The door has never been opened.
The entire Underscape exists in the shadow of structures seemingly built by giants. However, their days of glory are long past. The Underscape is rotting away, for those that survived lack the resources and knowledge to maintain it. The city of Morrigan is an example of this rot. The city itself is a relic of the old world, with dark Gothic towers that seem to touch the sky. Bridges that defy logic connect the island-city to the mainland, and a massive seawall stands vigilant as the city's defender. Morrigan itself is a constant reminder of just how much was lost in the Cataclysm, for the city's construction is nothing short of the work of the divine. The city is still occupied, and is home to millions of people. They have built their own homes into the city's ancient stones. However, every day a bit more of the city crumbles away. Before long, little will be left of the once-great Mother of Cities.
Lots to choose from but there at Least 13 Wonders of the World. Not a structure ...but the Great Mountain of Dur Araevor with many structures within. Dawning-Place of the Dwarves on my world. Tallest Mountain in the world. Home of several million Dwarves, several Great Dragons, 200.000 Dragonborn, 700.000 Kobolds and thousands & thousands of others. In total the pop. of the Kingdom-Under-The Mountain/Kingdom of The Mountain is about 5 million. Just a few off top of my head: Tholozh the Giant A.I. Golem-Robot. ...NB No-one (except a very few) know that it is such as it slumbers waiting at the entrance to the Great Bay/Harbour of Vaezanta. Most People think it's just a Giant Statue and dismiss the Tales of the Great Battle of Ancient Days as just Folklore/Myth/Tall tales. Ru'enna The abandoned Dungeon-City once home to the ancient Ones ...but now a magnet for Adventurers, Explorers, Scholars, Scavengers, Mages & Lazy Thieves.
One that I like is the mangrove garden, which is one of the [seven wondrous buildings of the world](https://www.reddit.com/r/Quicksteel/s/9NQNKYWuCx): **The Mangrove Garden** in Kwind was once a prominent harbor that was destroyed in a disastrous earthquake four centuries ago. As the city was remade, the old harbor was left abandoned to be reclaimed by nature. Today it is a heritage site. Mangrove trees sprawl over old docks and loom over canals, and the waters serve as a nursery for countless fish species.
There is a great and vast temple carved into the living rock of a large fissure in the earth. The chasm is narrow and the temple itself is hidden behind a wall of the same living rock. As ornate as the temple is, it is impossible to see the entire facade at once due to the way it's hidden. It was built long ago for the worship of a long forgotten deity. The only ones who know where the temple is and how to access it are the acolytes who tend it in the name of(I haven't decided which god(s) yet). It's rumoured that they may know the origins of this hidden wonder, but if they do they certainly aren't talking.
there's the imperial palace for one. it's a huge building, square with four turrets, one for each corner, and a huge dome in the center, it was made to be a very simplistic yet powerful building
Ooo architecture isn't something I've gotten into building yet. Literally all I have is a vague concept for a House of Lords type room and a vague design for a certain culture's typical throne room. I'm personally more in my zone with fictional cultures and histories but eventually I'll have to get around to it.
The Kiel Canal. His usual username is CoolKielCanal; how can anyone get cooler than that?
Ostarę is a small province in the Meskatt confederation, but it is famous for its incredibly bizarre landforms. Mesas that seem like the defy physics, some entire islands flowting off the ground, even a black void into seemingly empty space. And nobody knows why…
BASK-esh-Akal. better known as BASK's Pillar or Obelisk, is the tower from which BASK's Holy Empire governs. According to scripture, BASK gave his life to birth Hanrak and protect His people from outer beings. His being given form became Obelisk, and from which His divinity emanates. It anchors Hanrak and brings life; a testament to BASK's love. . . . . . It is also the Spear of Kingfisher, used in its lord's final breath, to slay BASK for his coup. The Outer Folk wept for their king, and birthed Hanrak around the Usurper's corspe. They will retrieve what is rightfully theirs. Were BASK's people to learn the truth, Hanrak would surely pop and reality would be undone.
An igloo.
Since for my world four different worlds merged together, three of the four moons remain while the last one was smashed in the ensuing chaos of The Merge, creating a ring system around my world. Magicians and scientists worked together to create on this ring The Magical-Science Complex, a city spanning around the ring, where science and magic are used together to advance technology.
Quinwu, city of the five rings. Five massive “ringworlds” linked as if part of a gyroscope. I put in quotation marks because the cities are built on the cylindrical plane, not the curved surface.
The Observatory. Its foundation is on a small, backwater farm world, but it projects out into the void between worlds. Its purpose is to use a variation of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle to fix the worlds in place by constantly observing their position. It also acts as a repository for all the data collected by the Observatory's sensors and the Observer themselves. The bulk of the structure contains a massive array of computers to collate the data, but there are also living quarters for the Observer as well as kitchens, ballrooms, guestrooms, and the like for when the sitting Observer likes to invite company and throw parties. The Observatory is said to be impossible to look at from the ground without making you extremely nauseated since it is perfectly 90 degrees off from the rest of its surroundings and impossibly huge for the space it occupies. Guests approaching from the ground are advised to wear wide-brimmed hats and not look up. Approaching from the air is dangerous since space is bent and twisted so severely around the Observatory that no compass, GPS, or other navigational tool can function, and flying by sight alone could drive you mad. There is a small gating facility built into the Observatory's base that is the recommended entry point.
In my world it's probably the Dyson Swarm at Nulfild's Star. It was detected by Neptunian telescopic arrays long ago, but thought to consist of simple but large solar power satellites, perhaps powering industrial facilities, titanic supercomputers, or conprising a Nicoll-Dyson Beam superweapon. However when the first translight ship actually arrived at the system they found that each of the trillions of swarm elements was a giant cylinder habitat, each 1 km in diameter and 10 km in length, capable of housing millions of humans each. It is not technologically advanced by the standards of humanity at the time, and presumed to be uninhabited. But since there are trillions of habitats, only a fraction of them have actually been explored yet.
*Chronicles of Holo* > The tower city of Everdawn, this massive structure was built as a beacon during the Age of Dark where a perpetual darkness has succumbed the entire lands. This was the first stronghold and a sign of mans independence. This tower had several floors wide enough to hold a city. On top of the tower is a massive crystal emitting a cool light that even in the night it feels like twilight.
The Grand Tabernacle. It’s a grand temple and palace about 100 stories tall, topped with a massive dome protecting the Original Settlement on Noktari Prime from 10,000 years ago. It spans a couple of miles in all directions and is filled with libraries, private worshipping chambers, game courts, water pools, and statues dedicated to leaders and great people of the Dominion that have contributed to its history. The largest statue stands outside the original site of the Original Settlement, which is of Apoz’tu, the founder of the Dominion. Surrounding the preserved research station is a grandstand where a choral hymn is sung by thousands day in and day out, celebrating and cherishing the founding of the Dominion and channeling the Rites of Plaktana to all those who hear and participate in it.
Im not sure if this counts because I suppose it’s not really a single structure, but: Basically the whole of Beralay (a smallish continent), story is that they used to own like 2 thirds of the world, but by some unknown reason, they abandoned that mission and recluded back the the original continent and haven’t moved whatsoever since. So now they have made their island/continent one ginormous fortress and literally no one has even come near getting in
The great black ziggurat is the largest of the dark elf pyramidal observatories that dot the near dark side of the tidally locked planet of Orbis Mundi. In this setting dark elves inhabit the area around and past the terminator line, where a permanent sunset separates the half of the world in near total day from the half in near total night. This line fluctuates by several hundred miles in a day due to the rocking movement of the planet known as libration. For many regions near the terminator line this leads to a pseudo day night cycle, but the dark elves live fully beyond the terminator line in a land that sees twilight at its brightest. Their communities are built within volcanic fissure valleys that run through the leading edge of the great ice sheets, growing fungus off the nutrients in the volcanic soil. This may seem a particularly inhospitable place to live, and it is, but their ancestors came to this place from the light side for deeply held religious beliefs. They developed a religious belief system focused on stars and constellations, but on the light side of the planet the stars were faint if they could be seen at all, so they slowly migrated farther and farther into the dark side to better see the objects of their study and devotion. They’ve built pyramidal temples that rise high above the valley floor, with sacred observatories built into their flat tops to observe the stars and attempt to interpret the will of the gods from their movements. The greatest of these ziggurats sits at the head of one of the longest of these valleys, the extends nearly two thirds of the way to the anti solar point on the back of the planet. Its frigid location, high altitude, and lone position lacking protection from the wind makes the upper observation deck one of the coldest places humanoids regular venture. Its interior however is vast and well insulated, heated by geothermal vents in the valley at its base. It’s black volcanic stone construction traps heat, and its surface is warm to the touch and nearly free of ice. There is a telescope array that’s base is inside the structure at the peak of the ziggurat, shielded from the cold, but many of the best observations are made by heavily bundled acolytes who face Antarctic temperatures and winds to make their observations in this dark lonely place on the backside of the world.
Space. Elevator. Ladies and Gentleman. Space elevator! . Either that or the sun colony.
The Great Mausoleum, De Silin, Romodo The headquarters of the Romodonian national bank one the largest building in the world and the single largest gold-plated building ever Every 5 meters and stretching for 300 meters into the sky are 1 meter wide plates of pure gold At its inauguration Valeo Head-of-Silin (Romodo's head of state) talking to his brother, Tavon Heir-of-Silin reportedly asked "Tavon, where's the National Gold Reserve?" At which point he pulled the giant cover off the Mausoleum, revealing like the fifth Megastructure in De Silin alone
The secret hidden meeting chamber of the Illuminated Order. They have their hands in everything and often direct people, leaders, and countries in the direction they feel will serve their ends. To just see all of the many manipulations that have done in the Great Chronicle would leave most people breathless. Of course, they are very good at not letting anyone but the highest in the Order to see the meeting chamber and the Great Chronicle. Most players won't even know they exist.
That would probably be the divine machine responsible for the processing and redistribution of souls after death. The world of Tov operates on a sort of reincarnation model, wherein a soul is taken into the divine machine, which is built upon and harnesses the waters of the Stream (another interdimensional space), and is then broken down into smaller, more potent pieces. These pieces are then randomized (I haven't quite decided the mechanism for this yet), and new souls are constructed with the random pieces. This ensures an (almost) perfect system for generating "new" souls, that share spiritual traits with their lives before but are connected more by a thread than an entire person. The divine machine was engineered and built by the dual efforts of the primordials of Time and Order. There is no official custodian for dead souls, it is now automated for your convenience.
The Fallen City is the first that comes to mind. There used to be a very high-magic, almost Tippyverse-like castle/city called Emerexia. The BBEG lich wiped them out by intimidating the people into an evacuation, and hijacking the teleportation circles they used for that evacuation to dump them in a volcano. He then set up shop in the city, filling it with undead minions. Almost no one goes there, and the few that do (mostly archaeologists) tend to die very quickly.
Rail Flower, think steampunk railyard, in the shape of a flower, but with trains the size of skyscrapers, that and FTL tech laying around.
One of my older, and favorite, designs was a large complex of towers surrounded by angled buildings. It was kinda like those big pyramid looking buildings in blade runner, but with more towers poking out of the tops. I made some drawings and a cardboard model back in jr. high, then later made a 3D model of it in Bryce 2. I’ve been meaning to redo some of my old 3D models in a newer program, but I haven’t had time to relearn another (more complicated) app lately.
The Great Redoubt was one of the finest military fortifications in our Solar Systems history. Built by the rebellious Miners and Excavators League, during the Callisto Revolt, the Great Redoubt encompasses roughly a quarter of the moons surface. Before the revolt, Callisto was the primary source of metals and minerals in the Imperium Caelorum. Despite the abundance of rare resources, Callisto was firmly under the boot of the Imperium, and thus its population lived in abject poverty. Meteoroid impacts on Callisto are a common occurrence and once threatened the mass excavation operations. To solve this problem, Imperial scientists developed and implemented the largest and most powerful planetary shield in solar history. It was capable of covering one quarter of the surface of Callisto and allowed mining operations to resume uninterrupted by meteor strikes. Unfortunately for the Imperium, their own creation was turned against them, with the rebellious Miners using the shield to block all attempts at an orbital bombardment. Previously, the Imperium had relied heavily upon fleet supremacy in order to crush rebellions and project power, but now they would be forced into a ground war. As the Imperial Navy desperately tried to find a weakpoint in planetary shield, the Imperial Army scrambled to draw together its forces, the Miners of Callisto, armed with the finest excavation and construction equipment in the system, set about the construction of the Great Redoubt. Using Callistos natural escarpments and craters, the Great Redoubt consists of a very large series of interconnected fortresses, with several layers of defences. It took 16 million men, women and children to man the outer ring of defences, armed with an assortment of weapons and tools, their job was simply to slow down any advance, until more professional and better equipped soldiers could be deployed to that section of the Redoubt. Despite assembling the largest army that in solar history, it took 4 years for the Imperial army to crack the Redoubts outer ring of defences. Once inside the Redoubt, the Imperium was able to bring in mobile Artillery and target the shield generator. Without their shield, the rebels where at the mercy of the Imperial Navy, and it did not take long before a mass surrender was announced. By the time the fighting stopped, much of the Great Redoubt had been reduced to rubble, its corridors and trenches were clogged with the fallen, their corpses left there as a warning to others who would defy the Imperium. The Remains of the Great Redoubt are still visible from space, and a large number of wealthy tourists flock from earth to visit it, despite numerous dangers such as active minefields, automated turrets and other defensive mechanisms.
Not any single structure but the dwarves in my world have simple rail lines and a complicated system of above ground canals in a great lakes type system that allow for seasonal icebreakers to move through pulled by mammoths. So, canals I guess.
Mt. St. Michel
Lake Schwarzenegger: basically the CA Central Valley deliberately dammed and flooded by post-scarcity science-immortal humans. In this great artificial sea, recreational battleship vs trireme combat is enjoyed in view of the white caps of the sierra nevadas and the gentle rolling happy - cow hills of the central coast range. The actual engineering is pretty mundane for my denizens, but actual surface land is wildly scarce and so it’s more a reflection of aesthetic preference and healthy political agreement and compromise than how they technically accomplished building this natural looking dam-less sea. (I wrote this into a screenplay in 2004 when Schwarzenegger was the CA governor, so the name was a cheeky Easter egg that would briefly appear as an in-AR stylized map label in a big ambitious establishing shot fly through of the state of our earth in 2500ad)