New Vance City

Chlorine Row is a stretch of decaying residential block near the southern fringe of the Shambler’s Graveyard—so named for the distinct, sharp chemical odor that lingers in the air, a relic of the hastily deployed decontamination units abandoned here after the first major outbreak. Originally a containment buffer between infected zones and the city core, the street once housed medical responders and civilian evacuees. Now, its structures sag under the weight of rot and time, with every window sealed in duct tape and every door marked with faded biohazard symbols. The area is rarely patrolled, but scavengers occasionally slip through looking for preserved supplies or access to the old emergency bunker beneath Row House 6. Some swear the chlorine scent isn't just chemical—it's masking something else. Movement behind sealed curtains. Wet footprints in dust. Low breathing that doesn't stop when yours does. The shamblers avoid the Row. That should make it safe. But it doesn’t.

Chlorine Row appears as a sagging corridor of mold-streaked apartments and crumbling prefab shelters, each soaked in a sickly greenish hue from corroded emergency lamps still flickering with dying battery power. The buildings lean at odd angles, their walls blistered from exposure and stained with chemical streaks running like veins across concrete. Thick plastic sheeting clings to shattered windows, some flapping gently in the wind, others stained opaque with dried residue. Cracked pavement is littered with broken respirator masks, crushed decon canisters, and brittle yellow tape that still reads “CLEARANCE REQUIRED.” A rusted mobile sanitization unit rests half-buried in debris, its tanks long dry but its hoses curled like dead serpents across the curb. Pools of stagnant rainwater shimmer faintly, their surfaces oily and still. The air seems thinner here—quiet, heavy, and oddly sterile—like the ghosts of cleansing chemicals still hang, waiting for the next breath to clean.