According to ENotes.com, war had taken place before John and his people were even born. The city was destroyed by a bomb used in the war that the people invented with the new technology they had discovered. Legend told it as the “Palace of the Gods” and “it is there that there are the ashes of the Great Burning.” However, it was just an average city that may had been on fire at one point in time, but it never continued to burn. Benet then brings forward the facts that drives the reader to think that it was just human nature that drove them to do this, but with their pristine technology, it shows that the Hill People and the Forest people are still trying to kill each other and John explained that even after the “gods” had left the city, the “Forest People could have killed me without fight.” This explains that even though John believes he and his people are going to rebuild and make themselves great like the past civilization, they would only destroy themselves again because it is human
According to ENotes.com, war had taken place before John and his people were even born. The city was destroyed by a bomb used in the war that the people invented with the new technology they had discovered. Legend told it as the “Palace of the Gods” and “it is there that there are the ashes of the Great Burning.” However, it was just an average city that may had been on fire at one point in time, but it never continued to burn. Benet then brings forward the facts that drives the reader to think that it was just human nature that drove them to do this, but with their pristine technology, it shows that the Hill People and the Forest people are still trying to kill each other and John explained that even after the “gods” had left the city, the “Forest People could have killed me without fight.” This explains that even though John believes he and his people are going to rebuild and make themselves great like the past civilization, they would only destroy themselves again because it is human