Hutments Next to the Circus

Nero picks these crowded shacks beside the Circus for the first flames. Dry wood and thatch pack tight in the arena's shadow, torches from loyalists touch them off under imperial order. Smoke rises fast from the flimsy cluster, winds carry embers to wooden homes across Rome's packed districts. The air fills with crackling fire and distant panic as the emperor's scheme turns shanties into the city's doom.