Location from The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson
A vast expanse of plateaus separated by bottomless chasms — the killing field where Alethi highprinces waged a war of attrition against the Parshendi for gemhearts.
The Shattered Plains look like a god took a hammer to a continent. Thousands of plateaus stretch to the horizon, separated by chasms that drop into darkness. The official reason for the Alethi presence is vengeance — the Parshendi assassinated King Gavilar, and the highprinces swore a Vengeance Pact to destroy them. The actual reason, after six years, is gemhearts. Chasmfiends pupate on the plateaus, and their chrysalises contain gemhearts worth fortunes. The war devolved into a competition between highprinces to reach gemheart plateaus first, using bridge crews — slaves who carry bridges across chasms under arrow fire — as disposable tools. Thousands of bridgemen died so that lighteyes could harvest wealth. Kaladin's Bridge Four transformed this system from within, and Dalinar eventually united the warcamps and led the expedition to Narak that changed everything. The Plains are now largely abandoned, the war ended by truths far larger than vengeance.
An endless grid of flat-topped plateaus separated by chasms twenty to fifty feet wide and hundreds of feet deep. The stone is pale, wind-scoured, and crem-stained. Chasmfiend chrysalises glitter with enormous gemhearts on contested plateaus. Permanent bridges exist only near the warcamps; elsewhere, mobile bridges span the gaps.
Also known as: the Shattered Plains, the Plains