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Why is the city of Ember located underground?
Quick answer:
The city of Ember is located underground as a precautionary measure to ensure human survival in the event of a catastrophe. Initially populated by elderly individuals and babies, Ember was designed by people from aboveground to be a last resort for repopulating the Earth. This underground setting was chosen to protect the human race from potential extinction due to an unspecified disaster, allowing the city to thrive for over two centuries.
The city of Ember is underground as a precautionary measure. In the book, we don't learn why the city is underground until the last chapters.
Long ago, the people who lived aboveground decided that Ember would be the only way to guarantee the continuation of the human race in the event of a catastrophe. The people believed that the underground city of humans would be humans' last resort to repopulate the earth.
The people aboveground arrived at this unconventional solution after realizing that the human race faced extinction from some unexplained catastrophe. According to the notebook that Lina and Doon find, the first humans to populate Ember were old people and babies. Each elderly couple was "matched" with two babies. In all, Ember began with two hundred humans. The babies were raised with little knowledge of the world aboveground.
By the time the babies reached adulthood, they were bereft of their elderly caregivers. The new adults then married and had children: this was how Ember flourished for more than two hundred years. So, the city of Ember is underground as a precautionary measure; it is an attempt at preserving the human race after the destruction of civilization.
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