From the introduction: Waste World is a planer ravaged by ten millennia of total war, where five gigantic city-states are locked in a deadly struggle for control of the most precious substance in history: Drakonium, the ultimate energy source. Everyone knows that without Drakonium their automated factories will cease to function. Their lights will go out. Their air will become unbreathable. Their people will starve. And everyone knows that Drakonium is running out.