Chapter 7 – A Explorer’s Lost Words

We reached the heart of the massive island, a place of power, marked by a large, intricate hexagonal pattern etched into the ground. At its center sat an ancient metal device, humming with a faint energy.

I approached cautiously, examining it closely. No traps, but a strange sense of familiarity. The central cavity, the precise lines, the subtle energy… it resonated with something deep within my memory.

“Noah,” Yuri said, “I think it needs something… to activate it.”

“I agree. Something… specific. But what?”

“We’ll find it,” Yuri said, her voice determined. “We’re not turning back now.”

I glanced at the gravity reader we’d found. Perhaps it could offer some insight.

“Let me try this.”

I activated the device. A soft light emanated from it, projecting a web of blue lines into the air, swirling and shifting like an ethereal river, mapping the invisible currents of gravity.

“What is that?”Yuri asked, her eyes wide.

“The flow of gravity… I think. It’s visualizing the forces at play.”

The lines weren’t static; they pulsed and flowed, bending and twisting around unseen obstacles, converging and diverging like streams of water. In some places, they swirled into tight vortices, points of intense gravitational pull.

“This isn’t just… empty space,” I murmured, pointing to a spot where the lines converged. “Look. The flow is concentrating there. Something’s drawing the gravity towards it.”

“Is that really gravity?” Yuri asked. “It looks like… energy.”

“We can’t see gravity itself,” I explained, stepping carefully along the lines of light. “But this shows us its patterns, its movements. Where the lines converge… there’s something there. A focal point.”

As we drew closer, the lines of light converged on a point amidst a cluster of floating debris, as if an invisible hand were pulling everything towards it.

“That’s where we need to go,” I said, pointing.

Yuri nodded, a flicker of excitement in her eyes. “This is amazing, Noah. It’s like… a map of invisible forces.”

“It is,” I said. “And we need to follow it. But be careful. The gravity could shift at any moment.”

“You’re telling me.”

We navigated the treacherous terrain, the gravity reader our guide, the shifting gravitational forces testing our balance, our coordination. We pushed off from floating debris, using the weightlessness to propel ourselves forward, then braced ourselves against walls and floors as the gravity intensified.

“There’s something here,” Yuri called out, gesturing towards a pile of debris nestled within a half-collapsed structure. “Traces of someone… or something.”

I joined her, examining the debris. It was the remnants of a massive hall, its ceiling partially collapsed, sections of the floor floating precariously in the air, broken pillars suspended in mid-air, the walls covered in intricate, geometric patterns that shimmered faintly in the dim light.

“This architecture…” I murmured, tracing a finger along a cracked wall. “It’s… familiar.”

“Familiar? How can it be familiar? We’ve never been here before.”

“Uncle Sven… he told me about ancient structures, similar to this. He said he saw them in the world outside, before the decline.” I pointed to the polygonal pillars, the intricate patterns on the walls. “This design… it’s almost identical to the ancient civilizations from the old stories.”

Uncle Sven’s words echoed in my mind:
“The Abyss… it preserves the past. Things lost to the world above might still exist down here.”

I turned to Yuri. “This place… it’s not just part of the Abyss. I think it’s connected to… to the lost civilizations.”

Yuri tilted her head, studying the patterns on the wall. “You’re right… they’re not just random markings. There’s a pattern, a design. Like it was… built.”

“Exactly. And these traces…” I gestured to the debris. “Someone lived here. Or at least, they stayed here for a while.”

I spotted something amidst the debris: a small, leather-bound book, its pages yellowed and brittle, but the writing still legible. I picked it up carefully, turning the pages.

“Yuri,” I said, my voice hushed with excitement, “it’s a journal. An explorer’s log.”

“Who would leave something like this behind?”

“This hall… it’s not just ruins. It’s a time capsule. And we just found the key.”

“A clue?” Yuri leaned closer, her hair brushing against my shoulder, her eagerness almost palpable.

“Maybe. But more than clues… I want to know what happened here. Who was here, and why?”

I held the journal, a tangible link to the past, a fragment of history preserved within the Abyss.

We settled down amidst the ruins, taking a moment to rest, to decipher the faded words. The cover was worn, the pages brittle, the language unfamiliar.

I rummaged through my bag, pulling out a battered, old language dictionary.

“Brought this just in case,” I said, grinning. “Looks like it might come in handy.”

“Can you even read that, Noah? The writing’s barely legible.”

“Not exactly
read
,” I said, flipping through the dictionary. “But I can decipher it. A few key words should give us the general idea.”

I began the painstaking process of translating the journal, comparing the faded script to the entries in the dictionary, making notes in the margins.

“This word… I think it means ‘danger’. And this one… ‘warning’. Maybe… ‘forbidden’?”

“Danger? A warning? About this place?” Yuri peered over my shoulder, her eyes scanning the journal and the dictionary.

The gravity shifted again, our bodies lifting gently off the ground.

“Noah! It’s happening again!”

“It’s okay,” I said, chuckling, holding tight to the book and dictionary. “We’re used to this now. A little weightlessness won’t stop us.”

“You and your deciphering,” she teased, floating closer. She wrapped her arms around my shoulders, ostensibly to steady herself, but I knew better. She wasn’t letting go.

“Yuri, I can’t concentrate when you do that.”

“What? I’m just trying not to float away,” she said, her voice playful, snuggling closer.

I sighed, giving in, and turned my attention back to the journal.

“Okay, this sentence… ‘At the end of the path lies the key.’ I think it means there’s something important at the center of the hexagonal pattern.”

“The device we saw,” Yuri said, pointing to a sketch in the journal. “But what’s the key?”

I turned the pages, deciphering more words. The gravity intensified, pulling us back down towards the debris. I grabbed onto a nearby pillar to steady myself.

“Wait… this word… ‘repetition’. And this one… ‘trial’. And… ‘endless’…” I looked at Yuri. “I think it’s referring to the fluctuating gravity. It’s not random. It’s a test.”

“But why did the explorer stop here?” Yuri asked, tilting her head. “Did he fail the test?”

“This word… it keeps repeating. ‘Limit’. I think he just… reached his breaking point. Couldn’t endure the trials any longer.”

Yuri floated behind me, wrapping her arms around me. I paused, letting her warmth seep into me, a momentary respite from the tension.

“Don’t overthink it, Noah,” she murmured. “You’re not going to end up like him. We’ve come too far.”

“You’re right,” I said, taking a deep breath. “We’ve made it this far. We’ll find a way.”

I turned to the last page of the journal. A single sentence remained.

“‘The key lies within the flow.’”

“The flow…” Yuri said thoughtfully. “Maybe your gravity reader… it can help us find it.”

“Maybe,” I said, a flicker of hope igniting within me. “We just need to follow the flow.”

Yuri smiled, resting her head on my shoulder.

I carefully placed the journal in my bag. The pieces were falling into place. We were getting closer.

We activated the gravity reader again, its light illuminating the space, the intricate lines mapping the flow of gravity with even greater precision.

“Watch closely,” I said, my gaze scanning the swirling lines of light. A faint tremor, a subtle disruption in the flow caught my eye.

“Yuri, look. Do you see that? Something’s different there.”

She peered at the spot I indicated. “It’s… distorted. Like the flow is being… deflected. Something’s hiding it.”

She moved closer, examining the area from different angles.

“Wait… there’s something here.” She reached out, her hand passing through a seemingly solid piece of debris. As the light from the gravity reader touched it, a faint shimmer revealed a hidden object within.

“Something’s inside.”

She carefully pushed at the debris, and I joined her, our combined strength shifting the heavy fragment.

Beneath it, nestled amongst the rubble, lay a small, metallic sphere.

“Bingo.”