Book One Chapter One

# **A Trip Through the Wormhole**

## Prologue

                  First, this book is a collection of multiple stories told by many different people, aimed to compile the events of our lives. The events are told by different people, but all the stories have been compiled and created into this giant record of the years of 2058 and 2059 on IZ 144.

If the person reading this is a human, then there are a few things you should understand about Pandorians, Coronians, and our planet of IZ 144. Pandorians are genetically like humans, but there are a few major differences. Pandorians tend to live longer than humans and don’t physically age, but we tend to be more susceptible to certain diseases and other natural elements. Pandorians also have access to magic, and most are born with powers that they can gain access to when they reach a certain age. While Pandorians are the dominant species in our section of the universe, there is a competitor in dominance to us.

Coronians are the biggest competitor in the food chain to Pandorians. The term Coronian is a blanket term that tends to describe the vast number of subspecies of coronians. Appearance varies from species to species, but they all resemble different common animal species, although they all share human-like anatomy and intelligence. Some believe that they are a genetic cross between humans and animals, and I personally don’t doubt that theory. Although there are 52 different subspecies of coronian, the most common are ones resembling lagomorphs, cats, and dogs. Although there are many other types, these are the ones you see the most.

For most of the planet’s history, pandorians and coronians lived without problems, until a disease befell most of the coronian population, causing them to become aggressive to pandorians and coronians who didn’t have the disease. This illness has only one name, is known as the corruption, and it affects about 86% of coronians and 6% of  pandorians. Despite this, coronians still live similar lives to pandorians, although most of them live in underground cities and in caves.

Pandorian society is very similar to society on Earth, and there is a very good reason for this. The year that pandorians started counting years, a large group of scientists and engineers came to the planet IZ 144, and started to build up our entire society, as well as the society and structure of the other planets in the general large system of pandorian and coronian planets that existed together for an unknown amount of time.

Although the planets were different, thanks to the scientists they all developed the same society on 37 different planets in only 5 years. All these planets use either the languages of Menofillian or Standard Galactic Language (SGT), commonly known as American English on Earth.

Although a lot of the nuance, history, and societal elements of pandorian culture, it’s enough information to start with, as more will be revealed later in the story. With that, the epilogue is concluded.

Content Warning: Contains Violence, gore, Death, bad language, abuse, and other sensitive topics.

# **Chapter I: A Trip Through the Wormhole**

"So, I bet you're excited huh? You're about to begin... I was too. Don't worry too much about it, I'm sure you'll pull through. In fact I was able to, so I'm sure that you can too. Go get 'em Corrie!"

-C.K

## Reymana, Connitt, Tuesday, August 13, 2058, Corrie Entra -Thrown-

It all began on a late summer afternoon. I still remember the day it happened. I was sitting on my bed, reading a book from my father’s library. The book was about pandorian powers, and how they work. It was interesting to learn how all powers have their limits, and how some are genetic. It was quite a long read, but I finished it rather quickly, only taking about four hours to complete a nearly four-hundred-page book.

I closed the book and went to water my plants in the garden just outside my room. I love my plants, every single one of them I treat well and water every other day with a strict schedule. I even have a clock above the garden entrance just so I know for certain if I forgot. The sun was starting to set, and the orange sky reminded me of a very strange dream I had the previous night.

I was sitting on a hill overlooking a valley, the only sound being the wind blowing through the grass and leaves. It was calming and it felt like it went on for a while, until I heard footsteps behind me. A pandorian I had never seen before sat down beside me and looked on into the distance with me.

I said hello, and we had a short conversation.

“Uh Hi”

“Hello, Corrie.”

“Why did you come here?”

“I just wanted to tell you something. Please remember it because it’s quite important”

“Ok, seems like a weird way to start a conversation, but go on,”

“I’m sure you know that every pandorian and coronian has a journey, but yours is quite special. There are few who have the privilege of meeting you on this journey, but it won’t be easy”

“I thought so, my life was always a bit difficult”

“You’re going to face new challenges, you will feel pain, your friends will feel pain, but in the end, it will be worth it, so stay strong, Corrie Entra, because we all need you.”

I remembered looking at him with hopeful confusion. He smiled and said, “everything will be explained soon, don’t worry.” and then he got up and walked away. I stood up and observed the landscape. I could make out buildings in the distance, but they appeared to be very old and broken.

There was a mountain far off in the distance near the town, and a forest to the right of it. The valley seemed so grand and open, almost waiting to be explored by someone, perhaps me? Perhaps that’s what he was talking about?

It sure was a strange dream, and after I was done watering my plants I went downstairs and got ready for my family’s annual camping trip. Our house is really close to a nice forest, so every year on August 13 we would go camping there.

However, tonight felt a bit different. Once I got everything from my room, I glanced outside the window, and I thought I could make out a silhouette of something moving in the twilight. I brushed off it as a wild animal, perhaps a coyote or maybe a deer, and went downstairs.

As we stepped outside the backdoor and into the woods, I felt a cold gust of wind brush against my skin. It had been the highest temperature in years for the entire week, so it was out of the ordinary. I brushed it off as paranoia, but it wasn’t.

It was 30:37 when I started setting up my tent, and it only took a few minutes to complete. My tent was the farthest from the others, on the back corner of the designated area, and I couldn’t see the other tents through the trees. I thought I had gone too far, but I thought nothing of it at the time.

Everything seemed so normal in that moment, sitting in my tent, putting in my headphones and putting on some music to jam to. Everything was fine, until I heard a crunching noise behind me. It came from the opposite direction the other tents were, so I looked behind me and there was nothing.

I thought I was just going crazy, but then I heard distant footsteps. I turned around and saw two white dots far in the distance. I already knew what it was, and I started running through the trees. I stopped and turned around, and it revealed itself from the darkness.

There was a coronian standing between the trees. It was wearing a cloak and a long jacket, and it stared at me with an eerie grin. I stood still for a second, and then it walked closer. I could see its mouth moving, but I couldn’t hear what it was saying, it was like a bad dream.

I turned around and started running through the forest, and when I turned around for a second, and I saw it sprinting towards me, so I turned and ran as fast as I could through the trees. I knew there was a major road somewhat nearby, so I ran towards the distant sound of rushing cars.

I kept running, but I tripped over a fallen log I didn’t see. I looked back up, and it was staring right at me. It walked closer, and looked down at me, still with the same evil grin, and extended its claws.

I crawled backward to get away from it, but it followed me at the same pace. After a while, I fell down a steep drop and looked back up at it. It just stared at me silently, and then waved goodbye. Just as it did, a wormhole opened underneath me. Before I knew what was going on, everything went white as I fell through.

I felt like I was blinded, but I eventually got my vision back. I was being tossed through a chain of wormholes, until I saw the green grass of a forest clearing. I finally did land, and when I did, I realised my leg was broken.

I had cuts on my arms and a gash across my cheek, but they weren’t that bad. Thankfully, there was a large branch nearby laying on the ground. I grabbed it and snapped it in half, using it as a pair of crutches.

I looked over behind me, and I saw a massive clearing in the forest, although it was completely covered in canopy. There was a large concrete circle in the centre, with five smaller straight parts going out from it, with chains connecting from the ends to the massive circle in the centre of the area.

I could make out three pandorians sitting on the edges of the straight parts, and I assumed there were two others I didn’t see. They were chained down to the ground, and a couple were asleep.

One of them looked up at me, with a look of fear in his eyes. I couldn’t make out what he was saying, my ears were still ringing from the fall, but I could just barely make out “why are you here”?

“I just fell through a wormhole, what is this place?” I shouted. I couldn’t really hear, but they all told me to get out of here. I started to gain my hearing back, and when I tried to leave, I turned around and saw someone standing in front of me.

The forest fell silent, the five voices behind me completely non-existent. He was far in front of me, but he was walking closer. Something in my head was screaming to get away from, so I started walking backward.

As he got closer, he flashed a devilish grin, similar to that of the coronian in the forest that tried to kill him. He started walking faster, and Corrie leapt backwards into the canopy covered altar.

As he looked back, the strange pandorian grew two giant arm-like appendages made from seemingly red and purple vines. Corrie ran as fast as he could with his crutches and broken leg, but one of them hit him in the face, and the other in the chest.

The pandorian was getting closer, and another one punched Corrie straight through the air. He felt like the soul was leaving his body, but he held on. He landed hard on the concrete, but he got back up.

“So, you’re a tough one, huh?” he said. Corrie didn’t back down, and it felt as the whole world was spinning around him. He wrapped the stick around his broken leg with tape from his pocket dimension and held the other stick out in front of him as if it was a sword.

When he launched another one of his arms at him, he managed to duck down, and wacked it with his stick. The strange pandorian seemed to be pained by it, so he punched Corrie hard in the chest again.

As he was sailing through the air, he felt the world slow down. The five pandorians who were chained to the ground were cheering for me, and I noticed a wormhole open up behind me.

Just like before, I was sent through a series of rifts. It seemed to be faster, and I could barely make out the scenes passing me by as I flew through the chain of wormholes. One set took a bit longer, and I could make out a floating island.

There was a castle on top of it, and a pandorian staring at me from the door of it. It seemed to get faster and faster, and I felt myself getting dizzier and dizzier. I passed out for a second, and when I woke up, I went through the last set.

As I did, I saw the ground getting closer. I fell on my back, with the branch from earlier landing a good two centimetres from my face.  I looked around, and I was in a strange place. I had landed in a very open valley area.

To my left, there was a hill and trees in the distance, and mountains in the distance. I could make out a city in the distance, but there was a forest there too. I could make out some buildings behind the hill.

I tried to get up, but I couldn’t move. I must have been paralysed from the fall. I could move my legs a bit, but I was temporarily stunned. I looked over to the hill, and there were a couple of pandorians on the top of the hill.

I saw two of them running towards me, with another two standing on the hill, under a lone tree. I felt a sense of comfort, as well as a sense of dread and I didn’t know which one to trust.

They came to me, and I couldn’t hear what they were saying. They must have worked in the medical field, because one of them pulled a stretcher out of their pocket dimension. They took me up the hill, and to their car.

I felt my eyes beginning to close, but I held on. The two that came to help me were driving, while the girl and boy on the hill were in the back with me. I didn’t know exactly where we were going, but I assumed it was to a hospital.

When we got there, I noticed we were in a large city before they took me inside and into a room. I didn’t know where I was, but I couldn’t ask because the doctor put me under anaesthetic to treat my injuries.

When I woke up, my leg was in a cast, and there were bandages all over my body. The four who saved me were waiting there for me, and they introduced themselves. The girl who drove me said her name was Joey, and the boy she was with was named Fury.

The boy who was in the back said his name was Kagiri, and his sister’s name was Kiri. Joey was rather outgoing, while Fury seemed to be a bit more reserved, but he still had a friendly tone to everything he said.

Kagiri spoke in a monotone low voice, but he seemed kind. His sister was very loud and outspoken, and she seemed to talk a lot. They all seemed nice,and I was thankful they had been there to save him earlier that day.

I was lucky that out of all the people I could have run into being flung into a strange place, I found some really nice people. We talked for a while, as I had nothing else to do and it was really nice to learn more about them.

“So where even am I?” I said

“We’re in Stonemill, Downtown Brandon.” Kagiri said.

“Wait. . . I’m on IZ 144?”

“Yea, I guess you are”

The wormhole I had went through somehow took me very far, and from Connitt all the way to IZ 144, the main pandorian planet and largest in its system. My home planet of Connitt is a lot smaller and had a much smaller population.

After a while, I feel asleep and when I woke up, Kagiri was there with me. We were the only ones in the room, and I saw he was quite injured. I asked what happened, and he began to tell me the story of what happened.

“Just after we left the hospital, we drove back home and, on the way, I thought I saw someone in the forest. I decided to go and check it out. I was walking through the forest, and it was completely silent.

In the distance, I saw a white-ish structure in the distance, so I got closer to check it out, and when I did a blue coronian came out of nowhere and started attacking me. I just barely managed to run away, but it wasn’t without injury.”

I felt pretty bad for him, but we got a long pretty well and talked from sunset well into the night. My bed was right beside the window on the corner of the building, and I could see everything from there.

As we talked, it was strange to see the lights of the city, seemingly looming out over everything. The building was really tall, and one could see everything all around. It was very enthralling. Kagiri was giving me business about staring out the window into space, but I didn’t care.

He was sketching something in a book, and I looked over at it. I recognised it as the hill the four of them were on the previous day. It was so strange to me that the day had gone by so fast, as it should have been longer to me

Days on IZ 144 are 36 hours long, so it should have gone by a lot faster than the 18 hours in the days on Connitt. It was pretty hard for me to make sense of everything. Contrary to the actual time, everything was going so fast.

It wouldn’t be just for me that everything was going so fast for, it was also for Kagiri. Him, Joey, and Fury were all a year older than me, and had their first year of mandatory education last year, while Kiri and I would be starting in September.

He told me a lot about how he was a bit stressed, as there were so many other things going on in his life since the school year concluded, but I wished him well. He had good friends, and I did too now.

Even after a nice conversation, I always found myself looking back out the window, on the roads that branch in all ways out from the city. It was strange to see all the cars zooming by on the roads.

After a while, I was getting tired, and so was Kagiri. It was a quiet night, and the room was quite dark, but I feel asleep quite easily, and I shortly drifted off into sleep.

## Hollow, Ironhall, IZ 144/6/76, Friday, August 6, 2058, Adries Archimegres -Roadkill-

It was a warm summer night, and I was riding around on what is normally one of the busiest streets in town, but tonight was rather empty. There were only a couple of other cars on the road, contrary to it being one of the busiest roads in Ironhall during the day. It didn’t matter to me, as I was just riding around in my sports car like I usually do. It used to be a coping mechanism for me, but it became a hobby of sorts.

The highway is famous for people like me who enjoy speeding down it, referred to as *nightriders,* due to us riding around at night when the road is normally empty. The highway was so famous it gained a second name, being nicknamed the *Nightrider’s Speedway*, a fitting name as races often occur on the road.

It was during one of these races that things went south. Many people preach about the dangers of going 200+ in a 120 zone, especially on a curvy stretch of road such as this, but there were only ever a few crashes on the road as most nightriders are skilled drivers.

I wasn’t participating in the current race; in fact, I was trying to avoid it. I was heading home and trying to escape the situation. Everyone was going the proper way, except for one car. It was going much faster than anyone else and appeared to me intentionally trying to cause trouble.

It crashed into several other cars on the road, and nearly missing others until it came head on with my car. It was going too fast to avoid and I was flung from the car as it hit me. I felt time slow down, seeing the busted glass fly through the air as I landed hard on the pavement. It was a miracle I was alive.

As I hit the ground, the car stopped near where I was lying in pain on the road. At this point, everyone was stopped trying to figure out what was happening, and I could barely move at all. I looked towards the stopped car, and the door opened.

A coronian stepped out of the car and walked towards me. It was a feline with blue and white fur, brandishing claws as it walked slowly to where I was laying on the ground. It picked me up, brought me over to the car and laid me in the trunk. It slammed the door and soon after, we sped off.

I could hear several voices inside the car, mostly sounded male. The female sounding voice was likely the coronian who took me, but the others I couldn’t figure out. There were four voices in total, varying in tone, one sounding broken and nervous, the others sounding calm and collected.

I never thought I would be kidnapped. I was an average person, and I couldn’t gather much information on why I was there, as whenever I spoke, a voice said, “I recommend you save your air, you’re going to need it later,” and nothing else.

It was hard to eavesdrop, as they were intentionally steering away from details. It turned out it would be hard to gather anything useful from my kidnappers, so I decided to sleep. It was hard to sleep in a confined space with little oxygen and covered in blood and broken glass, but I drifted off rather quickly.

I woke up again who knows how long after, and realized my wounds were bandaged. I moved around quite a bit, and discovered there was a sandwich and a couple of granola bars sitting in the trunk with me.

“Eat that, we’re not trying to kill you.” Right as the voice said that I tore into the snacks and ate like a pig. They were trying to tell me something, but I was too busy scarfing down my meal. After that, the rest of the journey was a blur.

It felt like the same sequence of events was taking place; I wake up, eat like a pig, stay up for a while trying to listen in on the conversation, and then fall back asleep again. It was the same repeating cycle for who knows how long until the car stopped.

They were filling up for gas, and the car stopping must have woken me up. After I ate the food that was there, I thought I could break free. I pushed on the trunk door, but it was locked. I gave up after a couple of tries, trying to conserve my energy like the voice kept telling me. After that, a thought crossed my mind.

“Am I going insane? Or is this really happening?” I asked.

“Nope, you’re not. You’re just lucky that you get to sleep through this awful journey.”

That made me wonder. How far did we even go? How long had it been since I had been taken? All these questions forced me to ponder the age-old question: “Are we there yet?” I said it not really expecting an answer, but I got one.

“Obviously not, we’re just getting gas. We’ll get there in two days if that makes you feel any better.”

After that I decided to stop talking and go to sleep. Although I didn’t have a frame of time on how long I slept, it felt longer than two days, yet the two following days were some of the longest days I had ever experienced. Finally, we were at the destination.

I felt the car stop, and adrenaline rush through my body. I prepared myself for whatever was about to happen as I heard footsteps approach the back of the car. I heard a key turn, and the trunk opened above me. It was dark out, and the clouds covered the moonlight sky.

I stood up in the trunk, but even then, I was just at eye level with the coronian. It allowed me to step out of the car and counted to ten. As it counted, I started running. I looked back and saw the coronian running after me. I ran as fast as I could, but the coronian was too fast and caught up to me.

It sunk its claws into my chest and slashed my arms. I fell over, but I picked myself back up. As I was running, I felt a horrible pain in my leg. It must have been broken during the crash. The coronian swiped at my legs, and then slowly started following me as I continued down the road.

It kept taunting me as I tried to get away. The immense pain blinded my vision, and all I could see was the road ahead. I felt it graze my shoulder with my claws, and I ran as fast as I could. The pain in my entire body was searing, but I kept going.

As I kept up the pace, a root almost tripped me, and as the coronian ran at me, it tripped over the same root, giving me an advantage. I felt the blood leaving my body, and I felt myself slowing down. I felt myself dying, but I refused. There was a large turn in the road, and I went down it, hugging the trees that lined the road.

As I turned the corner, I was met with a giant mansion in front of me. The lights were almost blinding, but I pressed on. I ran to the massive gates in front and pulled them open. I turned back and slammed them shut on the coronian. It couldn’t get in as the gates were too high to climb, and the wall around it was tall as well.

I turned around towards the giant mansion behind me, and it was magnificent. It was at least four stories tall, and it spread in both directions into the forest around. The exterior lights cast a warm yellow light on the front yard. I took a seat on the rim of the fountain to catch my breath and stared down at the coronian.

It sat down on the ground and stared back at me, its eyes piercing my soul. It had a strange tinge in its eyes, almost as if it wasn’t pure evil as I had thought. I steadily got up from the fountain, and knocked on the front door, hearing panicked voices inside, probably having seen me outside.

The door swung open, and I fell over, having no energy left. I stared up at the people inside, and they got a bunch of medical supplies to help me. There were two girls and three boys, one had bandages all over his body. Three of them came with me to the hospital.

The girl driving was Joey, and she introduced Fury and Kiri to me as we sped back down the road to the hospital. As we drove by, I could see the same car that took me there was driving on a forest path. I only saw it for a second before it vanished into the dark of the night.

I woke up in the hospital in a room with a view. I was alone in the room, and it was almost pitch black, except for the area beside the window where my bed was. The early light of dawn lit up the room. It was strange, yet it felt good.

It was nice to be safe for once. On the calendar beside my bed, it said today was the Fifteenth of August, meaning I was gone for about 9 days. It felt like much shorter, but that’s probably because I slept through most of it.

It finally felt like this whole tragedy was over, but it would only be the beginning, I was sure. Although my future would surely be tough, I could finally rest today, in a new place, ready to make a new beginning.

## Rekuma, Rosedell, IZ 144/6/76 Selkaday, August 10, 2058, Yomaho Reyurio -Free Will... or not-

The Past is often unforgiving, especially in a world like mine. I was a part of the three major wars that had taken place on this planet since the rise of the Red Kingdom around the year 1000. The very place I was standing was an old base built by the Red Kingdom sometime during the grace period as it was called, the time between the rise of the corrupted Kingdom and the Great Corona War.

I was ordered to investigate these ruins by a higher-up detective to look for any clues about the Dark Crystal Maps. These maps are highly sought after by all five kingdoms, mainly the Red Kingdom but I’ve been ordered to find the maps before they do. This was a hard place to start, as any remnants of where the maps could be would likely be buried under rubble and foliage.

Digging through the rubble would normally be a hopeless task, but I had a scanner that can detect specific materials, so long as they aren’t too far away. I set it to detect linen and paper, the two materials that make up the maps. I couldn’t find anything for paper and linen, so I decided to see if there were any secret compartments the map could be stored in.

This particular base was sizeable, but it’s tiny compared to other Red Kingdom hideouts, especially the kingdom’s base, Fort Yina. Although these smaller bases don’t have the same strange qualities as Fort Yina, they still serve their function as the many hideouts that litter the islands of Stonemill and Rosedell.

After a long search, I couldn’t find anything and before I knew it, the midnight stars shone brightly above me. I felt lonely tonight. Normally I am alone, and I’ve become used to it, but something about the landscape of the Rosedell countryside felt so distant and strange.

The distant tree line seemed to hum with a single droning note that suddenly pierced the silence of the night. I checked my watch, and it was exactly midnight. With nothing else to do, I walked towards it. I was confident walking straight towards it at first, but as I got closer, an otherworldly terror washed over me, but I couldn’t stop myself from going closer.

It felt like I was being controlled by someone else; like my body was on autopilot, but I couldn’t stop. The sound got louder and louder, until it was almost unbearable to hear, and I felt my hands rise to cover my ears. I was right about at the tree line, and I felt like my ears were about to burst.

When I got to the tree line, it was so loud I could hear it through my hands, but my body kept moving. As I entered the forest, there was a glowing orange light in the distance. The noise was all I could hear as I got closer. When I approached the light, it disappeared along with the noise.

Before I could process what happened or if I was dreaming, A wormhole opened underneath me and sent me right through. I was quite familiar with the rushing blue light of the wormholes, but I hadn’t seen it in a long time. When I saw the other end, it was almost pitch black on the ground.

I landed in the middle of a forest and in a different time zone according to my watch. Judging by the time jump, I was somewhere in a forest in Northern Stonemill, but that wasn’t much help. A lot of the North end of Stonemill is covered by fifteen distinct forests which cover the northern part of the island.

The only major parts that aren’t covered by forest in the North are the mountains on the northern border, as well as the large Windswept Valley near Fort Yina, and Downtown Brandon, the only city in the North end of the island.

The rest of the major cities are down south because there is simply much more land to build there. Sure, some areas of the south are wetlands, but those areas have shrunk a lot and have grown into meadows, as well as flat terrain prime to build on.

I’m not a tree expert; quite far from it actually so I had no idea what forest I was in, and even knowing which forest I was in wouldn’t completely pinpoint my location. There aren’t many landmarks in these forests, except for some houses in the middle of the woods or the occasional radio tower from Stonemill’s project to get cell service across the entire country. I decided to just wander around the endless forests. I had nothing else to do, and I had plenty of supplies in my pocket dimension, so why not go on an adventure and look for clues about the maps along the way?

It was starting to turn to dawn when I decided to eat my breakfast. It was strange to hear the crunching of the leaves under my feet again; I hadn’t been in these woods for ages, not since the sides war.  That was so long ago, but being cursed with an extended natural lifespan time goes by very fast. Time has seemingly lost its meaning, and time seems to just go as it pleases for me.

So many others who were also cursed took their own lives because they couldn't deal with the constant eternal dread of time losing its meaning, Some of them try and ignore this feeling, but I've embraced it. Some have called me dead inside, and I don't deny that but there's still a strange spark in my soul that forces me to keep going on. It's truly a strange feeling.

As I kept walking through the forest, the colours seemed to slowly blend from one to another, as the time changed as well. It was strange to find all the small remnants of evidence that someone else was here at some point, like old boards of wood, scrap metal, and broken windows that clearly made up homes at some point, but those homes have since vanished.

A couple times I found more recently destroyed houses, and some were only the stairs remained. there were many like that and they seemed to give off a strange aura. All of these broken down buildings seemed to give off the same aura, some more than others. One of them was simply charred remains of a large building that once existed in this forest.

As I kept walking and occasionally sitting down to eat, everything seemed to change so slowly, but it was only when I stopped for a minute that I realised how much the scenery had changed from where I had fallen. As appose to the shorter shrubs and clear mountain view, now twilight shone through the tall canopy trees that covered almost the entire sky.

I kept going and going, only ever stopping to remark on small things that appeared every so often in the woods. It was only in those fleeting moments that time seemed to slow down and pass at a normal speed, but when I would start walking through the endless forest everything seemed to speed up again. It was if time slowed down and sped up as it pleased, but it was likely the way my brain was processing the time passing by.

Before I knew it, it was the morning again. I had no idea how many days had passed, and part of myself didn't want to know. I kept on walking, but I stopped when I heard a distant noise. As I got closer, I could make it out as a car engine, seemingly going in circles. The trees and foliage were still too thick to make it out exactly, but as I got closer I was able to confirm that it was.

I could make out a car going in circles around a tree in the middle of a forest road. There was a roundabout that the car was circling, seemingly for no reason. I sneakily passed by it without being spotted, and I kept going down the path up to the roundabout. The smaller road led towards a much larger main road, and I decided to walk down it, as it reminded me of somewhere.

As I kept walking down the road, the thought of knowing where I was began to grow, but I was sure I had never been on this road; I hadn't even known of its existence before this moment, but I had a very strong feeling of Deja Vu. The way the feeling grew reminded me of that awful noise the night I fell through the wormhole to where I am now, whenever that was.

The road was very straight, and seemed to go on for a while up ahead, but I noticed that the road makes a sharp left turn at the top of the street. I kept going towards the turn, and when I turned, I was stunned. There was a giant mansion, just here in the middle of the woods. For a second, I was wondering what could so familiar about this area, but then I realized; this was Fury Manor.

I opened the giant metal gates at the front, and walked through the small courtyard to the front door. I walked up to the front door and knocked on it a couple of times in a very specific rhythm, that of an old Kansince song that was very popular during the Great Sides War. I heard him running to the door from the inside and then he opened the door.

Fury was very excited to see me, and I was excited to see him. We hadn't spoke in many years, and we were good friends during the wars. He told be about what his life was like recently, how he and his friend Joey saved someone who fell through a wormhole a couple days prior. He introduced me to his friend Joey, and her friends Kiri and Kagiri, as well as Corrie, the man they saved who had just gotten out of the hospital.

After they introduced themselves, I introduced myself and brought up my most recent missions, all about trying to find the Dark Crystal Maps. I gave Fury all the information that I had, as he had been interested in these maps for some time. I mentioned how I had only been recently ordered to start searching for the maps; only starting around the beginning of the year.

Corrie seemed pretty interested in the maps, and offered some additional information he had read in a couple of books from his home planet. He seemed to know a lot of information, but nothing I already knew. Before long we began to think of some ways we could try and look for the maps, and where the Map Stands; the little holsters they were placed in a very long time ago.

Although a lot of these were stored in museums, many are still hidden in the endless deep forests and mountain ranges of Stonemill, Rosedell, and Ironhall. It was around this time Kagiri and Kiri came over, Kagiri becoming much more interested than Corrie was. Kagiri asked why we couldn't go into a museum and view one of the maps.

It was a good question. I knew why, but not entirely why. I knew that the museums had to display the stands and maps in reinforced glass with a lot of security cameras, to ensure that nobody could view these. Although this seems obvious, I really didn't know why because the maps are apparently impossible to navigate, so how would anyone be able to navigate with them.

We shared a couple of theories on this, but our most stable was that whoever put them in there really wanted to keep all of this information secret. Apparently Umbra himself oversaw the construction of the special cases and arrangement of the exhibits in the various museums they are featured in, so possibly the maps are not impossible to navigate, or they contain other secrets.

That detail seemed odd to Kagiri, as he had gone to many museums, and had seen similar exhibits in the past, but whenever he would go the museums, the exhibits would be closed. He described how other confidential historical items were on full display, most notably the original declaration of war of the GCW, as well as other similar papers and items that would make sense to be hidden.

This conversation went on for a really long time, and before long, it was dark outside. We ate dinner, and then I went upstairs to set up my room upstairs as the others talked downstairs. I made myself at home and chose the room I had always chosen when I stayed at the manor in previous years, that being the third room on the right, on the third floor.

The Mansion had four floors, the first two being the main floors, the second being more focused on lounge areas. The third and fourth floors having all the bedrooms and most of the dedicated storage rooms. There is also an attic and a couple of basement layers. The main layer features the large kitchen which is even complete with a balcony.

As I got the room ready, I found a lot of my old stuff was already in the room. All the contents of the doors were neatly sorted, and there wasn't even a speck of dust on any of the contents of the room, even though I hadn't been here in more than ten years. Upon further inspection, all of the rooms had been neatly cleaned and dusted, all being in perfect condition.

I went back to my room and I began to reminisce on all the good times in my life, spent with old friends at this very mansion. I opened up the window and stared into the deep dark of the night. I went back to look in all the drawers in the room, and there was a lot of cool things I had completely forgotten about, like old notes and random things I've kept from my many expeditions.

There were many relics of the past I had taken with me, which brought back many memories, some good and some bad. It was strange to think how long ago some events were. It was weird to think how long I had really been searching for the maps. I had been interested in them for a long time before I was assigned to look for them, even more intrigued in the mystery that surrounded the maps.

A lot of people died searching for the maps, most were never found and presumed murdered by another kingdom who wanted to get the maps for themselves. I wasn't too concerned with that, because I was great at staying hidden. It was only ever the people who couldn't do that who got killed, and I wouldn't want to end up like another corpse hidden deep in the thick forests of Stonemill.

I was so deep in thought I didn't realise there was a commotion going on downstairs. I ran downstairs and the group was putting a man on a stretcher. He was covered in blood and claw marks, and somehow wasn't dead. After a lot of panic, we worked everything out and Corrie and I decided to stay home while the four went to take him to the nearest hospital. As they left the house, I felt a sigh of relief.

Corrie and I talked for a while, asking me questions about the maps. He already knew a lot about them, so I asked more about where he got his information from. He said that his dad had a massive home library and there were many books about these maps and old history of IZ 144. I presumed his dad must have been a part of the military, or had some affiliation with the kingdoms, likely a high rank due to how much books he had.

After that, Corrie got hungry so we went into the kitchen to see if there was any food we could steal. The kitchen was very large, probably too large. It was two stories tall and had a walkway overlooking it from the second floor. There was a lot of cabinets, and in those cabinets a lot of food that hadn't been touched. Some of the foods were past the expiration date, but the packages were sealed and they tasted fine.

It was very weird to see just how empty the back area was. There were large windows on the back wall of the kitchen which had a nice view of the forest. There was something strange about it, something I couldn't really describe. A certain feeling of dread that came from the path jutting out into the pitch black night that hadn't occurred to me when I was walking through the same woods days prior.

It was a strange feeling that my mind connected to the maps. It was like they had left a curse on the woods they remain in. One could feel dread, but it only added another layer of mystery to these maps, One which might never be solved.

## Viridian Forest, IZ 144/6/76, Saturday, July 18, 2058, Maximus -Anomaly-

I woke up with a start. It was 00:03 AM and I was in the middle of the woods again. I have to remind myself to stop sleepwalking. I am Maximus, and I don't have a last name, and there's a good reason for that; I'm an Anomaly. I'm what's referred to as a KM, which is a being that can reappear alive after being killed. Some might think it's a good life, but it isn't. Many things have happened in my life due to me being an Anomaly that really made me wish I was a normal person.

Being an anomaly, rigorous testing was done on me many times, which provided some problems in my design. There's only one day in the year where I can reappear perfectly fine, that being the 25th of August. On every other day, I still retain my injuries but to a lesser degree. The testing they did was brutal, and I'd rather forget about it, but it seems to follow me wherever I go, always lingering in the back of my mind.

I got up from the ground, and found myself in the middle of nowhere. I had really gotten lost now. I had always had a sleepwalking problem, but I never wound up in the middle of the woods at midnight. I was lucky that I found myself in a climate that was somewhat forgiving. One time I had wondered up into a mountain range, and I never did that again, but it was always hard to tell if I could really control that habit.

Judging by the types of trees and soil composition, I could tell roughly where I was. I had spent a lot of time studying the Geology of this planet, maybe a little too much time. Although some say the information is pointless, if I ever got lost I could tell roughly where I was with the information on hand. There are many separate forests in the north of Stonemill, where I knew I was, but these forests all have distinct soil and tree types, so it was easy to figure out where I was.

I was somewhere in the Viridan Forest, which was rather optimal. It's one of the few that's close to civilisation, so I wouldn't be lost for long. I used the stars to navigate South, which was the direction I had to go to get to Downtown Brandon. Stonemill is a nice place, because it's pretty rural compared to Rosedell and Ironhall. Although Rosedell has some empty areas, Ironhall is quite densely populated due to it's land being mostly flat and dry.

As I kept going, I thought I could see movement far up ahead through the trees. I immediately got cautious, and approached slowly, trying to make as little noise as possible. I crouched down and saw a couple of coronians standing in the distance. There was a white and light blue one talking with a dark blue one, and they seemed to pretty deep in their conversation.

I tried to listen in, but they were too far away to hear. I kept trying to listen in, but then I heard a branch snap behind me. I turned around and there was another coronian standing right over me. It looked nervous and said wait before I got up, but I reacted too quickly. I got up and tore through the trees. I could hear the other two I had been spying on running after me.

I ran for a good three minutes and then I was out of breath. I tried to stop them, but they kept attacking me. They actually killed me, but I appeared on the ground right next to the dead clone. They were really surprised now, and all that did was make them interested in me. The larger dark blue one picked me up and carried me over its back. There wasn't really anything I could do, and I somehow trusted the coronians who had just attacked me more than the others who've tested on me in the past.

The other yellow coronian from before had joined them as they walked through the woods. We kept going until we approached a structure in the ground. It looked of modern design, and it had steps leading down to a main entrance. I instantly knew where I was. I was in a coronian hideout, and when they took me through the door, it became clear just how large these were.

The main hall was super long, and had rooms and other halls jutting off in either direction. The whole thing was a very light grey, with some blue wall lighting and black doors. There were random coronians going up and down the halls, some gave the one who was carrying me a thumbs up. We stopped at a door in a indented part of the hallway. When they opened up the door, I was shocked.

There were vats of liquid which contained pandorians inside them, presumably left in stasis. It laid me on the ground, unscrewed the top of an empty one, and put me in. I initially tried to hold my breath, but when I released I realised I wasn't drowning. I eventually fell asleep, but as I drifted off I saw the three coronians leaving the room, and shutting the door.

The only light in the room was a few on the two long platforms that held the containers. I looked behind the platform, and there was a drop that went much lower than the floor between the three walls, forming a triangle. I presumed it was the same on the other side, but I couldn't tell for sure. With this knowledge in mind, I started to think of a plan when I woke up.

The plan was foolproof: the pandorians escape the vats, and hide behind the walls beside the door, and the ones who can't fight could hide in the indent behind the platform. The plan was flawless, but it was missing one small detail, they needed someone to break them out. I was awake almost every day, trying to see if anyone would come through, but eventually, someone did.

But it wasn't a pandorian, it was the same three coronians from before. They got a ladder from behind the indent on the other side. The dark blue one climbed on top, unscrewed the lid, and picked me up out of it. He laid me on the ground, and when I got up, the light blue one brandished it's claws, and I made it clear I would be compliant.

"How do I know I can trust you to walk on your own" the dark blue one said.

"I can barely stand, how am I supposed to run?" I said.

"Fair enough, come with us."

They took me to a separate part of the base and into another room. There was a very important looking coronian sitting in a chair at the desk. It motioned for me to take a seat, and I sat down at the chair in front of its desk.

"I'm assuming you know why we brought you here, correct?" it said.

"Because my name is Maximus?" I said jokingly.

"Please be serious with me."

"It's because I'm an Anomaly"

"Yes, exactly."

"Are you going to torture me like everyone else did?"

"No, quite the opposite actually. You are very valuable to us, and we don't really want to make you not want to be here,"

"Well that's a pleasant change"

"That's about all I wanted to tell you, but remember, if you try to disobey us, we'll change our mind."

"Seems fine, it's actually quite nice here. I don't even have a proper home anymore."

After that, he wrapped up the conversation, and got the coronians to show me to my room. There was a staircase behind a false wall that lead down to this area. It looked like a castle, and the windows were made to look like they were above the clouds. The main area was a dining area, and there were a couple of off shoot hallways which led to other rooms, and I was led to the one with the number 1 over it.

Inside, it was a beautiful room. The bed was massive, and there were dressers on either side, with a walk-in closet and bathroom all to myself. It was the best home I've ever had, and I instantly jumped on the bed as I got in. The bed was bouncy, and the sheets were fluffy. I could tell the coronians were jealous they only got cheap quarters.

They gave me the rundown about how things were going to work here, and then they left, but before they did, I asked the yellow one to stay for a drink because he seemed cool. He was the only one who didn't attack me, so I decided to talk with him to see if he was corrupted or not. After I heard the door close, I posed my first question, getting straight to the point.

"You're not corrupted, are you?"

"Nope. I think there might be one other, she's a cook and I may have a slight crush on her."

"You should shoot your shot, what's the worst that can happen?"

"I'm just, really nervous. I feel like I don't belong here, and these coronians are trying to make me evil,"

"Don't give in, pretend like you are, but if you have to kill someone, just don't. Also, if you're not corrupted why did they take you in?"

"Well, that I'm not sure. I could be an anomaly like the pandorians they took and they decided to take me in,"

"Possibly."

"Anyways, I'm being called back" it said as it left.

"Come back anytime" I shouted as it left. It seemed like a nice coronian, unless it was trying to trick me, although I doubted that. I didn't see the same glint in its eyes that I saw in the others. After a while of checking out all the rooms, I started to make myself at home, although I obviously couldn't access my pocket dimension. I was setting up, and then I got a call on the phone in the main area.

It was the head coronian again, and he wanted to talk to me about the uncorrupted coronian.

"You can hang out with that uncorrupted one if you want, we only really have him because he's kinda like you,"

"So he's an anomaly"

"Yes, and there's a couple of others like it. I'll allow them to be with you if you want, anyways that's all" After that it hung up the phone. I decided it would be fun to try and look for other secret areas, seeing as this area is only accessible by a going through a secret fake wall. It was entirely possible there could be other secrets here, and I wasn't about to stop looking.

I looked around the area, and discovered it was like a dorm room at a College or University, but being a lot bigger and more regal looking. The other bedrooms were exact copies of mine, but I wasn't really complaining. I checked all the rooms for anything, and in the last one on the right side, there was a switch at the very bottom of the closet. I pull it, but nothing seemed to happen.

I've always been a big puzzle fan, so I went around to check if anything else had opened up, but it seemed nothing had changed throughout the entire area. I thought possibly something could have opened up elsewhere in the complex, but I wasn't sure if I was able to roam free around the place. I decided to call the head office on the phone in the main room, and it responded.

I asked if I could walk around the place, it said yes, but that I needed a hall pass and someone would be sent down to give me one. I said thank you and hung up, and before long the yellow coronian from earlier came with a hall pass for me, and I asked him if he wanted to walk with me. He said yes, and we went walking through the complex. He noted how there were some rooms that I couldn't access, because they require a scan.

It was quite obvious what rooms these would be, but I still asked. He said the head offices, head quarters, vat room, and hospital rooms were all off limits to no clearance members. I still decided to just walk around the whole place to see if there was anything else interesting, and to see if that switch did anything. When I was able to roam free around the complex, it seemed a lot larger than I had initially thought.

The place also seemed to be much more busy when I was walking around, but that's probably because I was experiencing more of the fortress. Although every coronian passing by me was corrupted, I felt same. They couldn't touch me if I had my pass, because that meant I was valuable and if anything happened to me, whoever did it would surely be killed, or worse.

After we got back to the housing area, it was a lot later than I had thought. The lights beside the faux exterior windows were shining a deep blue, reflecting the colour of the night sky, however far above where I was. It was easy to fall asleep on a bed like mine, having an extra bouncy matres and fluffy sheets. It was the perfect bed, and probably the best sleep I ever had.

When I got up, I felt well rested, which I thought was impossible. I got dressed, and walked into the main area. It was it was 11 o'clock (~7:20 Earth Time) and I was ready to start the day. Before I could start looking for breakfast, the cook came in and introduced herself. She was a pretty big coronian and very obviously uncorrupted. She asked what I wanted for breakfast, and I gave her an order.

She prepared the materials and got to work on the food. It was satisfying watching her cook, and something about her felt really nice. After she was done, I asked her if she wanted to sit down and eat breakfast with me. She said she would love to, but she had to cook for everyone else. She said if I ever wanted to talk, I could call the kitchen, and as long as it wasn't during a meal, she could come over and talk.

At the time, I was a bit ashamed to admit it, but I had a crush on her. She was nice, and she was also very pretty. I think she knew I had feelings for her at the time, and that's probably why she was so easy to talk to then. I decided to walk around the fortress again, for no other reason than I had nothing better to do. Even though my room was amazing, I was bored most of the time.

When it was lunch time, I decided to head to the main cafeteria. I had remembered the head coronian saying something about how I would have breakfast personally served and I would have to go to the mess hall for lunch and dinner. When I got to the mess hall, it was a lot larger than I expected. It felt like the fortress was getting bigger every day.

When I went up, I got a burger, and she gave me a smile. I was glad there were a couple of uncorrupted coronians there, and it made my time there a lot better. After that, I went to roaming the halls, trying to circle the base in as little time as possible. After dinner, I would go to the room and draw, and then I would go to sleep. It was a working schedule, but then about half a month later, something unexpected happened.

I got called down to the head office, and I was escorted by the yellow coronian. It told me that my room would be under renovations, and in fact a large portion of the fort was, as some parts were barred off. It said there was a pipe leak or something, and it was too dangerous to keep me there, so they decided to let me go. It told me directions into town, and sent me on my way.

Before I left, I said bye to all the good coronians. The yellow one walked with me out of the fortress, but before I left I went into the kitchen and said bye to the pretty coronian. I never got her name, so I asked. She told me her name was Kaneku-Ryori. I told her it was a pretty name and she gave me a hug before I left. I told her I'd be back soon once it was all fixed.

As I was at the gate, the yellow coronian said goodbye. I never got his name either, so I asked him too. Nephki was his name, and I gave him a hug before I ventured off into the night. I didn't realise just how dark it was outside, and I had to find my way into town to find a decent home, or at least some shelter for the time being. I kept going in the direction I thought was south until I came by a dry riverbed.

I decided to follow it, and eventually I came to a bridge that ran over the trench. It was a small footbridge connected to a long path made of dark grey stones. I decided to take a left turn onto the path, and I went over the bridge and down the path. I thought I made the wrong turn, but eventually, in the distance, I could make out light, likely from a building.

I continued walking down the path until I could tell for sure it was a house in the distance. I kept going and I eventually got to the back door. There were two guys inside, and appeared to be talking to each other. I knocked on the door, and they both looked at me. It took me a second, but I recognised one of them. He came to the door and opened it. He shouted my name and shook my hand.

I hadn't seen Yomaho in years, and I didn't expect to see him here either. He told me the other guy's name was Corrie, and he waved. After he told me about what he had been up to, I told him how I spent time at the coronian hideout. I told them how they took me in and treated me well, due to me being an anomaly. Yomaho knew about that, but Corrie didn't and it seemed to intrigue him.

I told him about being an anomaly, and he told me about how strange things like that intrigued him. I used to have similar interests, but when I became more confident with my status, I stopped being interested in those things. I told him how life is still somewhat normal being an anomaly, as it doesn't really get in the way of daily life, in fact it's quite the opposite for my particular ability.

We talked into the wee hours of the morning, and eventually the others arrived and introduced themselves. It was fun meeting all these new people, but I missed life at the hideout. Although I had more to do here, things were much more complicated, not that's a bad thing. It was just hard to get used to when life for the past month or so was pretty straightforward.

## Viridan Forest, Stonemill, IZ 144/6/76, Wednesday August 14, 2058, Kosa Kinitarri -Bloody, Bloody Revenge-

The leaves crunched beneath my shoes as I ran on a forest path. There was a coronian chasing me as I ran up to the hill my house is on. I passed by the burnt remains of the other three homes where my sister and brothers lived, only leaving scorched reminders of their existence. I opened the door and slammed it shut behind me, and locking it. As I locked the door, I heard a noise at the back of the house; I had forgotten to lock the back door again.

I slowly and quietly opened the closet door in the main hall and got inside, slowly closing the door trying not to make a sound. I heard it rummaging around upstairs, probably looking for me. I thought it could be looking for a map, but even I don't know where that is. It walked around, it's footsteps thundering as it moved. I held my breath as it came down the main stairs and walked through the front hall.

It walked right by the closet, and I felt a sigh of relief coming on, but I stayed silent. I heard the door unlock, open, and then it shut. I cautiously opened the door, and it was standing right there. It extended its claws, and I gasped, seeing my life flash before my eyes, knowing what was about to happen. The coronian raised it's arm high above its head and prepared to swipe.

Before it did though, I pulled out my shotgun and shot it to the ground. It screamed in pain and rolled on the ground. I wasn't going to let one of these goons sent by the red kingdom take me.

"Who sent you" I said to it.

"Heh heh, You'll never know,"

"WHO SENT YOU" I shouted at it.

"There are more of us-" before it could finish its sentence, I shot it in the face. It stopped moving, but I shot it in the abdomen just to be safe. I put away my gun and lifted the body up, and placed it with the others. Many coronians had come here and underestimated me. I wasn't going to let myself get caught. I looked out the window, and saw another coronian approaching, and I had an idea.

I went upstairs and to the front-room as I called it. I call it that because it has portholes and loopholes, although they're well hidden in the exterior of the building, appearing as part of the design of the building. I readied my rifle and watched it approach through the loophole. I quietly ran down to the front of the house, opened the door, and shot two rounds into the sky.

It obviously ran off, and I decided to follow it. I followed silently, my footsteps landing in the steps it took as to not make any additional noise. I followed it for what seemed like ages, when I approached it enter a complex in the middle of the woods. When I saw it, my eyes widened. I knew what it was, I just never knew where it was. I painted a mental map of where it was, and retraced my steps back to my house to get ready. It was dusk when I was, but when I looked out the window in my room, I saw a group of about ten coronians approaching.

Those fools never knew what was coming to them. I ran to the front-room and readied a heavier rifle. When I scoped on in the group, I realised that they weren't armed, which surprised me. Were they going to try and take my fortress with their bare hands? I shot the one in the back of the group, and they all stopped moving. While they were stopped, I shot another two in quick secession.

They ran for the door, and I ran down the stairs as fast as possible, and beat them to the door. I opened it and sprayed with an automatic shotgun. I counted six dead on the ground, and knew the leader was just around the corner. I pulled out my favourite rifle, my 50-70 Lever Action and rounded the corner. It jumped at me but I shot it through the chest.

It was still alive, but I held my rifle in one hand and dragged the coronian with the other. The red glint of its eyes shone brightly as I dragged it to the basement. I opened the door, and threw it in with the other corrupted coronians who tried to take the fortress but hadn't succeeded. I slammed and locked the door, and walked away as it pounded on the door and shouted at me.

Thirty Five corrupted coronians had approached my fortress with the intent of taking me with them, but none were successful. After I cleaned up everything, I put the first one from the outside on a post and planted it outside the house on the large front yard. A bit tacky, but it'll deter them from coming back until I'm ready to come to them.

It would take me a couple of days to prepare, but I planned my assault to take place on the morning of the Seventeenth, exactly six months after my oldest brother Zak's birthday. I had three siblings, a sister and two brothers. My sister was named Kalie, and my brothers were named Jackie and Zak. I loved them, but on one day, the three were staying at Zak's house while I was stargazing. I somehow hadn't realised that Zak's house went up in flames, and so did the other two, but somehow not mine.

I knew for a fact that the coronians from the base had started the fire, and I made it my mission to seek vengeance. I couldn't sleep the night before, I was finally ready to avenge Zak, to avenge Jackie, to avenge Kalie. I selected the best guns to use for easy access in my pocket dimension, got my body armour and wore it under a large shirt. I carried extra magazines on my person, as well as lots in my pocket dimension, and with my best boots on, I walked into the woods towards the hideout.

I waited on the ground above the door for someone to exit, and I shot him with a suppressed rifle. The door was still open, and I walked in and started my assault. Three guards ran at me, but I put them down easily. I moved through the base, firing at the coronians who tried to attack me. It was going easy for about a minute until the base went into lock down. Now it was the fun part.

Red lights flashed and hellish sirens blared over the speakers as armed guards roamed the halls and tried to kill me. I wasn't about to let myself die, I had come to far. I felt like Zak's spirit was helping me avenge his soul. I shot the six or so that were around the corner and turned into a different hallway. I had to reload as I ran, and I threw the magazine at another coronian before I shot him.

I ran to a long hallway, and there was a big group ahead. I shot at them, but I had to reload again, and I retreated behind an indent in the wall. I reloaded, turned and burned my magazine on the four more that were approaching. I had to reload again, and when I looked to my right, there was a giant room that was almost completely dark. I ran up the hallway, and took out the rest of the coronians that approached, then I doubled back.

Inside the room were two platforms with a bunch of vats on top. Small lights on the floor lit up the vats, and it took me a second to realise there were pandorians kept in stasis inside them. I grabbed a nearby ladder, and started opening up all the vats. It only took us about two minutes to free everyone, and because I had a pocket dimension enabler, it jammed the technology that prevented pocket dimensions.

Everyone was armed, and went into groups. I was with a couple of pandorians, and we all shared names. There was a couple, one named Genesis and one named Jupiter, One named Accer, another younger one named Supernova, and a pandoreal named Saturn. Another named Lava came with us as we ran through the halls, progressing through the fortress. Eventually though, they got guns, and we were being shot at.

We could shot back, but they were getting more and more firepower, so we all decided to leave. Lava, being as noble as he was, decided to stay back and make sure the others escaped. I wished him luck, and gave him one of Jackie's bracelets, that I kept as a good luck charm. He ran back in, turned a corner and then disappeared. From a different hallway, the armed coronians followed us out.

We all shot back, but I got shot in the chest, and grazed by a bullet in the cheek. We decided to run through the forest road, but before we were out of sight, Supernova threw a grenade which allowed us to escape on the forest path. We kept running, until we got to a main road. We decided to split up here. Accer, Jupiter, and Genesis decided to go south, while Saturn, Supernova, and I decided to go north.

We all wished each other luck wherever they might find themselves, and bid farewell. We walked up the road for a while, and got to a turn. As we turned, we saw this giant mansion, just in the middle of the woods on this giant road. It was pretty strange, but we figured we'd be let in. I opened up the massive and heavy gate at the front and we walked up to the front door.

Supernova knocked on the door, and we waited for a response. It was about a minute later when someone responded. He said he was the only person home, and he let us in after scanning our eyes, presumably for any trace of corruption. He said we were clear, and let us inside. The place was HUGE, and very fancy. I went into one of the living rooms and jumped on the couch. He introduced himself as Maximus, and welcomed us inside.

I was sitting at the couch talking with the others, and I got a drink of water. I spilled it, and it was at that moment I realised I was bleeding through my shirt. I went to the massive kitchen and found some gauze and wrapped myself up. Maximus watched and asked how I knew that, and I told him how I taught myself to survive on my own, as well as to be able to defeat any coronian who attacked me.

After a while, The others came out and freaked out at Maximus for letting random people stay in their house, until one of them named Corrie started going absolutely bonkers. He had recognised Saturn as a member of a band, although I didn't know of the band, some of the others did and realised who he was. They asked why we were here, and I explained the whole situation.

Maximus said that he was at that base the other day, and he realised that the two who were uncorrupted could have been hurt. I assured him they would be fine, and that we hadn't been to that part of the base, but I could tell he had lost a bit of respect for me. We all talked for a bit, and then we had dinner. After that, I picked out a room a bit farther from the others, and I went up to bed earlier than everyone else.

I was staring up at the ceiling, when Maximus came in. He seemed apologetic, and I forgave him. He had every right to hate me for orchestrating that attack, but I offered to help him reunite with his friends if he wanted. He was a nice guy, and listened to me when I told him about how hard my life had been. He told me he was a KM, and he had seen his family and friends die, he became used to it.

We talked for a while, and realised how similar we were. It was pretty funny, and we hit it off. He told me how he was going to be bringing a couple of his new friends to meet his old friend, Vortex. I had the same friend, and we laughed over the coincidence. He was a funny guy, and he'd always been nice to me. I seem to remember something happening, but I can't remember what.

He offered to let me join him when he was going on the nineteenth, and I accepted. It felt good being in a place like this, where there were nice people who understood my problems. For such a large portion of my life, I had been isolated, only ever going out to get exercise, groceries, or kill the occasional coronian who wondered too close to my property.

In the morning, I was woken up by Joey, and two other girls she was with. it took me a while to notice one of them was Jupiter. Joey asked me if she wanted to go on a boat trip she booked with a couple of her friends, I had to decline as I already had plans with Maximus and Vortex. After Joey and the other girl left the room, Jupiter asked how I was.

I said I was good, and I loved it here. Jupiter said she went back to her home in the city, and Accer was staying with them because he had nowhere else to go. It was nice to have met these people who were all so nice to each other. I must have gone to a bad school where people don't care about each other. She asked about my siblings and how old they were, and I told them.

I was the middle, being twenty three, Zak, the oldest being thirty six if he was still around, and Kalie and Jackie being twins who would have been fifteen if they were still alive, the same age as Joey and Corrie. Jupiter comforted me, and we bonded over a similar experience. It was weird how many people I had met who had lost their entire family and have to live on their own.

That day was rather uneventful, it was mostly spent by everyone preparing for their respective day trips. I decided to clean my rifles, because I had nothing better to do. I always did that when I was bored, because if I have nothing else to do it doesn't hurt to do it. I had noticed that there was a strange symbol on a couple of my rifles, one that I was sure wasn't a company logo.

On IZ 144, there are only a few independent gun companies who are completely unique and not affiliated with any from Earth manufacturers. It's surprising how little guns are sold here, as people seem to think swords are a more effective weapon against coronians. It's a common myth that guns aren't effective against coronians, but I have no idea where this comes from.

Sure coronians are much more dense, having more muscle and slightly thicker bones, but that doesn't mean a higher power cartridge such as a 10 gauge shell or a trusty 50-70 round can't put one down in a single shot. I buy a new gun almost every year, and I buy ammo pretty often, and it's surprisingly hard to find sometimes. Sometimes, it's only produced when ordered.

After that, I didn't really have much else to do, so I started to walk around the mansion. I kept going along the main hallway on the right side, and I eventually got to a shooting range. I was quite surprised to see that, and I wanted to go in, but I decided to continue exploring. I kept going down the hallway and found a pool. I wanted to keep going, but that's where the hallway stopped.

I went upstairs to see if there was anything, and above both rooms were games rooms. The one above the pool had two pool tables, among other things, and the one above the shooting range was a bowling alley. When I was at the end of the hallway, I looked out the window. It was getting dark, and there was thick forest just outside the window.

I wanted to see exactly where it started, so I went back through the hallway to see how close the trees got. There was one point near the centre of the mansion where the tree line started, and I presumed the forest started too. I noticed there was a path around the building, so I exited through the back doors in the kitchen and followed it as far as it went.

The forest got pretty close to the path at some points, but I decided to keep going. I thought it would be the end soon, being approximately where the hallway ended inside, I noticed the mansion kept going in the distance. There was an overhang where the second and third floors were supported above this hole in the first floor. I saw the mansion go on for an unknown length into the forest, but the path had stopped here.

Part of me wanted to follow it to see how far it went, but it was dusk when I got that point, and I decided to head back. I didn't tell anyone what I saw, because it felt like something really confidential, and something the owners might not want me finding out. I went inside and went up to the third floor this time, to see what it looked like at those points inside the building.

The larger rooms were massive electrical rooms, the back one being a security one, and the front one being what I presumed to be a server room. It appeared that this place had it's own internet, something I had only seen in large public places like schools or community centres, because something like that is really expensive and really hard to maintain.

There was nothing at the end of the hallway, and I was about to turn back, but then I noticed something. In the dim lighting of the hallway ends, I could see a slight shift in the colour of the wall, and on the back of the floor at the wall across from it, there seemed to be a button. When pressed, the indent in the wall grew a handle, and it was able to be opened.

I decided to press the button again, but nothing happened. I turned back and headed to my room so I could get a good sleep for tomorrow, but as I went to bed, that door gave me a strange feeling. The feeling was so strange that I decided I wouldn't investigate it. After that, I went to sleep and when I woke up in the morning, I picked out my best clothes for the get-together.

When we got to the area, it was familliar. Vortex had taken me to this spot a couple of times with his friends when we were in school. It was a tiny park on the edge of town, beside an abandoned house that he said used to be his. Vortex was sitting on the bench. He waved to us and smiled as we walked closer. Everyone introduced eachother, and we laughed at the coincidence that Maximus and I were both his friends.

It was fun to talk with him, and after a while, he led us to the house. It looked odd standing in a clear area of the trees beside the park, but It had always been there. As we walked closer, the air seemed to taste salty, and Vortex seemed a bit off, but I assumed it was just because I hadn't seen him for a long time. I was glad to see him, but something seemed diferent.

As we got to the house, it seemed strangely skinny compared to most houses, but it was very long. The walls were made of wooden slats laid ontop of eachother. The wood was painted a light green which was peeling and severely faded by the sun. The house was very old, and something about the building gave off an odd aura of despair and hopelessness.

As we walked in, the inside looked a lot larger than the outside, I realised that the walls were really thin, and there were only large pieces of wood connected to the wooden slats holding up the walls. There were a lot of holes in the rotting wood. The paint was really flaky, and most of the dirt on the floor was made up of the shards of dried paint.

Vortex gave us a tour of the building, but something in his eyes seemed sad. It was strange to see all the furniture in the house covered in holes and grime. The house was in a state of disrepair, but he didn't comment on how destroyed the house was. The doors squeaked with an awful noise as Vortex opened them. It was sad to see all of the cool things in such a broken state, and the others seemd to share this feeling.

We went to the second floor, and he showed us the bedrooms. He showed us his first, and I could tell his voice got shaky. He continued in a chipper tone, but his voice was still shaky, as if he was about to cry. He went on to show all the other rooms, but his tone didn't change. A lot of the rooms were storage rooms, and there were many things inside the rooms, but they were all broken beyond repair.

He was heading to the third floor, but he stopped at the steps. I went into his old room, and realised a lot of the things in his room were similar to my room; even the layout was similar. It was sad to see all of the things in his room in such a state of disrepair; his bed was ripped and torn, his computer was completely destroyed, nothing in this room worked anymore. It was a really tragic sight, and it hit home for me.

As we walked up the stairs to the third floor, I felt tears running down my cheek. As we got to the area, the air felt really cold, and the stale smell was strong. The floor was more like a single large room, and the walls went up to the attic. The boards were not present here, the walls were just double slats, held together by large beams which connected them. Beams of light shone through the short windows at the top of the room, revealing all the dust in the room.

I could make out something at the end of the room, but I couldn't tell what, as Vortex was standing in front of it. He knelt to the ground, and his body was physically shaking. Saturn tried to step foward but I stopped him. I could tell there was something really off, and I'm pretty good at picking up hints in the air of things that were off, and then it hit me; he was corrupted.

I pulled out my bat and Maximus looked really confused, but then they all realised too. He stood still at the end of the room, and then he turned around, tears running down his face. His eyes shone red, and his voice sounded strange. I couldn't make out was saying, but before I could do anything, two large tendrils sprung out from his back, and with them knocked Saturn straight through the wall, and outside to the ground below.

I jumped out of the way and fell down the stairs, and I heard everyone else being knocked out of the house. I heard Maximus shouting how we could beat the corruption out of him. I asked if I could use bullets, and he said that I shouldn't. I ran down the stairs to the first floor, and he jumped through the floor. Before he could hit me with his tendrils, I smacked him in the face with the bat, but he flung me through the building, and I landed hard on the ground.

I couldn't shoot Vortex, as I didn't want to kill him, but I realised I could shoot the tendrils. I pulled out my shotgun and shot one of the tendrils at a thinner point, and it went clean through. The entire tendril fell onto the ground, and began to discintegrate. He shouted in pain, and focused his other tendril on me. He smacked the gun out of my hand, and threw me back at the house, but I saw saturn cut the other arm. I ran down and jumped ontop of him.

Kagiri had the bat and hit him a couple of times, and we tried to beat the corruption out of him until his eyes flashed white, and a large red blast erupted around him and blew us back. We were all hurt from the blast, and Vortex got up. He held his head, and asked what happened. I walked closer and told him what happened. When he asked what year it was, I felt myself crying again.

I hugged him, and cried into his shoulder. He asked if it was still 2042, and that only made things worse. After a bit I let go of him, and let him know what happened. He began to cry, and hugged me. He thanked me for being such a good friend, and I said it wasn't just me. I pointed out the three others, and he apolagised profusefly for what happend. I said it wasn't his fault, and I helped him back up.

He eventually calmed down, and we took him back to the mansion. He asked if any of us wanted to go to the hospital, but none of our injuries were too serious. We were more concerned with Vortex, as he was still really shaken up, and he had been possessed by the corruption for the past sixteen years. I could tell he really appreciated it, and he was really thankful. As we walked home in the sunset, I felt good knowing I made him really happy, and that I had helped to save him, and that was much more important than my injuries.

## Kapeville, Klorin, IZ 144/6/76, Saturday, July 18, 2058, Jupiter Kiff -Out of Place-

If you've ever been to Klorin, then you already know what I am about to talk about, but if you haven't, then this might seem strange. Like Kosoda in Rosedell, Kapeville uses a very old Gothic style of building. Everything here has modern technology, but for some reason the builders wanted to make everything look like it was from the eighteenth century on Earth.

Klorin is a small island which is not too far offshore from Rosedell, and is classified as part of the Mar Continent, even though it's not part of the two main islands. Kapeville is the only town on Klorin, which makes it the smallest recognised country. It's nice to live in a place like this, where everyone knows everyone, but when something goes wrong, people tend to notice.

Last month my husband went missing, and I've been trying to look for him, but still no luck. Whenever I tried to research, I felt like someone was watching me, so I stopped and I had a feeling I would find him soon. It was last week when I noticed a couple of oddities in the area. For one, Stonemill Island was visible on the coast. Normally, Rosedell Island is visible from the coast, but never Stonemill. Even though it was barely visible, it was still very odd.

Another thing I noticed was that it was colder than usual. Being a small island, it's much colder than the middle of Stonemill, but it seemed colder than usual. It seemed like lately, strange things were starting to happen, but more than usual. Strange things aren't too uncommon here, but I feel like the past couple months have been more strange than usual, although that might just be me reading too much into things.

It was late afternoon, and I was just sitting at the coast watching the waves as I do sometimes. In the distance, I heard the roaring motor of a speedboat. I waited to see who it was, and through the thick fog, I could see two coronians. They approached me and said they knew where Genesis might be. Although it wasn't a smart decision, I was taking any lead I could get and I got on the boat with them.

They drove me over the ocean to a port on Stonemill Island, and then we walked a bit up the port to their car. When I got in the car, I remember them saying something I couldn't hear, and then a gas filled the car and I was knocked out. In the moment it started to kick in, I realised I had made a big mistake. Never trust people in speedboats.

When I woke up, I was inside a vat of some liquid in a giant dark room. There were other vats in the room, all lit up by small lights in the floor. It took me a second to realise there were pandorians inside, but not just any pandorians. These were all pandorians who had gone missing. I recognised a lot of them, some from the wars, and some from missing posters.

I noticed that Genesis was inside the pod beside mine, and I immediately started to think of any way out of here. There were hatches ontop of every pod, and if one could get out of one, they could use the nearby ladder and open all of the other ones. When I realised that I probably wasn't going to be able to free the others for a while, so I started thinking of possible ways to escape the pod first.

I looked up and saw that I might be able to push the lid open from the inside, but that was unlikely and probably not worth a try. After a bit of thought, a better idea came to my mind. Instead of trying to open the hatch, how about I create an opening? I thought of the possibility of trying to break the glass with my body, but that would be pretty hard to do being submerged in a liquid.

I was thinking of different ways I might be able to break the glass with my body, when I thought about trying to bodyslam it, or at least use my body weight to break it. I tried that a couple of times, but I passed out, being too tired, and I woke up later. I realised that I was only able to stay awake for about 5 or 6 hours at a time, and that I would only have a limited amount of energy to go off of, so I had to conserve it.

After about five days, I felt very energized, and I noticed the pattern. I would be given a limited reserve of energy to feed me for five days, so I couldn't try to break out. That day I tried bodyslaming the glass. It didn't break, for me being too light or the tension was too high for it to be effective. Although it didn't break, the pod rocked a bit, and then it hit me. If I kept slamming into the glass, I might be able to knock it over.

I waited patiently for a good time to strike, and that came much, much later. If my math was correct, it was the seventeenth day of August. I tried for a while, getting really close, but it always rocked back into place and stood still. I was about to give up and drift off, but then the alarms started blaring. In all the confusion, I didn't notice the door was open, and I didn't know how long it was like that.

After a couple minutes, a girl came into the room covered in various shades of coronian blood holding a rifle. She stopped for a second, and then grabbed the ladder and started opening the pods. It didn't take long for everyone to be freed, and she took charge and divided up everyone there into groups. I was in her group with Genesis, as well as a couple of others who I didn't know by name.

We ran headlong into the coronian army that came to stop us, and took them out quickly. It was hard fighting in a hallway, and also very exhausting, but we were doing pretty well, trying to make our way through the fortress and raid the place as hard as possible. Everything was going well, but then they started to charge back, getting more firepower.

It was hard to counterattack, as they had much more firepower so we just decided to run. We ran as fast as we could, out the front exit of the base. As we got there, one of the group members decided to go back in and make sure the others got out fine. I wished him luck as he ran in. After a while. the soldiers caught up to us and drove us far away from the fortress. We ran through the woods, and eventually got to a main road.

We decided to split up our group here, so Genesis and I headed south with one of the pandorians. He told us his name was Accer, and as we walked south down the long road he told us many stories about the events he participated in. We all exchanged stories on our way to the hospital, and when we got in, we got Genesis a room, because he had been shot in the arm.

They said he would need a new part, him being a pandoreal he would need parts exchanges sometimes. He said that we wouldn't be able to talk for a couple of days, and he encouraged me to do my own thing for a couple of days, so I decided to go shopping at the nearby mall. It might seem a bit tacky, but sometimes I just like to walk around there.

It was there where I encountered two people I knew, named Joey and Alpha. I had known Alpha for a very long time, and knew Joey as another friend's younger sister. I was surprised to see them, and I didn't know they knew each other too. We talked for a bit until Joey asked me about a boat trip she was going to go on, she was meeting with Alpha about it. I accepted and she asked if I wanted to stay at her house for the next few days, and I said yes to that too.

We got there late a night, because we decided to eat dinner in town and did a lot of other things. I said hello to everyone who was there, and then we watched a movie for a bit. After that, we talked a bit more about the boat trip, and I started getting things ready, as well as picking a room in the massive mansion. When I first got there, I thought it was a hotel, just because of how many rooms there were, as well as the size of the place.

After doing random things for the next couple of days, and on the twentieth of August, Joey, Fury, Kiri, Supernova, Alpha and I got in the car and Fury's car as he drove us to a port. When we got there, there was a large boat docked in a river. There were a good amount of other people there, but not enough for it to be too crowded. We got there right as the crew announced people could board, so we got on in a group.

They all talked together, and I walked to the balcony area. I've always loved areas like this on boats, because I get to have an immersive view of the river. I've always loved the sound of water rushing by, it's always been calming to me. I felt like I was the only one there, but that wasn't a bad thing. I wasn't really a fan of being in large groups of people, and it was already getting really loud inside.

Even though the engine was loud combined with the sound of whooshing water was quite loud, the people inside were pretty loud. I was watching the shoreline, and then something caught my eyes up ahead. It was hard to make out as the ship passed by so fast, but I could make out someone standing on the shoreline staring at me. It felt really strange, and the air started getting colder. I immediately recognised what was happening, and I prepared myself.

Having fought in two wars and having lived for so long, I recognise the outward symptoms of a corruption onset, or at least the most common ones. Those common ones are typically cold or foggy air, or a salty taste in the air. I've always used these to identify a corrupted individual before I knew about it, and I've used it to warn others in the past, but I was too late this time.

I ran into the room and tried to warn people, but nobody seemed to listen, so I decided to try and find the others. I tried to get to the upper level, but there were too many people blocking the stairs, so I decided to just save myself. Although it was quite a selfish decision, I decided if they landed on the ship, I would probably be able to fight them off, and I knew for sure that Alpha and Fury had a lot of combat experience, and possibly any number of others on the ship.

I decided to watch the shoreline from the balcony area, and looked out to see if there was any sign of the man. I focused my attention upstream and watched intently. Eventually, I spotted him between the trees, moving his way upstream to catch up with the ship. It wouldn't be hard to do so, as the boat was travelling quite slowly. I assumed he was waiting for the right moment, but then he noticed me.

I could tell he did because his expression changed. He changed his position and emerged slightly from the trees to get closer to the shore. After a while, there was a bend in the river where the boat would get closer to the shoreline. As it did, the man ran back and jumped towards the ship. He managed to get a hold of the ship, and he climbed inside the cargo hold which was below me. I looked for the entrance and I eventually found it.

I opened it and went in, but it slammed shut behind me, locking itself as it did. I realised I was now trapped down here, but I tried to not bring attention to myself. The area was quite strange, with there being hallways like there would be above the ship, unlike the large open area I thought it would be. There were three doors around the room I was in, and the first two were locked, so I had to go through the third. As I did, I heard a loud thud somewhere in the ship.

I opened the door and was met with a long hallway. I went into the adjacent room and saw two people there. On the far side there was a younger looking boy, and in front of me was the man who was on the shore. He turned around and closed the door, backing me into a corner as he did. I thought he was going to do something worse, but he tied me up with rope and did the same to the other guy.

After that, he left the room speedily and locked the door behind me. I was honestly quite scared, and remembered my pocket dimension was locked here, so I couldn't free myself. I sat there in silence until the other boy started conversation.

"So what brings you here?" he said.

"I was just on a boat trip with my friends, I saw him on the shore, and then I ended up here." I said.

"I just wanted to get a nice view of the lake, I haven't been here in a while. Glad you didn't start by asking me how old I am."

"Now that you mention it, how old are you?" I asked jokingly

"Well, older than you think. I was in the GCW and I served as a messenger, even though I was eleven years old at the time."

"WOW. That's unfortunate,"

"Don't worry, I'm used to it. I actually tried to help as many uncorrupted coronians as possible, but it was rather pointless in the end I realised."

"At least you tried, and that's still pretty admirable,"

"I did try, and I have to stop beating myself up for that,"

"I've done wrongs too. You just have to live with the fact that you couldn't save everyone."

"Right."

We talked for a bit about our lives, and realised that we weren't too different. Our lives were very different, him being older than me, but our experiences weren't too different. Burdened by our past, forcing us to live a completely different way, and giving us regrets. War changes a lot of people's lives, for most being the end. Those who survive don't have it good either. They have to live with regrets, nightmares, PTSD, and the awful memories of war.

We both tried to look past that, as anyone would want to. A tragic past is never fun to discuss. He told me how he lives in a small house in the middle of nowhere, and how he likes that life. He told me about his two older brothers who adopted him and raised him well. I told him about my life as a pandoreal, and how I found solace on the small island of Klorin, and how nice the place was. The people there were great and treated me well.

We had gotten along pretty well, and I didn't realise how long we were talking for until I looked out the window. I noticed it was starting to get dark outside, and I pointed it out to him. He started to think of a plan, and then I realised I never got his name. He told me his name was Nomad, and that he named himself that. I told him my name was Jupiter, and he commented on what a nice name it was.

He looked for anything that would be sharp enough, and I pointed out there was a sharp edge on the wall. I freed myself first, rubbing the rope on the sharp edge until it snapped. He did the same, and before long we were both free. The boat was eerily quiet, but I knew we were still moving. I could see the shoreline slowly passing through the small window in the room. We were going much slower than before, and I was beginning to wonder if the man who tied us up was driving the boat now and that everyone else left.

I slowly walked through the strange underbelly of the ship, being cautious to make as little noise as possible. Nomad followed quietly as we both snuck through the long, narrow hallways looking for a different exit. The ladder that was in the first room was gone, so we had to either find the ladder or another way up. We were trying to think of where a way out could be, and I remembered that there was one in the balcony area. I told him and we both walked quietly to the other end of the boat. The air felt tense and cold as we walked through the old boat.

We got to a door at the end of the long main hallway, and sure enough there was a way up. There wasn't a ladder here either but it looked easy enough to climb up. There were grooves and indents in the walls which made it easy for the both of us to climb up. Before long, we were on the main level of the ship, and noticed all the lights were off. The bottom of the ship used candles to illuminate the hallways, and it looked like the generators of the boat were turned off after it was docked, and that meant our pocket dimensions weren't locked anymore.

I felt dumb for not checking, but it didn't matter because we were on the main level of the ship, and we had access to our weapons. We started to look for the man, but we couldn't find him on that level. We decided to head up a level, and assumed he might be driving the ship. When we got there, he was sitting on the front of the ship, and I knew for sure he knew we were coming. I could tell he had that large, uncanny grin across his face, and he was facing away from us. He was staring at the water before he spoke.

"there's two of you isn't there?" he said in a creepy voice.

"uh yea, what's supposed to mean?" Nomad said.

"you didn't find the third is what I'm saying." At that moment, a wave of shock fell over the both of us. We ran down below deck and checked all the rooms. Near the front I could hear something moving inside, and we only saw a crate in the middle of the room. I could hear faint scratching coming from the inside of the crate, and I tried to peel away the boards. The boards came away easily, but there was a metal box underneath, with a couple of air holes presumably for ventilation.

I could see there was someone inside, and they started yelling. They were screaming for me to get them out of there, and I tried to cut them out. Nomad tried to get them to calm down as I tried to saw the box open. I started at the holes and cut it open with my scythe. It took a really long time, as the box was really strong, but it was also thick. Although it was tough to cut, my scythe is pretty strong. It's made of an alloy known as Surralion. It's strong but it isn't the strongest alloy.

When I finally opened the box, the boy inside was crying. We got him to calm down, but he didn't want to tell us what happened to him. Something seemed familiar about him, and then I noticed the tattoos on his neck. When you join the army, it is tradition for one to get tattoos that represent their rank, which is meant to reinforce the idea of an undying loyalty to the military. As you get higher in the ranks, you get more tattoos all over your body, with there being a total of fifty two ranks, with additional ones being granted for specific requirements, such as having a specific occupation, like a medic or tattoo artist, as well as one signifying what weapon or weapons you're best with.

He had a medic tattoo on his cheek, as well as a lot along his body, including a couple I didn't recognise. I didn't ask him about it, because he seemed injured although I couldn't tell where at first. Nomad and I picked him up over our shoulders and walked through the narrow halls back to where the balcony area was. When we got there and walked into the room, I made an alarming discovery, the top hatch had been bolted shut.

Nomad quickly ran to check the others, and said there was one that wasn't welded shut, but it would be a difficult climb. As we walked through the hallway, he got up and thanked us for the help. He was able to walk, but he walked with a limp. As we walked to the room, I asked about his tattoos. He mentioned how he was a medic, and that he was a pretty high ranking soldier. He was really proficient with his weapon of choice, being a heavily stylised katana as well as being a good marksman.

He grabbed some rope from his pocket dimension, tied a weight to the other end, and threw it up at a pipe in order for it to tie around, almost like a Bear Hang. It took a couple of tries, but it wrapped around the pipe a couple of times and held its place firmly. We all climbed up and up to the top deck, catching the corrupted man off guard. He looked really surprised and possibly scared for a moment, but that expression turned to anger.

At this point, I predicted what was about to happen. Two sets of giant tendrils sprang out from behind him flying towards me and the medic. As the giant arm flew towards me, I pulled out and extended my scythe as well as splitting the arm in half, all in one swift movement. I looked over at him, and he had done the same with his sword. I recognised the orange glow of his sword, it was made of Alion. Alion is a really strong alloy, being stronger than Surralion, but not as strong as Stardust, which is an experimental alloy.

I only had Varalion weapons, which was two tiers below alion, with Tarralion being in between the two. I could tell the man was mad, and he pulled out a sword. The medic stepped forwards and put his arm out in front of me. I took a couple of steps back and watched as they fought. They slashed at each other, and it seemed like it was going to be a draw, but the corrupted man managed to hit the medic a couple of times.

Although he was injured, he managed to quickly slash him a couple of times. Nomad and I ran to the back of the boat as they fought, landing hits on each other. It looked like he was starting to win, but then the tides started to turn. The two tendrils flew towards him. I ran to slash them in half, but he shouted for me to go. Nomad and I ran off the boat and jumped to the shoreline. As we landed, we looked back and saw the medic destroying the arms.

We broke through the trees trying to follow the boat as they fought. We lost sight of them for a bit, and when we caught sight of it, we saw the medic being sent into some kind of portal by the corrupted man. I was scared and worried for him, but we had bigger problems to worry about. All was quiet for a moment, until the corrupted man jumped from the boat to the shoreline behind us.

At that moment, we both had only one thought: to get the hell out of there. We both ran through the trees as fast as we could. We eventually outran him and were far enough away from him that we could only barely hear him yelling, but we still kept running. He took the lead and led us far through the forest until we reached a clearing. Up ahead in the distance, there were a couple of broken buildings, as well as a mountain range in the distance.

We both slowed down and we were completely out of air. He pulled a key out of his pocket and unlocked the door to the only intact house in the area. All the other houses near it were broken, and there was a whole ancient looking town down the road from there. I couldn't really see well because it was night, but I could make out broken buildings and many trees in the distance.

When he went in, he shouted "I'm home and I got a guest," there was no response for a couple of seconds, until I heard a male voice shout "That's nice, they can sleep in the second bed in your room. I'm doing something right now I'll come down in a bit." Nomad explained how that was his brother Leas, and that his other brother Zane was doing something else. Nomad showed me to his room and I got changed in the washroom connected to it.

After we were both ready for bed, Nomad turned off the light and we started talking. I was still a bit shaken up by what happened, and I could tell he was two. After a bit of talking, I could hear Zane from the other room say "ooooooh Nomad's got a girl". It made me laugh, and Nomad responded with "At least I bring home girls," I burst out laughing, and I could hear Zane laughing too.

Nomad was nice to me and I was glad to have met him on such a bad day. No matter how hard I tried to forget, I couldn't stop thinking of that medic and the battle. I kept wondering if he was alright, I kept wondering what happened, and I was afraid I would never get any answers to that question. Although I didn't know for sure, I could tell Nomad was thinking the same thing as well.

## Old Yina, Stonemill, IZ 144/6/76, Saturday, August 21, 2058, Nomad -Dying Breed-

A gust of wind blew through the clearing, howling as it swept the land. The mountain covered the sun as it came up in the morning. Jupiter woke up before I did, and she was already in the kitchen eating breakfast when I came down. I told her about how I was planning on exploring a cave that was visible from the road, and I asked Jupiter if she wanted to come with me. She said yes, and we got ready and headed out. Beside my house there's a 4-way crossroads. Facing the mountain, my house is on the left street, and to the right is the path that leads all the way to the river and down in that area.

We walked down the road towards the mountain, a road I had never gone down. The road was longer than it looked from my house, and it led all the way to the base of the mountain. The mountain looked easy to climb, having what appeared to be diagonal faults running down the mountain from the cave. Upon closer inspection, they looked almost like a giant staircase, and there were some markings on the rocks. We walked up the stone staircase all the way up to the cave, taking small breaks on the landings up the way.

The staircase appeared to be man-made, although the stone seemed somewhat natural, although I still couldn't ignore the markings on the stones, which seemed to indicate a proper staircase underneath. When we got to the top, the mouth of the cave seemed a lot larger up close. The inside of the cave seemed to have a lot of indents and possible offshoots, but it didn't look natural. There was something large at the very end of the long cave, but I couldn't make out what it was. On the platform in front of the entrance, the view was amazing.

You could see everything from there. You could see Viridan Forest and part of Fury Manor just barely visible through the trees. You could see Fort Yina and the Windswept Valley farther off in the distance. Even part of the river was just barely visible. The air was clear and fresh all the way up here, and even Downtown Brandon was visible in the distance. It was weird to see everything from up so high.

After a while of staring and taking a small snack we decided to head into the cave. When we walked into the cave, the air felt warmer and slightly fuzzy, almost as if it was charged. The cave was long and seemed to go in a straight line pretty far, with a couple of indents and off-shoots as it went down. At the very end of the cave, I could see something but I didn't know what, as it was too far to make out.

As we walked down the cave, I noticed how weird it looked. I was now sure that this wasn't a natural cave, and looked like it was some sort of complex, but there seemed to be no doors or rooms, and the off-shoot caves resembled alleyways in urban cities. Although it was strange, we kept going down deeper and deeper. There seemed to be a notable decline in the ground level, almost like a ramp going down from the mouth of the cave.

As we got deeper, the air began to warm up slightly, and the fuzz in the air seemed more abundant. When we eventually got to the end of the cave, we stood in front of what was a giant door at the end of the cave. The door was very large, and went up to the ceiling of the cave. There was a large metal arch that surrounded the two giant doors, which appeared to be made of a very dense, dark wood.

The two handles on the doors were large, being more than half my height. Jupiter tried to pull the handles multiple times, but they didn't give. The door must have been locked from the other side, or possibly sealed off. Whatever it was, there was no opening these doors. After Jupiter tried the door a couple more times, we decided to turn back and exit the cave.

When we turned around, I thought I heard a voice. I turned around, but there wasn't anything there. I was a bit creeped out, and that shot my nerves up. We both walked down the cave back to the exit, but a bit faster this time. At this point, the air was hot and I couldn't tell if it was just me, or if it had really gotten warmer. I tried to ignore the charged feeling in the air, but it soon became too hard to ignore.

When we were about half way through the cave, I thought I felt breath on the back of my neck. This time I didn't turn around, but I continued to walk forwards, not moving my head and keeping my arms at my side. My steps were perfectly aligned with Jupiter's and the sound of our footsteps was synced. This normally wouldn't be significant, but further along I heard another footstep which fell out of line, sounding softer than Jupiter's. I walked even faster this time, just trying to get out of the cave as fast as possible, Jupiter keeping pace.

We were almost out but I heard a voice calling my name. I stopped in my tracks, Jupiter doing the same. Although I was scared out of my mind, I glanced up at Jupiter who was completely calm. The voice called my name again, and I shook. I could feel the sweat on my arms. I glanced to Jupiter, and she threw her band beside her pocket, drawing something tiny and red. For a second, I didn't know what it was, but then i recognised the colour. It was her scythe.

It was somehow able to fold in on itself so many times it was merely the size of a thimble. I wondered how it was possible to extend itself and then be able to cut through a material stronger than itself without folding back or snapping at the seams. I could see her unfold it, but something washed over me, like a wave of oncoming regret. I had a weird idea, but I decided to play it out. I took a deep breath in, and then I turned around. I was surprised to see a coronian who appeared to be uncorrupted.

It appeared happy and did that thing where they put their hands on their legs and bent forwards like adults do to children. It introduced itself and explained how it was uncorrupted, and the whole community was uncorrupted. I glanced to Jupiter who was just as confused as I was. The coronian walked over to the wall at the edge of the cave, reached behind a rock and pulled a switch that was hidden. As it did, the whole cave changed in appearance, shifting into what appeared to be a normal city walkway, the indents and weird shapes turning into doors and buildings.

Needless to say, I was really surprised and amazed. I was excited to meet an uncorrupted coronian, and we talked a bit. Jupiter said that her husband had called her, so she left shortly after I met the coronian, and then it was just me and them. They were really nice, and asked if I wanted to meet some of the other coronians. I said sure, and she walked me down the hall to a larger door. She opened it, and inside was a huge room that appeared to be a mess hall of some kind.

There were coronians sitting at the tables, and the coronian who took me in announced she found a pandorian who wanted to visit, and a couple of coronians came up to me. There were a lot of different types of coronians, some I didn't even know existed. There were a lot of cats, dogs, rabbits, and bears, and some birds and other mammals. They all seemed pretty interested in me due to me looking so young, and I won't lie I enjoyed the attention. After a while, I picked a table and sat down to eat. Another one came to sit after me, who appeared to be a dog.

He was wearing glasses and had his lunch with him. He introduced himself as Kadori-Fray, and I introduced myself as Nomad. After talking for a bit, we realised that we had pretty similar interests, and pretty similar lives. He was nice, a lot nicer than I was and he respected me even though I was involved in the GCW. He knew that I tried to help the uncorrupted coronians who got swept up in the conflict, and he said that he wouldn't be brave enough to do it. After a bit, his older brother came in, and sat down.

They talked for a bit, before he talked to me. He said his name was Saturo-Mar, and told me about how he was involved in some of the smaller wars that happened between the corrupted and uncorrupted coronians. He knew from Fray that I was involved, and he knew that I was on his side. I had never even known about some of the smaller wars, and he told me a lot about coronian culture and how they had something similar to the corruption crystals, being two pearls that were said to liberate all the smaller factions of coronians, and finally make peace and cease the corruption.

He said he had been looking for them all his life, and he reminded me of one of the men from my platoon way back in the GCW, who had been devoted to searching for the crystals from a young age, although I forgot his name over the years. After a long conversation about random things, I realised it was quite late, and that I should probably head home soon, but Fray and Mar offered a bed at their house. I decided to accept it, because why not these guys are cool.

The insides of the buildings looked much larger than the cave, and I asked why the ceiling was so low. Mar said it was so they could conceal themselves. He explained that that was the reason the cave was transformable, so that the coronians could easily hide themselves. The cave would look as if it was natural or close enough to make people either go away or stay long enough for them to be dealt with, either being taken in or being killed.

Mar explained more about how it worked, telling me that there were two ways to get into the main cave if it was in its hidden mode, although these were well hidden. There was a network of tunnels that connected all the rooms so one could easily get around without having to go into the main area. It was a smart design, and solidified the rumour that coronians were great builders. If this engineering marvel wasn't proof enough, then I would be surprised.

After a long conversation about how the cave worked, I asked about the giant door that was at the end of the cave. He hung his head in sadness, exhaled, and told me. Long ago, all of the coronian bases on the island were connected to each other via an underground system of tunnels powered by a railroad, which was eventually made into a subway system. Even though this base was of uncorrupted coronians, the builders didn't know it at the time.

There were little problems and very minimal interactions, as 99% of the work was done behind the door and out of sight. But one day, a girl came through the cave and was welcomed as I was. She was nice but she wanted to explore further, and went through the door while the subway system was being built. She was killed on the spot, and they only found out when her body was found in the woods.

After that, the doors were locked and sealed, so such a tragedy could never be repeated. It would only ever be opened if it was a serious emergency, and there was a system in place for that too, just like there was for everything else. Fray explained how the place was kind of like a giant machine, where most things were mechanised or had a specific system in place to make life easier and making the place a proper fortress.

Fray demonstrated this by showing off how the drawers were spring-loaded and calibrated to pop out a very specific length at a specific force to open properly. All the doors were sliding doors so they could be easily shut by a remote that every coronian carries in their pocket dimension. At that point I didn't even know coronians also had pocket dimensions, but it made a lot of sense.

After that, I got ready for bed and got into the spare bed that was in their home area. The bed was large and pretty soft, but the blankets were rather thin. This was likely due to coronians being much larger and furry, so of course they wouldn't want thick blankets. The cave was warm anyways and although the charged feeling went away, the air was still pretty warm and still had a little bit of fuzz.

When I woke up, Fray and Mar were still asleep. It was a normal time for me to wake up, but I realised they did things a bit differently here. When they woke up, we all went down through the tunnels and up to breakfast in the mess hall. We were some of the first down there, so there was almost no wait. The coronian serving the breakfast was Caslow-Chrome, the one who took me in yesterday.

Breakfast was toast covered in a peanut butter-chocolate spread with a yogurt on the side. There was also a glass of milk and a couple of cookies to go along with it. The breakfast was amazing, and it was rather filling too. If this is what they ate every morning, then I don't see why I couldn't stay here, other than the rule my brothers set up, where I have to stay at the house for at least one day every week so they don't miss me.

After breakfast, I decided to go where Jupiter told me to go before she left. While we were talking, she gave me a little note with an address, so I decided to head to it. It took me a while to realise where it was, and I noticed that the address was to Fury Manor just as I was leaving the cave. Luckily, I knew a shortcut to get there. I walked back home first and told my brothers where I would be staying for the next couple of days, and they got me to sign it in on a piece of paper.

After that, I walked through the woods, following the small footpath through the woods, until I got to the main road leading up to Fury Manor. I had been here only a couple of times before, all of which were with my brothers in banquets held there by Fury Niravia, who was a high ranking officer in the GCW and other wars. I only took part in the GCW, because the other two major wars were very pointless.

When I got there, I knocked on the door. Jupiter answered and let me inside. There were a lot of other pandorians there, a few of which I recognised. Jupiter explained to me how they were going to go to the beach on the 26th, and asked if I wanted to come. I agreed and spent the rest of the day meeting everyone. They all seemed like nice people, and some of them I remembered from the GCW from way back.

I was surprised to see Yomaho, and he was surprised to see me. He told me about how he fought in the other wars and asked why I didn't participate. I told him I thought they were pointless acts of violence, kind of like the GCW. He pointed out that the GCW was started due to coronian and Red Kingdom aggression, but that always seemed a bit fishy to me. The duel that kicked off the battle was obviously rigged, because it caught fire in the sky and fell into a lake which would be vaporised with everything else seven years or so later. It all seemed pointless.

He said there was a point to the wars, but even though we were friends in the GCW, I couldn't agree with him. He'd probably been so messed up from the wars that he somehow agrees with them, becoming more of what Umbra would call a 'perfect soldier', being somehow who fights for their country valiantly and skilfully until the end of the war, or the end of their life. It was an impossible standard many tried so hard to achieve.

I recognised a couple others from the war, although they weren't in my platoon. They looked almost exactly the same, but with more regret in their eyes. They all had the typical 'raisin eyes' of a killer that most people point out. When I was young I didn't believe it, until I experienced it firsthand in the GCW. It's something people don't talk about, because a lot of people who fought in the major wars and even the smaller ones have them, but nobody wants to point them out.

After that conversation, I was given a time to be at Fury Manor, ready to go for the beach trip. On August 26th, they would be leaving at exactly 10:30 AM. It was an early time to leave, but I could more than manage. After working it out with everyone, I went back to the coronian cave. The walk back was calm, as the winds blew through the grass. I was pretty excited to do something like a beach trip with strangers, and I knew it would be fun.

**-August 26-**

I arrived at the manor at 9 AM, and everyone was starting to get ready. Some people, like me, were already ready to go, but there were some who were still getting ready. It took a while for the rest to get ready, and in that time I ate a second breakfast while I waited. Joey made coffee and I had some. It took another hour and a half for everyone to be ready, and we were out the door by 10:50.

When we got to the beach, there were less people than I thought were going to be there, but it was still rather busy. The morning sun shone brightly on the turquoise water, and the warm breeze brushed through the sea grass on the sand. The pier was filled with shops and stands, with some being closer to the water and others right up on the pier. Lots of people were already set up, and there were people swimming in the ocean.

We set up our stuff beside a group of pick-nick tables. We assigned Saturn and Supernova to keep watch, and Kosa decided to stay with them as well. We split off into a couple of groups, and Jupiter went with Maximus and I. The others made separate groups and we all went in different directions to explore the beach and maximise fun had. The first thing we did by request of Maximus was to visit was a store for really bizarre items.

One of the items inside was a giant buzz-saw, and it reminded Maximus of something. He decided that we should go to a different store, and we followed him. As we walked along, there was a little side section of the pier that looked old. I stepped towards it, but Maximus said I shouldn't. He threw a rock at one of the beams and it broke in half. I decided to take his advice and stick to the pain path.

I asked him how he knew it would break, and he brought up how he's been here a couple of times before, every time resulting in a death, although he was revived instantly, being a KM. He noted a list of things that killed him, being a giant buzz-saw in the store we passed, that old boardwalk that had jagged metal underneath, a gun display, a different gun display, and someone's rabid dog.

Him listing all of these things made the place seem much more dangerous than it was, and I took note of every possible danger, just like Maximus did. He said that every time he came to this beach, he was killed, and wanted to see if this time would be an exception. I made it my mission, along with Jupiter to help keep Maximus out of trouble and death free for the day. It was going to be a fun day and I made sure of it.

We continued to walk down the main boardwalk, seeing if there were any stores that seemed interesting, and then I saw a familiar face. Jude noticed me first, and I said hi to him. We hugged and greeted each other. I hadn't seen him in a very long time, not since his brother's house burnt down a long time ago. He was doing well and I asked if he wanted to hang around with us. He of course agreed having nothing else to do, and it was nice to talk to him again.

As we both walked down the boardwalk I could see Maximus was rather nervous. He decided to keep walking down the boardwalk, and he led us to his favourite part of the beach. It was this giant area where the sand is almost shaped like a crescent moon, and the sea filling it. Due to its shape it was referred to as the Kat Crescent, named after the beach and its very distinct crescent shape.

Due to all of this, one would think it'd be a popular spot, but it was rather the opposite. Maximus explained how it was normally completely empty, but there were two people sitting together on the beach. Maximus went to sit beside them, and they seemed pretty friendly. Jude, Jupiter, and I went to go sit with them, and we had a nice conversation. It turned out one of them, named Willow knew Jude.

At first, Willow referred to him as a different name, but Jude corrected him, explaining how he had changed his name, but he didn't get into why. The other boy introduced himself as Pollux. They explained how they were trying to find something, and apparently this spot was somehow a clue. I asked what it was, and they decided to tell us, assuming we could help with it.

They explained how they were looking for two things, one being the crystal maps, and the other being some sort of key. The maps I already knew about, but the key was completely new. Pollux explained how the key wasn't a normal key but a different type of key. It apparently opened a different type of door and told me he would explain it later on. He didn't even explain what it looked like, but that we'd know it when we see it.

We spent a while going around the crescent, trying to see if there was any clues hidden in the sand, or if there was anything in the waters deep below. I asked about the clues that led them here, and Willow explained that there was a whole long line of clues that led from one discovery in a small house by the edge of the woods. From there, there were clues that led them through multiple locations, and finally to the Kat Crescent.

He showed me the piece of paper that was hidden in a tree in the woods that led them here that read: *High above the lonely breach, the next clue won't require much speech. Where the waves pierce the sand, the sky meets the land*. They assumed that the "won't require much speech" line referred to a secluded area, and the "lonely breach" being in reference to the breaches which were south of the crescent way out in the sea.. They also assumed "High Above".

We agreed on most, and thought that the second sentence was being another reference to it being secluded and on the edge of the beach. But I thought a bit differently on the "high above" line, and the "little speech" line might not be seclusion, but requiring at least two people because little is still some. Then, I had an idea. What if "high above" meant literally high above the beach. When I brought up this point, they both agreed with me.

Jupiter said that she had access to a Jet-pack, being a pandoreal. She flew up high above the crescent, and then came back down excited. She explained how there was a shimmering light that was only visible at a certain height. She explained how it wasn't visible a bit above or below a specific height, so Maximus pulled out an industrial sized extra long tape measure so they could measure the exact height.

Maximus offered to hold the tape measure, and held it to the sand. Finally, when Jupiter got to the top, she marked down the measurement on the tape measure. Jupiter descended slowly as to not ruin the tape measure or cause it to freak out. The measurement was really specific, and it seemed to be a code. The code was a simple letter-number substitution, and it spelt out the number forty.

I suspected that the forty was a measurement for below the waters. Maximus offered to dive in, and he got to about forty feet down, being one of the lowest points of the river. He was down there for a really long time, and I started to get worried that he might have died. He then surprisingly breached the surface, taking a giant deep breath, holding a crystal box that reflected the light off it.

He swam to the shore where we were and gave the box to Willow. Inside was the next clue, and we wished them luck on their journey. They asked why we couldn't come with them, and we explained how we had to get back with the rest of the group that took us there. Pollux assured us that we'd meet again some day, and that him and Willow would come see us if they needed help again.

We stayed with them for a bit, and watched the sun go down. The sunsets here were beautiful, the entire sky turning a bright orange that slowly faded as the sun slowly faded below the sea line. We sat together in near silence, but in unspoken awe as we admired the sunset. As the sky got dark, we bid them farewell and walked towards where the others were camping. They had a bonfire going, and we talked and laughed together as the night began to wind down. It made he mow happy everyone was. It was truly a lovely night. After a long and fun day, it was nice to see the sun go down and the light of bonfire fill the night sky.

That's the end of Chapter One.

Chapter Two is Available Here.

"If only I knew what was going to happen with that medic. Something about the way Jupiter described him reminded me of someone who came to my house one day. He said his name was Apollo, and he came shortly after the other houses on the lane burnt down. He told me he knew Zak, and he had a very important message to give him. I'll never forget what he said in response to him being dead.

"*It appears I'm too late, and I'm sorry for your loss. He was a good man and he always stuck with us. I'm too late currently, but for you it's too early. I'm not sure if Zak's still out there, knowing him he'd want to take his secrets to the grave, but your brother and sister... I swear I recognised them"*

It wasn't uncommon for people who knew Zak to turn up at my house, in fact it was really common. I just wish I knew why he never told me anything. The others seemed to know everything he did, but why was I left in the dark? Was it because I wasn't ready? Sadly I doubt I'll ever find an answer to that question, but if Apollo was right, then they could be out there somewhere, but that leaves out one question about him: Why was such a strong-willed man crying when they found him?"

- Kosa