Captain Sebastian Bluerose used his Lifeform Radar to check the giant ruins, but to his disappointment, there weren't any larger lifeforms present within his range. From his guesswork, he should cover at least most of it—if not all—so he didn't expect anyone living there still.

However, this might be the opportunity to fill in some blanks in history. While he wasn't a historian, he was an educated man and a discoverer, so finding pieces of lore was always welcome. “Seems empty so far, but maybe there are some traps.” He didn't believe it himself, but in case this used to be an important place.

He also didn't abandon his hypothesis about the Zheng Empire, the question was just whether the giants were before, after, or during it. They could have lived with or at least next to each other after all.

Therefore he went wide-eyed through the ruins, keen to find any conclusive proof of one of his many ideas, but as he wasn't a true archaeologist, he could neither tell how old the stones were, nor what exact function the buildings served.

So running through what he assumed were streets was a rather boring matter. In fact too boring: “Hm... I take another look from above.” Once again he jumped high in the air, and caught another glimpse at the ruins below him, and this time it made him ponder. “Ina,” he asks a random crewmember: “What do you believe this ruin used to be?”

The young woman looked at him with surprise and then answered: “A city?”

“This would make sense, but look at the height of the crumbling walls. If I'm right and this is a giant ruin, then the whole premise would be too small for a city. And too fortified for a village.”

“Which means?”

“Maybe a fortress. Or a temple. I wish there were stairs or the like here, then we could be more sure whether it's giant or the Zheng just really loved to build high walls and large rooms. However, there was a big building further ahead, hopefully it's not as ruined as it looked from above.”

Following the captain's directions, the explorers took a rather non-direct route, it was all about the detours in life, after all. This deliberate choice of Captain Sebastian Bluerose was mostly for the off-chance to find something interesting, but the ruins were so old and weathered, that there wasn't much left aside cold stone.

“Strange,” exclaims the prestigious pilferer of old as he took quick glances here and there: “There should be at least dishes, jars, and the like.” The chance was high, that someone already took whatever was left behind, though nothing told why exactly this place fell to ruin.

If there were traces of hardened magma or foreign rocks within the walls, then it could had been a volcanic eruption, but it just looked like that place was abandoned and either the inhabitants took everything with them or someone retrieved the rest later.

Finally, they were at the big building, maybe even the main-building, though it was surrounded by several layers of debris. The captain regretted not having Ocher here, as she would be able to tell if this building was even save to enter. “Let's look for a way inside.” He says lightheartedly and decided not to jump over the heaps of debris right into the ruin. There was always the line between brave and unnecessarily reckless to consider.

The problem with this building was, that the debris was the building, or at least something like its second floor. Walls crumbled away and while some remains of them stuck out, the age created a hard to bypass barrier.

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However, the search had another result. There was a big piece of debris, and there was giant script on it! “It has to be much younger than this ruin. Let's see, it's been a while. This means see, here we have forest, that one was sun—wait, that's with a dash, so it's south—then we got spear and mountain... then... ah, 'Look for us at the Spearmountains behind the southern forest.' Dear Crewmembers, we got a new destination! We could find some giants that survived whatever cataclysm happened here, maybe they even know of the Age of Giants, other than the ones on the main-land. This might be the biggest discovery of all time, so let's revisit this place another time, and find those giants!”

“Erm captain,” a young lad asked carefully: “Wouldn't it be better to return to the ship by now? We're already several hours away and with our... big discoveries, wouldn't it be better to share them first?”

“Well thought, Matthew, but what explorer would I be if I returned now? How could I write 'And then we returned to the ship' in my next book, right after we found such a message of massive meaningfulness?”

“Erm... you could not write it that way and just ignore the breaks?”

“I can't, because then I would basically lie and all of my stories are true. I may shorten days and weeks into single sentences to not bore the readers, but now we're onto a mystery! Don't you like mysteries, Matthew?”

“No, I hate surprises in general.”

“Then we have to solve it, because it could be a sudden surprise that will spring on us spectacularly, if we just ignore it. Of course, I won't force you to go with me, you may return with everyone that wants to accompany you, but I will press on nonetheless!”

While the captain didn't mean it that way, there was a clear 'I won't be there to protect you from harm if you leave'-threat there, so Matthew shook his head and uttered: “No thank you. I'll gladly be with you, captain!”

“That's the attitude! Now let's press on and see what lies in the south! Let me take another look!”

As the captain jumped high into the air once more, Matthew could only think of how much of a monster the captain himself was, being able to jump effortlessly multiple times to the sky. Maybe people of that caliber thought differently.

Captain Sebastian Bluerose landed and then he exclaimed: “I think I found the Spearmountains. It's really southwest from here, so let's not hesitate. We could be there before the sun has sunk, so let's push forwards. But dear Matthew, you gave me an idea.”

The captain ripped a page out from his notebook and wrote a message on it for his crew. Then he looked for a good stone to bind the message around and then he took another look at his compass and checked the sun with his pocket watch. “So the Reverence is around there...” He then jumped up and threw the stone with a very enhanced arm. A practice thrower was able to throw a stone a distance longer than a furlong, but the captain's had to be measured in leagues. Not only because of his great Body Enhancement, but also because of his mediocre Air Control. “That should do it.”

“Erm, captain? Why do you use blades, if you can throw that hard?”

“Why should I forfeit the glory of heroic melee-combat, facing my enemy directly and see it into the eyes and then use a single slash to ensure my victory in the bravest and most satisfying way possible?”