I’ve trailed Kerian. I record this to state that there’s nothing wrong with it and my motifs. Only curiosity and no other hidden agendas. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with following a crewmate, especially in a potentially dangerous environment as the Old World, but with all of this I just say: there’s no ground to prosecute me, Kerian.

Anyways.

Nothing happened, but paranoia is healthy. It would be more healthy if I didn’t have it, but the idea of the voices coming back stresses me out.

Kerian just checked places with some sort of handheld device. She didn’t check any technological piece in specific, not that I was aware of. Kerian just seemed to check more about the places themselves than the actual contents. Kinda the opposite of what we do.

The device was strange, it hummed strangely. I have no other way to describe it. The sounds, they felt as if they sounded more than sound, like they affected my own body. It’s difficult to put into words, and I’m far from a fucking poet.

I felt the vibration in my bones, that’s what I want to say.

Every time the device activated, it was as if the space warped. Weird I know, but I’m at a loss of words myself. I could see black motes floating around when the vibration ended. Kerian ignored them, which unsettled me a lot. Couldn’t she see them? Or was she just ignoring it?

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

I think I’ll try to fake an encounter with her, to naturally ask her what she was doing. I wish for my sanity that she can see the motes.

Please.

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I found a diary, well, what I think it’s a diary. The paper is corroded, and the ink has faded away. There’s only one thing I made out of the diary, a single beginning of an entry in the last written page. It said: Light 15th, 510.

Now, I thought I misread. I showed it to both Zal and Teradoi because they were next to me and supposed the ink blurred out, but that’s the thing, this was the only intelligible page. The ink wasn’t clear, but it didn’t look like a random splotch.

Next, I asked Kerian. And then I freaked out. Kerian did agree with me that the text looked right, and we she ran it through some of the machines that I have no idea how to use, it estimated that it was some centuries old.

How?

That’s what I asked Kerian and she suggested that the Remnants just resetted the calendar. Today’s Void 15th, 495, so that can only be the only right answer. I. Well. The other possibility implies that this entry is somehow from 15 years into the future. More like 14, but that doesn’t really matter.

If the Remnants really started the calendar again, how old is really this diary? At minimum five centuries, but then how is the paper still here? Does paper survive that long? I don’t know, but my instinct tells me no.

The diary took my mind for the full day, and the hauling of recoveries is getting difficult as there’s not even trash here, only rubble. I’ll try to ask Kerian again tomorrow about the device and the black spots.

I have no prove, but I think the diary and the spots are related. Everything is too weird. The air is too humid and the temperature too cold even though the suit is fully water and temperature tight. The whole aura of the place gives me the creeps.

I hope for a more comfortable tomorrow.

That’s not much to ask, is it?