As their footsteps echoed through the chamber, a clicking and buzzing noise echoed throughout. After a few moments, a dull hue of yellow light filled the room. Highlighting a dazzling display of stonework. The room’s walls were adorned with gold lettering in various languages that thrummed with light, illuminating them to the eyes. In the center of the room were two prominent displays, a small square table inlaid with gold in an almost map-like pattern. The other, was a small enclosure, contents occluded by the wall around it.

Lun’s face was in amazement. Unable to comprehend what he was seeing. He walked up to the various walls and continued to stare bewildered at them. It was the most fascinating thing he had ever seen. These were extremely ancient languages of old kingdoms. Some so old that they linked back to old tribes. He quickly shifted his eyes around trying to catch one that he knew. He looked over to Abel who’s hands ran over the center table.

“There are so many old languages here. Whoever this was has been documenting these for generations. Some are extremely old. It’s like some sort of historical archive.” Lun said.

“They’re the Gods, Lun. That’s who spoke to me and told me. It was the last remnant of them. They said they were slain by their children. We killed them.. “ Abel responded.

Lun looked confused before responding back. “What gods? The saints? Or are you talking about the old wives tale about the old gods?”

“I don’t know what the Saints are, but they’re not the real gods. Whether they are made up by the church or something else, I don’t know, but the being in my vision warned me about the veil and those who want to break it to come through.” Abel said dejectedly.

“I’m glad your memory is returning about the ordeal, but this doesn’t fully explain it I don’t think. This is the find of the century, we have to report this to the Archivists. They’ll love to detail, document and find.” Lun said.

“We can’t share this with anyone. We can’t trust anyone. We don’t know who sides with who and we don’t know if this will leak to the Church. They can’t find this.” Abel said defiantly.

Lun pondered the statement for a moment, coming to the same conclusion. “You’re right. If this is important to the real history of the world, then we’ll need to keep this quiet and do some investigating of ourselves. We don’t have much time though since we need to get out of this desert.” Lun said.

“The being said something about locations, like there’s more of this place, and something to restore the barrier. So there has to be something here we can find quickly, then head on to the next one.” Abel hurriedly stated.

“We need to get medical treatment for Sheridan and Oya, first. Then we can explain to the group what we need and continue on from there.” Lun retorted.

“Yes, of course.” Abel nodded in agreement.

Abel tapped his finger on different places of the center table, looking for something to find a hidden chamber, anything at all. Unexpectedly, the familiar hum began again and the gold inlays in the table began to glow with a bright, amber light projecting a picture into the air. It showed a similar structure with a series of mesas and mountains surrounding it. One particular mesa seemed to stand out to both Lun and Abel as they stared at it.

“If this is the next location, that is definitely Owlshead Mountain. That’s pretty damn far from here to the north. If we want to make it there quickly, we’ll have to somehow hop a train from Blackwater without being discovered.” Abel said as his finger followed an imaginary road. “Then we’ll have to hop off at Drygulch before trekking across the desert again. Again, all without being discovered by the Empire.”

“There were rumors that there was a prison work camp in that area that the Church would take people. I’m surprised they haven’t found this place already, if the y are the ones looking for it.” Lun said.

“Let’s hope they’ve been too busy torturing people into being good little followers for us to sneak right by.” Abel stated.

“That’s amongst all other dangers, in addition to if we can convince the group to go along with this. They’ll need proof.” Lun said, walking around the room looking for some sort of evidence. He stopped at a wall of language for a moment, studying it carefully before continuing on. “This is ancient Agraisian. They were great builders to the far south many generations ago, where the current Bilgehallow Republic sits. There were tales of them building great cities against the ocean, and even cities out at sea. Too bad the whole place is ruined by the pirate ‘king’, eh?”

Abel wasn’t listening, he continued to walk around the center of the room, this time past the map table and towards the enclosure. He put his hand on the stone wall and looked over the side. Looking inside there was a clear, viscous liquid with flecks of inky black in various shapes and sizes, for a moment Abel had thought that they could even be symbols or letters. He thought that it was a crazy thing, but something inside of him beckoned him to reach in and touch it.

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His hand trembled as they reached down into the abyss. His hand touched a smooth, milk-like substance, engulfing it completely. For a moment, he felt a warm sensation grip his hand, surging forward through it to engulf his body. The welcoming presence felt like sitting beside a campfire on a cold night, letting the flames bathe you in a comforting embrace. That feeling was replaced like the flick of a lamplight to an outpouring of searing hot pain as it felt like tons of solid iron needles were digging into Abel’s skin, burying themselves underneath.

Lun watched in horror as the black liquid engulfed Abel entirely, wrapping itself around him for what seemed like an eternity, before melting into his skin. What remained was his body on the ground in the fetal position, his exposed skin covered in a series of strange letters and symbols, as if his skin was turned into parchment. His eyes widened when his eyes laid upon a specific symbol. Is that the First Language he thought to himself? How did that happen?

Stepping over to Abel’s body, slick with sweat and the ink of the symbols were freshly carved. Blood oozed from the etched lettering. Peering over to his side, where there was no arm or hand of Abel’s, Lun spotted a strange clawed hand beginning to sew and attach itself to his stump. It’s fingernails jutted out as if they hadn’t been trimmed in ages, and the mottled, ashen skin sagged and stretched over the bone like an ill-fitting costume.

Abel grunted in pain and confusion, but didn’t budge. Lun looked around the chamber in vain, knowing that the rest of them were upstairs waiting in the hot sun for them. He cursed himself and his curiosity, allowing them to end up like this. He wasn’t sure whether Abel would recover from this, or additionally, what it even meant. What the hell kind of thing does this to a person? Is this something from the Old Ones?

There was a grinding and whirring noise from within the enclosure that “attacked” and tattooed Abel. Lun sighed and drew his sword from its scabbard, pointing it dejectedly in that direction. All hope began to fade from his body as he heard it grow increasingly louder, with a crunching of stone soon sneaking up as a tertiary sound. Eventually, whatever was causing it peered over the side of it. It was a mechanical humanoid made of a mixture of brass and strange light blue metal. It’s face was marked by two eye sockets with glowing lights emanating from it, as well as an etched smile. No teeth, no nose, just a smile.

As Lun started to align his feet into a defensive stance, the mechanical person fully climbed over the side of the enclosure. It looked down at Abel’s body, kneeling down to touch him. Lun’s sword was soon placed in front of the creature’s face as a direct warning sign.

“Don’t hurt him or touch him. He’s hurt. If you have a quarrel with us, take it up with me.” Lun responded.

The creature turned its head to face Lun, and tilted it sideways. If it had a face, it would most likely portray a look of confusion. Lights flickered inside of it’s metallic skull, with a series of clicking and chugging following that.

Speech that was cold, calculating and genderless eminated from it’s mouth. At first the words were in an unknown language, and it read the confused look on Lun’s face as it turned to a more common tongue. “The Conduit is injured. Care must be taken. Please let me tend to him.”

Lun was frozen in his place. His entire world view had continuously been shattered over the past few days, and there was almost a tipping point he had reached.

“What can we do to help him? What is wrong with him? What are you?” Lun’s voice shook with fear.

“The imprinting of the first part of the incantation is damaging to one. Being a Conduit is painful, and thus his condition. Additionally, I am the Custodian. I was created to aid the Conduit in acquiring all of the incantation so that the children of the world can repel the darkness. That is my sole purpose. The Conduit will be okay with rest.” The Custodian responded.

Lun took in the words carefully before nodding. “Right.. Right. That makes total sense. So you can get us out of here?”

The Custodian nodded. “Please follow me.”

Each step of the Custodian was echoed with a large thunk as it almost crushed the aging concrete below it. It stepped towards a panel in the wall, and placed it’s hand against it. A luminous glow emanated from it, and soon after the grinding of stone filled the air. A door appeared where the wall once was, and stands began to ascend up towards the surface. Without looking back towards Lun, he reached down, scooped up Abel and began walking up the set of stairs.

Lun took one last look back at the room before catching a quick idea. Reaching into his bag, he pulled out a few sheets of paper and chalk. Walking over to the sections of the wall with the various languages, he quickly made rubbings of them before shoving them back inside of his pack and running up the stairs to follow the Custodian back up to the surface.

Stepping back out onto the surface, the sun beat down on Lun once again. He came upon a scene of Jaqri still holding Sheridan in his arms and Oya on his back. Sheridan had a gun drawn and pointed in the direction of the Custodian. Through gritted teeth and pain, he narrowed his eyes to aim up a shot on the being. The Custodian’s eyes began to flicker with energy once again, and a ruby tint emerged from behind them.

“Wait! It’s not harming him.” Lun shouted desperately, dragging his feet through the painfully hot sand.

“He better state his business with the boy then.” Sheridan responded.

“I am the Custodian. I am to protect the Conduit.” The Custodian said plainly.

“The whose-it in the what’s it?” Sheridan said, confused.

“Let’s find a place to camp for the night and I can explain? It’s something we found down there in the dark. Something that requires a lot of explanation. I think it has large ramifications.” Lun said drly.

Sheridan’s hand gripped the gun even harder. “Now boy, you best be telling the truth or I’ll put a bolt right between you and that hunk of metal’s heads faster than you can say snakebite. Abel is a pain in the ass and dumb, but he’s my charge.”

Lun shook his head. “I promise you he’ll be okay. Please, let us have the chance to sit down and talk about this.”

Sheridan slowly placed the gun back in it’s holster and looked up to Jaqri to nod. Jaqri responded with a nod of his own in silent acceptance, and began to march north. The Custodian did not move, but instead looked back over towards Lun. The plain face and voice hiding any emotion.

“Are these allies of the Conduit like you?” The Custodian said.

“Yes, you can trust them. Let’s go, man, before you melt in the heat and I start looking like a lobster.” Lun said, chuckling at his own joke.

“There should be a small mountain in this direction on the way to Blackwater. If ,my memory serves me right, a cave should be a great place for us to get some rest and avoid anything that tries to bump us off in the night.” Sheridan stated.

The Custodian looked forward and began trudging along in the sand, carrying Abel in his arms. The band of wounded and weak moved through the dunes, desperate for respite, unaware of what awaited them in the coming days. The world had been changing around him for years, but the change had now pooled into something tangible, something deadly. The calamity was coming.