Theron
A couple of weeks have passed since I attacked the celestial grove. Since then, I have delved deeper into my isolation, as my body and soul continued to mend.
I still hadn't heard back about the operation to snuff out Zaire, and I had given them more than enough intel to succeed. The old man is rusty and off his game; they should have fared well.
But during this time, I've spent my time doing two things: progressing in my nodes and spending time in my mindscape, but right now my mindscape was the highest priority.
There was something buried deep within my memory that I needed to access. I believed it could provide a clue to what I was searching for.
Floating in my healing vat, I poured the cosmic energy into my mind and projected the image of my mind escaping into my private quarters.
In my room, the golden temples of my homeland manifested, and my mental image of myself pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Inside the temple, there were shelves that housed scrolls. Some were etched in crimson ink, and others in gold.
The information I sought didn't belong on this floor. I had to go deeper into my mindscape. I was running out of clues and exhausting my resources.
I strode past the numerous shelves until I reached the end of the hall. There, I pulled on the rope lying across the limestone floor, lifting the wooden plank it was attached to. I then walked down the steps leading to the next floor.
For the past few months, while my body and core healed, I hadn't been able to venture far into my mindscape. But I was nearing the completion of my recovery, and with that came more cosmic energy at my disposal.
The last time I checked, my mindscape had nearly four hundred floors, each one expanding as I descended deeper. Every floor contained countless pieces of information I had gathered throughout my life.
My sense of time was always distorted whenever I entered my mindscape. By now, it felt like I had spent nearly a couple of hours descending. Finally, reached the floor I had been searching for.
Dim lanterns lit the corridors, revealing rows upon rows of shelves. The sight reminded me of the astral technology warehouses in the capital city of Arthenos.
Somewhere among these shelves was a scroll containing the information and memories I needed from the day my father transported the top-secret remains of the meteor crash that led to my mother's assassination.
I only remember parts of that day. I should have retained more, because we didn't often travel to the underwater kingdom of the Illianr Isles.
My father didn't want our country to be the beacon of constant espionage and killing, so he struck a deal with the High Chief of the country.
A deal that would allow the Corvatnis to store the remains of the crash deep within their vaults at the Vuka Puha.
Zaire never trusted me with the information. To this day, I still don't know what made those remains so valuable that he was willing to bargain with my mother's life for them. Finding the people who orchestrated her abduction was only part of my goal. I also intended to get inside that vault and see the remains for myself.
But I never had the knowledge nor the power to break into it myself.
So I hoped that scroll containing that information would provide a clue.
I continued searching row after row, regretting that I had never bothered to organize the shelves on the lower levels of my mindscape properly. Finding anything down here could take hours.
Fortunately, I knew one thing that narrowed the search: the scroll I was looking for had been etched in golden ink.
Even so, it took several more hours before I finally found it.
When I picked up the scroll and unrolled it, an image rose from its surface and began replaying the information as if I were watching a movie.
Seeing myself from twenty years ago felt alien.
I didn't have my shaved blonde hair, the white bandages on my left arm, or my black battle suit and hooded cloak.
I wore my white silk tunic, stitched with orange, red, and yellow threads along its borders, with sewn suns at the collar.
Back then, I also wore my clan's traditional locs. Seeing them reminded me of a time before my perception of the world shattered, a time I was naive to the horrors of this world.
It also reminded me that I was too late to save my mother.
The scroll's recording continued, showing the Corvantis High Chief arriving to greet us and escort us to the underwater palace.
I was reminded of the first time I laid eyes on the underwater kingdom. I thought it was so beautiful that the entire world deserved to see it, just as it had been before the first crusade of the first Warlord of the Vortaris.
But I was also reminded of why the kingdom had remained impregnable ever since. No other clan could safely reach its depths.
As future heir of my clan, I respected how fiercely they protected their people.
I was jealous because that was what my clan was tasked with doing.
As the scroll continued to play, the High Chief and Zaire left me with their royal guards, because I was forbidden to travel to the deep depths of the Vuka Puha.
The guards escorted me and gave me a tour of the kingdom.
So far, everything that replayed gave me information I already remembered, like useless details about trade routes and how the speed vortex tunnels operated.
But we were soon stopped by a woman in a seafoam dress, with flowing green hair and teal eyes.
The guards bowed.
"So you must be Zaire's son, correct?" the lady asked me.
"I am."
"I'm sorry for your loss; she was a wonderful lady and a fine queen." The woman said.
"I had the pleasure of meeting her at a couple of conventions in the past, and she always bragged about her son, who had all the making of being a fine archaeologist one day, and hoped that one day you would discover something that would change the world as we know it," the lady before me said.
Once that woman brought up my mother, my mind drifted to the sweet, tender moments I shared with her as she taught me to classify fossils when I was younger.
I never paid attention to what she said after that.
At least until now.
"You know, your mother always told me that I was lucky to be born a Corvantis. She talked about all the knowledge and history at our very feet; I never cared much for it. I was more focused on the healing properties it offered," the lady said in the projection, placing a hand on my shoulder.
"She had these prophetic declarations. Whenever we met, she would tell me about them. I even suggested that she join the Coterie, but she always declined. One of the strangest prophecies she ever shared was that the key to the universe lies on the floor of the abyss.
There was never a time when that prophecy came true, but she was certain it would. She believed that if there was anyone who could find it, it would be her firstborn child, Theron Solaris.
So I leave the task to you. Honor your mother by finding the treasure she so desperately wanted to find."
The scroll faded, and my mindscape dissolved, revealing my quarters once again.
I had gone seeking information regarding the crash site, but I left with something just as important.
Looking back, this might have been what sparked my thirst for knowledge and hidden treasures. That search ultimately led me here today.
The key to the universe?
Could this be what I think it is? Was it really more than just legends and myths?
My mind raced. I needed to verify this, not only for my own goals, but to honor my mother. I knew Zaire and Ezra never would.
Now I just had to decipher what floor of the abyss meant.