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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 0:44:51 GMT -6
But this wasn't a language or a script he had ever encountered before, which was saying a great deal. His frown deepened as he flipped the book open and had a look at its contents. Not only were there more of the same foreign runes, but there were diagrams -- circles for spells, he thought, but not in an arrangement that he could make sense of.
There were two possibilities here. The first was that this book was complete gibberish. It was a rather elaborate prank if that was indeed the case; the craftsmanship was fine and comprehensive enough that, had he found it anywhere else, he would have dismissed the idea out of hand. But the mansion was home to a great deal of strange and frankly useless objects, and it wouldn't have surprised him to find a book of exquisite make devoted entirely to nonsense here, of all places.
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Post by Nadia on Nov 25, 2021 1:49:34 GMT -6
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:40:34 GMT -6
But the other possibility was that he had happened upon a genuine discovery here, hidden away in the mansion by some unknown force -- possibly even the same unknown force that had made this place so strange to begin with. And that was no small feat of magic, Noa knew.
He had to take it with him. There was the same possibility, as there had been with the flowers, that it might simply vanish or lose its value as soon as it left the grounds, but objects that one could find like this generally had better odds of surviving the trip, from Noa's experience. Granted, he didn't often step inside the property itself for the same reason that Rhys had cautioned him against entering today... Noa thought of the solid steel door that he had pulled open, grimaced, then drove the thought from his mind.
He would take this book with him.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:40:45 GMT -6
Noa hadn't come with the expectation of doing much more than a little cursory exploration, but he did have the sense to bring a light pack with him, just in case. He had been debating the matter before he had left the estate, and now he was glad that he had chosen to bring it after all. He wouldn't be leaving with a great quantity of things, but it was enough to hold a book -- or two, if he managed to find another tome to pique his interest. Now he placed the book with the strange runes into the pack, then turned his attention back to the shelf to see if anything else of interest might turn up.
"Rhys," he said. The Faeron was still hovering nearby, having caught up some time ago; Noa had not, after all, proceeded any further into the house after seeing what was in this room.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:40:56 GMT -6
Rhys had been off to one side, possibly trying to formulate another argument for why they ought to leave the mansion -- Noa didn't know. Whatever he had been doing, the Faeron had stayed quiet. But now he felt a soft start of acknowledgement across their mental connection.
"Help me look for anything that seems similar to those runes from earlier," Noa said.
{But... I don't know how to read,} Rhys pointed out. Noa frowned. It was true that he hadn't taught Rhys to read; it hadn't seemed particularly important early on, since they had always been together, and Rhys could translate between minds and was privy to a great deal of knowledge that even Noa didn't have. But it was also true that this ability meant that Rhys didn't exactly know how to differentiate between languages very well, let alone learn to read the script for one or another of them.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:41:22 GMT -6
It was a reasonable objection, but Noa shook his head. "Surely you can keep the image of a few runes in your mind. These, for example." And through their mental connection, he showed Rhys a few of the more commonly repeated symbols he had seen from his cursory look through the book that he had found. It wasn't enough for him to garner an understanding of what they meant, but he had studied scripts and runes enough that his mind was well trained in memorizing new symbols.
{I guess I can try,} said Rhys. He didn't sound terribly confident, but he didn't refuse either. That was the most Noa could hope for out of him.
In truth it might not really expedite the process of looking through this room, but... Noa didn't know why, exactly, but he couldn't quite bring himself to remain calm. It felt like he needed to do this quickly.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:41:34 GMT -6
He wasn't sure if he thought that he would be interrupted, if he spent too long here and the whole thing would just vanish into thin air... Well, it was true that there wasn't long left in the month of November, but they had several days left, so it couldn't have been that. Logically it might have been that he did feel uneasy at the prospect of being trapped inside. He was pretty sure that the door had closed behind him after he entered, though he wasn't exactly eager to turn around and confirm that fact. If the door was closed then it was closed; seeing it would only make him more uncomfortable, and it wouldn't change the state of things.
But if that were the case, then he would have felt the urge to leave this place. Instead, what he felt now was an impetus to continue further in.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:59:06 GMT -6
He couldn't explain it. He didn't know what lay further inside the house. Maybe it was the magic of the place, planting thoughts in his mind, pulling him toward some prize -- or some trap. If that was the case, then he had to admit that it was being rather clever about it. The book had been a nice little breadcrumb, a taste of what it might have to offer him if only he continued onward.
They didn't have any luck finding anything more like it. Noa and Rhys scanned the shelves for anything else of note, but the bulk of the collection was written in languages that Noa knew of, even if he wasn't necessarily fluent in any of them; and as far as he could tell, most were scientific texts of varying levels, or else research notes on topics relating to the same. None were of real interest to him.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:59:16 GMT -6
The message was clear. There was nothing else for him here. He would have to move on.
There were several doors leading out of the room they were in, all closed, and all identical. Nothing on the surface of any of them held indications as to what they might find within. Despite the sense of urgency thrumming in his veins, he forced himself to walk past each one, contemplating them for a moment. Rhys drifted beside him, hovering, hesitant to try again for his usual perch, but unwilling to stray far in case anything happened.
As he walked past the third door, something made him pause. He frowned slightly, inclining his head, concentrating... And yes, there it was, some sort of noise that was barely audible through the door. It must have been loud indeed, if this door was made of the same thick plated metal as the door they had entered through.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:59:29 GMT -6
At first it was difficult to discern exactly what the noise was, as it was faint enough that he couldn't make it out very well. But the longer he listened, the more sure he felt that it was some kind of machinery. Noa had never been very interested in machines either, though he didn't have much experience with them to begin with. If that was what was waiting for them beyond this door, then he doubted it would give him anything useful to go down this direction.
But it could have been something else. If they had a look, then at least they could be sure. And the sound, faint as it was, was stable and rhythmic -- the sound of something doing steady work, and not a weapon or trap waiting to be sprung.
Though it wasn't as if Noa couldn't defend himself either, if they did find danger here.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:59:41 GMT -6
His mind made up, Noa opened the door. Rhys inhaled sharply behind him, but said nothing; or perhaps he did, but was drowned out by the noise.
It washed over Noa like a wave -- no, that was not giving it due credit. It would have been more accurate to say that it hit him like a physical force. He grimaced, gritting his teeth against it, and clapped his hands to his ears. The door had been thick, but he hadn't quite accounted for just how much it had been doing to dampen the noise... Or how loud the sounds would have been to begin with to be audible past it.
The entire room was filled to the brim with machinery. There was so much of it -- a visual cacophony as well as an auditory one, a mess of stationary and moving parts, sometimes obscured by the occasional gout of fumes.
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Post by Noa on Nov 25, 2021 15:59:51 GMT -6
It also smelled terrible. The fuel, most likely; and it would have been a great deal of fuel too, to power something like this. Noa's hands were already occupied, but now he wished there was a spell to dampen all his senses. Until now he hadn't thought a spell of that nature would be something he wanted to use on himself, but evidently life endeavored to teach him new things with each passing day, and some of those lessons were more unpleasant than others.
He would have shut the door immediately, but something caught his eye in the midst of all the machinery. On the far side of the room, he could just make out another door, this one open and leading into darkness. Despite the general unpleasantness of the room he had just discovered, he felt that same sense of curiosity stir. He wanted to know what lay in that room beyond.
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Post by Kadin on Nov 26, 2021 9:15:49 GMT -6
You know what they say, find a penny and... Hey, is that a robot?
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Post by Noa on Nov 27, 2021 0:46:42 GMT -6
Gritting his teeth, Noa stepped through.
{Wait, we're going in?!} said Rhys, but Noa had already begun; and once he started, it was easier to keep going, to push past the towering machinery as if he was certain it couldn't touch him. In reality, he had no such confidence -- not in the machines, at least -- but adrenaline or something had been punctuating his actions ever since he set foot inside the house. Possibly before then. He didn't know.
For what it was worth, the machinery did nothing to impede his progress. It seemed like an eternity, stalking as quickly as his feet could carry him through the wasteland of noise and moving parts, but eventually he arrived on the other side.
It was an open door, but as he stepped through it, he felt himself passing through some sort of... field, perhaps. It was hard to describe exactly what it was.
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Post by Noa on Nov 27, 2021 0:46:53 GMT -6
Maybe it wasn't even a physical sensation so much as something he had felt with his magical senses, but there had definitely been just the slightest bit of resistance, enough to alert him that he had passed through some sort of threshold, beyond the simple physical gap of the door itself. He turned around to look -- only to see Rhys emerging through a colorless void. {Wait!} said the Faeron, his flight disrupted as he passed through the door, presumably checked by the same thing that Noa had passed through. He faltered in the air for a moment before beating back up with some effort, though he didn't dare use Noa as a perch, even now.
There was no noise coming from the machinery anymore, Noa realized. He lowered his hands from where they had still been pressed to his ears, and found that there was barely any noise at all.
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