When Alex placed his hand on the rune, the world around them burst with blinding light. Magic surged through the air, and the stone gate began to tremble, as if responding to his touch. At first it quivered gently, then more violently, until all the cracks started sealing themselves.
Fractured stone merged back together, vanishing fissures and crumbling fragments reversing the process of decay. The sand that had filled the gaps receded like a withdrawing tide, until the gate stood whole once more—untouched, as if it had never been damaged.
Alex and Lyra watched in silence.
— Magic... — Lyra whispered reverently, reaching out to touch the stone.
Alex nodded.
The gate opened on its own, revealing a passage leading inward. Darkness awaited them on the other side—but it wasn't ordinary darkness. It pulsed with something familiar, something Alex had felt before… in his dreams.
They took the first step.
Crossing the threshold, they were met with a sight that stole their breath.
Before them stretched a vast cavern, so immense that its end was lost in shadow. High above, carved into the stone ceiling, glowed enormous thirty-meter runes, shining like a sky full of stars. In their magical light, the city below bathed in a soft greenish-blue hue, making everything appear like a vision from another world.
Old buildings surrounded them on all sides, rising along broad stone streets. Built from dark, nearly black stone, they seemed to have endured for thousands of years with little damage. Towering and massive, their facades were adorned with intricate carvings—symbols and shapes that seemed vaguely familiar to Alex, though he couldn't read them.
But there was no life here.
The city stood silent, motionless, as if frozen in time. No people, no animals, not even wind stirred the air. Here and there, among the ruins and empty streets, lay old, yellowed bones—the remains of those who once lived here. Some were scattered, as if death had struck them mid-step, while others rested in seated positions, as though their owners had never awakened.
Lyra glanced at a skull resting beneath a collapsed column.
— This place... is dead, — she said softly.
Alex looked at her, then at the bodies left behind, as if no one had ever buried them.
— Something happened here, — he said grimly. — But we don't know what.
Ahead of them stretched a dark river, its surface so still it reflected the glowing runes above like a mirror. Its color was unnatural—not clear, but deep and shadowy, as if hiding secrets that should never be unearthed.
A bridge spanned the river—simple, solid, made of the same black stone as the rest of the city. It bore no decorations, no statues or signs. Only the raw strength of its structure, built to last for ages.
— Do you think this city once thrived? — Lyra asked, gazing at the rune reflections in the water.
— It must have, — Alex replied. — The buildings, the bridge, the scale of it all… This place wasn't built to be forgotten.
They stood in silence for a moment, listening.
But nothing moved.
Only silence.
In the middle of the river stood an island—small, surrounded by black water. And there, at its very center, grew something that immediately drew the eye.
A tree.
It was massive. So large that its crown touched the stone ceiling, as if trying to break through and reach a light it had never seen. Its trunk was wide, covered in smooth, almost metallic bark with a silver-golden sheen. The leaves shimmered with emerald green, and from each one flowed a soft light.
Beside the tree, nestled at the base of its vast roots, rested a stone, and around it floated faint wisps of green energy, flickering in the air like ethereal sparks of magic.
This place was alive.
Alex felt a sudden jolt in his chest. Something inside him stirred.
— I can feel it, — he said suddenly.
Lyra looked at him, startled.
— Feel what?
— The tree… it's calling to me.
She looked at it again. For a moment, it seemed to her that the gentle light surrounding it pulsed—as if it truly reacted to Alex's presence.
— It's what's keeping this place alive, — she said quietly. — Maybe it's the key to what happened here.
Alex didn't wait any longer.
He stepped onto the bridge, leading them toward the island.