Day 122: Mineshaft mysteries...

     I didn't get much sleep last night; I was too busy trying to comprehend everything that AMPHIS had told us about the contents of Finis... Yesterday he had revealed that an error in translation and interpretation had led to a vital piece of information being misunderstood. Instead of The End being a time, an occurrence, an actual event, it was a place. However, I can't say that knowing The End was a place rather than a time made any difference to the imposing impact it had already made on my mind! And those figures, those End Men... They had stayed with me since I first saw the image; the short bodies and spindly arms and legs, with a small head containing two glowing, purple eyes... What kind of creature was that...? Was that really the ancient being that AMPHIS translated? Did it really exist? Does it still exist to this day? We hadn't seen any proof of that, but that one line that AMPHIS re-translated... 'We are close to The End. When we see them, I know we are close.'... Who was 'them' referring to, and more importantly, who was 'we'? There was so little we had gained from this, other than a very confusing tale about a place called The End... I went to the discussion room, ready and waiting for UOPETA and THEROS to get ready so we could begin a hopefully successful day of mining. AMPHIS was there, seated on the far side of the table, flicking back and forth between the last written page, and the back of the book... Confused, I asked him what he was doing.. He didn't answer for a moment, instead continuing to flick the book back and forth, with a confused look on his face. He then ceased this action, leaving the book open at the last written page, and ran his finger along the inside of the spine where the pages merged together...

"There are a few pages missing..."

What? How could he tell that? I moved over to him, and looked over his shoulder and looked at the area he was rubbing his finger along.

"Look! They're ever so slight, but you can see the edges of a few pages that have been torn out..."

Looking more closely, I could indeed see the torn edges wedged deep into the spine of the book, almost not even there... As further proof, AMPHIS closed the book, and looked at it from the side.

"See? The pages don't seem perfectly straight after those torn pages. There's a slight gap... There must be at least... Seven or eight pages missing... That would explain why the book seemed to end so suddenly! The book was completed, or at least contained more information, but was never fully filled, hence the blank pages at the back. Someone must have found this book and torn the last written pages from it. Either that or... The person who wrote this disagreed with their own work..."

Maybe whoever had wrote it found out what they had written was wrong... Or maybe... A million other maybes could be the real answer, but we weren't going to find out the truth by just guessing... After looking at the book for some time, UOPETA and THEROS emerged from their rooms, and I followed them out to the hatch. Before leaving however, I stopped and turned to AMPHIS to tell him to inform COLUS about what he had found.

"Will do..."

     My mind is still not on the job at hand... We've been working for a few hours already, and the progress I've made, I cannot recall any of due to my mind wandering off, thinking about The End... Since these new things have been brought to light (The End is a place and the torn pages), it's added a new level of mystery to he already mystery-enshrouded incident... After reaching the bottom of my shaft, I was reminded if the book by the chamber being in the way of my mine. I was forced to head off to the right to continue my shaft, and within an hour, I had already shelled out a large amount of stone and dirt, and I don't remember doing anything... Nonetheless, I continued down, slightly set off to the right. It didn't take long before my mind had wandered back to the book again, and hours flew by. It wasn't until I came across a strange part in the shaft I was mining out before I became aware of my surroundings... There was a sharp drop beneath me, with a large amount of light coming up from below... Looking down, I was able to determine that the light source was due to a lava flow falling between a rock structure below my shaft. It was here that I realised that I was low enough, and should start fanning out on a flat level for more iron. I was only likely to encounter more lava the deeper I went...

Choosing a path before heading down, I then carefully edged further towards the lava flow, hoping to find some useful, and maybe precious ores and minerals further down. As I got closer to the lava, the temperature increased, which was actually rather inviting, what with the slight drop in temperature due to being deep underground. Navigating past it cautiously, I jumped over a small stone step, and down onto the lowest part of the chamber. There was quite a bit of iron down here, but there was still much to explore, and I'd rather secure the rest of the area before continuing. It was unlikely, but I didn't want to risk being attacked by a Creeper I hadn't found due to lack of securing the area! I continued through the chamber, lighting torches, lying them on the ground and on other convenient places. There was lots of iron down here! Tons of it! OROTHO and COLUS would be very happy with this haul! I'd need to get UOPETA and THEROS to help me extract it all though. But first, I decided to finish of exploring the rest of the chamber. From around a bend, I could see a small amount of light, and was a little surprised at the presence of even more lava! How deep was I? Rounding the corner, the light source came into view, and I stopped, very confused... I called out to UOPETA and THEROS, but I heard no reply... Odd... How was that possible...? Curiously, I shouted 'Hello' and waited a few moments for a response, but there was still nothing... Incredibly confused, I stepped forward into the main chamber that had expanded upwards and outwards, leaving an odd hollowed out area with a high ceiling. This wasn't what had confused me though; against a few of the walls, still burning torches stood, casting light into the centre of the chamber... Who was here...? Who put these here?

The chamber seemed to only possess two directions travel in; the one I had come from, and one straight ahead from me, which even odder still, more light emerged from... Cautiously, and with pickaxe raised, I moved towards the far side of the chamber, expecting to be ambushed by a Creeper or the undead... An icy wind blew through and around the chamber, brushing past me, making me spin around in terror, with pickaxe raised in defense! Nothing there, but the hairs on the back of my neck remained erect... Turning back around, I continued to head towards the corner where the light was coming from. Rounding the corner, what I came face to face with surprised me... It wasn't what I had expected at all, and I lowered my pickaxe, in shock slightly... What was this...? I didn't know what to do... How to feel... Was this a bad thing? Was I meant to be scared? I stood there, completely free of emotion or action for a good minute or two, not knowing what to do. It was as though my mind had overloaded on oddities that it couldn't function with any degree of logic any more... After some time of just standing and staring, I turned back to go the way I came... Instead of running as I had intended, I walked all the way, back to the shafts. I needed to fetch UOPETA and THEROS... They needed to see this...

Syeonyx signing off