Back to basics

     I set to work digging out more of the tunnel per SERVERE's instructions, in search of this supposed abandoned building left behind by Endermen, and found a few years ago by HoN Co.. UOPETA decided to head back up to the wooden shack with THEROS and AMPHIS, to keep up appearances so AMPHIS didn't suspect anything, but he said he would return every now and then with torches to light the tunnel. He's hoping to convince AMPHIS that it's a good idea to remain down here in the wooden shack for the night so that we can all continue our work without being disturbed. Despite being with THEROS and UOPETA quite a lot recently, being cooped up digging a tunnel alone didn't phase me one bit. In fact, I quite enjoyed it! It reminded me of the fun I used to have all those months ago back before HoN Co.'s treachery, the Lone 7 or the portals. Life was a challenge, and it was fun living it from day to day, not knowing what the next would bring. I can't lie about it, but back in the early days when I had barely known the Lone 7 more than a week, I had been attempted to start afresh, on my own, completely cut off from everyone else. I had often thought about how my life would be different if I had gone off by myself and made a fresh start; I wouldn't have to worry about anyone else but myself, there would be no need to hide from HoN Co. as they wouldn't know where I would be, the list was endless! But then I think about all of the bad things that might have happened to me instead... I could be dead! I could have been gravely wounded by a Creeper or worse... I couldn't leave now anyway. I was in too deep. And besides, despite the danger that I encountered regularly, I was thankful as to how much my eyes had been opened, and the friends I had made along the way...

----

     Thanks to my wonderfully strong and durable diamond pickaxe, I'm making mincemeat of the stone wall before me! UOPETA had come down a couple of times, impressed at the amount of progress I was making. On the second return, he brought a drink and something to eat for me, offering to take over for a while and let me have a rest. I kindly declined the offer, but asked if he wanted to stay down with me for awhile. From the look on his face, he was more than happy to!

"AMPHIS is beginning to ask some very awkward questions, and THEROS thinks we should involve him in the current situation. I have to admit, I agree. It's becoming rather odd fobbing him off with fake answers as to why we're really down here... On the upside, it seems SERVERE has already collected the coordinates THEROS left out for him."

That was good news at least. I finished off the last of the drink, and continued with the tunnel, whilst maintaining a conversion with UOPETA. I think we would have to tell him as well. I was surprised that we had come this far without either letting something slip, or AMPHIS actually asking what was really going on. He was a smart man, which suggested either he had his suspicions or he didn't care...

"I think he knows... He would have asked otherwise. He at least knows about us seeing SERVERE again. I mean we hardly acted normally when we got back yesterday. Insisting to head down into the cliff mine... Not something we usually do, so I'm not surprised if we've caused some suspicion. Probably a bit of confusion too... Is it just me or is it getting hotter?"

I hadn't noticed it, but now that UOPETA mentioned it, it didn't seem warmer the further we advanced forwards with the tunnel. I shrugged it off as though it was nothing, and UOPETA decided to head back to the shack. Just before he left though, the chamber flooded with light and heat as I broke through a soft portion of rock, revealing a lava pool beyond! Breaking away more of the wall, UOPETA came back and stood behind me, letting out a long, slow whistle.

"Now that's an obstruction..."

"SERVERE didn't really give us a direction to head in, but I would assume he meant straight ahead, otherwise he would have specified. Either way, you're not going to go straight over that..."

I was going to have to go around. Bending down close to the edge, I scoped out the pool of lava, trying to determine the extent to which it spread, allowing me to know how far around to go. Once I had a good idea, I began to mine the wall to my left. UOPETA had left by that point, allowing me to work on my own again, and as I dug further and further out from the lava pool, it became cooler and cooler. Once I got as far as I thought was necessary, I began to mine the wall to my right, heading back in the direction I had started. It was lucky as well, as I may have caused a small cave-in with the amount of gravel that faced me. A few metres into the wall and the heat began to rise again, and before I knew it, I had created another hole in the wall, facing the lava pool to my right this time! Luckily there was enough space to walk along the left-hand side, but it was becoming more and more dangerous. After crossing over the small little puddle of lava, I continued the wall along for a while before cutting back into the left wall. Once again, a few metres in I was faced with the same lava pool to my right, and looking across, I could see the tunnel I had dug all the way back to the wooden shack! I had made quite some progress in the few short hours we had been down here. I began to mine through the wall, in the direction I should have stayed with until the lava pool decided to make matters awkward.

     Another hour of mining and I was beat! I began to head back through the slight diversion I had had to make to get back to the other side. I had made great progress and I had found something that could prove rather useful, although I had left it back within the tunnel. As I got back to where the diversion began, I met UOPETA. He was squinting into the distance, past the heat haze of the lava, looking rather surprised at what he could apparently see.

"Is that... diamond?"

It definitely was! I had struck a small deposit of diamond about twenty minutes ago, leaving it there for the time being. No sense in digging it up if we didn't know what to do with it. It was hardly likely to be going anywhere...

"Come on up to the shack. We're turning in for the day, and I reckon you're definitely in need of some rest."

Music to my ears. Sweet, sweet music...

Syeonyx signing off

Close to the chest...

     After SERVERE had left, UOPETA turned to us with a strange look on his face. It was as though he was trying to express shock at the same time as he was trying to express confusion, resulting in a weird facial spasm instead... I couldn't tell if this was as a result of SERVERE appearing out of nowhere, or instead because of what he had just told us about the Endermen. Then again, thinking about it, it could well be as a result of these two reasons as to why had pulled such an odd expression. Unbeknownst to even me why I did it, I went over to the lever which usually opened the door to the portal data room, and tried it for myself, hoping I possessed the magic touch to open it. However it remained closed, like before...

"It's not going to open, Syeonyx. It's locked... For good it seems. Looks like we'll have to acquire the information we need from somewhere else..."

"What information? I was under the impression that SERVERE had given us another task to undertake...? We need to go back to the base, inform the others about what he's told us regarding the Endermen and The End and then take the coordinates AMPHIS translated back down to the wooden shack beneath the cliff mine for him to finish off destroying the portals...?"

"No! We don't tell any of the others about the Endermen or anything that SERVERE has told us. You heard him; even HoN Co. are speculating most of it. It's unlikely that it's all true, let alone any of it, and all of this talk about civilisations using and building portals millions of years ago... Really?"

"So you reckon that SERVERE was lying to us...?"

"No, I reckon that SERVERE is either being misled or misinformed, which in turns impacts us badly as well..."

"You've changed your tune, UOPETA! It wasn't but a few days ago that you were still trying to deny SERVERE's existence at all! We have to tell the others about what he told us. How else do you think we're going to get away with heading down into the cliff mine otherwise?"

"The books...? We simply say that upon decoding one of the books, we found a message to decode a new set, a set that we conveniently left behind because we couldn't carry them."

"I don't know about that... Didn't we collect every book from down there already? How do we convince them there are more? And besides, I still don't think it's fair to leave them out."

For once, I actually had to agree with UOPETA! SERVERE had just unloaded mass load of information to us concerning the Endermen and other things related, none of which could be validated or proven otherwise. It was confusing enough as it was currently, without informing the others and then possibly having to change things if we found reason to believe it may have happened a different way.

"Exactly! I'm not saying that we shouldn't tell them, I'm merely suggesting that we delay telling them anything just yet until we can be clear of the actual facts ourselves. Surely it makes to clarify our findings before offloading a mass of unknowns to anyone else?"

THEROS couldn't and didn't argue with that, but instead nodded silently. We began to head back out of the tower, slightly worried about the length of time we had been there. As UOPETA flicked the switch to close the wall behind us, I took one last look up at the sky-high antennae. With twenty guards being posted here in the near future, this was likely to be the last time we'd set foot in there. At least for now...

----

     How we managed to get past COLUS and the others without letting slip anything that SERVERE had told us was way beyond me! UOPETA informed COLUS that we had checked the primary portal status, and it seemed the progress we had made alone was enough to distract him. He went on to mention a "lead" we were following up after AMPHIS had decoded the yellow book; luckily AMPHIS wasn't around at the time he mentioned this, and he gave us permission to head down to the wooden shack to retrieve the books. THEROS had a better idea instead though, and fortunately managed to sway COLUS around to the idea.

"We don't know how many books are left down there, so it might be easier if AMPHIS comes with us and decodes them there. We can help if there are a sufficient amount."

"Fair enough. He's in the lab at the moment."

Luckily I had left my pickaxe in the lab, and attaching it to the connection parts on the back of my armour, we headed over to AMPHIS, pretending as though nothing odd was going on. UOPETA was able to quickly inform AMPHIS about what he had just said with COLUS; at one point I thought he was going to involve him as well, but when AMPHIS stood up, collecting only a pencil and some papers, I knew otherwise. Before heading out, THEROS collected the pieces of paper that AMPHIS had written the coordinates on, and stuffed them into his bag, before leaving for the wooden shack. Now here, we're all a bit nervous. AMPHIS seems quite happy to decode the books, but myself, THEROS and UOPETA were visibly on edge. I'm just glad AMPHIS was too engrossed in SERVERE's books to notice. THEROS had left the coordinate papers in between a few of the pages of one of the red books, the books which were the basis for those decoded coordinates. UOPETA took me to one side and began to talk about the plan of action. It seemed that not involving AMPHIS was going to be difficult, but I assured him that he would remain disinterested provided he had a book to translate before him. UOPETA was still unsure, but he came down with me into the tunnel, allowing me to start digging out the tunnel.

"What do you expect we'll find then? Do you think SERVERE is right about this? An abandoned building that was once inhabited by Endermen...? Seems a little... Unbelievable to me..."

Usually I kept an open mind; I had had my eyes opened so many times since landing here in Minecraftia all those months ago, so saying no to anything immediately was usually a good way to show yourself up!

"True, but... There are some things that we didn't think were possible that are now possible. Things we didn't know existed or could exist, and we've been proven wrong. Humanity as a whole, not just us... But this... It just seems to be on a whole different level..."

At this point, I stopped and asked UOPETA a simple question: did he believe in aliens? I say simple, but I merely mean that by referring to either a yes or no answer. He replied immediately, which gave me the exact answer I needed!

"Of course, how can they not exist!!! With the size of the universe as it is, there can't not be aliens out there!"

With the size of the universe being what it is, it was surely plausible to believe in intelligent life out there somewhere, even in another dimension! We had already proved that by travelling into the Nether! There were so many unexplained things there that we couldn't understand, so as far as I was concerned, there was a very good chance these Endermen had existed, and perhaps they still do...

Syeonyx signing off

SERVERE opens up

     We slowly lowered our blowpipes, still slightly uneasy about how easily SERVERE had hidden from us. Was he here before us, or had he been following us since we had left the base through the tower-side tunnel entrance. He moved past all of us towards the door of the portal data room, tapping on the surface of the seemingly normal wall. The walking over to where UOPETA stood, he double-checked the lever, nodding when the lever was unable to move the door.

"They've locked it to prevent anyone gaining access. They did it quite some time ago; I think it was shortly after your last excursion to the tower. The scientists who are sometimes based here are packing up the operation, and leaving it in the hands of the HoN Co. guards..."

"What do you mean? Where are they going? Have they decided to remove their presence from the master portal?"

"Oh no, nothing like that. There's been quite a lot of talk about a "rebel" group who is preventing any progress being made with the connection to the master portal, and the constant disruptions. Oh yes, they know that sedatives are being used on the guards here. They deem the scientists too valuable an asset to allow to get into the wrong hands. Presumably after one in particular went missing... I won't say who, I think you know..."

"So HoN Co. know we're here? They know about our activities...?"

"Unfortunately yes... They don't know about your current whereabouts or most of your activities, but judging from what they've said, they have some good ideas as to where you could be, what you're attempting and what you're doing. I'd be careful from now on. They're removing all of the data stored in that room, shipping out the equipment and leaving the chamber a shell to be guarded by a company of more than twenty guards!"

"Twenty!?!?! How are we going to be able to check on the progress of the primary portals if we can't get inside?"

"I'm afraid it doesn't get any better; using the map you gave back to me, and that stone you procured from the Nether, I was able to remove all of the remaining portals in that region, along with a handful or so that I could remember off the top of my head. But there's not much more I can do at the moment. Unless AMPHIS has decoded all of my books?"

"Yes, he has actually. He's managed to pull out all of the coordinates stated in all of the books with the red covers!"

"Good. I will need them to remove all of the portals within the region stated on my map. That will hopefully deal another significant blow, but we'll need more coordinates. I have been trying to access more of the portal data stored within the main base back at HoN Co., but after nearly getting caught finding these, I've had to be very careful about what I do. I don't think that's a viable option..."

"Well talking about information, we need to know a few things. End Men, the End, End portals... What are they? Where did you find the information?"

"Ah, so you decoded the yellow book? Good, it's nice to see COLUS is still won over by intrigue. The End is a location I have determined exists close to this region. Well, I say it exists. What I mean is a method of getting to it exists..."

"Through an End portal?"

"Yes... I think..."

"What do you mean 'I think'? I thought you were getting your information from HoN Co. somewhere?"

"I am, therein lies the problem. I can only access small amounts of information at a time without drawing attention to myself. The amount of information contained within that yellow books was all I could accumulate before they altered the systems and locked me out. I'm still trying to find a way back into it. But the information about the End was what intrigued me most."

"What are they, these End Men? Where did they come from and where did they go? We need to know about this because we read about this item held within The End which could help us drastically!"

"Technically it's 'Endermen', not End Men. It's hard to put across a new word in a dead language. But this object I mentioned I cannot guarantee it exists. I wasn't able to see all of the information they had stored. All I know is that HoN Co. stumbled upon the ruins of an ancient underground building. After thorough exploration, they found writings and tablets written in a strange language, which after some time they managed to decode and understand. A race of beings that existed in another dimension, The End, somehow managed to end up in our universe through a portal technology that they either created or stumbled across. They found our world abundant in resources, and settled deep underground. Much like the Creepers before, they had some form of reaction to sunlight, and would rarely venture on the surface, even during the night."

"Wait, so these Endermen were real, and they came through another dimension? The End? Not the Nether?"

"No no, that is linked to the Endermen but not immediately. After countless millennia populating the underground, the Endermen became ever greater advanced, and came to the point of being able to generate their own portals to hop between dimensions. They created the portals that we know of which led to the Nether, but unlike here, the portals didn't act the same way in. After creating a few in the Nether dimension, the Endermen found that the destination of these portals couldn't be predicted, whereas portals made here could be accurately plotted in the Nether. They built many hundreds more portals, all throughout the Nether, attempting to expand into other hospitable areas. After significant study into their own technology, the Endermen managed to create three additional variations of the standard portal..."

"Primary portals, secondary portals, and... master portals?"

"That's right. Linking them together, they hoped to succeed where other variations hadn't, and achieve accurate portal destination plottings. However they found something that posed a threat to their very survival, and destroyed the connection to the master portal by removing the link from every portal they had currently created. With the portals being constructed from obsidian, the Endermen had shot themselves in the foot as they could not destroy them, so they sought an object they only knew existed back in their original dimension. But, and this bit is the speculation, the Endermen made passage into the dimension and became trapped. The remaining Endermen were either killed off by some unknown force, or they reactivated the portals and headed into the Nether, no-one knows..."

"How does this tie in with HoN Co. trying to merge the dimensions? And what does the Ascension have to do with this?"

"The Ascension is the name HoN Co. has given to the moment when the "two dimensions are unified in a single, glorious universe!"... They seem to have determined that from preliminary excursions into the Nether years and years ago, and this event that made the Endermen seek an item held within their dimension. They seem to think that they will be able to mine that vast quantities of energy-rich minerals and resources that will spill over into our dimension, but I don't think that will happen. I think whatever caused the disappearance of an entire race in the blink of an eye could happen again... If HoN Co. manage to activate it that is... But judging from the state of these portals, we're a few steps away from putting that master portal out of action for good!"

"So... What do you want us to do?"

"It's obvious that you want more information about the Endermen, so I suggest you head back to the wooden shack at the base of your mine and continue digging out the tunnel I started. Also, I'll need those coordinates from AMPHIS to destroy the remaining ones."

"Why don't you come back with us then? We're heading back to the base now, and it'll be easier that way."

"No, it'll be safer if I take the coordinates from you outside the wooden shack. Leave them close by an I'll pick them up."

"Fine, but only if you're sure. What are we meant to fin by digging this tunnel then? It's obviously of some significance if you started it..."

"And if you want us to continue it..."

"Of course it's significant. I used the information from the HoN Co. databases and found an ideal place to begin digging out a tunnel. If I'm right, you should find the remains of one of the Endermen buildings. Now if you don't mind, I've got to keep up appearances; they'll suspect something otherwise."

The faceplate closed and he turned around, almost literally melting into the air, as his suit activated, rendering him invisible to the human eye. Before he was fully invisible though, I caught sight of a large red patch on his back plate armour. I think OROTHO would benefit from knowing that...

Syeonyx signing off

Primary portal pay-off

     Entering the tunnel, we passed the first security door, noticing that all of the bulbs lining the wall were unlit. It seems that someone had closed all of the security doors behind us when we had returned last night, likely to be OROTHO as he was the most security conscious out of all of us. The first security door stood strong and fast before us, unlit UOPETA flipped the lever on the control unit, whereupon it slowly began to slide into its little niche in the wall. The first light near the lab-side tunnel entrance would now be lit, indicating that the first door was now open. It was a marvellous method of ensuring a high level of security was maintained for gaining entry into the base, but it was way beyond the level of understanding that I could endure. All I had to do was look at a mess of cables, wires and circuit components and I would switch off. It's a good job we have talented people like OROTHO and Joe on our side to help us.

"How many portals do you think SERVERE has managed to destroy since we handed over the map and glowing stone to him?"

"Well, that depends on a lot of things. He's only one man, he has a suit which can supposedly enhance his movement and agility, not to mention make him almost completely invisible, and he's likely to be familiar with the locations as he drew up the map. Those are a few points in his favour. However, he may be being watched by HoN Co. which may slow him down. He may even be monitored by members of the same Elite group as him."

"I've actually been wondering in what capacity SERVERE actually aids HoN Co.... Does he scout out potential areas himself, reporting back to them if he finds anything, or do they send him out once they've performed their own preliminary searches...? If it's the former then he may waste resources by pretending to have found us which inevitably turns up nothing."

" I don't know... Does it really even matter how he goes about it? So long as he keeps them distracted for as long as is required to keep us safe, I don't see how his methods of doing so come into it..."

"They matter to me! What if SERVERE is a double agent but is actually playing us for fools? He could be on HoN Co.'s side, pretending to actually be on ours, but in reality his loyalties remain with HoN Co.!"

"What would SERVERE possibly have against us for him to betray us like that? We haven't done anything wrong or immoral to him, before or after his capture by HoN Co.! As far as I'm concerned, SERVERE has no reason from us to turn to the other side..."

"I don't know... Greed... Personal gain... Maybe HoN Co. offered him something that would be worth a lot to him..."

"I knew SERVERE quite well, and I highly doubt he was bought by HoN Co. through some form of enticement or offering."

"Well, we'll find out... Sooner or later, we'll find out."

We continued past all of the security doors, following the tunnel down and around to the North West, getting closer and closer to the tower, whilst remaining completely undetected.

     We reached the inside of the base of the tower; dispatching a paltry two guards at the entrance, we made our way inside, ready to take on any more. But once again, the base of the tower remained deserted. We had begun to wonder where HoN Co. was sending these guards, as we had assumed that security had increased drastically since the destruction of their obsidian plant... Locking the door from the inside, we searched around the base area before heading down the stairs towards the main chamber. Unlike before, we didn't spot any guards in the stairs heading up or down. In fact we managed to reach the chamber without coming across another guard at all. There weren't even any guards in the main chamber itself! It was almost as if security had been reduced recently, for some bizarre reason...

"Well, looks like we've made progress. Look!"

Looking at where UOPETA was pointing, we examined the left-side wall, noticing that only one primary portal was active.

"Brilliant! What about the other side?"

Making our way down the remaining steps, we headed past the large pillar in the centre used to hold up the conducting rod, and over to the other side. I had purposely lowered my hopes, assuming that the wall would be full of active portals. But to my relief, only one portal was active on this wall as well!

Keeping the celebration to a minimum, we headed towards the portal data room to look for anything that might help us, or even SERVERE.But we didn't get very far; UOPETA activated the switch to open the door, but it remained locked. Looking slightly confused, UOPETA tried again, but the door didn't budge.

"What the...?"

"It's locked... Permanently..."

We all turned around, blowpipes at the ready, just in time to see an Elite suit shimmer into view from the wall. We maintained our defensive stances until the faceplate parted to reveal SERVERE's face.

"Nice way to say hello..."

Syeonyx signing off

SERVERE calling the shots!

     SERVERE was trying to find an End portal...? How did SERVERE manage to find out the location of one at all? Was the information contained in these End Men books and writings that detailed he was able to pinpoint an exact location? How close was he to finding it then? There were so many questions buzzing in my head, it was almost painful! There was too much to ask, and it was unlikely that SERVERE would have gone into that much detail, even with a two-layer encryption on the text.

"Wait, going back to the End Men... You say they're extra-terrestrial... Do you mean otherworldly, or... From another dimension...?"

"It doesn't say, but the information that HoN Co. have collected on them seems to suggest that they're definitely not from this planet..."

"But how can they make that distinction? It's hard to say what's real or from this world as it is..."

"SERVERE goes on to mention environments detailed within this data which do not match any known terrain on this planet. "Thorough tests and experiments have been performed" apparently... It seems HoN Co. have even gone as far as looking for an End portal themselves, although not to find this item..."

"So let me get this all straightened out... SERVERE spoke to you back when you had left the outpost to destroy the portals from the map you found, which later revealed to be his in the first place. He instructed you to come back here, translate that book, and find out about the End portal, which leads somewhere where there is an item of great value which can destroy the master portal instantly, regardless of its current state...?"

"That's the long and short of it, yes. But there are many holes and missing pieces... We assumed that the tunnel that SERVERE was digging beneath the wooden shack was his attempt at finding the End portal. We could be wrong, we don't know. It seemed the most logical explanation as why else would he be doing that..."

"Well it seems to me that priority one is the need to obtain more information about these End Men, and uncover more about the civilisation they possessed. Who they were, what they did, where they went and how they tie in with HoN Co. and the portals..."

"I agree, but that means trying to contact SERVERE, which we wouldn't know how to. He appeared and disappeared faster than he allowed us to question him, so we're more or less waiting on him. Let's hope he finishes off with the portals and leaves us a sign to contact him. He knows where we are..."

"We can't just sit around waiting for a potential traitor to contact us with the next stage of his plan, or until we can talk to him about procuring this information!"

"There's very little else we can do..."

"Well we can't prove any of this is real. The existence of an object which can destroy the master portal immediately sounds too good to be true, and casting aside all other responsibilities and tasks to go in search of something we can't prove exists is dangerous at the very least! We need to continue with destroying portals!"

"But the only portal locations we know exist are given as coordinates from the red books to which we no longer have a map for... How do you suggest we go about destroying portals we can't locate...?"

"Fair enough, but we can't just sit around waiting for SERVERE to get back to us. I know what you can do; the progress you did make may be sufficient to make a change to the primary portals within the master portal chamber at the tower, and teamed with the work SERVERE is supposedly doing, we might be making some real headway! I suggest you, THEROS and Syeonyx head over to the conducting tower and check out the status of the portals."

"That's a good point. If we've made as much progress as we've hoped, there might not be a need to go in search of this End portal..."

"Standard procedure applies: get in there, check the portals, look for data in the portal data room and come back. Remain undetected at all times, and keep your blowpipes at the ready."

Myself, THEROS and UOPETA left the discussion room for our own rooms and began to collect the necessary equipment we would need. In everyone's case, all we needed was the blowpipe and a clip of darts, so it wasn't long before we were back together and heading through to the lab, where we would enter into the tunnel and head off to the conducting tower.

Syeonyx signing off

Day 137: Plan B

     That image... The End Men... Just standing there. It was very similar to the first image of the End Man we had found; a solitary figure standing in the centre of the page with empty purple eyes, the words "Homis Finis" printed above encrypted with the pig-pen cipher. I remember being unable to get that image from my mind, and now here was another, only worse! Now there were six on the same page, with the same words written above them, each standing still with glowing purple eyes. What were they? Where did they come from? Where were they now? How were they linked with the current issue, and did they have any link to the Ascension business...? We knew from the book 'Finis' that they had a link to the portals in some way, and we had begun to wonder if they originated within the Nether dimension as well.

"If you give us a little more time then I'm sure we'll get somewhere. Get some rest or occupy yourself whilst we continue. We'll call you if there are any new developments..."

We all left the lab, save for OROTHO who busied himself by checking the security doors, ensuring they were all locked and secure for the night. I headed off to my room to catch any sleep I could. We had walked quite a distance in the last few days, and not only due to the physical exhaustion, but the mental fatigue of getting my head around what's been going on may have just done me in!

----

     I was awoken today by AMPHIS who looked rather excited about something, before rushing out of my room and leaving me in a daze... After convincing Chiron to get off the end of my bed, I got up, was dressed in a matter of minutes, and began to head off to the lab where AMPHIS had presumably gone. As I got there, AMPHIS, THEROS and UOPETA were seated in the exact same positions as they had been last night when I had gone to get some rest. The mess of books and papers still littered the floor around the table, however a large collection of these papers had made its way onto the surface of the now cluttered desk . AMPHIS saw me enter into the lab, and approached me in a hurried and excited manner.

"Syeonyx! Good, you're awake! Where are the others...?"

Shrugging, I moved closer to the desk and the stack of papers, hoping to catch a glimpse of some of the translations that had been made in my absence of the night. The image of the six End Men, was still visible from my position for all of a few seconds, before AMPHIS moved in front to block my way.

"Not here; in the discussion room, when everyone else is assembled together. We've got quite a lot of information to relay to you, and a lot more to discuss! And the best thing is, if we've decoded and translated it properly: it could all work in our favour!"

Still a little dazed from being awoken so suddenly, it took me a moment for this statement to register, before agreeing and turning around, heading back towards the discussion room. From where I was, I could see COLUS, Joe, Amie, THEXIS and OROTHO seated around the central table in the discussion room, so I turned around and told AMPHIS. He nodded to me, before talking quietly with THEROS and UOPETA, before quickly collecting the mass of papers into a bundle and heading towards the entrance behind me. This was either going to be good or bad... Very good, or very bad...

     AMPHIS had been speaking for over an hour. Non-stop! He had managed to go through the entire stack of papers, passing key ones around the table, allowing us to see what they had translated. It seemed some pages were merely notes of what they had found out; a summation of the entire book, whilst AMPHIS kept the larger stack of papers to himself. Presumably the direct translations and decoded statements taken exactly from the book itself. It was hard to follow him at parts; it seems that over the night, AMPHIS, UOPETA and THEROS had made some assumptions based on the general information they had found, and the likely reasons for them, but they seemed to make sense... I think... Many topics had been covered, including portals, End Men, The End and many more, but no mention of the Ascension... Up until the later part of AMPHIS's talk. He had mentioned the Ascension as being "unavoidable" as they had assumed it was the name HoN Co. had given to the merging of the two dimensions.

"SERVERE seems to hint towards the possibility that this event HoN Co. is trying to achieve is avoidable through another method other than destroying portals. He makes reference to the End again, the location which is located through a portal..."

"But not one of the portals we've encountered before...? A new type of portal?"

"That would certainly see to be the case. End portal in fact... Well SERVERE gives s distinction between the two types, but refers to another series of books or book with the purple covers for the portals we've encountered. There is very little about the End portal, but it is said to lead to The End, where there is an item that possesses the power to destroy the master portal with no need to remove the link to the primary portals..."

"Does he say which item...? What it looks like, how it works?"

"No, he doesn't... Just that there are writings he has found that suggest this..."

"Writings... Written by whom?"

"Funnily enough... End Men..."

COLUS looked at AMPHIS a little confused, picking up the image of the six End Men, and pointing at it with his free hand.

"You mean these...?"

"Yes... Supposedly..."

"But... I thought these didn't exist... Do they?"

"SERVERE states that he has found substantial evidence in HoN Co. data stores that suggest significant interest is made towards investigating these creatures. They detail the possibility that they formed an advanced civilisation that actually created the portals we're dealing with now. A form of communications and transportation, they were used widely throughout the... Well, we translated the word "galaxy" but we're wondering whether that's accurate..."

"Wait, are you saying that these portals exist throughout the galaxy?"

"We can't prove that, but SERVERE seems to believe that these End Men did not originate from this planet... They were extra-terrestrial... The End Men are aliens... Apparently."

"So they did exist then? They're not some random imaginings of HoN Co.?"

"SERVERE mentions the existence of certain books and writings, found and collected close to images of these End Men... SERVERE also seems to make reference to a location for a place for one of these End portals..."

"Wait wait wait... SERVERE thinks he knows where one of these portals is? Where? Does he say?"

"It seems he was looking for it himself... That's why he had the wooden shack deep underground... That's where there is a partially finished tunnel leading away hidden by a lever... Using equipment either stolen or "procured" from HoN Co., he's using geo-location to find the exact position of the portal through coordinates. He was digging his way to the End portal..."

Syeonyx signing off

The End... Again...

     Rushing over to the desk with all of SERVERE's books piled high atop it, AMPHIS pushed them all to one side and began to frantically search for the one yellow book bound with the yellow cover. OROTHO, THEXIS, Joe and Amie slowly walked into the lab behind us, all looking rather baffled at our hurried excitement; aside from OROTHO and COLUS, the others hadn't said a word when in the discussion room. They were likely thinking over everything that UOPETA had said to COLUS, and I didn't blame them for taking so long in doing so. It had taken me a while to fully understand the situation, but even now there were bits of it that didn't quite slot together properly...

"What do you hope to find in this book then? Presumably if SERVERE himself directed you to it, it must contain some rather valuable information..."

"My thoughts exactly, although finding it was going to be the first task to overcome..."

"I think you've found it, AMPHIS."

"Eh...?"

AMPHIS looked at Amie with a look of complete and utter bewilderment, whilst the rest of us tried to hide our smiles. Despite searching the entire surface and the sides of the desk, AMPHIS held the yellow book in his left hand, as though he had forgotten about picking it up. Amie pointed to the book in his hand and smiled.

"There's the yellow book. There's only one book with a yellow cover, remember? You said that yourself..."

"So I did..."

AMPHIS cleared away the remaining books and pieces of paper from the top of the desk, before placing the yellow covered one in the now clear space. Stooping down, he then picked up a pencil and fresh piece of paper he had knocked aside, and sat down on the chair behind the desk.

"Right then... Let's begin. I'll decode the first page, and then when you UOPETA and THEROS decode the second and third page, I'll work on the Latin translation of the first. Let's see how much we can reveal!"

UOPETA and THEROS sat down before AMPHIS and looked at the page upside down as it was decoded. Meanwhile, I sat with the others and filled in the bits that were obviously still gaping holes to them...

     Over the time it took to decode and translate five pages of the book, I had updated the others about everything we had encountered since leaving the base. The underground basement beneath the outpost, the burial of the skeleton before we knew, strange occurrences with the hidden room within the library, footprints in the sand and mud, which inevitably led to talk of the actual meeting with SERVERE. They were more or less quiet until I got to that part, at which point they began to ask many questions. Well, THEXIS did, however OROTHO, Amie and Joe seemed to remain oddly silent. The questions ranged from simple, unimportant ones that sounded half-hearted such as "what did he look like" up to more deep questions like "how did you feel when you saw him"... However, I answered them all more or less in the same manner as I was pretty much frozen with shock at the time. All I could remember with any clarity was SERVERE appearing out of nowhere; the air around him shimmering like rippling water, and his face... That scar...

"So... HoN Co. are making use of this light refractive technology... Interesting..."

Everyone turned to OROTHO, who was looking into his open hands thoughtfully, muttering something to himself. It would certainly seem that way. Nothing I knew of could make an entire person reappear and disappear at will... OROTHO looked up after a moment or so, with the first question of the evening...

"Did you manage to see if he was wearing a red backpack or back place for the armour?"

Thinking hard, trying to visualise everything that had happened, I couldn't think back to any point where he exposed his back to us. Even when he disappeared, he was entirely invisible before turning around.

"Erm, if you lot are finished with the catch up, you might like to know we're getting somewhere over here..."

I stopped and we all went over to where UOPETA, THEROS and AMPHIS had been working for the past half hour or so...

"What have you found? Is this about the Ascension?"

"Oddly enough... No. It seems to be about... The End... Again..."

"The End...?"

"Remember? A few weeks back, Syeonyx, UOPETA and THEROS stumbled upon a chamber with a book inside called Finis? It detailed an event called the End which I later reinterpreted as a place, a physical location rather than an occurrence... This seems to be an extension of that book."

"There's pictures too. Here, take a look..."

The image before us was that of another End man, however this time it was surrounded by other End men. Either smaller ones, or ones off in the distance... It was hard to tell...

"What does this mean...? What does SERVERE know that we don't...?"

"I don't know, but I get the impression that we're going to find out with the more we translate..."

Syeonyx signing off