Beneath - An Uru Explorers Journey Through D'ni and its Ages

A curious sight met my eyes upon my return to Kehrahn a couple of days ago. A sight which has seemingly triggered a larger chain of events.

I returned to the location of Lore’s Journal, my hope was to see if there was anything I had missed during my first reading. The book however was no-where to be seen. In its stead was a stone tablet mounted upon a wall, a tablet modeled curiously after one of Yeesha’s Journey Cloths.
At first thought I had pondered whether Lore had access to similar Linking technology as Yeesha, a thought that stayed with me as I placed my hand upon the spiral hand symbol that Lore has been using.
This thought was quickly banished when the mechanism of the tablet was shown to be nothing so complicated. The symbol was highlighted in a pale blue glow akin to that of the Journey Cloths, but what happened next was significantly different.
The tablet, or Lore Stone as we took to calling them, lowered to reveal a compartment which contained the original journal within.

This in itself was not an indication of greater things, I had simply assumed he or she had wanted to protect the journal.

But over the next couple of days reports from other TTP members started to trickle in, these “Lore Stones” were showing up in other Ages. One has even shown up in Fahets.

However unlike their Kehrahn counterpart they would not open upon activating them. I have spent the morning correlating reported sightings and investigating other Ages. I would like to find out which Ages these are all located in and perhaps find a way to opening the others. I have to wonder, if the Kehrahn one was the only stone that opened then perhaps the key to opening the others lies in Lore’s journal there?

The hand symbol from the note and the book, I’ve seen it elsewhere! Why did I not piece this together sooner?

“Ah! I’m thick! Look at me, I’m old and thick! Head’s too full of stuff! I need a bigger head!”

- The Doctor

Kehra and I discovered it during our exploration of Kehrahn during our last visit back in November. Our journey took us out through the forest where we discovered that the lake actually sat upon the top of a vast column of rock. As we stood at the edge we found other columns and walkways linking some of them. It turns out there was once a village near the lake column. We had figured there must be some signs of civilization due to the carved head that lies next to the lake.

The village was abandoned but there were carvings left inscribed with the language of the people who resided there. And upon one of the tablets was the spiral hand symbol. The hand symbol was attributed to someone called “Lore” who had saved them from an oncoming evil by moving them to a new world. This turn of events were correlated by a journal we found in the village written in English, the journal of “Lore”.
The problem is more questions now surface. It stands to reason that Lore knows me, so do I know this Lore under a different name? How did Lore access Kehrahn when access is only between myself and my wife?

Perhaps another read through Lore’s journal is needed, perhaps I over looked something.

Now as to how this relates to the current ongoings in Fahets…
Kehrahn has some interesting creatures that the locals referred to as Skyfish, these fish use the water in the foggy air to “swim” through the sky. They had developed a means to capture these fish with nets that resonated the air and the resulting frequencies attracted the fish. Different frequencies attracted different fish.
After I had completed my studied of the Grass Shark, which I have officially named Mangark (Mangrove Shark), the similarities between it and the Shark of Earth was not missed. So I started to ponder the idea of using sound to repel the Mangarks, to keep them at distance and away from the populated areas of Fahets.
So Sophie and I took a trip to Kehrahn to study the “nets” in order to perhaps build a similar device on Fahets.
Of course it was during our wanderings of the village that I walked past the carvings again and saw the hand symbol making the connection finally.

But the theory should be sound, we figure it was probably the sounds of us working that attracted the Mangarks in the first place. So it is just the case of finding the right frequency to repel them. Sophie says she should have something that will work within the next few days but she may have to harvest some parts from Kehrahn to do so.

It was not as early as I had wished when I set of, but I had spent the evening back at home playing games with a friend before he left for the Navy so it was well worth it.

I wandered past the work area to see if the creature was there, which it was not. So I took the small boat out in the direction it had swam off. Navigating the boat through the maze of trees proved to be most taxing.
Eventually I spotted movement within the long-grass. Cautiously I followed as best I could. A difficult endeavor for me as I was in a boat and did not know the lay of the land. The creature however knew the environment and could swim a lot fast that my boat could travel.
I lot sight of the creature several times, perhaps I ended up following a different one completely, who know. But eventually I reached an area that was teeming with them it would seem that this is were they reside.
Tethering the boat to a tree I set up a perch within the same tree safe from the waters surface so that I could observe.
I had been sat watching for several hours, learning what I could about their interactions with each other, any hierarchy there may be, as well as witnessing their eating habits. They are indeed carnivorous, eating other creatures that swim within the water as well as eating birds that stray to close. My studies were interrupted by a message from Steven notifying me that one of the creatures was back at the work site causing a problem, only this time they had managed to capture the creature and sedate it. Wasting no time I decided to Link back, leaving the boat behind.
Sure enough they had managed to subdue one and had constructed a makeshift harness around it to keep it from escaping when it woke up.
We had no idea how long the sedative would work on the creature, so we had to work quickly. I had the team hoist the creature up out of the water for short periods of time so that we could study it without causing it damage.
The creature is huge, it looks like some sort of hybrid between a shark and a lizard the one we had was about 27 feet long. Along its body there were stripes of darker and lighter skin, which seems to be camouflage of sorts, especially when combined with the fins on its back.

The creatures had a kind of armor shell on the top of its head and running down its back. Out of the back were a number of long fins that looked a lot like long-grass.
As it turns out, the fins seem to secrete a paralytic, which we unfortunately found out after one of the guys touched it and keeled over.
We rushed him off to the first aid area and he started to get feeling back after an hour or so.
We are guessing that the long fins act as a disguise, the creature lies in the long-grass hidden. Animals either land upon or brush against the fins and are paralyzed which makes for an easy meal. Which is why we nicknamed it a Grass Shark.

In the end we had about 20 minutes of time with the creature before the sedative wore off and he started to get aggressive again, so we released him back into the waters.
I have been forced to reconsider the idea that they were relatively harmless after seeing the sizes of them and combining it with how they “hunt”. We now need to figure out a way to at least keep them from the populated area of Fahets in order to retain explorer safety.
The question is how…

So we had a fright of our lives today whilst working on the support cables. The divers had reported seeing something large swimming through the water. Unfortunately the water is so murky that they could only see a vague dark outline.
It seems their activities in the water had attracted whatever it is, because not long after they had finished their task the creature came at one of the walkways with surprising speed knocking into it and causing us to stumble. Whilst we once again failed to get a good look at the creature given the water, we did see that it seems to have a kind of shell with what looks like long-grass growing out of it.
It swam away shortly after knocking into the walkway but it wasn’t the last of the incursions. Several times throughout the day it (or others of its species) continued to harass us. As a result work on the bridge did not make as much headway as I had wanted.

Tomorrow I plan on taking the boat out in the direction the creature swam off to, perhaps I can find a means to study it. I do not even know why it attacks. Are we infringing upon its domain? Is it carnivorous?

The last few days have found me back upon Fahets overseeing the installation of a new area. It continues to amaze me the changes wrought within the Age, when I compare what sits before me with the photos from when I first Linked to Fahets…
Everywhere wildlife is growing without restraint, helped along by the continued stability that the Garohertee provided. I have even discovered new plants and animals that I had not seen before, all waiting to be studied.

I continue to have little desire to return to D’ni and even less desire to mingle with those in the “explorer community”. But try as I might Ages like Fahets and Kehrahn still hold sway over me, perhaps it is the prospect of unfinished work.
And there was plenty of work to be done in Fahets. Most of the walkways we had set down had been damaged or destroyed during the upheaval so new (and better constructed) walkway had to be put down. The boat had to be lifted out of the mud and repaired. But work has progressed nicely the walkways have been finished and I have been working on setting up a familiar memorial to David with help from Sophie and Nad.
But for now,the hour is late and I need to retire. Tomorrow we install the support cables and bridge mechanics, so it is destined to be a long and arduous day.