Chapter 6: The Truth
Last updated
Last updated
Tak'Oba unmasked a thief and recovered a potentially significant book in a new village. His daring escape with Selos leaves him relying on an unexplained intuition to escape.
There were only 3 villagers left chasing him.
Clinging to the feathers of Selos, Tak'Oba tried as best he could not to fall.
Guided by what he thought was his instinct, he gave Selos brief directions on which way to go.
Sadly, every time Tak'Oba looked behind him, the villagers were closer. Their knowledge of the terrain was far superior and they would eventually catch up.
Panic rose in her and she did not notice the huge slope coming in front of her.
She toppled forward, dragging her partner with her.
Tak'Oba was knocked off and propelled.
He tried to control his fall with his hands, but they slipped, and he fell abruptly to the ground. He then began to slide down the slope. Right behind him, Selos was not doing any better.
Their run was stopped by a barrier of bushes. Tak'Oba looked up to see that he was in the middle of a deep basin. In the middle was a gigantic abandoned structure, covered by Oloma vegetation.
He hadn't seen everything in this world, but this building didn't look like anything the Eclerays had ever built or anything he had ever known. Yet he felt that this was the place where he should be.
Further up, his pursuers seemed to be looking for a safe way down.
Crouching among the thicket, he climbed slightly up the slope to retrieve the book.
He stood up slowly and began to move almost mechanically toward the gigantic structure, Selos following his path.
The steps were huge.
Each one was as high as his hips
He climbed them one by one.
Once he arrived at the platform, he stopped to contemplate it.
The shade which followed him since the beginning stopped next to him.
Suddenly something happened in the air, a strange vibration.
An explosion of light burst from the structure. It flooded the basin. The almost blinded pursuers covered their eyes and folded their body in half as if to protect themselves.
The elements that made up the building began to float all around. The vegetation that dominated it was swept away.
Tak'Oba, however, did not flinch. He stood and welcomed the light in a warm embrace.
Then he began to move forward.
One step.
Then another.
And another.
The light was calling him. He didn't know why, but he had to get closer to it.
The other Eclerays could hardly see what was happening because the light was so bright.
Tak'Oba kept moving. The light receded to focus on the central triangle.
He didn't understand why he kept going. He was both fascinated and terrified by the display he had just witnessed. But an external force was calling him. He had to go on. His mind, confused, wanted to order his legs to stop walking. His body kept moving anyway.
Tak'Oba was stuck. Behind him, the villagers were bound to come. If he turned back, he risked capture, and to continue forward was a leap into the unknown, perhaps to possible death.
He had to take a chance, for himself, for his people, and for the truth.
He finally managed to stop. He could feel the vibrating light of the gate. A thud emanated from it.
His hand rose to the door of light and passed through the beam. He brought it back to him and, seeing that it was intact, decided to plunge his whole body.
Trusting her partner, Selos followed him and the two of them disappeared in the light.
They discovered an unknown world.
It looked like a deserted city, but brand new at the same time.
The ground was made of what is seemingly a unique white stone with golden inlays arranged in a very aesthetic geometry.
Everything was gigantic. Some structures were as big as the ancient trees of Oloma. Tak’Oba never felt so small in his life.
He’s terrified by the coldness of these stone buildings, but at the same time blown away by this unique spectacle.
On his left, he saw a gate similar to the one he had just passed through. This one appeared to be inactive.
He continued to observe around him to realize that there were more of them.
He had never witnessed anything like this. He was stunned by what he just had discovered.
He had hardly left his village and, right now, had just discovered a new world. He was the first Ecleray ever to witness this.
He looked up. The sky was dark. A deep, haunting midnight blue dotted with bright spots and green, blue, or even violet clouds. There seemed to be no limit to this silent and cold spectacle.
It was probably the most beautiful sight Tak'Oba had ever contemplated.
These myriad colors reflected off the pristine white walls and Selos' scales in a unique swirl of color.
At the same time, a lot of questions crossed his mind.
Where was he? Who had built this? Could other Eclerays join this place?
As if to answer him, the villagers walked through the gate.
They were all armed with the same type of stick that the counselor had used to stun Tak'Oba.
Both partners came back to reality and backed away. Selo pulled out her claws and dug them into the ground. She was ready to fight.
Tak'Oba lined up beside his partner, ready to fight back.
Selos was the first to attack. She threw herself at the group, her mouth open, and her claws forward.
The first villager managed to dodge the attack, while the other two were thrown to the ground.
Selos began to bite one of them, while the other rose to strike her.
Tak'Oba found himself alone against the last villager.
He put the book on the ground and put his arms forward, ready to fight back.
The villager jumped forward before striking a clean blow from the top to the bottom.
It was too fast for Tak’Oba.
The stick came crashing down on Tak'Oba's arm as he raised it to ward off the blow.
Horrified, Tak'Oba saw his left forearm explode under the force of the impact.
His scream was heard hundreds of meters away and lost in the cosmic immensity.
Tak'Oba knew what he was fighting for. With his foot, he blocked the stick as it went to the ground. His opponent tried to pull it away and looked up at Tak'Oba.
The last thing he saw was Tak'Oba's right fist hitting his face. The pain had multiplied the young Ecleray's strength.
He picked up his now unconscious opponent's stick and ran toward Selos. The two villagers were holding her down and beating her. But they were too busy to notice that Tak'Oba was coming up behind them.
The young Ecleray raised the staff to the starry sky and brought it down on the head of one of the villagers. Pieces of bark flew off his head and he fell backward.
Tak'Oba dodged the last villager's blow and with a kick sent him tumbling over a low wall.
This was his chance.
He lifted Selos up before pouncing on the book. He tucked it under his arm and climbed over his partner. As the two villagers struggled to their feet, they passed through the doorway again, back to Oloma.
Selos started with short strides to make sure his partner was gripped, then accelerated up the hill.
"We have to get to Ascanda," Tak'Oba thought.
"They must know that such a place exists."
After two hours of uninterrupted running, Selos collapsed from exhaustion in a glade.
Tak’Oba decided they should stay here as long as it would take.
As her partner was falling asleep, he thanked her and sat down against a tree.
He could finally take a close look at the book.
He shifted his gaze to the cover and in his excitement, he opened it.
On the first page was a title: Fallen from the Stars: Memoirs of a Captain.
"This book must be over 3 000 years old!”
The title intrigued him. He turned the page.
"After the Great War."
He continued to turn the pages.
"Some of us made a choice." "For others, the choice was not left to them."
"They are now on the other side, and we can no longer consider them ours.”
“They took their Mwahindoes away. I think they want to swell their numbers."
“We started to call them The Olkirs.”
"They must have been corrupted by something, or someone."
“CORRUPTED"
One word.
One word that Tak'Oba would never forget.
One word that explained everything he had seen and experienced.
This word echoed in his head, along with the voices of all the elders who had watched him grow up.
He could not hold back his tears. If these lines brought answers, they also unloaded a ton of new questions, one of which kept coming up:
Corrupted by what? Or who? And How?
Tak'Oba realized that what he thought was the end of his adventure was only the beginning. He had to live, he had to survive to inform all Eclerays.
"Ascanda must know.”
After thousands of years of living in harmony, the Eclerays were about to discover the alarming boundaries of their utopia.
