Chapter 2: Chapter 2

• 3^rd Person POV

Eagerly, that man passes through the archway hoping that he would find a dilapidated building or some sort of that type so he can take a shelter.

But upon entering, his vision is greeted with something much more than what he expected. Wide-eyed and mouth agape upon landing his eyes on that.

What he sees in front of him is a massive spiralling white tower and surrounding it, are tall marble walls coming from the white pillars that he had just entered. Furrowing his eyebrows, he begun to think.

(“I definitely saw that there’s no building or walls outside of the archway.”)

Taking that into consideration, that man stepped out going through the way he came in. Upon passing through the archway and moving away, the sight of the tower & its walls disappeared.

(“What is happening?”)

He raised his eyebrow seeing this odd phenomenon as he tries to enter the archway. In doing so, the tower & its walls appeared again when he entered it. Confirming to him that the archway functions as a gate of some kind.

Nevertheless, he travel further approaching the spiralling tower. Even from afar, he could see the large structure’s height almost reaching the heavens.

But now, in closer look. The tower itself might be even larger than he anticipated as he needed to turn his head upward seeing the tip of that towering height reaching above his eyesight.

Before long, he look down at eyelevel & notice that there’s an entrance leading to the inside of that white tower.

Getting more curious, he walked towards it and take a good look at the entrance. Its sophisticatedly carved & adorned with several etchings resembling constellations. In addition, the very same word from the archway is also etched on the entrance.

(“Huff…”)

Taking several intakes of breath in & out to gather courage in his heart. That man finally decided to enter what he assumed to be an academy.

(“Whoa….”)

He left speechless seeing the interior of this tower. He thought the white colour of the walls was paint but similar to the pillar he saw. This tower is entirely made from marble making everything look glossy due to the moonlight, attracting his gaze everywhere he can look at.

(“Hmm?”)

He landed his view on the central floor of the tower. There’s a shallow circular pond that’s obviously have dried long time ago. Seeing this though makes his heart jumped, quite happy at the discovery.

(“Good! This means that there was water here”)

Wondering about it more, he move towards the pond as he sees a short set of stairs leading below. Only taking two to three steps before he finally arrived at the bottom of the pond.

(“It reaches my knees”)

That man looked to the side wall of the pond and compared its height to his legs. As he thought.

(“Then the pond must have contained a lot of water, I need to figure out where the water came from.”)

He began to ponder for a bit while continuing his investigation, until he found something interesting that caught his eye.

In the centre of that pond, he sees an elegantly carved fountain. Resembling a statue of a humanoid that bends down slightly toward the pond.

On its shoulder lies a large jug as it seemingly depicted carrying & pouring the content into the pond.

(“That must be where the water came from”)

But unfortunately, that fountain didn’t pour any water as he had hoped for. Just like the dried pond, the situation of that fountain is the same, as that man comes closer to look into the jug’s content.

There’s nothing there, only pitch-black darkness through, although a particular scent wafted to his nose. He sniffed it and immediately it reminded him of a swimming pool. The smell of chlorine albeit not too intense but a hint of it is there & he can also smell something metallic coming from the jug.

That man begin to think as he racked his brain.

(“There must be a generator somewhere here to activate this fountain again. But where? I assumed this place is an academy at first. Now that I think about it more, it doesn’t resemble any academy I’m familiar with. Maybe it’s because otherworldly academy? Hahah….”)

While thinking & laughed at his own thought process, he already exited the vicinity of the pond as he scout around the tower interiors. The walls of the tower begin to close up at the top, making a conical shape as he follows along with his gaze.

On the edges of the wall, there are two helical staircases made from the very same material of this tower that occasionally intersect with one another making an interesting sight to behold.

He continues following that staircase until his eyes landed at the top of the tower. There’s a glint of light coming from that direction. It caught his interest as he ponder if he should go to the top.

(“I don’t know how long it might took to climb this insane staircase though…”)

But he also thought, that there’s a chance the generator would be located there since he sees nothing resembling a mechanism on where he stood at the moment, also no signs of a basement entrance as well.

Resolving himself to do it, that man approaches the staircase as he notices something. Through out the walls of the tower, there are etchings resembling what he sees at the entrance or the archway leading to the tower.

His pale right hand touches the wall as he put his feet on the first step of the stairs. He can feel the roughness of the etching & its groove as he traces it.

(“These are constellations, but I don’t recognize any of them. Makes sense, this isn’t earth after all. Not that I remember any of them anyway.”)

He jokingly commented to himself while tracing the etchings, all he knew is that constellations or stars are used to find directions, particularly useful knowledge for a sailor as he sighed.

(“Maybe I should’ve learned them a bit more especially in this situation… can’t do anything about it now”)

While regretting that, he climbed the staircases as he occasionally sees shelves similar to bookshelves carved onto the walls.

Although he’s always been disappointed whenever he tries to inspect the inside of the shelves since everything there is completely empty.

He hoped to find a book or something that people who lived here left behind. Sadly, each time he found those shelves there were nothing in it. Nevertheless, he continue his endeavour while climbing the helical staircase.

(“Hm?”)

His eye caught on something different in one of the shelf. Amidst the white marble of the tower there’s a grey metallic colour in the shelf.

That man immediately went closer to the wall’s edge to that particular shelf to inspect what is it he’s looking at.

Lies in that shelf, is a small metallic looking cube. Upon gazing at the item, this man reminded of a toy called ‘Rubik cube’ but it doesn’t have any matching pattern rather everything part of this cube is just grey coloured metal.

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Picking that up, he can feel that its fairly light quite a contrast since he anticipated that a metal cube would be heavier. He began investigating the metal cube trying to twist it, but the cube wouldn’t budge.

(“Hmmm….”)

He ponder for a bit, looking at the cube’s sides

(“They all look the same. Eh?”)

Until he looked at the bottom part of the cube as he noticed that there’s an elevated small platform. It reminds him of a button as he has the sudden urge to press it.

*CLICK*

Succumbed to the urge, his thumb pressed the button as he extended his arm to make it as far away from his face as he can. Soon after, multitude of sounds such as clicks & turning of gears came out from the cube as it resonates throughout the tower. He can hear it that the sounds are getting quicker & quicker as time goes on.

The cube also glows in faint cyan light with the source coming from the button that he has just pressed.

Surprised by that, he immediately put the box on the shelf again as he took several steps away & down from the box while watching it carefully.

*CLICK *CLICK *CLICK *CLICK *CLICK

*PANG!!!

A loud sound of metal hitting metal echoed through the tower as he averted his eyes for quick second, anticipating an explosion…

Seconds have passed after that loud sound, yet that man didn’t feel any sharp pain or anything like that as he opened his eyes.

(“Huh?”)

There’s no damage at the stairs nor the shelves, rather he can see that the metallic cube top part opened by themselves almost like a jack in a box type scenario.

He felt stupid for being such a scaredy cat and got startled from the cube, nevertheless he assessed the newly opened cube.

The cube is now enveloped with geometric lines that glows in faint cyan blue light making him grew more curious about this development.

He looked left and right of the cube if there’s any changes beside those glowing geometric lines & the top part of the cube that has opened, but none caught his eye as he sighed in relief. Coming closer to the opened metal cube, his gaze landed on the inside of that box.

(“Nothing?”)

What he sees are pitch black darkness which confuses him for a quick second as he took the cube in his hand. Taking it out from the shelf, he orients it near the moonlight coming from the top of the tower.

Yet, despite his effort the content of the cube is still pitch-black darkness even if the moonlight has shone down upon it. Although, he shakes the cube & confirmed that there are rattling contained inside the box.

(“Is this an optical illusion? This cube looks high-tech so it would make sense they have protective measure”)

He pondered upon looking at the cube. Before shrugging his shoulder and decided to do something about it. He flipped the cube downward…

(“Rather than putting my hand to where it doesn’t belong, how about forcing the contents out?”)

That’s what he thought as he shakes the cube multiple times. Due to this, he can hear faint clanging inside of the cube as he continues shaking it until…

*PLOP*

Something falls from the cube towards the staircase and stopped there.

(“Hmm?”)

He set the cube aside for now as he looks down to what’s the item that has fallen & pick it up to inspect it further. It is a small silver water canteen exquisitely decorated with filigrees. The shape of that canteen is round and comfortable for his hand to hold.

Even if he cannot determine the exact value of this item in his hand, he can sense that this silver canteen is quite expensive in earth knowing its vintage look making it unique & eye catching.

Though he feels elated not by the expensive looking canteen rather, it is a water canteen!

(“There might be water in it”)

He hopefully thought as he opens the cap of the canteen. The cap is attached by a silver chain as well so it wouldn’t go anywhere if he opened it in a rush like this.

Before he put it on his mouth though, he opened his palm and slightly tilt the canteen to his palm.

(“Sigh….”)

His hope crushed upon seeing what’s going on. The canteen did not contain any water or anything of sort as he already fully tilt the container & shake it several times with nothing coming out from it.

Nevertheless, he took the cube & pocket it in his pajamas including the canteen as well. When he did it though, he realizes something.

(“How does the canteen fit this cube?”)

Pulling them out again & side by side, the silver canteen in his right hand is larger than the size of the cube. This conundrum confused him as he looks closely at the cube with glowing cyan geometric lines adorning it.

(“There must be a trick to it…”)

Though, he continues climbing the long set of helical staircases leading to the top of the tower as he ponders about the mysterious cube and didn’t come to an answer.

(“They did say advance science is magic… I just can’t figure this out.”)

He gave up on trying to figure the cube out and now focuses his attention on wandering what’s up there. Whilst looking around from above to below, almost all the shelves he encountered contain nothing in them including books which bring a question in his head.

(“Is this really an academy?”)

There’s not even a dormitory nor cafeteria in the tower. It is just a straight path towards the top of the tower. As he continues forth, for how long he himself doesn’t know but he knew that the day is still night-time.

That is until he sees something, an end to the excruciatingly long staircase.

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