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The little village is unnaturally empty and devoid of all life sans that which came from Destiny City. To add to the eeriness of everything, sometimes a small area will randomly feel cold and unnerving more than the rest of the town. Close investigation of the area will result in finding a small piece of weathered metal; you can just barely make out runes carved into it, but it's not large enough for you to make out anything. As soon as the metal is picked up, the mood in the area immediately fades and, oddly, you feel safer holding it. You may only find one of these per character!
There was something… off… about this village. Other than the fact that it seemed to be frozen in time. Although what exact time they were frozen in was up for debate. The structures seemed too old to host the crude indoor plumbing, but Oberon supposed if there was a creature prowling the woods, going outside was not exactly ideal, even to relieve oneself. Even the plants they’d come across for food seemed to be suspended from the effects of time. They weren’t exactly growing from what Oberon could tell, but they weren’t decaying on the vine, either.
Even the strange disappearances, and the howling and clawing from the unknown creature, always at night, always with the eerie fog, seemed unusual. As unusual as strange disappearances could seem.
From the little investigation Oberon did during the day, there never seemed to be signs that the people who disappeared were killed. Or perhaps the creature wanted to save them for later, and humans were better served fresh?
“What do you think happened to everyone? They were taken into the woods and eaten?” Oberon asked Sessrumnir as they collected supplies for the night.
“How would I know?” Sessrumnir responded with a shrug as he piled wood into his arms, pulling apart an old fence to use to barricade the door. They seemed to be able to keep the monster out no problem, but humans were a little more worrisome once they got desperate. Especially if they were in the Negaverse.
“In your professional opinion,” Oberon tried again, ignoring his brother’s grumpy attitude as usual, and turning to stare out into the woods nearby, as if hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever was giving him a horrible feeling. “Do you think the... creature is what brought us here? But then why hunt us again at night? Why not just dump us wherever it’s taking the others in the first place?”
Sessrumnir tightened his jaw in an attempt to stop from rolling his eyes. This was typical Oberon, though. Always looking for the third choice of a two opinion scenario. Currently their choices were to continue trying to protect themselves and stay out of the way, or confront the monster, but that usually ended in people going missing. Until he learned more about their situation, Sessrumnir wasn’t all that inclined to try to take on the monster. As long as they stayed indoors and left it alone, the monster seemed to leave them alone.
“What else would have brought us here? From what I can tell, the monster controls the fog, or the fog controls it, one or the other.”
“Don’t call it a monster,” Oberon cut his brother off, only to receive a look as though he’d lost his mind. This was not an unusual look for him to receive, especially over the past several years of his youma researching attempts, so it didn’t bother him as much as calling this unknown creature a monster did.
“We don’t know what it is, but it’s not a monster. For all we know it’s trapped here like we are. Maybe humans turn into that form after being here for too long,” he suggested.
“I’m going to call it a monster until it corrects me,” Sessrumnir grumbled under his breath and hoisted a large piece of wood over his shoulder so they could start heading back to their shelter. “And that’s really comforting, thanks for that. I’ll let you know if you start growing antlers. Now are you going to help carry something or not?”
”Okay okay,” Oberon frowned and turned from where he stared at the woods back to where his brother was standing.
By now he was mostly used to the strange fluctuations in the temperature, especially as the fog started rolling in, but it was the sudden sense of unease that stopped him in his tracks this time. He shivered and tried to shake off the feeling. The crudely built wooden fence had been pulled apart by Sessrumnir already, so it wasn’t difficult for him to pick up the pieces left for him.
But as he shifted one of the rails to lift, something strange caught his eye.
A couple pieces of metal with strange writing on it. Latin? No, it was more archaic than that.
Cautiously, Oberon reached out to pick the pieces up, and was surprised when the discomfort he felt faded. He felt… safer, almost. But why?
“Hey, come look at this,” he called over to Sessrumnir, who had already started heading back in his direction when it was obvious Oberon had found something.
“Runes?” Sessrumnir asked without need for an answer as he was passed one of the two pieces. He brushed the dirt off with his thumb as Oberon bent back down to try and find if there were any more, but it seemed those two were the only pieces accidentally unearthed when he was pulling the fence apart.
He was also aware that the tension in the air seemed to change as he held onto the weathered piece of metal.
“I don’t recognize these symbols. I feel like I might have seen something similar in the library on Sessrumnir, but I’m not sure. And there’s not enough here to try and decipher. Maybe if we found more pieces,” he said, only to pause at the look he was given by his brother. A look that clearly said Oberon highly doubted everything coming out of his brother’s mouth.
“Look. If they are runes and have specific meanings, they might be able to help us get out of this place,” Sessrumnir said with another frown, not wanting to discuss his interest in linguistics with his little brother at the moment. He had recently graduated with a new degree in literature. “We’ll have to see if others find any and compare.”
“Uh huh, okay,” Oberon rolled his eyes as he pocketed the piece of metal and watched as his brother did the same. Still, collecting wood and food that day seemed more comfortable than previous days, he found.
