As they entered the first building, crows fluttered out from its collapsed roof.

The building itself was mostly destroyed, but Rai felt like it would’ve been worth checking anyway. Surely there had to be something of worth in the crumbled rock and debris.

After a while of looking around it, he didn’t find anything worth analysing. Neither did Lina or Tullian.

So they moved on to the next building on the path.

This one was a bit more intact, and looked like it served some kind of purpose other than simply being a house.

As they looked around, Lina seemed to notice something.

“Don’t you think this is like a shop?” She asked the group.

“Now that you mention it... the layout feels like it would suit a shop. Over there in that corner is where the counter would be, and then there’s all these rotten wooden shelves that would’ve had stuff to be sold.” Rai said.

“Mhmm. There’s no artifacts in this one, but at least we learned that the civilisation that lived here had shops, even this close to the mausoleum.”

“It’s a little strange though, no?” Rai asked.

“What is?” Tullian asked in response.

“Why would they have a shop next to a burial site like that mausoleum?”

“Perhaps it was more than a shop then. It could’ve been a storage building where people put their shoes. I know of some cultures within my clan that would ask you to remove your shoes in respect for the house.”

“That’s... some good insight. Thanks Tullian.” Rai replied.

Tullian looked closer at some of the shelves in question, and back at the counter that Rai pointed out earlier.

“The counter seems a little low for a shop counter too, so it was probably used as a high bench of some kind.” He said.

“That also makes sense.”

Rai took some lessons from Sin, and started to write some of the information that they’d found down in a notepad that he’d brought along.

Once he was finished, they moved onto the next building. This one was surrounded by undead. It was also much larger than the previous one, which begged the question as to why the undead were surrounding it.

“How do we get in?” Rai asked.

“I’m not too sure...” Lina muttered.

“There’s an entrance on this side!” Tullian called out from a bit further ahead of them. He’d found a doorway into the building that wasn’t blocked off by the horde of undead.

Rai, Lina, and Hiron all joined him.

They entered the big building.

As they did, they found that there was a lot more intact in here than in either of the previous buildings. The floor had signs of being carpeted, at one point in time. The building also seemed to be one single large hall going all the way across its span. A crumbling pillar held the ceiling up in the middle of the room... or what was left of it at least.

Chiefly, there were some artifacts on the ground near the walls at the back of the room. Lina noticed them and walked over to look at them.

One of the artifacts was a very old papyrus scripture of some kind. Lina reached for it, before stopping herself. She pivoted and took some of the potions she brought with her, out of her side pouch.

Rai had walked over shortly after to see what she was up to, while the other two roamed the room looking for other interesting things.

“What’s that?” He asked.

“It’s a potion I made!” She said excitedly. “I thought that alchemy would’ve been useful to learn at the Academy, and it was! I learned how to infuse potions with my magic... but I’m still not very good at it. B-but even then! This should work fine... maybe... hopefully...”

Rai stared at the small vial full of bright blue gloopy liquid in Lina’s grip.

“Do you have to use all of it at once?” He asked.

“Goodness no! You see, I have to take this little syringe and take only a few drops out and... actually just watch! This’ll blow your mind!” She said, even more excitedly than before. Her passion for alchemy might’ve been underlying what she was saying, but it was palpable nonetheless.

Rai watched as Lina placed the vial on the ground after opening it. She carefully and gently siphoned out a small amount of the vial’s contents with her syringe, before closing the vial and storing it back in her pouch. Lina then placed the syringe just above the super old scripture and squeezed out a couple drops.

As the blue liquid made contact with the scripture, waves of blue energy shot out from the points of contact. They expanded to the edge of the scripture and back.

Eventually, the waves stopped.

Lina looked satisfied, Rai noticed.

“Now...”

She picked up the scripture with ease.

One would’ve thought that something that old would’ve crumbled to the touch, but Lina’s potion worked well enough to preserve it.

“Woah... That’s amazing!” Rai exclaimed.

“Thank you!”

“Are you two done with that scripture?” Hiron asked from where he stood.

“Give us a minute.” Rai replied.

“Fine. But when you’re done, get your monkey ass over here.”

Rai turned his attention back to Lina.

“Can you read it?” He asked.

Lina looked at the lines on the scripture.

Suddenly, she gripped her head in pain, dropping the scripture.

Rai realised that the scripture must’ve been written in Ancient.

He was about to use his lightning spell to relieve Lina’s pain, but she beat him to it.

Lina used one of her own healing spells to relieve the strain on her mind.

After about 10 seconds, she seemed to be somewhat fine again.

“You alright?” Rai asked to confirm.

“... Owh... It’s written in Ancient! Gosh that really hurt...” She said, gently rubbing her head. A single pained tear escaped from her right eye.

“Will you be alright Lina? First and foremost, we have to make sure you’re gonna be fine.”

“I think... I’ll be okay. I just can’t imagine trying to read more than one word of that language and not having your mind crack into pieces... that’s how sharp that pain was, Rai!”

“It doesn’t sound pleasant, at least. Anyway, if you think you’re gonna be fine, then go to Hiron for now. I’ll use some of the storage tools to store this so we can bring it back to the Academy.”

“... Alright. Just don’t try and read it, okay?”

“Don’t worry, I won’t.”

“Good... good.”

Lina got up from where she sat on the ground, wiped the crumbled rock off of her uniform, and went over to Hiron.

Rai was left with the scripture alone.

The first thing he did was make sure no one was looking. Then the second thing he did was read it.

‘Tae ye within this hold,

Find yer final whisperes.

Ye shall warm yer cold,

Or may ye ne’er bury them old.

Pray fer ther everafter,

Or doom yerself tae disaster.

A story forever told,

In a Zenith further’an old.

De House o’de Brave,

Fer ye within this hold.’

Rai had absolutely no clue what this could mean. Not a single idea came to mind.

But, he was losing time and couldn’t think about it any longer.

He used the storage rune handed to them by Rodrick to store any artifacts that they found, and got up from where he crouched.

Rai made his way to the other end of the hall.

By now, Tullian had joined the other two as well.

“What’s up?” Rai asked Hiron as he got closer.

“Look at this.”

Rai looked where they were all looking.

On the wall was a plaque.

Somehow, the plaque was completely fine.

Immediately, Rai felt like something was off.

“That’s not right.” He said.

“I know. As much as I said this wouldn’t be interesting...” Hiron grew a smirk. “I’m beginning to be proved wrong.” He said, hungrily.

“Before you go fighting everything in sight, let’s try and make sense of it first.” Rai said.

“It’s obviously the lich’s doing.” Hiron replied.

“But what’s it made of? It could just be made of a metal that doesn’t rust, or dirty up easily...” Rai tried to argue.

“Hey, monkey brains, this thing is spotless! You really think a ‘pure’ metal is gonna stay like that over how many years?”

“Alright fine, someone’s been here and cleaned this thing specifically. Sure, that makes sense.”

“You’re... such a dumbass sometimes. I literally just said it’s gotta be the lich!”

“Guys...” Tullian said.

They turned to him.

“The aura that just started coming from that plaque... we need to get out of this room, now!”

Too late, my little dolls!

*Thuds*

They all fell to the ground, unconscious.