#nilk

WIND / FISH The seas had been calm for days, but the clouds were coming in so fast that nilk could swear they were alive. In a matter of minutes the brightness of the day was gone, there was barely enough time to light the ships lanterns before the blanket of darkness covered the seascape. Off in the distance nilk spotted something glowing in the darkness and changed course to investigate. The storm seemed to be growing exponentially with each passing second. A white flash of light illuminated everything for an instant and then a thunderous crack exploded from the stern of the vessel. Nilk turned to find the back of his ship on fire. A bolt of lightning had decimated the backside of the craft. Turning back towards the bow, nilk gaped in horror upon seeing that the spot where the glow was originally had been replaced by a whirlpool with a massive sphere in the center. Without any time to brace, the ship breached the edge of the torrent and he was flung from the vessel.

Nilks eyes shot open. The storm and sea had vanished, and now all that stood above him was a wood ceiling. He was safe in an unfamiliar bed. Turning to his left he found a young girl at a desk. Upon noticing his movement a smile splashed across her face and she shouted to someone in the other room. A mid-aged man walked through the doorway. They introduced themselves and explained that they had found him washed ashore amidst the wreckage of a ship. The only thing they recovered was his shield, which they posited as the thing that had kept him afloat while he drifted on the sea. They then turned the questioning to him. Nilk explained that he was an adventurer from the kingdom of continuum and that his ship had been sucked into a flash whirlpool. The two looked at each other and then back to him. They asked if there was anything else he could recall? It wasnt until that moment that he remembered that as he was falling he looked up in the sky and he could have sworn he saw three sets of colossal black eyes looking down on him. This response garnered an even more peculiar reaction from the pair / extreme interest mixed with skepticism /. Nilk began to feel awkward and in an attempt to extricate himself from the situation, asked for the location of the beach where he was discovered. The mid-aged man gave him some hesitant directions and nilk was off.

The moment nilk walked outside, the gaze of the towns people was on him. Their looks followed him wherever he went, as did the remnants of their whispers. This would bother some, but to nilk it was commonplace. When he was only a babe, nilk was abandoned in a small forest just outside of continuum city. A young couple found him and took him in. His adoptive parents were good honest people, but he could tell they never really understood him, and when the couple had a child of their own, their focus left nilk almost entirely. While nilk was a humanoid like all the citizenry of continuum city, his appearance was notably distinct. Most of the people had rotund soft features, but nilks were angular and sharp. He always stood out in a crowd. As soon as nilk was old enough, he enlisted in the adventurers guild, hoping that he would discover the camaraderie and excitement that all the adverts promised, but the result was the same as always, people seemed to like him, but he could never make a real connection. The only person he ever really called friend was a new recruit he met 3 years ago named Aren. Nilk was a natural hard worker and was promoted very early in his service. He was given a leadership position and immediately burdened with a unit of noobs. Aren was the worst of the bunch with little-no natural skills, but he molded her into a perfect adventurer. They shared a love for local theatre and spent hours talking about past productions theyd seen. While they werent main mates, he felt like he finally succeeded in attaining a friend. After only commanding his unit for a year, the higher ups offered nilk a chance to be one of 6 adventurers to spearhead their new sea scouts division. Him and 5 other brave souls would all receive ships that could be operated by a single individual and then they would all be sent in different directions in an attempt to discover the secrets of the greater world. It seemed like an interesting opportunity, the only wrinkle was aren. The next day, after he and his squad had completed their daily assignments, nilk went to talk to aren. He told her about the position and said that it would probably be years before he saw her again. Aren said it sounded cool and told him to have fun. Even though nilk never felt any romantic feelings towards aren, her apathy was an iron boot on his fragile heart container. The interaction steeled his resolve, and he immediately went to his higher and accepted the position. More isolation was not we wanted/needed, but there was no reason to stay, but. This wasnt the time for retrospection, so nilk returned his attention to the task at hand.

The beach was only a little way outside of town, and nilk was there in no time. Besides a couple planks here and there, traces of the ship were almost nonexistent. Nilk was about to head back when he spotted a small rock cluster by the edge of the beach. When he walked over, nilk found one of his supply chests half buried in the sand. It took a minute to unearth the chest, but once he did, he quickly rummaged through its contents. It was mostly nautical navigation instruments, but deep at the bottom he struck gold when he found his monowave! He had remembered packing it, but it had remained lost until this moment. Nilk wondered to himself how it got buried so deep inside the chest, but it didnt really matter, he was so happy that he held the monowave straight up into the air, as if to show some unseen observer above him the item he just acquired. After stowing the monowave safely in his beltpack, nilk noticed an alcove in the rock wall that lined the edge of the beach. There was a sort of thorny bush inhabiting the recess, and nilk could see there was something behind it, so using his shield he plowed through the abrasive bush. The alcove turned out to be a short tunnel that lead to a secret grotto. Inside there wasn't much beside more sand and water until nilk spotted what seemed to be a small cross jutting from the ground. Nilk walked up and pulled it from the ground. It was a very old, very plain sword.

Upon returning to town, he showed his newly acquired items to his rescuers. They were intrigued by the music the monowave made, but once he pulled out the sword their eyes went wide. The man instantly grabbed it out of his hands and started examining the sword closely. After a minute he returned the sword. The man explained that what nilk was holding was the long lost hero sword, and that nilk must be the hero/savior from all their myths and legends. Nilk was pretty sure this wasnt the case, but he let the man continue. The man instructed him to go to the temple that sits at the base of the mountain at the center of the island. Nilk was incredulous to say the least ( he kept wondering how no one had found that cave before, it wasnt even that well hidden), but he was always up for helping people and adventure, so he proceeded on the quest despite his hesitations. For nilk, the adventures were never difficult, it was the people. The thing that generally disappointed nilk so much about most people was that they seemed to so rarely actually spend time to understand each other. From what he could gather most people seem to just make you into whatever is most convenient for themselves, no matter how much you prove the contrary. Nilk knew he wasnt the hero they wanted him to be, but it was pointless trying to change their minds. So he always just tried his best.

As far as quests went, this one seemed simple enough, just follow the path through the forest until you reach the giant mountain, but nilk was lost almost instantly. Every time he thought he had acclimated in the correct direction he would look up and realize the mountain was behind him again. Nilks frustration was raising quickly, and he was about to head back when he noticed an owl watching him from a nearby tree. It seemed strange that this owl was out in the middle of the day, stranger still, the owl seemed to be staring directly at him. They locked eyes for a moment, then with a hoot the owl took off in the direction of the mountain. Nilk was compelled to follow him. The owl made abrupt strange turns, and moved at a pace that was almost impossible to keep. Finally they came upon a grouping of trees that formed a straight path and the owls speed dramatically increased. Nilk watched it fly away and then looked ahead to see the temple in front of him, the interminable mountain looming behind.

Getting inside was easy enough ( there wasnt even a door to obscure the entrance ). Inside nilk realized that calling this a temple was a bit of a stretch, the place was more akin to a dungeon than anything else. The massive entrance hall was dank and dark, and there were chains and old weapons littered everywhere. The only light was from a torch sitting in a sconce to the right of the door that lead to the next room. The dungeon looked as though no one had set foot inside it in ages, and nilk wondered how the torch stayed lit. Nilk walked up to the door and tried to open it, but it was sealed shut. Stranger still, there didnt appear to be a lock or even a handle. It was then that he noticed that there was an identical torch on the other side of the door sitting unlit. He removed one and used it to light the other. When the second torch caught flame a short melody wafted through the air and then a chest materialized in the center of the room. Nilk stood for a moment gaping at the mysterious chest, trying to grasp all the strange things happening on this strange island, and then he put it all out of his mind and opened the chest. Inside was a music box. It played a longer melody than the one that preceded the chests appearance, but it was just as haunting. Nilk closed the box and examined the exterior. The lid of the box had a triangle symbol made up of smaller triangles, on the underside there were 6 lines of what nilk guessed was some sort of music notation. Unsure of how this would help him, nilk returned to the locked door on the other side of the room. Now standing in front of the door nilk noticed that a triangle was etched into the floor directly in front of the door. Nilk stood over the symbol, opened the box and let the music play. The same melody that preceded the appearance of the chest rang through the hall again and the door opened. As nilk adventured through the temple/dungeon he solved more traps and puzzles like the first room, each area raised in difficulty as he proceeded. He traversed rooms with rickety bridges and vanquished creatures he could never have dreamed/nightmared existed. It was dangerous and frightening, but exhilarating. Nilk couldnt help but wondered, who constructed this elaborate labyrinth, and to what end? He hoped that when he reached the end of this adventure, the answers would present themselves. Finally nilk came upon an empty room with a door at the other end. Unlike all the other rooms in the temple/dungeon, the far door was open, and nilk could see daylight on the other side. Nilk breathed a sigh of relief and walked over to the door, but as soon as he reached the passageway the door slammed shut in his face. Nilk whirled around to see a black mass descending from the ceiling. The creature seemed vaguely serpentine in appearance. It had a large spherical center with coiling arms that seemed to be made out of spiraling black orbs. Slowly the spherical center of the beast changed from black to white, and nilk realized it wasn't its body, it was its eye. Without hesitation, nilk ran towards the living nightmare that loomed before him. The creature caught sight of the rapidly approaching adventurer and swung a coiled arm in his direction. In one seamless movement nilk drew his sword, leapt over the swinging extremity and plunged the blade into the colossal cornea. The creature turned to a puff of black smoke and was gone. The melody from the first room played again and the door opened once more.

The door lead to a secret flight of stairs that ascended the mountains southern face. As nilk scaled the steps he started to notice something strange about the mountains peak. Instead of being pointed it seemed to be rounded. After trudging the steps for over an hour nilk was finally closing in on the mountains zenith, he shielded his vision and took another look at the mountain top. It wasnt rounded as he originally thought, there was some sort of oblong sphere impaled on the peak. A few minutes more and nilk reached the summit. To nilks surprise he discovered that the odd sphere was actually an enormous egg. The egg must have been laying dormant for years because someone had constructed an altar around it in the interim. Was this what he was sent here to discover? This certainly wasnt answering all the questions he had about this strange place. Nilk studied the altar that surrounded the egg and discovered another multi triangle emblem engraved into the ground. He stood over the emblem and played the music box. The egg shuddered almost imperceptibly, and then a small crack appeared right in front of nilks face. He played the box again, but this time nothing occurred. Looking down at the music box he flipped it over in his hands and started looking at the notation again. It was an odd form of music, but he believed he could translate it. He pulled out the monowave from his beltpack and began programming. It took him a couple minutes, but as soon he translated the first line he hit play. The melody that emerged from the monowave was the same as what the music box played, and he saw the egg shake again, but this time, no crack. He quickly began programming the other 5 lines of music. After nilk was done, he opened the music box and let the song play for a measure then / in time / hit play on the monowave. All of the elements combined created a beautiful piece of music ( nilk thought it sounded like a ballad he heard once when he was young ). The egg began to tremble again, and the original crack began to expand exponentially. The instant that the piece concluded the top half of the egg burst apart and a blinding light shot out of it. Nilk could only make out the faint silhouette of a creature emerging/growing out of the egg as he was flung from the mountain top altar by the shockwave of the blast. As nilk plummeted to earth his ears became filled with a high pitch cry coming from the top of the mountain. Nilk twirled in the air so that he was now face to face with the rapidly approaching earth ( wishing he had done so many thing differently ), until a rush of aqua passed under him, and suddenly he was in the clouds. Nilk gaped in amazement at the giant cetacean he seemed to be perched atop. It looked like the whales he had seen on the high seas ( and once in the lake behind the castle ), but it was easily twice as large and had a set of angelic wings keeping it aloft. The creature began to tremble ( vibrate? ) and the high pitch tone rang through the atmosphere again and suddenly they were careening back to earth. They passed through the clouds, charging headlong at the peak of the mountain. Any trace of the egg had vanished, a sphere just like the one he had encountered on the high seas had taken its place. It seemed too small for them to pass through, but just as they reached it, the vortex doubled in size and swallowed them whole.

It was black at first, and then there was a rush and everything was bright. The scenery around nilk appeared to be moving at a speed beyond his comprehension, but at the same time he didnt feel any inertia pushing on him, it was the oddest sensation nilk have ever experienced, and then it was black again.