2. Expanse

While we walked to the entrance of the tomb, we continue our conversation.

Firstly, Jevannah. Jevannah is a torchbearer. What is a torchbearer?

Jevannah: “Torchbearer is someone who can harness the power of light. We primarily operate outside the city. We collect resources, we protect the city, and we rescue people like yourself. The light you’ve seen here was emitted from my hat.”

A person that emits light? From Jevannah’s description alone, light seems to play an important role in this place.

Me: “Has this place always been dark?”

Jevannah: “Every place has always been dark. You’ll see it soon once we get out of this place.”

The darkness that I've seen from that crossroad before, is everywhere? How strange! That means without light, I would not realize I was here all the time. Did the light allow me to wake up? Did the light make me realize I exist? When did I actually exist here, before or after the light?

Me: “You mentioned that the place is dark everywhere, so how did you find me, if the tomb itself is already dark and empty? Was I already here for a long time?”

Jevannah: “My spirit guides me to where you are supposed to be, not the exact chest you are actually in. I simply radiate my light across the entire sections of the tomb, then I'll know when someone actually walks in. As for your last question… only your Spirit knows about that.”

My spirit, huh? I wonder why my Spirit is not with me.

Jevannah: “There, we are getting close to the exit. My followers are waiting for us.”

Me: “Your follower?”

Jevannah: “Yes. You wouldn’t think I came here alone, do you?”

…

***

After walking for a while, we soon met with two people. They both seem to wear thicker brown colored robes, and a pauldron, actually one of them wore a pauldron at both shoulders.

Jevannah: “I’ve found the guy. Here, this is my follower. You two should introduce yourself before we go.”

The man on the left looks rather intimidating. The man has a black, high flat top hair, spiky sideburns, and a mustache. The man is taller than me and looks muscular, wearing a thick robe and pauldron on both shoulders.

Man on the left: “Name’s Regan. I work for Jevannah. What’s yours?” While offering their big right hand, subtly asking for a handshake.

I shook his hand… Huh?

Me: “My.. what?” I’m confused.

Regan: “Your name, duh.” Regan too looks confused.

Me: “I… I don’t know.”

That’s right. I don’t know my name. The people here have names, I don’t…

Regan: “Alright, you’re Baldy then!”

Jevannah: “Isn’t that a bit rude?”

Who am I? I questioned my existence in this place, and now I questioned what am I. I may not remember anything, but forgetting names? That’s gone too far! What is this feeling? Am I really what I am? Or…

Regan: “What’s wrong? You don’t like your nickname?”

Me: “Uh, no, not that…”

Regan saw myself standing in daze, and sighs.

Regan: “You don’t have to think too much about it. You know, we get this kind of case sometimes.

Eh?

Regan: “The people we rescue, especially those we don’t recognize, most of them don’t really remember their names too. Some of them got so bad they couldn't even drink. You seem fine enough, young man.”

Some of them lose their memories too, huh? I’m not sure why but I feel somewhat relieved… even if it’s wrong. Perhaps it is the fact that I don't experience this alone.

Regan: “So, Baldy’s fine for you? Or do you have a better name for-”

Me: “Baldy is fine.”

Regan: “See? I’m not that rude. The guy accepts the name without complaint.”

I’m not sure if Baldy is a nice name, while I scratch my bald head.

Jevannah: “I’m saying that you should not come up with the name based on their appearance.”

Regan: “Right, you don’t like the nickname. What is your suggestion then?”

Jevannah: “How about… Praximal Nun-”

Regan: “Hah, is that the name you got from reading weird texts? That is even worse. It comes from dead people, you know.”

Jevannah: “Agh, enough of this. Oh, by the way this man here is Oskar. Oskar may be a quiet person, but they know what to do.” Jevannah pointed at the man on the right.

Man on the right: “...Hello there.”

Oskar on the other hand has long, golden brown curly hair, and a short whisker beard. The Oskar eye looks rather like a tired person, and the face has a scar on it. Oskar wore a robe the same as Regan, but with a pauldron only at left shoulder. Oskar seems to wield a stick with a curved sharp end on it. Is this a weapon?

Jevannah: “There is another follower named Thorne, but they are out there at the moment. Thorne is our scout here.”

So, five of us in this place…

Jevannah: “Alright, let’s get out of here.”

We then walked to the exit of the tomb.

Goodbye. You were a nice place, but I don’t think I want to stay in that chest again.

***

We finally walked out of the tomb.

On my left side there’s a wall similar to that tomb, while on the right side, it’s a complete darkness. I could see some little dot of dim light far away from here, but I could not see the rest. I headed toward the right side and tried to look at the bottom. It’s so dark, and menacing…

Jevannah: “Careful there, you don’t want to fall from here.”

Me: “R..right, I’ll be careful.”

Still, this place is very dark. Is there no light in here?

Me: “Is this ‘outside’?

Jevannah: “Yeah, this is outside of the tomb.”

Me: “Huh? Then, where is the light?”

Jevannah: “What do you mean?”

Me: “I mean this place, is it supposed to be that dark?”

Jevannah: “It’s always been dark, everywhere.”

Me: “What? Where did the rest of the light go?”

Jevannah: “That’s… a long story, but I'll try to make it brief”

As we keep walking, Jevannah explains the history of this dark world.

This tomb, alongside the world itself, was built by an ancient empire, long, long time ago. The empire built massive megastructures that were believed to stretch across many sectors, each built with care and fine details.

It is also believed that a long time ago, the ancient empire was full of bright light, packed with people and activities. The people back then used the very light to perform many activities. Life was good, until one day, a disaster happened.

Jevannah: “The light that shines in every corner of that empire, gradually dim into darkness.”

At that point, panic began to consume the empire. First, the people fled to the nearest available room with light, they went black soon after. Then, they fled to the furnace, forges, the cook house, anything that emits light through heat. They brought everything that can be burned, for a spark of light, but soon they ran out of resources.

Me: “How could they live when there is no light at the end?”

Jevannah: “That’s where the miracle happens.”

The remaining people began to discover a massive, super bright stone that they call firestone. Unlike furnaces, they do not dim at all, and they maintain their brightness until today. People then build cities around the stone, and it has been like this for ever.

Jevannah: “We then take the chunk of the firestone, and it becomes the basis of torchbearers.”

Now I know how torchbearers like Jevannah get their light, but there is something missing though.

Me: “So, as the torchbearer, you do need to take a chunk of that firestone, yes? If the bright stone is as eternal as you mention, surely people can use the firestone to make this place bright again, right?”

Thinking about it, if the stone can be split across the place, wouldn’t it be possible to light the place across the world? If it’s possible, then there is no reason torchbearers to be exist…

Jevannah: “I did say it’s a miracle, and every miracle has its cost.”

Me: “A cost?”

Jevannah: “It’s true, we do take the ‘chunk’ out of that firestone, although not literally. When we take the ‘chunk’, we meant to manifest that into an object.”

Jevannah: “The problem is these objects, they gradually melt. When they melt, they produce less light, and sometimes, the object began to lose its cohesion. The cloth you are wearing now is an example of firestone, made into something usable.”

This cloth? I looked at my cloth and check if it was truly an actual firestone, but I did not see anything in particular that screams light.

Me: “So, my cloth here is the manifestation of that firestone, why didn’t it produce a light?”

Jevannah: “That is because I, as a torchbearer, are able to control the strength of light of my followers, well… to some extent. Your cloth did produce a faint light, you’re just not perceptive enough.”

Me: “To some extent? Such as?”

Regan: “Ugh, it’s getting chilly here, ain’t that right, Baldy?”

!!!

I see. So that’s the meaning of ‘melt’. The object exerts a heat to keep the light, the same way as how burning works. It’s a shame though it cannot last forever, at least I get to be warm.

Jevannah: “The light we have here is not just simply to light the way, it’s also to keep a person sane.”

Regan: “Every one of us here that wishes to go outside the city must carry a ‘firestone’.”

Jevannah: “And only torchbearers are able to manifest the object.”

Manifestation of an object… interesting. I wonder if they ever do something absurd such as:

Me: “Can you manifest as many objects as you wish?”

Jevannah: “You know that’s a nice idea, but unfortunately, such absurdity won’t happen here. A torchbearer can only manifest an object as the Spirit deems necessary.”

The Spirit again… What’s their problem, anyways?

***

Oskar: “We’re here.”

We’ve walked a straight path for a while, and now we are on a crossroad, except it branches out to more paths. On the left, there is a stair that goes up, leading into a passageway. At the front, there seems to be a small bridge that is quite short, reaching up to a place with many pillars. And then at the right side, there is a stair that goes down, but i can’t see what’s more at the bottom though.

Getting lost here is clearly a terrible idea.

Regan: “I didn’t see the mark though. What should we do? Should we go back to the last path or we find a new path?”

Jevannah: “Regan, can you tell me which layer is this?”

Regan then pulls out a string with a ball and a ring attached to it. Regan then wears the ring of the string vertically. The ball starts at the top, then slides down to stop halfway through.

Regan: “7th layer here.”

Jevannah: “Thorne said to meet at 6th layer, so… back to the last path, i suppose.”

That ball… I’m curious about it.

Me: “What is that thing you hold?”

Regan then glances at me then sighs.

Regan: “This? This is a Measuring Bell. It tells us which layer we are in now.”

Me: “Layer?”

Regan: “Yep. This place goes all the way up and all the way down. Going down is such a pain though.”

We then proceed to take the stairs at the right side. Halfway through, the stairs end in a one way straight path, then at the end of the path, we take the only stairs down again. This time, I can see the surroundings as the stairs have no walls around it. On the left, I can see a massive building with corridors that stretches so far away. On the front, I can see many bridges above and its supporting pillars below, and on the right I see a single building standing alone with a single large tile with drawing, surrounded by darkness. Here, the surroundings start to turn from yellow to maroonish color.

This time, I can feel the change of atmosphere. We did not exchange a single word while going down the stairs.

It looks like everyone except me looks rather tense. Is there something that bothers them down there? I try to break the silence.

Me: “Why do you guys seem tense? Is something down there?”

Regan then replied to me with a serious expression.

Regan: “Yeah, bad things tend to happen the deeper we go down here.”

The deeper we go the worse it gets? Now, I might not be a perceptive person, but my eyes did not see anything strange. Somehow, I can see even better compared to where I was on the upstairs. I could only feel in awe of these megastructures people built a long time ago. *Sure this place is dark, but it’s awesome.* I thought.

That thought ended when we reached the bottom of the stairs.

There, in front of me, I saw a darkness, and it’s not a normal darkness. They do not look still like other types of darkness, they look to be… blurry, as if they are moving.

The darkness is moving closer.

Jevannah: “We’ve got visitors.”

I felt fear for the first time.