Bloodlines of Archaea I. Afira
Solving the Ancient Riddle

“So that helped a little, but we still don’t really know how to get the necklace,” Akuma said, taking the piece from my hand and turning it over as if to see whether we missed anything.

I thought for a moment, replaying the words of the text in my head over and over. “I’m sure it gave us something. Let’s just go over the lines one by one.” He nodded, handing the piece back to me.

“Okay, so obviously, in the beginning, it’s talking about someone somehow related to you, because only your family holds the blood of the gods,” he said after quietly reading the first few sentences to himself. I nodded.

“And because the girl became enveloped in darkness, we know that this is talking about Sombra, Grandma Lilly’s sister, apparently,” I said bitterly, recalling the pain in Grandma Lilly’s eyes anytime I mentioned a sibling.

“So Lilly ruled with her sister when they were young. Okay. And then her sister fell in love with her guard. But not my Grandfather, because he was only the royal guard for a year before he was killed at sea. So his replacement. Do you remember who that was?” He asked.

I thought for a moment. “Maktu’s brother, Tamoe. I remember a time when Grandma Lilly and Maktu were speaking of him. It was the only time I had ever seen her cry.”

“So then Sombra traded her soul to save Tamoe, but he died anyways and Sombra still had to hold her end of the deal. And then a long time after that, I guess the darkness consumed her, leaving the inhuman, terrifying, soulless-thing she is.”

“Yeah, that sounds about right. Then I just don’t get the whole, ’fire burns, water drowns, etc. Thing,” I said, thoughtfully.

He looked up thoughtfully, then said, “it seems like ever since we got onto this island, the elements thing became a really big deal. I mean, even when Sombra was talking to the other lady about ‘the others,’ which I guess might be like you, but then that seems kind of important to leave out when people were telling us about this.”

“Maybe they didn’t know. Or maybe it means something else. But right now, we still don’t know how to get that thing out of the box without getting killed. And, we have no idea when anyone will walk in on us, so we should hurry this up,” I said, frantically realizing the possibility.

“Good point. Okay, So whoever wrote this made it very clear that what they were going to say was important, it turned out to be a story. Then, in the end, they said that stories unfold through action. So maybe this picture is important to the story, and vice-versa,” he said, looking down at the image once more.

“Sure, so this girl is probably Sombra, and as we know, she’s a military leader for the shadow creatures. So that makes sense as to why she seems to be commanding the army. But then also, she led us to the clue by pointing to it, so maybe the army is going somewhere important for us, or something,” I ran my finger along with the carving once more, eventually replaceing yet another crease in the otherwise flawless granite. Akuma stood, continuing to examine the papyrus he had taken from me once more. This time, whatever it was seemed to be in the shape of a small circle. I pressed down carefully. Suddenly, the piece Akuma held burst into flames. He yelped, dropping the burning papyrus and shaking his burnt hand frantically. The folded piece still in flames as they fell, until quickly turning into ash.

“Are you okay?” I whispered, suddenly conscious of the noise we had made. He nodded, his eyes tearing in pain. “Alright, let me see,” I said, taking his hand. “It’s like you’re setting out on killing your hands this trip. I mean sheesh. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with them,” I joked, carefully examined his burn, recalling how many times he had been hurt on our dangerous journey. Such thoughts made my throat ache but were interrupted by his quiet chuckle. Neither one of us said anything for a moment as I looked over each of his burns and where the flame may have hit his flesh. The burns were very mild as if for whatever reason the scroll erupted in flame had no intent on harming Akuma. “You’ll be fine. It’ll just be sensitive for a while,” I said, letting go of his hand.

Another folded piece of ancient papyrus fell from the ceiling but left no trace of being dropped. I caught it in mid-air just as a bottle of nice ink and an ostrich feather appeared on the glass case. They seemed to come from thin air, as if they were pushed from another world, right into the room we stood in. I walked over to the glass casing, where I was joined by Akuma. “I’m a little scared to open this,” I said truthfully.

Akuma smiled. “On the count of three, ready?” He asked. I nodded. “One,” he counted slowly, “two...three.” I unfolded the mysterious piece. There were beautiful ancient words written in bold and loopy cursive.

The words, “a test of memory to unlock the past,” read at the top. I held my breath, continuing to read, “fire -, water -, ice -, ash -, wind -, earth -, and balance seeks it all. The five, the heroes of this -world. Each with -of their own, chosen by the -they will free us from this never-ending.” A few of the words were blank, otherwise, I recognized the passage from the last piece of ancient writing, which now sat at the ground in ashes. For a moment, there was nothing but silence, until finally, “oooooh,” I said aloud, “a test of memory to unlock the past, the past being either the necklace or the passage which is in the past. So I guess all we have to do is fill in the blanks with the correct words.” Akuma nodded, looking thoughtfully at the wall as if trying to imagine the passage.

“We’re kind of lucky. Most of this stuff was just common sense, like fire, well fire burns of course. So that would be the answer.” I agreed, staring down at the piece of ancient text.

“Remember the kinds of tests Maktu used to give? Those were insane. I was so jealous of the other children who were allowed to play while we studied with him. It was like he knew what would happen,” I said, recalling days of study in Maktu’s house, where we worked for hours before he was pleased with the work we had done. He had taught us to read, write, and to do math. He taught us the words people in other places spoke, he taught us our history and the history of the world. He taught us to sing and to dance, he taught us to fish and sail. We learned to climb and to speak with the animals of the sea, while other children just had to read and write in our native language.

Akuma nodded, filling the first word with his lovely cursive. “I think they used things each element did to harm things, so like fire burns, so water drowns,” he said, passing the feather to me, I filled in the word with my own style of text, small and careful, yet bold and dark.

“Yes, so then ice freezes and wind- well I guess it kind of stings your eyes if it blows hard enough,” I said, carefully writing the next word, then passing the feather and ink back to Akuma.

“And then I suppose earth rises like mountains and hills,” he said, filling the blank.

“Also, the world is at war, and therefore it is broken,” I said, reminding him of the text. He nodded, writing the word and then passing the quill back to me.

“With weapons of their own, because they probably can’t share, because then it would be easier, and nothing can ever be easy,” he said bitterly. I laughed, filling the blank space with the word. “And they, like you, were apparently chosen by the gods.” I nodded, writing the word and then handing it back to Akuma for the last word.

“And my personal favorite, ‘to save us from this never-ending torture,’” I recalled, watching Akuma write the word.

The moment he was finished, he lifted the paper from the glass, just as our letters began to glow gold, then the glass around the necklace melted away, leaving it free in the otherwise empty room. A feeling of need washing over my bones as I reached out and took the necklace from its perch on the granite pedestal. I shoved the necklace into my pocket, and dove to hide behind the door as the sound of giant footsteps echoed through the hall. Akuma followed, silently dashing across the floor.