"AHHHHHHHHHHHH…Ah?"
Glenn stopped yelling, hesitantly opening his eyes, having reflexively shut them tight during the fall. He glanced around, a cloud of dust flying everywhere. He coughed a few times, trying to stand up, but slipping on what seemed to be stretched fabric. More dust got disturbed by his slip, and he didn't have to wait long to start sneezing and coughing uncontrollably from it.
"Cough, this dust might be deadlier than those monsters, I swear!" He swore, trying to cover his mouth and nose with his arm. With the dust finally settling down, he could finally stop dying and find out where the hell he fell. Standing up on the fabric proved to be too much of a challenge no matter how many times he tried, as he just slipped and fell again and again, so he settled on rolling until the end of the thing.
Finally falling out from this deadly trap, Glenn got back on his feet and dusted off his shoulders, coughing a few more times. He looked back to see the fabric he'd landed on was a square tent, coated in dust and spider webs. It wasn't a trap, but the sole thing that saved him from breaking the spine on the stone slates of the room. The tent was held in place by pristine metal spikes and seemed empty of any occupant. A glance informed him that he fell into some kind of huge stone chamber, the tent residing at the center of it.
Besides this tent, the surroundings were plunged into darkness, and Glenn could barely distinguish the stone walls and the pillars holding the ceiling. Gazing upward, Glenn witnessed the ceiling slowly closing with a cranking sound, and he cursed silently.
"Need a light," he muttered, searching for a torch. To his surprise, he found one nearby hanging on a torch holder stuck on a stone pillar. He quickly took out the flint he had safely stashed in his pockets and began striking sparks with it. He managed to light the torch just in time, illuminating the ceiling as it sealed shut, leaving no trace of light. Sighing with relief, Glenn surveyed the previously obscured areas, grateful he'd brought the flint along.
"Good call taking this flint, but a lighter would've been nice, way less stress," he mused, raising the torch high to illuminate the place. His eyes first settled on the nearest wall, covered in pictures engraved in the stone in the same manner as the moon on top of the mountain. There were a few captions written in a foreign language, with seemingly a runic alphabet. Despite his best efforts at trying to activate his translation power, he couldn't figure out what was written. Thinking about it, he didn't think he had ever seen this kind of writing before, which wasn't really that surprising, considering that he was in another world.
He decided to try to figure it out later and turned his attention back toward the tent. He stepped toward it, determined to fight the dust and cobwebs off to enter the tent if he had to. He made sure not to burn the fabric with his torch and entered carefully. He covered his face with his arm so he wouldn't die from dust again, but to his surprise, the inside was remarkably clean.
There was a sleeping bag on one side of the tent, and on the other, a chest and a desk. Seeing the chest, Glenn was reminded of the usual treasure chests from games he had played before and instantly got his looter instinct ignited. He hurried to the chest, kneeling in front of it. Using one hand to open it, he held the torch above it to illuminate its insides. His excitation quickly calmed when he saw that the treasure was only a few sets of clothes.
They looked pretty nice if one liked the all-black style. It consisted of multiple black pants with white shirts, which would be completed with a black trench coat. Glenn wouldn't spit on it anyway, as he thought back to his current set of garments.
'Was the owner a noble gentleman? Or is it the usual style out here? I'm quite curious, but we'll know later, I hope,' Glenn silently mused.
Taking the clothes out and examining them, Glenn found out that they were his size.
"Perfect. Bye, bye, the rags..." He muttered, smiling slightly.
He noted the absence of underwear but decided it was a minor concern. He swiftly changed and checked himself out. There was no mirror in the tent, but he could still tell that his charisma points had probably jumped from minus twenty to a regular ten.
'Well, that's way better,' Glenn concluded, patting his new coat and pants. He tied his scabbard to his waist and deposited his "belongings", which consisted of rags, in the chest. He kept the flint, as it could still be useful, and abandoned the fruits he had kept after discovering that they were completely crushed from the multiple falls he experienced.
He then turned his attention back to the desk, which promised to be slightly more interesting than the chest. Effectively, an open book was lying on the stern wood, as well as a pen and a bottle of ink. A small candle was half consumed, its wax sticking on the desk.
'A dip pen? It looks pretty well made,' He remarked, examining it, 'Was this tent owned by a noble? I guess I'll figure it out with the book if I can read it.'
With his torch's assistance, he strained his eyes, inspecting the book's pages where a new alphabet was waiting for him. After focusing on it for a few seconds, the language began to get decrypted, and Glenn understood it easily after another minute.
"I need to figure out the limits of this 'interpretation' ability," Glenn thought aloud, turning the pages to the first one. He lit the candle before placing his torch in a steel holder meant for this effect. He sat on the small chair, leaning toward the book. He quickly gathered that it was a journal, written by a man named Howard Jefferson. He came to this place specifically to understand a phenomenon called the "Moon Rift". Glenn quickly understood that it was the earlier blood moon that the stranger was researching.
"So it's called a Moon Rift...How fitting," He remarked, muttering lightly as he read the journal.
The Moon Rift also called the Blood Moon, was an event that existed since the dawn of time and generally happened without warning. The only sign it was happening was the big moon taking on a crimson color. The author didn't give a specific name to the moon, literally calling it "The Big Moon", and its smaller counterpart "The Small Moon".
This event would go on for three days, sinking the world in red darkness, the sun not reappearing until the end of the Moon Rift. It was an event that was both feared and awaited, depending on who you asked. For Howard Jefferson, it seemed like a precious opportunity that he awaited since he was born. He was sure that he would be able to find out when the next one would happen if he could decrypt the secret of this place.
The Moon Rift was quite an unpleasant event since every object it was spitting during its final phase could cause massive destruction after their fall. Still, some considered it a gift from the gods, naming these objects "Fallen pieces", items from another world. There could be as little as a simple rock made out of foreign material, or a whole town falling from the sky. Relics, technology, artifacts, mysterious items...The list was long. But what made Glenn tilt his head was the mention that monsters and people could also fall from the Rift. People. Everything and nothing could get out of this hole.
"Which means that there is a slight chance that I'm a Fallen Piece...No, I awoke before the Rift opened..." The matter was quite puzzling, as Glenn rubbed his temples with a serious look. He kept on reading, discovering one certainty: each time this event happened, monsters and "Corrupted Ones" would appear and run amok. If they survived the three nights of madness, they became monsters endowed with human intelligence, making them stronger than ever.
The journal didn't explain what a "Corrupted One" was, but Glenn chose to gloss over it, assuming it was likely just another variety of monsters, just stronger than the usual ones. There was also a slight explanation of who the author was. Howard Jefferson was a noble from the kingdom of Mun Irp and was an adventurous gentleman, who didn't like being enclosed in his lands and preferred to explore ruins and understand the mysteries of this world.
He described himself as a Seeker, and couldn't help but leave his Barony for exploration. His family's situation was quite complicated, and it seemed like he had some certain daddy issues. The term Seeker wasn't explained any further, sadly. It did confirm that Jefferson was a noble, though. That gave quite a little information on this world. There was a kingdom, with a king and its nobles. A working system! Awesome!
"'Seeker'—maybe that's their term for an archaeologist? Then, am I a Seeker as well? Kind of?" Glenn wondered aloud, turning the page.
The author went into a rant about himself for about a dozen pages, which Glenn quickly skipped over as 'how great was Jefferson and how he was going to restore his family's honor' didn't interest him the slightest. He tried to get to the interesting part, where the Seeker described what he found and understood from this place.
Soon enough, Glenn found what he searched for. Howard Jefferson began his explanations by stating that this mountain, the "Still Peak", was a fallen piece that had replaced a few hectares of the forest centuries ago.
"Wait, so does that mean that the whole mountain fell from the sky? Wow, how did this place not explode? Does gravity not work the same way here?" Glenn exclaimed aloud, bewildered. He tried to imagine a literal mountain fall from the sky, but he quickly gave up, keeping on reading.
The Seeker explained that many villagers living in the surroundings of the mountain had legends about this mount, each different but with a common link. Those legends were all linked with the Blood Moon. Pushed by these myths, Jefferson braved the difficult ascension under the rain and thunderous wind, before finally arriving at the peak. He had been overjoyed when he found the engravings of the Moon Rift, that he had been investigated. On the next page, the engravings had been drawn remarkably.
Glenn could think what he wanted of the man, but he did know his job and was good at drawing. After investigating the engravings, he pressed a hidden device and fell inside this place, where he quickly set up his camp. He had food and water for quite a while, so he wasn't worried about dying because of that.
'At least I'm not the only dumbass who fell into this hole,' thought Glenn while grinning, ignoring the fact that it was Jefferson's job to fall in this kind of place.
The Seeker explained that he was almost sure that this place could unveil the Moon Rift's Mystery, and, if he managed to be the one to unveil it, he'd get incredible honor and recognition, finally raising his family's state back from the ashes. That would also give him enough influence to throw down his father, get rid of his hateful mother, and get the Howard family back on track.
"This guy seemed hellbent on gaining his honor back. And what's up with his family?" Glenn questioned aloud, invested in the book's contents.
Turning the page, Glenn kept on reading. Jefferson explained that he discovered many signs of rituals being carried out in this place, hinting at a cult. The Seeker explained that it had been quite a long time since the last ritual, as the place was dusty and completely abandoned when he arrived there. A few of the engravings told the history of the cult, which had begun when a village near the crash point of the mountain witnessed the event, and found this ancient complex.
One of the villagers had found an ancient treasure that blessed its village with a bountiful harvest and safety from the beast, which began the cult. They prayed to the Moon Rift, hoping to get blessed with its gifts, or at least that's what Jefferson understood.
The last entry was about him exploring the main passage after he finished decrypting everything. The following pages were filled with the language on the wall, unreadable to Glenn. He closed the journal, sighing. That was quite a bit of information to absorb, but the more he knew, the less he felt scared. He decided to stash the journal in his vest for future usage, maybe that would prove useful later on. He got out of the tent, deciding to take a look at its surroundings a bit more before deciding his next move.
After taking a tour of the place, he had a more precise idea of where he was. The stone chamber had four stone walls, with each of them spanning 30 meters, covered in engraved pictures.
On one of the walls was an opened passage—likely the Seeker's departure point.
After checking that there was nothing but darkness in the passage, Glenn went back to the tent and thought about what he should do. After a not-so-long consideration, he decided to sleep in the tent and go explore the passage after being rested enough. Whatever was hiding there, exit or secret, it could wait for him to sleep a bit.
He placed the torch in the steel torch holder in the middle of the tent, hoping it would still be on when he woke up. He slipped into the sleeping bag, finally obtaining a well-deserved rest.