John and Caleb started tramping together through the thick forest, their exhalations misty in the cold air. Both of them were shaken by the event taking place at the stone circle so far, but they knew very well that they could not stop now. Without doubt, The Order was ruthless, already reforming their assault. The Heart of Aether pulsing gently in John's pocket seemed attuned to the danger of their situation.
Suddenly Caleb stopped. His eyes stuck to something in the distance. John had followed to where the missile of his friend's eyes leveled onto a system of some enormous ancient building, partially hidden by the trees. It was covered in some dark stone, moss-covered wall, with some fine silk of vines falling over it. It seemed that it had been abandoned for eons, but at the same time, it radiated some weird magnetic energy.
"Do you feel that?" whispered Caleb, amazement battling an edge John couldn't pinpoint in his voice.
"Alive." John nodded. His senses had sharpness. The building attracted some sense of livingness, humming at a low barely audible click, one that resonated in symphony with the artifact in his pocket. "Alive."
They advanced toward the building while, with each step, it seemed to grow colder and creepier. At the front of the building was a large stone arch, once was the door; it had long since been absent, though and there was merely a large, open space that provided access to the dark interior. Caleb looked inside, his face bathed in the dim glow from his flashlight.
"We should go in," he said in a voice barely above a whisper. "There might be answers in there, something that can tell us more about the Heart of Aether."
John paused. All his instincts screamed for him to leave well enough alone. But the thought of finally beginning to understand the artifact, of finding a way to protect it, kept him moving. And together, they stepped into the darkness.
The inside was cold and damp, the air full of the smell of earth and rot. Their footsteps echoed off the stone walls as they moved deeper into the building. It was much larger from the inside than what one could judge from outside, with a lot of long and thin hallways that branched into multiple sections.
Venturing further inside, he came across what appeared to be a central chamber—a gigantic room with an enormous, very high, vaulted ceiling. Its walls shone with many strange, ancient symbols that glimmered dully in the dark. There stood a large stone pedestal in the room, and on the surface of that stone were the same glowing symbols that used to decorate the walls.
"This place," Caleb murmured, running his fingers over the carvings, "is some kind of temple. The symbols. they're like the one in the manuscript. This might be where the Heart of Aether was created, or at least where it was worshipped."
John's eyes latched onto the pedestal. In a way that felt primal, the artifact in his pocket felt as though it were pulsating to him, in time with the glowing symbols, like reacting to the energy of the temple. He hesitatingly moved toward it, and he felt an overwhelming sense of fear and curiosity all at once.
"Be careful, John," Caleb warned in a watching way. "We don't know what kind of power this place holds."
Ignoring the warning, John reached out and placed the Heart of Aether on the pedestal. The whole room almost vibrated as the artifact touched the stone. The symbols on the walls blazed to life, casting flickering, eerie light throughout the chamber.
The ground rippled up beneath them in a suddenness that had John stagger back. The symbols on the walls swam and blurred, reforming in new patterns, as if the very temple were coming to life.
"John! We need to get out of here, now!" Caleb's voice, now bordering on frantic, shouted.
The next thing they knew, a mighty force surged through the room, sending them both to the ground. In a strange way, the walls of the temple almost seemed to pulse with energy, while John could the feel the power of the artefact increasing, actually as if it were feeding off the energy of the temple.
As ow they got up, the floor just under the dais cracked open, and the chamber below was surfaced. Something utterly bizarre was thrown out, a glow from every pulsating light, which filtered up into the room, filling the place with an all-too-un-natural light. Not at all fazed, John was the first to crouch and recover his object, advancing closer to the edge of the opening to examine it.
He could hardly catch his breath with what he beheld. The place was filled with ancient machinery; strange devices hummed with hidden energy. In the center rose a large stone structure of similar form to a sarcophagus, with glowing runes etched onto the surface, much in the style of the temple walls.
"This is it," Caleb whispered in an awed voice. "This is what made the Heart of Aether; this is where it all began."
Thoughts whirled in John's brain. The temple was not only a sanctuary, but it did feel like the very workshop in which this precious artifact was born. Whatever had been there, inside that sarcophagus, had to be from the origin of this artifact, the key to understanding the real nature of the Heart of Aether.
The ground shook once more, but this was even more intense, in the moments just prior to them rounding the corner. The whole of the temple was falling in on top of them, and John knew they didn't have much longer. They had to get to that chamber, had to know what secrets were held within it before the temple buried them alive.
"Let's go!" he roared as he pulled Caleb to the opening, through it. A rattling cascading form, they tumbled, onto the chamber floor. The temple kept on rattling. An electric charge seemed to fill the room with heavy, thick energy. John could feel a pulsation from the object in his hand, so strong now, almost as if it was leading him to the sarcophagus.
They were just reaching the structure as all the walls around them began to break down and splinter. John let out a long sigh and laid the Heart of Aether against the surface of the sarcophagus. The symbols on the surface blinked with a flare of light, outlining shapes that immediately vanished as the lid of the sarcophagus began to roll back.
Inside was a figure ancient and lifeless, but still resonating with great power. The dead hands of the figure clasped another artifact; it was an exact reflection of the Heart of Aether, save for one crucial detail. The second artifact was dark and extinguished, as if its power had drained away.
John and Caleb nearly had to strain their heads to see the figure before them. The creator of the Heart of Aether had captured its power hundreds of years ago. Then they grasped for the second artifact, a tremendous roar filled the chamber, and the temple walls truly began to break down.
"Run!" bellowed John to Caleb, seizing the second artifact, as his friend was nearly lifting him from the ground. They sprinted out of the temple, which crashed down, the very ground giving away beneath their feet. They barely made it out before the temple caved in completely—ancient structure disappearing into the earth.
Breathless and dirty, John and Caleb lay on the ground in front of the temple toward the sky of the night. Within John's hand lay the Heart of Aether, throbbing feebly with its energies combined with that of the second artifact.
"What now?" Caleb asked, his voice laden with tired, heavy uncertainty.
John stared at the two artifacts for a long moment. He knew that their finding only deepened the mystery. "These things," he said, some new determination in his voice, "we figure out what they really are. We finally find them and we figure out how to stop the Order before they unleash something even worse."
Both sprang to the realization of what they had found and began their way back along the trail to go home. The forest seemed darker than before and now was more sinister. They had gone down a path of finding ancient secrets buried for centuries and now they realized that what they were seeking would bring real danger.