The moment Darian entered the house, he found only Vane still there, who signaled him not to make any loud noise. "They both went to sleep downstairs," he said. Darian looked at the stairs that would lead down to the floor below, then sat down next to Vane, breathing heavily.
"Did you discover something important with Rusty?" asked Vane, worried about what they saw before.
Darian shook his head and lay down on the bed. Snowy, not expecting that, lost his balance from Darian's shoulder and fell on the bed. "Sadly no… but I feel like there is actually a lot more going on than we think."
Vane looked confused. "What do you mean?"
Darian remained silent for a moment, thinking of the best words he could say. "Rusty understood that the person killing the ones in the video was a human."
"And we think they might still be around somewhere… even if none of us was able to understand who it might be," added Darian. Hearing this, Vane felt a bit shocked. "You're sure that this video is 500 years old?" asked Vane.
Darian without hesitation nodded his head while looking at the ceiling. "The video was created right after the Earth crashed against the planet; we're 100% sure of it." Hearing Darian's answer, Vane lay down on the bed next to Darian, too.
"It doesn't make any sense… how can a human live this long?" said Vane as he looked at the ceiling too. Between him and Darian, Snowy curled up and closed his eyes.
"We couldn't find any solution…" said Darian while gritting his teeth. "And that tower is destroyed too; we can't search for anything inside of it anymore."
"But we took everything from there, right?" asked Vane.
"What we could… but I feel like because we arrived over 500 years later, we've lost too many things," said Darian while looking at the ceiling with empty eyes. 'I want to discover what happened, yeah…' thought Darian in his mind. He wanted to do everything possible to find some answers to what happened to Earth, but everything was feeling too strange for him; he didn't even know if the things he had discovered were enough.
'And if in my room in Therya I'll not be able to find anything? Then from where am I supposed to start?' While Darian was lost in his thoughts, Vane suddenly got up from the bed. "But wouldn't that make things too easy?" he asked. Darian slowly moved his face and looked at Vane, confused.
"It's not a matter of simplicity or difficulty… it's just that we don't have an actual starting point," said Darian while sitting on the bed again.
"But we've found enough things there, right? I don't see any reason why that wouldn't be enough. Rusty was already able to tell us a lot of stuff, and he is going to study the white feather too, isn't he?" Hearing these words, Darian felt more reassured. Even if he knew that Vane didn't know anything about experiments and stuff like that, Darian realized that Vane wasn't saying anything wrong.
As he started to walk towards the stairs that would lead him to the floor below, he stopped right before them and spoke again. "Think about it, Darian. You've already been able to discover a lot of things, even from what you told us of your past… so I'm sure that even if you don't have an actual path, you'll be able to create one." With that, Vane went down to the floor below so he could sleep too.
By now the sun had already set and darkness had taken over everything. Darian remained still on the bed looking up at the ceiling until Rusty entered the house. "I was waiting for Vane to go away." Darian, who was lost in his thoughts, returned to reality. "What is it, Rusty?" he asked.
"Is it alright if I keep the white feather for you like I'm doing with the black one?" asked the robot.
Darian without any hesitation nodded his head. "By the way… has the black feather activated again like last time?"
Rusty shook his head. "Sadly no; the feather has remained the same as it was." Hearing that, Darian began to think about the possibility of when the feather might activate.
His eyes suddenly met Snowy's while thinking. 'Let's see… if hypothetically it was activated 500 years ago during the attack at the tower…' Darian began thinking of the last frame of the video, when the black feather was falling down.
"Rusty, do you remember if the feather in the video was activated like last time?"
Rusty analyzed the video again and answered after a few seconds, "The feather seems to have a different color than the one it has right now; it looks more black." Hearing that, Darian felt like he was able to understand something important. "Then maybe the feather activates only when a sort of power activates?" suggested Darian.
"It is possible. No human is able to throw a human's body at that speed like the mysterious killer did in the video," answered Rusty.
"You think it was magic like the same one humanity has right now?" asked Darian.
"I'll analyze it tomorrow. You're leaving the next morning, right?"
"Exactly. If you discover something… let me know with the phone, please." With that, Rusty waved at Darian and headed outside so he could charge himself. After that, Darian lay back on the bed looking at the ceiling with Snowy curled up on his body.
While Darian began to pat Snowy, he remained lost in his thoughts. 'Let's think… if we understood correctly, in that tower they were able to discover the magic…' said Darian while he thought about the letters they found in the tower.
'And they said that someone was attacking them after the Earth crashed against that black planet…' Darian, wondering about what was actually written in the letters, grabbed one from his backpack. There he read this line: "It felt like he used that for years," written on the last letter.
Darian put the letter back in the backpack and lay back again on the bed. 'If what they told us is true, and not just their superstition, it means that this creature with the black wings has been able to use magic even before humanity discovered it… Then what if it attacked the tower because he didn't want the magic to arrive to humanity?' thought Darian as he looked at his arm.
'Then why don't I have it? Is it because it was spreading while I wasn't there?' thought Darian. He slowly moved his hand over Snowy's body to pet him again.
'But if he really didn't want for the magic to spread between humanity… why didn't he arrive early? I'm sure that the studies started a lot of time before the attack that happened in the tower… then why did he arrive only after the magic already spread between humanity? Was he doing something else? I'm sure he's definitely related to the creature of the white wing project… but if that has got white wings, why the hell are his black?' Darian's mind was exploding with theories. As he kept thinking about this thing, he slowly closed his eyes and drifted to sleep.
The following day, early in the morning, the group was already ready to reach the mainland. Lily and Liro were feeling definitely better; it felt like they had accepted their role as the people who would discover the truth and were feeling less scared.
Vane as always was feeling extremely tired and could barely stand on his feet. He looked at Snowy, who was still sleeping on Darian's shoulder, with envy in his eyes.
Darian was checking if he had everything inside his backpack. "So, as I've told you, I've left the letters on my desk. Can you check them too?" Darian knew that if Rusty could create some hypotheses, they would be able to reach the truth faster.
"I've understood, Master. Did you take the phone too?" Rusty knew that if something really important happened he immediately had to contact him. Darian searched in his pocket for a moment before grabbing the phone in his hands. "I've got it, don't worry, Rusty."
"Perfect. Because you need to reach the water, I suggest you to stay alert with that phone; it isn't resistant to water." Rusty remembered that Darian had landed on water, even if it wasn't really deep, this phone couldn't resist water, so even a little inside of it and it would get broken.
"Don't worry, Rusty, I'll pay attention." While Darian spoke, Rusty looked behind at his companions and then moved his eyes again towards Darian as if saying 'keep an eye on them.' The others, understanding that, laughed softly.
"Still, contact me only if you discover something really important or if something extremely bad happens at the base." With that, Darian left the phone inside his pocket, then Rusty spoke again with his metallic voice.
"Don't worry, Master. I'll write to you immediately… now I guess I'm going to look again at the video to realize if I can understand something really important." With that, Darian and the others waved back at Rusty until they finally reached the mainland after some hours of walking.
Darian and Liro were standing in the front, while Lily and Vane remained behind. The moment they reached the mainland, they chose a small spot between them so that the Krukins wouldn't spot them.
"Well Darian, we've never gone the other way… I guess you need to guide us," said Liro referring to both him and Vane. In all their expeditions they only went in the direction of the black planet, never on the other side.
Lily didn't speak, in fact, she walked away and began to watch a small flower that was next to them, even if she could get spotted by the Krukins.
"Hey, I've seen it in Yalemba too!" Lily spoke with a tone so loud that one of the Krukspies nearby heard her. The enemy started to slide on the ground, thinking the humans hadn't spotted him yet.
Darian and the others behind noticed the Krukin and immediately called to Lily, "Attention!" The moment Darian spoke, all the Krukins nearby heard his voice and started to rush towards them. It wasn't a dangerous situation, especially because there were only Krukspies around.
While the other Krukspies were reaching the group, the one that had already spotted them had thrown himself towards Lily with his horn pointed towards her. Without even looking, a root rose from the ground and started to smash the Krukspy until his body completely exploded. Some of the black blood landed on Lily's face. She, without caring about the Krukins coming towards her, had a small, creepy look on her face.
"Don't worry… I'm just looking at the flowers." With that, the other Krukspies reached the others and the fight started.
It was now night. The group had found a small cave to shelter themselves. The few city ruins they found were completely crowded with Krukins, so they couldn't find a place to sleep there; they decided to pick a safe cave nearby.
"I'm sure the direction is only one… but do you know when we'll arrive at the rocket?" asked Liro, worried that they might get lost.
"Don't worry, I clearly remember the path that I took around two months ago." Darian spoke with a reassuring tone. Lily next to him had multiple flowers that she had gathered in the wild before.
"Mhmm, the smell is totally different… it feels more natural, I don't know how to explain it," said Lily as she couldn't stop smelling the flowers in her hands. "I guess it is because the ones in Yalemba were created with magic… but hey, whenever someone took them out of the ground, did they die immediately?" asked Darian.
"Yes, but as long as they have a small portion of earth with them, they will not disappear and will remain there…" As Lily started to speak, she remembered the flowers in Yalemba, and now that they were completely destroyed because of the Krukins. 'Don't worry… I promise I haven't forgotten about our revenge, Yalemba…' thought Lily. Suddenly she snapped back to reality because a vibration arrived from Darian's body.
"It's Rusty!" Darian grabbed the phone in his hands. Everyone gathered around him and started to peek at his phone to see what text Rusty sent them.
'Take a look at these pictures of the video, Master.' Rusty had sent some pictures that were taken directly from the video they had seen yesterday. It was the moment when the body was thrown behind the one recording. When they looked at the video, it was impossible to tell because of the low light, but thanks to Rusty's help, everyone could see clearly what was on the human's body: a black crystal.
Everyone recognized it immediately, it was the same one they had found in the room at the top. It had the same color. "Hey, that's the crystal!" immediately called out Vane; everyone remembered them clearly.
"Maybe the mysterious assassin can use these crystals?" suggested Lily. Everyone agreed with her.
Darian answered Rusty: 'Remember when we told you about that last room in the tower? These crystals are the same that we found there. At first we didn't give them much weight, but we think they're the same.' Darian pressed send and the text arrived immediately to Rusty.
'Do they look the same?' asked Rusty. The others checked the pictures again, trying to find an answer.
"It's actually impossible to tell…" whispered Darian while trying to look at that picture. The others next to him tried to do the same, but from this picture, the similarities were the same.
'Actually it's impossible to tell, Rusty. Can't you try to make the picture look better?' Darian knew that it was extremely hard, especially because Rusty had already made it look ten times better. 'I'll try,' answered Rusty. Reading that, Darian turned off the phone and put it back in his pocket.
"If these were the same crystals… it means that the assassin could use magic?" asked Liro.
"I thought about it too… but remember how many there were in the last room?" asked Darian. In everyone's mind, the memory of when they entered that black room for the first time was playing again.
"If he uses them to fight… maybe he was going against the creature inside the cage?" whispered Darian. "But they were too many… you've seen how many crystals were on the person's body; they were extremely small and could barely be seen. I'm sure the human didn't have over three of them," called out Liro.
"Then if he had used them to fight… who was he going against…" said Vane. For the whole night everyone remained with this thought in their minds.