John pulled out a lithium flashlight from his backpack, and its cold white light cut through the darkness, illuminating ancient gray stalactites hanging from the ceiling like frozen tears of giants. The narrow trail led deeper into the cave, where dampness gave way to dry, cold air smelling of dust and metal.
The walls, covered with cracks, seemed alive, their uneven edges whispering of centuries spent in silence. John cautiously ran a probe along narrow sections, quite passable for the slim, slender village residents, but clearly too small for such large people as he and Lewis, widening the passage, and the metallic scrape echoed in the silence of the galleries. Lewis, following behind, was silent, his breathing heavy, his gaze warily catching every shadow, as if expecting it to come alive at any moment.
Over time, the narrow trail turned into a spacious gallery, where each step echoed with a hum, and the air grew colder, seeping under their clothes. Lewis felt his skin prickle, not from the cold, but from the sense that they had intruded into a place not meant for the living.
More and more often, they found traces of the past along their path: extinguished fire pits surrounded by charred stones smelling of old smoke, and fragments of torches crumbling into dust at a touch.
These finds confirmed that the trail was not just a path but a ritual road, walked by generations before them. Lewis crouched by one of the fire pits, his fingers touching the cold ground, which held the faint imprint of someone's steps, long erased by time.
Among the moss and stones, Lewis noticed a fragment of a small sword, more like a long dagger, entirely covered with lichen, its wooden handle crumbling like dry clay, leaving only the blade in his hands.
He lifted it, feeling the cold of the metal, and saw strange patterns engraved on the surface—not like local ornaments, but rather something extraterrestrial, with smooth lines resembling diagrams.
He handed the find to John, whose fingers, accustomed to precise tools, gently touched the artifact.
"This is a very old thing," Lewis said, his voice hoarse from the dust floating in the air. "I wonder how many generations walked this trail."
"It seems this object was part of an ancient ritual or tradition," John replied, examining the item in the flashlight's beam, which reflected off the metal. "But one thing is clear to me—this path hasn't been used recently."
They exchanged glances, feeling the find added weight to their mission, and the darkness around thickened, as if watching them.
With each hour, the trail grew more challenging, and Lewis, though unusually silent, clearly felt their paths were crossing with something far more ancient and mysterious. A calm underground lake they encountered on their way, where they decided to spend the night, left a strange feeling in their souls.
On the second day of the journey, they continued moving, gradually passing more difficult sections. Narrow passages were carefully cleared and widened with tools, traces of which were still clearly visible under limestone deposits. However, places where they could have gotten lost were pre-protected: red markers, warning barriers, small bridges—all this indicated that this path had been used many times, and people took care to keep it in order.
After two days of travel, when their legs grew heavy and backpacks dug into their shoulders, they emerged from the gallery. Before them opened a valley, surrounded on all sides by dark mountain ridges, smelling of dampness and rotting grass, and dense forests, whose branches swayed in the wind like living things. In the distance rose low mountains of the third range, their peaks lost in gray mist. The air was humid, with a hint of earth, and the silence so deep that the friends' steps seemed sacrilegious. John and Lewis stopped, their breath forming clouds, a premonition flickering in their eyes. They set up camp in a small cave, where the cold stone under their sleeping bags smelled of minerals, and the wind outside howled, making them wrap up warmer in the extra blankets they had prudently brought along.
Closer to midnight, a downpour crashed onto the ground, furiously drumming on the stones, with wind tearing branches from trees. John lay awake, unsuccessfully trying to focus on an e-book he had brought for the journey, his heart pounding as if sensing trouble.
Lewis immediately began snoring nearby, but his sleep was restless, his face twitching as if he saw something tormenting in his dreams, which greatly alarmed John. In the darkness of the cave, where the flashlight cast trembling shadows, John felt his rational mind struggling with an inexplicable anxiety. This was not just a premonition—something inside him, like an alien will, took hold of him, pushing him forward. He clenched his fists, feeling the cold sweat on his palms, and realized: they must move, and move quickly.
In the morning, barely swallowing breakfast soaked with nighttime dampness, Lewis jumped up, his eyes burning with resolve.
John, feeling the same inexplicable pull, followed him. They moved faster than usual, their steps echoing loudly in the narrow passages.
Soon the trail led to a massive forty-meter cliff, its surface, polished by time, gleaming like obsidian. Lewis, without hesitation, as if knowing the way, turned left, where a staircase, carved with inhuman precision, was visible in the smooth stone. The steps were slippery, worn, but Lewis climbed without fear, his boots scraping the stone.
"We need to be careful," John said, his voice trembling with slight anxiety as he followed his friend, feeling the cold of the cliff seeping under his fingers.
Lewis was already standing on a platform, his silhouette a dark spot against the gray sky.
On the platform, they froze, stunned. The stone surfaces were too smooth, as if laser-processed, their edges gleaming, reflecting the faint light.
"This platform and galleries couldn't have been made by the village people," John said, his voice quiet, almost reverent, as he examined the walls, carved and polished by an unknown tool with such precision they resembled glass.
"We use laser processing in industry too, but this, Lewis… This could only have been created by those who were centuries, if not millennia, ahead of us."
At that moment, both realized that ahead of them awaited not just a trace of an ancient civilization. This was a civilization that left its marks not only in the stones but in the very structure of the world.
John froze, feeling the inner urge to solve the mystery pushing him forward again.
"We need to go," he said, addressing Lewis. "What we've found seems far more important than we thought."
Lewis said nothing, silently examining the work of the ancient builders.
"Are you sure you want to go further, Lewis? I do too. But that's exactly what worries me. Some force is pulling us, making us forget caution," his voice trembled, though he tried not to show his unease. "There, in the depths, there's something unknown to us and, it seems, very dangerous. No, Lewis, we're going back! We'll return with help and then…"
But his words were interrupted as if an alien will had taken hold of him, and this unexpected sensation grew stronger. John felt his body obediently responding to the external force, compelling him to move forward. His legs carried him deeper into the gallery, and though John tried to stop, his muscles wouldn't obey. Lewis had already gone far ahead, disappearing into the darkness.