338. The Puzzle and the Mysterious Script

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The discovery of the hidden chamber sent shockwaves throughout the entire Ruins of Alph Park. Word spread quickly. People began abandoning their tasks and gathering outside the stone chamber, craning their necks to catch a glimpse inside, eager to see what secrets lay hidden within.

With the crowd swelling, Foster quickly stepped in. To avoid a potential stampede and to protect the integrity of the site. He ordered the security line to move back, keeping onlookers at a safe distance. Only after that did he and Kai step together into the newly revealed chamber.

It was even darker than the rooms outside, yet, at first glance, just as empty. Nothing about it seemed different until they reached the back wall.

There, carved into the stone, was a large mural engraved onto a slab.

The etchings were remarkably clear, but something about them felt… off. The stone had been cut into nine separate square pieces and scrambled, like a jigsaw puzzle tossed carelessly into place. As it was, the image made no sense.

Foster stepped closer, narrowing his eyes in thought. Then, his face lit up with recognition.

"This is a puzzle an actual stone puzzle!"

Kai nodded. He'd seen this before in games, sure but here it was, right in front of him in real life.

In today's world, puzzles are just a form of entertainment or mental exercise. But in ancient times, this would've been considered a sophisticated mechanism, possibly even a kind of test or safeguard.

Seeing it here reassured Kai. He'd worried that all this effort would lead nowhere, but this… this felt like progress. It was something real. Something left behind on purpose.

Foster pulled on a pair of gloves and tried moving the pieces. Since the slabs couldn't be removed, he had to slide them around within the wall like a classic tile puzzle.

Luckily, most researchers had a knack for logic. With a few thoughtful movements, Foster managed to reassemble the image.

Once completed, the picture became clear it was a Kabuto.

"A Kabuto fossil?" Foster murmured in surprise. "Huh… I guess that makes sense."

In ancient times, Kabuto would've been a common Pokémon using its image as decoration wouldn't have been unusual at all.

Still… was that it?

Just a simple fossil image?

But before he could say anything, the puzzle emitted a faint glow. A moment later, a string of glowing symbols appeared above the picture lines of text, written in an eerie script.

The characters looked like letters, vaguely resembling the English alphabet but each one had a distinctive eye-like circle at its center, giving them a strange, uncanny quality.

Foster gasped. "That's… Unown script!"

Kai played along, feigning surprise. "Unown script?"

"Exactly!" Foster nodded. "It's an ancient language we've found scattered across ruins all over the world. It's believed to be the precursor to modern writing and some theorize it evolved directly from a Pokémon species."

"Can you read it?"

"Give me a moment." Foster fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a reference booklet, quickly flipping through the pages and comparing characters.

After about ten minutes of decoding, he scribbled the translation into his notebook and read it aloud:

'We, the tribe, leave our words here.'

Just one sentence. Ten simple words. But everyone in the chamber looked at each other in confusion.

"…What's that supposed to mean?" Foster asked, scratching his head.

Kai shrugged, unwilling to give away too much. "Probably just a ceremonial phrase. A kind of blessing or offering, maybe."

When no further changes occurred, Foster tapped and prodded the mural, clearly hoping for more. But nothing happened.

"Hold on," Kai said, holding up the radio. "That was just one puzzle. There have to be more."

"More rooms?" Foster looked stunned. "Wait… you knew there would be others? And how did you even come up with the idea to use a radio?"

Kai smiled vaguely. "Call it a hunch. Let's head out we've got more ground to cover."

Foster was burning with questions, but he could tell Kai wasn't about to answer them. So he kept his curiosity to himself and followed the group out.

Once outside, Kai turned the radio back on. Though the signal they'd just decoded had vanished, faint whispers of other signals could still be heard from different directions.

It confirmed what Kai suspected: the first hidden chamber wasn't the only one.

Working together, they got into a rhythm Kai roamed with the radio, following the signals, while Foster organized excavation teams to dig out the chambers as they were discovered.

Their efforts paid off. One after another, they uncovered three more hidden rooms.

Inside, they found more scrambled stone puzzles. One featured an Aerodactyl, another an Omastar. But it was the final chamber that stopped everyone in their tracks.

On the wall was a mural of Ho-Oh.

The researchers audibly gasped.

"Ho-Oh?!" Foster whispered in disbelief. "That must be the Pokémon we heard in the radio transmission the bird cry… it had to be Ho-Oh!"

Kai thought so too. The melody they'd heard earlier did have an almost mythical quality to it. But since he'd never actually heard Ho-Oh's cry in person, he couldn't be sure.

Each puzzle they completed brought with it a short cryptic sentence, just like before. But after the third one, something changed.

The radio fell silent.

No matter where they went or what frequency they tuned to, all they could hear was the dull hiss of static.

The mysterious broadcast had ended.

"What now?" Foster asked, visibly anxious. Everything that had happened today had been the most extraordinary event since his arrival at the Ruins. He needed to know what came next.

Kai frowned, deep in thought.

In the games, this entire sequence was just a scripted cutscene a minor event. But this was the real world. The rules were different. And right now… he had no idea what to expect.

His gaze swept across the positions of the four hidden chambers they'd discovered.

And then… it clicked.

Mentally connecting the four points, he traced their paths like a puzzle until he found the center point where all four intersected.

Without a word, Kai sprinted across the ruin and stopped at what looked like an unremarkable slab of stone.

He stomped on it.

Thud, thud.

The echo was hollow.

There was something beneath them.

Foster was stunned. He'd passed that spot dozens of times never once had that slab been there.

It must have appeared after they activated all four chambers.

Energized, Foster waved for the team to move in. With careful effort, they pried the slab open.

Beneath it… was a pitch-black chamber, hidden deep below the ruins.

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