It was the kind of day where everything felt quiet, yet heavy with unspoken thoughts. The rain had started sometime in the afternoon, a slow drizzle that painted the streets silver and turned the skies to ash.
She sat on the floor of her room, knees tucked to her chest, thumbing through the pages of the book she had found only days before. It was strange—how it had appeared in her attic, bound in black leather and filled with the story of a world beneath her own. A story of monsters. Of war. Of a child who fell.
Many pages were missing. Torn, ripped out, or perhaps never written. But the gaps only deepened her curiosity.
That evening, she met up with her friends at the corner store like usual. Laughter echoed as they passed around snacks and traded jokes, but she mostly listened. She smiled when they looked at her, nodded when spoken to, but said little. They were used to it. Her quiet was not silence—it was her presence.
One of them, Leo, nudged her with an elbow. "You look like you've been dreaming with your eyes open."
She shook her head, her gaze drifting to the edge of the horizon where the mountain loomed in the distance.
Mount Ebott.
Later that night, long after everyone had gone home, she sat up in bed, restless. Something tugged at her thoughts. She glanced at the clock—just past midnight—then slipped from the sheets and crept to the window. The rain hadn't stopped. Still, she pulled on her coat and stepped outside into the cold.
She wandered through the trees beyond her backyard, boots sinking slightly into the wet earth. After a while, she reached the overlook—the place where you could see the mountain clearly on a cloudless day. Now, the shape of it loomed like a shadow behind the mist, ancient and silent. She stared for what felt like hours, rain soaking into her hair, her coat, her skin. And in that moment, the decision was made.
She had to go.
She didn't sleep. The next morning, she woke from a shallow nap before the sun had even risen. She moved quickly, quietly. A light pack with food, water, a flashlight, her scarf, and the book.
No one else was awake. She left through the back door, the soft creak of hinges the only witness to her departure.
The journey took most of the day. She crossed familiar roads that turned unfamiliar, winding through forests and climbing narrow hills. The closer she got, the more the world seemed to hold its breath. Trees grew older. The air colder.
And then—Mount Ebott.
It rose like a cathedral of stone, clouds swirling around its peak. The air buzzed with something she couldn't name.
At the base, she found the entrance. It was smaller than she expected, half-hidden by vines and broken stones. An old well, they used to say. A pit into the past.
She stepped forward.
And froze.
A man stood there.
He wore a long black robe that swept the earth, the hood casting his face in shadow. No eyes. No mouth. Just a hollow darkness beneath the hood.
He raised a hand as if to stop her. "You should not go down there."
His voice wasn't loud, but it carried. Deep, like it echoed from beneath the ground itself.
"You seek answers. I can see it in you. But the Underground is not a place for curiosity. It is a place of memory. Of mistakes."
She didn't move. Only stared, clutching the book tighter against her chest.
The man tilted his head slightly, as if trying to read her without eyes.
"You've read part of the story. But stories... they lie, sometimes. Or leave out the parts too painful to remember."
He turned and walked past her, the hem of his robe whispering against the stones.
"But if you insist on learning the truth," he said, pausing at the edge of the path, "then come. I'll tell you the tale. Not the one in your book. The real one. The one that began long ago... with a child who fell."
She followed.
And the mountain swallowed them whole.