:: Random Location—Nexus to Nowhere ::

Nexus to Nowhere

by Wm Jay Carter III, 6/12/15

a bórean

Architecture: Barn/Silo

Nation: Bórean

Condition: Haunted, Maintained

Weather: Dry

Color: Glow in the Dark

Keyword: Nexus

You light a torch and hold it overhead as the cavern opens up before you. Stalagmites emerge from the darkness like tusks, strange curled lines flashing across their surfaces as your torchlight passes. As if sensing your presence, the stalagmites begin to glow and pulsate, finally bursting with light as the strange curled lines crisscross the walls of the cavern in knotted patterns.
Dousing your torch, you observe—in the light of the strange lines—that a large neat pile of grains lies swept together in the center of the floor. Against one wall leans a large square shovel and a straw broom. Just then, a gyrating wisp of light materializes above the pile of grain. A small echoing voice speaks out of the wisp: “Hello. My name is Dai. Have you come to feed me?”

The folktales of the humans living near Bórea Caverns tell of a cave in the Shallow Depths where a beggar child died of hunger many years ago, her last meal only a handful of dry grain. The girl’s body was never found—she simply vanished—thus earning the haunted place the name “Nexus to Nowhere.” While a bit dramatic, the name is nevertheless accurate. The folktale, on the other hand, is a bit embellished.

Over the centuries, as the bóreans dug deeper and deeper into the earth, they would sometimes find virgin caves that simply existed with no entry or exit (until they had dug one, of course). Inside one such air-pocket in the otherwise solid rock were strangely carved stalagmites that lit up with a ghostly glow when a group of bóreans approached. One brave bórean named Dai touched the light and then simply ceased to exist. Becoming wiser from the spectacle, the others left, never to have dealings with the place again. Well, all but one, anyway.

When the humans discovered the place they began experimenting with the cave, and learning what they could from the voice inside the wisp of light. The voice identified itself as Dai, the foolish bórean that had become trapped. Dai explained that what had happened was all an accident, and that there really was nothing anyone could do.

Thinking the story a clever fairy trick, the humans settled on their own version of things that had nothing to do with the truth. When the tale about the starving child came about, people began delving into the caves to offer handfuls of grain as an appeasement to the poor child’s soul.

Every now and then, one of Dai’s friends will return to the cave to chat, tidy up the mess the humans have made, and have a good laugh at all the things the village folk do for no good reason.

The true nature of the Nexus to Nowhere has yet to be truly fathomed...