In but a few moments, Ninna understood exactly why Theodore had suddenly begun to feel a little smug. The chatterbox in her head was endearing and lovable, for sure, but she also spoke without pause, constantly!
On the bright side, the more people that Faavi had contact to, the less conversational load each individual would have to be responsible for. Still, coming into contact with her for the first time, Ninna was a prime target for much of the Armament Spirit's focus. As a result, she was soon buried underneath a towering mountain of queries and topics.
The only ways out were to either be relatively harsh with her and end the dialogue, or to wait for the initial fervour and excitement to calm down, and for the chat to fizzle out naturally on its own.
'You did that on purpose, didn't you?'
Sending Theodore a private message, her tone was somewhat accusatory and pouty, but mostly just amused. Very quickly, though, his response made her shoot him a playfully annoyed glare.
'As husband and wife, aren't we supposed to share our joys and sorrows?'
His smile widening, Theodore decided that he had teased her enough for now, and returned to the second question that she had asked him earlier.
"Now, regarding why this World Shard is so important to me... that's a bit hard to explain Just like your own situation, there are some things that I cannot put into words, as doing so would be too dangerous for us all."
Switching from a serious tone to a more relaxed and calm one, he continued.
"To put it simply, there are some things about my own past that I do not fully understand yet. I have an unknown connection to Faavi, and she originates from ruins extremely similar to the ones that I've seen on this World Shard. Therefore, I would like to investigate it. Perhaps, I'll find more information, or sense something."
Having presented the gist of it, he looked at Ninna as raised an eyebrow and grew contemplative for a few seconds. Then, she gave him a solemn nod.
"Got it. Let's keep an eye out."
She definitely hadn't expected for the renowned Winter Saint's early years to be shrouded in a layer of mystery, as nothing even remotely pointing in that direction was public knowledge. Her family had no idea about anything like this either! But clearly, her man wasn't joking, so the matter had evidently been very well hidden. To the point where even he himself was none the wiser about many details.
'I wonder if that's a good or a bad thing. For both our sakes, I hope that it's not the latter.'
Arriving at the area that Theodore had previously taken note of, the two of them spread out their perception, scrutinizing the surroundings in their totality. It was a crumbling, decaying metropolis that had weathered countless ages, all of its past splendour gone and vanished, with but traces of it remaining here and there. Murals and engravings, illegible remnants of writing, as well as almost entirely destroyed statues could be found all over the place.
Comparing it to the underground ruin that he had mysteriously 'stumbled across' in the first round, they definitely shared the same style of architecture. This time, however, instead of being a subsurface creation, the city here clearly had always been intended to be located above ground.
Unfortunately, just like back then, he still couldn't tell which family or force this place had a connection to, as he couldn't recognize or decipher any discoveries that he made. Whether it be the parts of symbols that had withstood the endless erosion, or any letters that had miraculously remained whole, none rang any bell at all.
He wasn't the only one who felt this way–Ninna did as well. Having gone through extensive education and knowing about some secrets that even the Winter Family was not aware of, she was utterly stumped!
Admittedly, neither of them was a professional archaeologist, but their knowledge was staggeringly expansive! To encounter the ruins of a civilization that had evidently been powerful enough to be taken note of, but was utterly unknown to their families, was an event so rare that it could be counted on the fingers of a single hand.
Not one body or skeleton could be found, no matter how hard they searched. Heck, they quite literally inspected every single speck of dust, coming to the conclusion that the beings who had once lived here had not died and turned to actual dust in this place. Instead, judging by their complete absence, it was highly likely that they had been relocated somewhere else, abandoning the city in the process.
'But were they kidnapped by someone much stronger than them against their will, or were their own higher-ups looking out for the populace and protecting them from danger?'
For the time being, Theodore couldn't decide on which one of the two options was the more probable one–or even if the real answer was truly amongst them.
'It's a shame that there really is just... nothing here. Maybe there once were some interesting items, but either time or people passing by have long since caused them to disappear. I didn't sense anything unusual at all, and neither did Faavi...'
This outcome, while unfortunate, was completely in line with his expectations. In fact, there had been one particular discovery that had given him some more leads–and now was the time to follow up on them.
"Next, let's go underground. Which one of these tunnels do you think we should follow first?"
Having no particular preference for any of them and his instincts staying more silent than he was comfortable with, he left it to Ninna to decide.
Underneath the metropolis, there was a whole network of passageways, intricately interwoven and extending far beyond where their perception could reach. The landmass itself, however, did make probing deeper considerably more difficult. Due to its nature of originally having been an extremely powerful world, their senses were being dulled significantly once they tried to extend them down into the depths of the earth, even if only for a relatively short distance.
"Hmm... then, this one. I've got a good feeling about it."
Choosing a tunnel starting near the city centre, the two arrived at its entrance and followed it without hesitation. The pitch-darkness didn't bother them whatsoever, as they could still make out every single nook and cranny around them.
The corridors were never-ending, branching off and connecting countless times. They had walked right into a carefully designed labyrinth whose exact structure they had no conception of. At some point in the past, there had clearly been waymarkers and signs on the walls, but they had almost entirely been worn away by time.
As a result, the duo could do naught but blindly explore, following their gut feeling and mapping everything that they could perceive as they went along.
-----
Meanwhile, another one of Theodore's bodies was teamed up with Vigdis and Sarasvain. He would have ideally wanted to give them some space, but for now, he needed to be on top of every potential find.
Right after forming a group, the three had plotted out the entirety of the crater that they had started off in, confirming once and for all that Theodore's initial assessment had indeed been correct: It was a gigantic handprint, resulting from some sort of palm strike.
Regrettably, they were unable to figure out what or who exactly had been either suppressed or annihilated here, as there was simply absolutely nothing remaining of whatever the attacker had been aiming at.
"Mr. Sarasvain, when did you first come across this World Shard? And do you know anything about its origins or potential secrets?"
As the trio was distancing itself from the already explored depression and keeping an eye out for something else of note–of course going in a direction that none of the other five groups had chosen–Theodore made a few inquiries.
"I don't recall the exact time, but it was shortly after I helped to found the Sarasvain Federation. Back then, I was drifting off deep into the Lesser True Void without a goal in mind, and was woken up after directly colliding with this chunk."
Unbothered by revealing such an 'embarrassing' fact, the Undying President deeply contemplated for a while, before finally shaking his head.
"I initially felt some interest for this place, but it soon dwindled. No matter how long and hard I searched, I just didn't come across anything of particular importance. I'm sure you've spied the tunnels already, but I could never be bothered to painstakingly explore them. So I'm sorry, I really don't know much other than the general geography."
Neither disappointed nor happy, Theodore simply shrugged. It had never been likely that Sarasvain would know this World Shard like the back of his hand, but it had at least been worth a shot to ask him about it.
'It's high time I get around to upgrading my Lesser Void Scouting Array Disks. In an effort to evade detection early on, I gave Vigi a version that only rather gently probes for the presence of any World's Wills nearby. Dead lands like this one couldn't get picked up at all! Who knows how many more of these behemoths are floating around out there? Well, probably hardly any, but I should still make some new Compound Array Disks that can find them.'
Deciding to set aside one body and allocate it to this task for a short time once he got back to Pytho, he shelved the matter for now. Then, not long later, he discovered something that attracted his attention.
"Come, let's explore that deep fissure over there!"
Splitting a vast mountain range in half, a dark rift cut through the landscape. With his perception relatively unhindered, he could extend it inside and tell that it went deep enough to reach many layers of the subterranean labyrinth.
Deciding to make this place yet another entry point to the underground part of this World Shard, he led Sarasvain and Vigdis into the depths.
-----
The Theodore with Xie Mei plus a few guards and maids had come across another crater–but this one wasn't the result of a powerful expert's attack. Instead, it seemed to have been naturally formed, and even been put to use by the native civilization.
They had built another one of their superterranean population centres here, this one being much smaller than the one which he had combed through with Ninna. Judged based upon the various building ruins that he could see, it also appeared to have a lower percentage of residential structures.
Naturally, he couldn't be fully sure about this inference of his, but based on the general layout, he supposed that the majority of this city had once either been filled with factories, or some sort of research stations.
That aside, there was what could only be described as an enormous arena down at the very deepest, centremost point of the crater. It could also have been a stage of some sort, of course, but nearly all civilizations following the path of cultivation were in dire need of designated sparring locations for their people, as well as training fields.
The latter of these could be found at regular intervals, therefore it was only logical to assume that this notable location had indeed been an arena in the past.
Eventually, after nothing else was found, Theodore led his group into the local set of tunnels. In his mind, the 'World Shard map'–especially below the ground–was still largely blank, but as his bodies strode further and further, it began to get populated by a network of pathways.
While three of the groups had embarked on a journey through the endless labyrinth, the other three remained above the ground. But considering how many layers of pathways and corridors there were down below, it was only a matter of time before they would finish the surface's exploration. Then, they would join the others in their much more challenging task.
Which group–if any–would finally stumble across the true secret of this place, however, that was still impossible to tell. Heck, in the worst case scenario, Theodore wouldn't even get any answers here at all!