Robert gave me a Linking book for when I make up my mind, I shall take it with me and figure out what to do.

Sophie said a team is going up to the surface through the tunnels if I was still interested in returning home.

I leave in 2 hours, not sure if I’ll get to return to D’ni again, we shall see.

Ran into a guy called Butch in the Uru Obsession Neighbourhood, he said that the cavern is set to close in about 60 days. Sophie said this has happened before, she snuck back in with her friends so I asked if that is possible. Butch said that explorers kept their books last time, not sure if that will happen and suggested I hide it.

Sophie hadn’t heard the news, seems to have caused a bit of a panic. I told her I was heading to the surface to hide my book away for a while, she had asked me to hold off a few days. She wants to arrange a trip to an Age she has been working on with her friends.

Was a really nice place.

Found a couple of the pages there, and more cloths and a door like Tsogahl. Spent a while wandering around, enjoying the scenery before I started getting cold.

Decided to check out the Watcher Sanctuary next, found a lot of books there, a couple of Age books downstairs and a DRC book, which I need to go back and read over. Upstairs was a case with 5 books on it, in side were lines of text, D’ni version of haiku’s maybe?

Picked up an Er’cana book.

After I had been wandering for a while, I visited another hood, had a few people in, Kl’aamas, Dakro and Jeff Lewis. Chatted to Dakro for a while, he told me there were more books in Ae’gura, in the museum and library. I asked him about the Linking Stones, he said they were made by the Bahro and sent me this picture.

I was shocked to Yeesha still seemingly alive after all this time, but that was nothing compared to the creature in the image, it was one of the demons in my dreams. How can I dream about something that I have yet to see?

Maybe I did see it, maybe I glimpsed an image whilst I was researching, maybe its a side effect from hopping to other Ages, guess it could be a common thing, will need to ask around about that.

Sophie has granted me access to her hood, she said to drop by if I ever need help.

The first book I decided to use had a red cover and depicted an orange landscape, according to my KI it is called Eder Gira. The place looks pretty barren, cracked mud beneath my feet, some plant life but not a lot, pretty warm here too.
The area is studded with geothermic vents which have what looks like a lid system on them. One of the journey cloths was up on the cliff wall and a vent below, so I figured the vents will need to be used to get up there.
Spent about 20 minutes fooling around with them, realized when I closed all the ones bar the one I want to use I can get to the area I want. One of the vents lead to a back area to the Age lots of giant bones and waterfalls.

Behind the waterfalls were a series of caves, seems a couple of the geothermic vents were converted into lighting units, decided to turn them on despite being able to see alright. Tunnel led off into what seems to be another cave, couldn’t see a thing in there though, stumbled around until I walked into another lighting unit. Turning it on revealed a door which lead to an area at the top of the waterfalls.

Looking over the edge I noticed another one of those strange stones, decided I would check out the new book I found before heading to see if Sophie could tell me anything about the stones.

Eder Kemo it is called, it reminds me a lot of Tsogahl, hadn’t been there long before the skies opened up and thunder followed. Finished up the sketch I was working on quickly and left to go and see Sophie.

It was a long walk, pretty tired, managed to map it out nicely though in a journal I stole from the hood.

Josh explained to me that the 4 hydrants contain “The Journey”. A journey from Yeesha to teach us about D’ni and the fall, he mentioned that when the journey is completed passage to The Cleft is returned.

I can’t help but feel like Yeesha is holding us hostage.

I need to spend some time in the house finishing the next set of paintings to send to the gallery, will have time to take this journey after.

Now, it’s time for nap as my feet are killing me.

Realized that I can get home via the tunnels leading from D’ni to The Cleft, just need to find someone who has been that way.

Opened the hydrants (as I have taken to calling them) to find new books in there, one of them I recognized as the place I got my “KI” from.

I recalled seeing some books in my “Hood” too, so I decided to stop by and see where they lead too. As I arrived I decided to check the information boards to see what was new when I saw this;

I decided to check out the site, it seems to be a collection of journal entries from people exploring D’ni so I decided to add my own journal/blog to the collection.

I wandered over the bridge towards the book room, something grabbed my attention down below. It was another one of those pages, attached to the side of one of the windows couldn’t quite see what it depicted though, I guess I will find out when I return to Relto.

In the book room I found something curious, it seemed to be a Linking Book only it was constructed of cloth and stone.

I didn’t want to use it, not sure if it was safe to use but then why would it be there otherwise?

Instead I decided to use the book that was in the middle of the three behind the “Nexus” book. It took me to a wonderful sunny place in a bowl of rock. Long flowing grass, blue skies, autumn and green trees, it was beautiful, my KI indicated my location to be in a place called Eder Tsogahl.
Embedded in the rock was this big metal door with a spiral symbol upon it, near by I found a cloth like the ones at the cleft only blue with the same spiral symbol found on the door behind me. I touched the cloth and the spiral lit up, but it also lit up on the door, only partially. I played around hunting for more cloths and seeing if the door would open if I touched them all unfortunately it didn’t might have to ask one of the seasoned explorers about that.

I did however find yet another page which seemed to depict long grass.

I decided to venture into another hood and see if they had the same books after my trip to Tsogahl. Linked to a hood which according to the Nexus only had a single person in, was surprised to find it was Sophie the lady who had helped me with my KI previously. We chatted for a bit she said she’s been in D’ni for several years now, I mentioned about the lack of a book to The Cleft and she said she could help, she had been along the tunnels and so had her friends so she could get one of them to take me through, we went to her hood to find it busy lots of equipment around and computers. She told me her group works from the hood and let me use one of the computers whilst she went to speak to her friends. Which incidentally is where I am posting this from, seems they have a way to access the internet from here which isn’t to surprising as I recall reading about the DRC doing something similar.

Time to go, she has found someone to take me going to see if I can steal one of their journal books so I can map the route for further use.

I decided to pass talking to Zandi for a moment and head over to the sign at the entrance to the area surrounding The Cleft, thinking that the likelihood of a cloth being on the sign was pretty high, sure enough there was one on the back.
I returned to Jeff to speak to him, he mentioned the “riven remnants” I was curious if this had any relationship to Riven that the Book of Atrus talks about.

The only place they could be is the only place I have yet to explore (aside from inside the volcano itself, which according to the Book of Atrus contains an entrance to a series of tunnels that lead to D’ni) behind the volcano. As I walked in that direction I saw fragments of something metal sticking out of the ground, investigation revealed no cloths, but it did reveal another one of those strange pages. This one had a different symbol on of birds which did the same slight glowing act again. I dropped the page when I noticed the huge bones of a creature I wasn’t sure I recognized, especially given the location. I walked over to inspect and found the final cloth, now the entire hand was lighting up, it was time to try that tree again.

I returned to The Cleft and headed down to the tree, pressing the symbol on the stone caused it to glow and it slid down revealing a ladder leading underground. I descended into a small cave like space, a glowing symbol of blue on the wall that matched the one in my Relto hut and book, a symbol of Yeesha’s? The cave was full of strange chittering noises and what sounded like running around, I headed in deeper to find a pedestal of rock above a pool, on the walls around it more glowing symbols one of which I recognized as being The Cleft. I think I will need to bring a notebook or journal with me in future so I can make notes of these symbols.
I walked over to the pedestal to find another one of those pages on it, I picked it up and it began to glow, then there was a frightful screaming sound and I found myself back on Relto.

Only Relto had changed, the single totem with The Cleft book had gone and now there were 4 totem bases, and there was an island with a bridge leading to it. On the island there was the same symbol as one of the pages and above I heard the screech of birds, and I realized, the strange pages actually add things depicted on them to Relto, how is that even possible? Of course I say that and I have been traveling to different planets through books, it will take me a long time to get used to the incredible things that surround me.

A problem arises though, if the book to The Cleft has gone, how do I get home?

I took Jools with me to Relto the other day to show her that it was all real. Was nice wandering around with her soaking in the sights. I asked her if she would like to join me regularly but she wasn’t sure, will need to find out how to get a Relto book for her if she decides to. Bumped into a few explorers whilst we were traveling around, sheer knowledge these guys hold you can tell they have been down here a while. One explorer, who was talking about the imager technology, told me about pulling photos off of my KI and onto a computer. I guess she saw me struggling with this device and took pity, even now I am still trying to get used to it.

Spent some time reading up a little more on the D’ni history, ordered the Books of Ti’ana, Atrus and D’ni. So far I have only read through the Book of Atrus, I started the Book of Ti’ana this morning.

Today I visited The Cleft again, only I explored it thoroughly and bumped into Jeff Zandi who told me about a message waiting for me and journeys. Something I did find that was interesting was this page on the ground, it had a strange looking green symbol upon it that glowed briefly, I figured it had been left there for a reason so placed it back where I had found it and moved on to looking in The Cleft for this message.

Was considerably cooler at in the shadow of The Cleft at the bottom of the ladder, was kind of nice. I could see wooden bridges and a pool of water with ledges and rooms carved from the stone. Everywhere I looked there is this intricate pattern carved into the rock, framing windows and wooden doors which in themselves are carved.

I passed over one of the bridges which promptly gave way under my feet causing me to fall. I managed to land in a soft area which was lucky, looking at the ends of the bridge it looks as if this bridge has broken before but hastily repaired, it wasn’t the only bridge that had broken.
Using the one bridge as a ladder I climbed up onto the ledge to see a strange looking cloth attached to the wall in one of the rooms, it had a spiral hand symbol on which when I touched it began to partially glow for a few seconds. From what I could tell it looks like it progresses so that the entire hand glows, thus I assumed there were more cloths of that nature around.

Another bedroom was next to the room with the cloth, inside was a letter from Atrus, the Atrus, to his daughter Yeesha, talking about people returning to D’ni. Over the page someone (I am assuming Yeesha) had scrawled writing over the page “I will use them to bring me the least” and “now his burden is mine” along with some other things.

Across the span of The Cleft was a room that looked like a workshop, diagrams decorated the wall along with a circle divided into quarters, within each quarter was a symbol which seemed to relate to a strange looking device opposite. The button on the device didn’t work, seems like the power needed to be turned on so I looked around for the means to do so. I found it in the kitchen, a lever unlocked a pole which from my guess went up through the rock to the windmill so I returned to the surface to get the windmill turning.

Back down in The Cleft I decided to check out the final room, a storeroom and next to it I found a bucket which had another cloth on it, I was correct in my assertion that there were more cloths around. I touched the cloth and like the other one the hand symbol lit up for a few seconds but more of the hand was glowing this time. At this point I noticed the tree, it had what appeared to be a slab of stone embedded in it, upon the stone was the same spiral hand symbol found on the cloths, I brushed my fingers against it to see what it did but it did nothing, perhaps the 7 cloths unlock its mechanism? I headed back to the device in the workshop and put in the symbols I found on the wall and pressed the button.
Immediately a figure appeared, it was a hologram projection device. The figure spoke of water, of pride, of death and of D’ni, she said she was Yeesha, I was looking at the daughter of Atrus.

As she spoke I watched and listened, 7 she said, 7 cloths in each Age. I had found 2 (well 3 including the one that appeared during her speech) I need to find the others, Zandi would know where they were. I closed the door to the workshop experimenting with the doors wondering if the one in the kitchen would open after all this time. The workshop door closed fine so I tried the kitchen one, it opened allowing me quick access across the span.