Fragments of a Broken World: The Lost City [Complete]

Episode 1 - In My Mind; I was Reborn

A book written by: Fernando Daniel Acevedo

I don't remember who I was, I don't even know my name. It's time to write, to make my own diary, not only in case someone finds me dead, but also for myself.

My mind is starting to betray me. I only remember that I had nothing to lose, so I decided to go to no man's land in search of absolutely nothing. I just wanted to disappear from the eternal torment that I carried with me. I followed a path guided only by a hunch from an unreliable source.

In the middle of the desert, there I was, with a long-ragged overcoat, a staff with a skull and two feathers tied to it, and a handmade backpack containing several bottles of water and enough food for a month if rationed properly.

I had to get there, I had to find something. At first, all I saw was sand, weathered wood buried in it, and the sky, which as I moved forward, became darker and denser due to pollution. At night, there was only darkness, with no stars to guide me.

I witnessed a sandstorm in the shape of a sphere, which explained the greenish color. Could this be what I was looking for? I covered my face with everything I had and decided to venture into its depths.

It was so dark and empty that it felt like being trapped in a dream. Any sane person passing by would turn around and go back the way they came. But I was not a sane person. Being in that darkness made me realize how empty I was inside, how lonely I was on the outside, and how I could be dead if I wasn't careful. I could end up just like the many skeletons covered in sand that could be found in these lands. There were many skulls and bones of those condemned by long-forgotten wars that had taken place in this place that "no one" would ever step foot in again.

These details were enough to make anyone run or panic, but fortunately, I wasn't that kind of person. After all, fortune favors the brave, right?

At times, I wondered:

Why did these people fight? Was this place always like this? What did they gain by ruling this territory? Is there a human power at play, or is it something paranormal? Was there an entity responsible for starting it all? Is there something that could explain all of this? Something that could give meaning to war? A deity perhaps?

These and other related questions repeated in my mind again and again. At first, I thought I wouldn't find anything, that it was just pollution, and that I would die here, keeping company with these wretches. But at the same time, the atmosphere became increasingly terrifying. It was a sign, I knew it.

What I noticed was that the wind in this area always blew in one direction, and that was where I came from, as if something was trying to push me in a certain direction. With a map and a compass in hand, I knew there was something, an explanation, a reason. I had nothing to lose, so all I wanted to gain were answers. I walked and walked, avoided sand and dust storms, and eventually found a cold and humid cave, the warmest thing to be found in a place like this.

There were fewer and fewer insects, fewer and fewer corpses and weaponry from another era, worn and corroded by time, and even vehicles that were nothing but rusted metal, making it very difficult to know what they had been in their heyday. But instead of giving me a profound disillusionment, it gave me a macabre hope, something was here. It was impossible that they had fought a battle during the fog, maybe, just maybe, they fought before the storm appeared.

I had too much water and food for just one person, and with enough will, I managed to survive. I advanced for several days, always looking for the best path, and after losing track of the time I spent in those sandstorms, my vision became clearer, or rather, not pleasant. The sky was still green, but now I could see beyond a meter away, which was saying something.

Upon being welcomed by the clarity, I found an abandoned tower, the door was pierced where the handle should have been, so it was not difficult to enter and climb up to the top on a spiral staircase while holding onto the walls of the tower made of what was possibly marble.

Although, to tell the truth, I don't think I ever saw a snail, but I somehow know that's what circular stairs are called.

When I reached the top of the tower, I saw a wall in the distance, behind those walls, a few houses and tall buildings could be seen, in the center, there was a large temple with a column that almost touched the sky.

I didn't know exactly what was there, but maybe it was what the rumors said. I didn't think they were true in these weather conditions worthy of a natural anomaly, but apparently, just maybe, there had been a prosperous life in these lands after all.

What happened in this place?

The tower I was in now was possibly a watchtower of some civilization, very well built for being something improvised.

There was an column in the center of a dome above a kind of castle or mansion... or something like that, as I wrote before, I lean more towards it being a temple, it fits the descriptions I saw in some books I used to have.

It seemed like an abandoned city, lost from the eyes of the rest of the world, but I had to enter to find out more, maybe there was something interesting.

The closer I got, the more surprising it was, definitely the map was not accurate in proportions even though it helped me get here.

I decided to walk along the walls, and thanks to some things I noted in my diary, I calculated how big the city could be approximately with my steps, the walls were approximately 241 km², assuming that all parts of the wall were proportionally sized. But these are just estimates, maybe more, maybe less.

I still couldn't believe that I would come across a city like this inside that toxic cloud that was surrounded by sandstorms in a round shape and with an almost uniform appearance as if it were a portal to another dimension, like the ones I read about in stories.

Once I arrived at the entrance of the city that managed to resist all erosion from the environment, I managed to enter.

I don't know how many days passed, but I had arrived and still had some supplies.

While I didn't have any goal to come here, no memory that gave me faith except for my knowledge of mathematics, literature, and a bit of agriculture in case of finding fertile land. Everything was about finding "something". Something that gave me a reason to clear my mind, to not lose my head, and to be focused on something I find pleasing.

Exploring that city will be my goal from now on.

Here I am under the entrance of the wall writing in my diary, jotting down everything I remember, because as I said before, my mind betrays me, it distorts more and more.

It's curious, I barely remember anything before entering that darkness that I crossed to get here. The only thing I'm sure of is that everything would change, and when I entered this mysterious entrance that welcomed the city, I felt like I had been reborn.

Because now I had a reason to live.