Beyond the North

Despair

A week passed. They walked and walked, and the further they walked, the more city ruins they encountered. However, the more they found, the more destroyed they became. Occasionally, they also came across some strange machines—some with huge pipes, others resembling cars, but they couldn't identify the type. When they searched, they rarely found resources, and most of them were already past their expiration date.

 With time, something strange happened—the mountains began to disappear, and the terrain became increasingly flat. Soon, they found themselves in a completely flat area, with no mountains in sight.

— "Rejto... are you sure we're going in the right direction?" Tel asked anxiously.

— "Yeah... we didn't change direction even when the terrain got tough," Rejto replied.

The young man sighed, but suddenly felt something hitting his head. When he turned around, rain started pouring, but something was off—the sky was clear, and the clouds were farther away than they should be.

— "Every day is a different surprise," Cynna commented.

They continued, but the rain didn't stop; on the contrary, it got stronger. Still, there was no sign of clouds other than the ones coming from the North. They decided to stop and camp, still confused, but they didn't want to risk catching any diseases.

— "Two weeks," Rejto said. "We have supplies for two weeks."

The other two looked at each other with concern, but the young Asian continued, "Anyway... let's stop thinking only about the future."

Tel and Cynna woke up; it seemed like morning. They looked around and noticed that the rain had stopped, but... Rejto wasn't there. They searched more carefully, thinking they were hallucinating, but they only found the dictionary and the map, which was turned the wrong way. They began to panic, realizing that even their backpacks and belongings were there, so they rushed out of the tent and looked in all directions.

— "Rejto!" the girl exclaimed.

They then looked in one direction and noticed a silhouette standing a little way from where they were. They looked more closely and fortunately, it didn't seem to be a soldier, so they ran towards whoever it was...

Luckily, they found Rejto standing there, looking at something. They felt relieved.

— "Rejto... what the hell are you doing!?"

— "This..."

They arrived, but soon they were startled. Cynna almost slipped, but they were confronted with not one, but dozens and dozens of enormous craters extending beyond what they could see, along with them, more and more ruins of a city. They were shocked, not knowing what to feel about it.

— "Let's... let's keep going..."

The other two noticed that Rejto seemed unwell, but despite insisting that he rest, he only said that resources were running out, so they couldn't stop. They packed their things and continued, but decided to detour around the city, and finally, the previously flat terrain returned to being hilly. But something was wrong again; they started finding clothes and weapons scattered around, but they tried not to think too much about it.

Two days passed, and among the towering mountains, they finally found something... far away, they observed through the monocular and saw something resembling a base. They were startled and decided to go around it, but as they passed by, they heard a noise—a familiar nois

—and when they looked, they saw a train.

The train then stopped at that base and remained there. Upon closer inspection, the base seemed strange—several antennas were positioned in a field-sized radius, but what confused them even more were the guards, who wore uniforms completely different from those in the box. They observed the train, and on it, they saw the letters "HAARP" engraved on one side.