Chapter Text
Deep beneath the surface of the cold northern sea, among rough rocks, wispy sand, and long strands of plant life, an odd structure rested at odds with its surroundings. Most of its contents had eroded over thousands of years, but the shell remained, a series of connected boxes with smooth walls meeting at perfect right angles. These boxes opened into each other, but the only entrance from outside was a gaping, jagged hole at the top; occasionally sea life would swim inside, seeking shelter.
Within the box mostly exposed by this opening, a cylindrical object rolled between opposite walls with the waxing and waning current, caught in the eddies. It was a hardy little object that had survived far worse than rolling back and forth across the empty floor, but nonetheless, it too gradually wore down under the unabating weight of time. Components rusted away, and cracks formed in its metal exterior.
Finally, its incessant tumbling split open one of the cracks and part of it fell loose, spilling a black heptagonal bit out onto the floor with it. The cylinder was foreign to the resting place it had been dropped into, and would erode into nearly nothing over the next few hundred years. But the heptagonal bit would remain far, far longer in this lost and forgotten corner of the world, the place where it belonged, joining the others like it with their rotted wrap of leather.
It had been on quite the adventure since it had been taken from this very room, by a white dragon who had repeatedly braved the depths despite the additional torments inflicted upon him by the crushing pressure. It had since seen the rise of a powerful clan of dragon hunters, only for its leader to finally crack its deepest secrets and be disillusioned of his beliefs and very way of life. Alongside him, it had helped answer the questions of a motivated individual who used that knowledge to bring an entire species to the brink of extinction. It had been an enigma for a young entrepreneur, and part of the journey of a young pair of dragons searching for their place in the world.
Now it was returned, joining many of its long-lost brethren, though they did not hold much of note. The black bit was special. Now, however, it was as the others, only a curiously shaped stone at the bottom of the sea.
It would never spill its secrets again. But with what it contained within… what stories it could tell…