Chapter 1

Richard was walking carefully through the excavation site, which was supposed to eventually become a cinema, with the constructions starting in about nine days. The archaeological team he was a part of, was spread throughout the future construction site, looking for anything of interest. They weren't expecting anything outstanding here, but everything was a possible valuable insight into the past, the older the better, obviously. Up to now there hadn't been anything that exciting yet, only some broken plates from the 1950s, hardly worth noticing.

Richard kneeled down, touching a row of bricks with his hand, inspecting them closer. Those were most likely from an building that was destroyed in the Second World WarMaybe it's worth looking here he thought by himself while grabbing a small shovel. While he started to dig carefully, he asked himself what he should do at this evening: Should he sit alone at home once more or go and visit a Bar for exchange? While the Bar would, beyond a doubt, bring him among other people, he wasn't really comfortable in places like these. Sadly he couldn't think about what else to do to catch the attention of a woman. Huh, maybe it simply has to happen. He thought by himself, when a noise caught his attention, it sounded like his shovel hit something wooden.

Looks like I got something here, lLet's hope it's not just some rubble. Were his thoughts while he kneeled down to the ground, and he carefully started to remove the dirt around the piece of wood he had hit with his shovel. The piece of wood turned out to bee a small box, which was luckily mostly undamaged. It seemed to be nothing special, through the decay of the centuries he could still see a carving. He took a small brush and cleaned it from the remaining dirt. As he lifted up to move it to a small table on one side of the excavation site, the lid suddenly sprang up on it's own with a small 'click', as the lock seemed to unlock itself. "Now that's strange,." he muttered to himself, while he wondered if the lock was simply broken.

In the box was a chain with a pendant in the shape of an eagle, made out of an material, thatwhich looked like silver.

"Looks like we finally got something good. You're quite the beauty,." he said to the pendant. "I wonder who you belonged to"

Now having a closer look at the carving on the now cleaned lid. Looks like a king… where have I seen this before? He wondered while inspecting the bearded man with crown and plate armour, who could barely made out on the lid. Some details had sadly been destroyed forever by decay. He bowed over the box until his nose almost touched the lid and started inspecting it closely. Looks like letters here, most likely Llatin considering that it comes from early middle ages most likely. "O-T-T-O-I-M..." he spelled out loudly as it slowly dawned on him.

"Oh no, that can't be!" he exclaimed, almost laughing. If his suspicion was correct, then this wasn't only old, but very valuable as well.

"Now forto some closer inspection." he said, putting on a pair of gloves and he tried to lift it carefully so he could have a closer touching it he felt a jolt like he had just touched an electric fence. For a moment his memories of the past week passed by before his eyes. He was unable to let go for a moment before he finally could drop the object it back into the box.

"What the hell was that?" he asked himself, with a strange feeling creeping up his back. First the lock had broken conveniently just when he lifted the box and now this. Something just had to be wrong with this strange pendant.

Feeling spooked now, Richard closed the box again, not caring if it could ever be opened again. I should get it back to base, there should be proper equipment and a safer environment for it there,. he thought while storing the box carefully before he made his way to the car.