Tuesday, May 15, 1990 (cont'd.)
The path up the side of Kappa Mountain led up a series of rocky switchbacks zigzagging back and forth. The sun was visible for the first part of the climb, arcing towards its zenith, but once I entered the layer of clouds surrounding the mountain it vanished. Around the same time, the rocky terrain abruptly became grassy, but the same sort of overgrown, unkempt grass down on the plains below. The humid air clung to me, and water beaded on every blade of grass bordering the path. Not that I could see far beyond the path anyway, with the thick fog surrounding me on all sides. I could see the faint outlines of trees several yards from the path, but nothing more.
And once again, the world was silent. Well, mostly silent. Occasionally I heard a sound like a twig snapping from within the fog, and the hairs on the back of my neck would stand up. But whatever had made the noises never revealed itself.
Suddenly, the path cut a sharp turn to the left around the shores of a lake. At least I assumed it was a lake. The fog was a bit lighter there, but I still couldn't see enough of the body of water to know it wasn't a river.
Whatever it was, though, the water was musty and stagnant. Sickly green pond scum had clumped all over the surface, and tall weeds poked through the surface. And stranger still, farther into the water were a number of shattered columns, their jagged remains drifting in and out of sight behind wisps of fog. I couldn't be sure, but it looked like their surfaces were covered in various runes or glyphs. I felt like there was something pulling me towards them, some invisible force. Maybe it was just my curiosity trying to override my common sense. But either way, there was no way I was setting foot in that water if it could at all be avoided. So I followed the path to the left.
As it turned out, the body of water was, in fact, a lake, as the path curved around its western shore. More broken columns were visible from the side of the lake, but none of them any closer to the shore or more visible.
On the other side of the lake, the path continued through the trees, which slowly thinned out again. It wasn't much longer before the path reemerged above the clouds and continued cutting back and forth up the rocky mountainside.
…Or, rather, I thought it wasn't much longer. Because when I could see the sun again, it was almost touching the western horizon.
When I'd entered the clouds, it wasn't even midday yet. And there was no way, there was no way, I'd spent more than an hour in that fog. The sun couldn't possibly have gotten so low in that time.
And yet, somehow, it clearly had.
The path snaked through several more switchbacks before coming to an abrupt end a few hundred feet below the top of the mountain. And drilled into the mountainside above the end of the path was a rusted metal ladder that looked like it led the rest of the way to the mountaintop. It looked rickety, but with no other way up, I didn't really have a choice.
Fortunately, a few creaks and groans from the ladder were the most precarious parts of the climb. A few minutes later, as the last rays of sunlight shone over Dinosaur Land, I reached the mountain's flat top. At the center of it was a large circular building made of golden bricks, with a clear glass dome atop it. The ground surrounding it was made of cracked grey stones, with green and brown weeds sprouting through them, and congealed black puddles surrounding some of the larger fractures.
I walked towards the building. I didn't see a way in on this side, so I walked around the back. Nothing there either, or on the sides.
But then when I made my way back to the front, there was a large wooden door in the wall, where there sure as hell hadn't been one before. And carved into the door were a bunch of garbled letters:
RLP JSHJSH DKERGS, RCHB ED EVA QYY, TB ICQZCM KD XSP QAJIDEWWJ KFLFZGEYD HDC PFXOO, ULZ RORC XSPWN JMGPG OM SFC CSL IITGPCRNP AWW PLDH W DIH DQWLX MCSWRLD WCJEIC. CSWB XSPWN LEXPG, SMVESM KLI, LYR NCQPXPAP. EYO WB RLP DKERGS TG UMYC RCWJ, QLJ UKB LLGS ICVNJ CJ WSFC GKSP. QZF PFI QZFOYOPY CJC WSLZH QYCPZU QLZH BKLI.
I had no idea what any of that was supposed to mean, but it was more than a little unsettling. It seemed like it might've been written in some sort of code, but I couldn't tell how I was supposed to decipher it. I reached for the rusty iron door handle and pulled on it. The door squealed open.
Inside was a pitch-black hall; only its first several feet were illuminated by the light shining in from outside. The grey stone floor matched the ground outside the building, and the walls were of similar design. I took a wary step across the threshold.
Suddenly, with an echoing whuff, rows of flickering yellow torches flared to life down either side of the hall, leading away into the gloom. I lightened the pressure I was placing on the door to keep it open, and it immediately started to swing closed. I knew if I let go of it, it would shut on me. But on the other hand, I couldn't advance any farther holding it open. And maybe this was the first castle on my quest. It didn't exactly look like any other castle I'd come across in the past, but this wasn't the Mushroom Kingdom either. Maybe this was some preexisting structure that Bowser had commandeered to serve as a castle.
I sighed and let the door shut behind me, then set off down the hall.
Several minutes later, I was still walking, even though I had managed to circle the perimeter of the building in less than two minutes. And the entire time I'd been walking down it, the hall had been continuing straight, not curving or descending down into Kappa Mountain or anything.
In short, there was no way it could possibly have fit inside the building.
And that was when I noticed the names carved into the walls.
At least I think they were names, one on each brick.
"ARCTURA," one read.
Then "RIGÉLE."
"LUBBA."
"VEGARA."
"POLARI."
A faint, whispering sound seemed to come from behind me. I turned around, but there was nothing there. I tried to convince myself it was just the wind, but even I didn't believe that. This had sounded like a voice, just barely loud enough to be heard but not loud enough for me to clearly make it out. I looked back at the names. Could they have been written in a code, like that message on the door?
Either way, this place was starting to feel more like a tomb than a castle.
But after that, it was only another minute or two before the hall ended in a circular chamber. More torches lined its perimeter, and in the center of the room was a yellow button, several feet wide, with an "!" on it. It looked like those new blocks I'd seen in the level at the foot of the mountain. Seeing nothing else to do in the room, I ran over to the button and leapt on it.
The button collapsed into the floor, which sealed behind it. As it did, a low, ambient vwaaaaash sound emanated throughout the floor before fading away. Then a section of stone in the far wall retracted, revealing an exit. Surprised that there was no boss fight awaiting me, I walked towards it and passed through it, back to the mountaintop outside the building.
I turned to look behind me, and as I did, the building started to sink into the mountaintop. At the same time, though, the dome on top of it faded away, and a giant yellow flame blazed to life where it had been. I stepped backwards, not wanting to get hit by any debris that might fall off the building. In less than a minute, it had retracted into the mountain so that the flame, sitting level with the rest of the ground, was the only sign that it had ever been there.
By now it was almost completely dark out, but the flame cast sufficient light to illuminate my surroundings. But then I saw a second light flare in the distance, off to the east. I turned towards it. It was a dim yellow glow, the same color as the flame next to me, but if my sense of distance was accurate, it was coming from far beyond the shores of the island I was currently on. In fact, it seemed like it was in the middle of the ocean, just to the north of Choco Island.
But I wasn't able to study it for long, because after a few seconds the glow faded away again. And as it disappeared, a deep boom rang out from somewhere in that direction, like a bell tolling. Only it was loud enough that I could hear it as though it were right next to me. The note rang only once, and then all was silent again except for the crackling golden fire.
I decided I'd spend the night atop the mountain. The fire would keep me warm and hopefully keep any potential predators away, and I didn't really want to climb back down that rickety ladder in the pitch-black of night. Or revisit the foggy forest halfway up the mountain, for that matter.
But as I settled down to go to sleep, my thoughts kept wandering back to the names on the walls inside the building, and that light off to the east. And wondering if jumping on that button in the castle had been a mistake.