Chapter 175: Foreign Identities

Late Morning - Mid Summer : Deep Ocean (West of Central Sirathian Mountains)

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Quickly moving around the structure to look at the symbols and find a way inside, I almost immediately found what looked like it could be an entrance facing the open ocean. -But how do I open it?-

Not wanting to break it, I swam up to the closed entrance and looked inside the material with my aura, but before I could find anything, a large platform started extending out of the building.

-Do I stand on this?- Setting myself down on the platform, I expected the building to sink or shake slightly, but it didn't budge. -I guess I'm underestimating whoever built this..-

As I idly thought to myself, a small black tube extended from the structure.

"ɨ̷̲̲ռ̷̲̲ֆ̷̲̲ɛ̷̲̲ʀ̷̲̲ȶ̷̲̲ ̷̲̲ʍ̷̲̲ǟ̷̲̲ռ̷̲̲ǟ̲." A somewhat robotic yet glitchy and distorted voice came from it, speaking a language that lacked a single strand of familiarity.

-Does it want me to touch it?- Reluctantly reaching up to it, I tapped my nail against it.

"ʟ̷̲̲օ̷̲̲ǟ̷̲̲ɖ̷̲̲ɨ̷̲̲ռ̷̲̲ɢ̷̲̲ ̷̲̲ʟ̷̲̲օ̷̲̲ƈ̷̲̲ǟ̷̲̲ʟ̷̲̲ ̷̲̲ʟ̷̲̲ǟ̷̲̲ռ̷̲̲ɢ̷̲̲ʊ̷̲̲ǟ̷̲̲ɢ̷̲̲ɛ̷̲̲ֆ̷̲̲." It spoke again before pausing for a moment.

-Oh sweet, that must have been what it wanted...-

"Ɨnɉɇȼŧ MȺnȺ." My ever-building excitement immediately halted after hearing the distorted voice again, this time speaking a language I could actually recognize. -The ancient draconic language?- It was an ancient dialect used by dragons before and during Ragnarok, back when dragons casually dominated the world.

To describe it quickly, it was a more noble, formal, and slightly convoluted dialect, similar to what people on earth thought dragons would talk.

"Ɨnɉɇȼŧ MȺnȺ." My thoughts were quickly cut off by the voice repeating itself.

-Right, I should probably do it before it does something else...- Trying not to overthink things too much, I injected mana into the sensor until it closed itself off and retracted back into the structure.

Before I knew it, a different yet all too familiar monotone voice radiated from within my head.

{"Authorities: -Unknown Error-

-Update Impossible-

-Attempting to Connect to Servers-

Unable to Connect: Low Power Mode Initiated: Please Fully Charge Batteries in Order to Attempt Long Range Reconnect

-Ignoring Remaining 'Non-Critical' Errors-

-Granting Temporary Authorities-

Authorities: Approved

Welcome to Laboratory 4856A"}

-This is a laboratory?! For what?!- I felt unusually deep anxiety quickly fill my stomach as the doors opened to reveal the large ship docking area.

There was a thick layer of salt buildup on the floor, but it was being cleaned up and pushed outside as I walked in.

Quickly scanning the room, I noticed several doors, each with unknown symbols above them, but one door was significantly taller than the rest and just so happened to be perfectly lined up with the entrance. 

As I got close and the door opened though, I finally realized it was still too small for my dragon form and had to create a bubble around myself. -I need to be extra careful with my humanoid form around this kind of water pressure...-

Once I finished transforming though, I quickly got distracted by a few changes. 

-Did all these changes really happen since I went underwater?- I looked to be a tad taller with the scales that used to be isolated on my back now visible on my arms and the base of my neck, but most noticeable of all, there were nubs of dragon horns poking through my hair right next to my wolf ears. -There's no way I just didn't notice those before, right?-

Although I found it a bit weird for them to pop up out of the blue, I decided not to question it just yet. -Those questions can be saved for later…-

Continuing into the building and walking through an extremely strong vacuum barrier, I came into a long and completely dry hallway with pure white walls and floors.

The hall was quite long but was also lined with doors I could open by tapping a half-working panel.

The inside of each room had dozens of glass cases showcasing anything from fossils to 'preserved' samples of now rotted flesh or eggs, but the most amazing thing of all, each case had a panel, some working, some not, with tons of text and information on them. 

Being able to immediately recognize the mathematics and chemical formulas among the information, I quickly figured out how to read the more scientific information, but that was still far from enough to actually learn the language or understand everything on the panels. -For now, I'll just memorize everything and sort through it later..-

Finally getting into a systematic rhythm of memorization, I started to pick up the pace moving through rooms, only sometimes taking extra time to look at certain specimens.

But it didn't take long for me to reach the last door.

-The final one, huh?- Lightly tapping the touch panel on the large double door a few times, I finally heard the quiet click of a lock before the doors opened to reveal a dark room.

The room was simply massive, spanning nearly 150 meters in every direction, and was packed full of scientific instruments and computer screens, but only a single one of them was actually lit. -To think a computer is still working when even their basic touch sensors for doors were faulty...-

Walking up to it, I noticed it displayed a slightly broken lock screen with several visible glitches. -As long as it works a little… Just maybe..-

Grabbing hold of a ball I assumed was the mouse, I quickly learned how to move around the cursor and click, but I was still at a loss for how to get past the lock screen.

-Maybe this scanner will do something..- Looking at a small, thumb-sized scanner, I noticed it looked similar to the one I saw outside and injected a bit of mana into it.

Almost immediately, the screen updated to show a window with thousands of little boxes, each showing a different, unrecognizable language. -Holy sh*t..-

Scrolling through the list to try and find something I could recognize, I quickly came across Ancient Draconic and selected it.

Almost instantly, the screen updated again with a small box appearing.

'Language Change Confirmation: Proceed - Return (10.. 9.. 8..)'

The phrasing was a bit odd since it was the old dialect, but the most important thing was that I could understand it.

I felt a deep and almost limitless excitement as I clicked 'Proceed' and was met with a desktop full of icons I could actually understand the names of, but it did not last long.

Almost immediately, countless errors popped up on the screen.

(display text)

'-Offline Mode Initiated-

-Current Emergencies: Low Charge: 0.07% - Security: Disabled - Life-Scans: Disabled - Server Connection: Disconnected'

Quickly realizing I likely had less time than I thought, I moved the warnings to the side and scrolled through the innumerable icons to find helpful information about this place, but only after digging through thousands of files related to research did I find a gold nugget.

'Translation Bank'

Opening it in a rush, I was met with a list of about 40 languages, each being the name of an ancient dialect from thousands of years ago, and immediately picked Ancient Draconic, the language I knew best among them. 

Inside that folder, I was met with a long document detailing how the ancient draconic language worked in the foreign language's terms.

In short, it was a translation dictionary. -I can actually learn the language!-

Almost immediately, my focus was ripped away from my surroundings and poured into learning the language. 

Before I knew it, several hours had passed and I had memorized the entire file.

-For such a complicated language.. it's really efficient...- The language contained an unreasonable amount of different words with 35 different base 'letters', yet somehow that complexity wasn't even slightly noticeable when reading or writing. Words each had their own concise meanings and although it made learning it more time-consuming, once everything was memorized, the beauty of the language came to light.

-To think a language that doesn't allow incorrect interpretation can exist..-