...they were setting off individually, or in groups. Falling away from the body of countless colony, the place of their birth, to undergo deadly test. None thought to turn back, it was not a formal initiation, prosaic fossil of the past, but a necessary and highly respected tradition in society of Moduli...
...initiation, a series of trials, which every Modulus has to cope with, before he was allowed to become part of the architectural world - the fulfillment of dreams of harmony and divine division...
...test required to pass through unimaginable worlds. Nobody of the Moduli matrix did not know what was to come...
...when the time was coming, it was happening only during the second interval of one long cycle, acolites were detaching from colony and following to the Gate...
...enormous breakthrough in space, the entrance to the maze was more than 1000 units north of the nucleus of the bunch. I, modulus 132x12866y78z, departed there on the 186 cycle of my life, as so many before me...
...took the test earlier, but I waited until now. I tore myself away from my neighbors and I joined the largest group floating within my reach...
...stunning speed caused incredible emotions. Challenges laying ahead, were something that every future citizen of a society dreamed of. Society based on cooperation and the creation of new values, while respecting the old...
...before us was extending a huge Portal, inside was the tangle of torned spaces and perspectives. We knew, that when we break through the protective field around it, it will begin to attract us and become a gateway to chaos. There will be no turning back from a trip to morphological hell, denying every regularity...
...we find ourselves in front of the mouth of the dead god, understood that many will not be able to get to the other side... first victioms... vestibule of faith...
...slowly, one by one, my companions submerged into the darkness that seemed to advanced from all sides...
...suddenly the Gate closed behind us and I felt that I begin to rotate in the huge vortex... centrifugal force was to strong... colllied with a group of my brothers... still accelerating... huge pressure of thousands of atmospheres pushing from all sides... we were trapped in monstrous throat, which was the forecast of the upcoming travel. We were caught by this place and have lost the ability to create oneness...
...time stopped and I stopped to feel anything...
...vast plain... covered with fumes and dominated by flowing shapes that were created from others, having no beginning and no end...
... started to move toward two spheres giving a mysterious glow, unable to orient myself in the surrounding environment...
...everything suddenly started to adapt to my movements. Bending under my weight, floor carrying loads between its levels, that writhed and undulated, leading me in a certain direction...
...shapes divided before me, fog was pushing toward the heart of this strange place...
...small creatures running somewhere on the border of sight, but never came out from the shadows. Something began to change...
...my presence in this world was something alien and repulsive, revolting. Here me, modular creation, was perceived as something chaotic and abnormal... outdated and anachronistic...
...tried to kill me, rip to shreds and incarnate to its bulk. Monster partly familiar, but existing in an alien manner, irrational and grotesque... defined by hundreds of minds, but united in one... freak polluting world, spreading its effluents in habitation zones of other beings. I understood what was locked in this maze, somewhere in the bowels of the rotten world... I started to run...
...thought of the Great Architect lived here, but somewhere deep, hidden beneath the accretions of ages...
...I began to feel unity with this strange environment, which changing, tried to hide my presence before the eyes of a predator...
...order in chaos, chaos in order, everything was constantly shifting... corruption and decay became common enemy...
...diving into the ocean primordial life... went down to the bottom and emerged on the other side... beach, where stretched panorama of many horizons...
...followed by the sky, so I had to travel quickly through the wilderness of this strange land...
...from the slopes of the nearby hills overhanging something like a huge, bloated body of monstrous, cripppled creature. I knew I should stay away from such places, but something drew me there. I understood that there I can find answers to your questions...
...higher and higher, approaching skeleton of the leviathan, coated with remains of once-living matter...
...wandering through the belly of a giant, I realized that it is build of millions of small creatures, just like our colony, one body with many cells...
...one was still alive. To my surprise, it started to move and attack its dead neighbors. After a while, exhausted, it stopped moving and collapsed into dust. I realized that this was the cause of death of this so perfect, complex body. The arrogance toward those with whom we form one. The false belief that you belong only to yourself, not paying attention to those, with which we are connected...
...walking to the light I found myslef rapidly in the shadow zone...
...realized after a long time. From the earth to the sky rose a gigantic construction. Obstacle absorbing entire horizon. Smooth and solid, unable to climb or bypass...
...by the base, a hill eligible to climb. I walked closer...
...it was not a hill...
...barrow, build from the bodies of my dead brothers, Moduli. Above, in the wall the was a single hole, a passage...
...round and too small for normal Modulus to fit. I realized the reason for their failure...
...what to do? How to get to the other side? It cannot happen, not to me!
...I climbed up the bodies of those who came before me. I saw myself in them, guided through all the troubles by the promise of belonging to the elected, those who could make changes...
...what to do...
...what...
...
...I know!
