The straps of my backpack pulled at my shoulder as I filled it with my new journal, some snacks, some rope, and a flashlight. I told my parents I was off to visit friends for the weekend, though I lied. I wanted to continue to explore the uncharted caves nearby. That is if I can sneak past Miss Hari. She’s really mean. I learned the hard way that if you want to go down in the caves, bring rope. Normally I’d be going with my friends, but Nate is grounded and Ferin is busy with her dad.

“Bye mom! I’ll see you in a little bit!” Mom is very pretty, Dad says that’s why he married her, though I think it's for a different reason.

One of my friends said men like big boobs. I feel bad for mom’s back.

She has very nice green eyes like me, though she doesn’t have any brown splotches on her fur. She has a creamy white to her, like frosting on a cake.

I was excited since I found a cave that had begun to go up. Most of the ones around here go deeper or lead to a dead end, maybe this one leads to an opening.

I want to join a delving team when I grow up; I hear they are super strong and fight humongous bugs. They're the ones who give most of the people here hope for a good future, since they are the ones who allowed Raligan to even exist.

My mom looked at me and brushed back a little tuft on my head. “Have a good day, sweetie. Don’t be out for too long, Gran is coming over for dinner.” I hadn’t seen Gran in a while, she lives in the middle ring and has a special leadership job in one of the sectors, she’s a seat representative. That means she gets to tell people what to do. Someday I want to be like her, but for the outer rim sectors, since we don’t have any say in the government.

“I’ll be back, you better cook up something yummy!” I quickly leave the house, I hear mom say goodbye once more before I shut the door, it creaks really loud. I wonder what’s for dinner tonight? I hope it's not the same old bronk fish we always eat, though I don't mind it, it gets old after a while. Maybe Gran will bring over some of her fancy middle ring foods? I always love the food she brings, though sometimes she brings too much—there’s only so much food in Raligan.

Walking around town is easy, we live in a smaller sector so there’s not too many people here. It's not as colorful as most places but is still somewhere to call home. We’re way out on the outer rim so the floors aren't fully paved and things aren’t fully developed here. The delvers never come here because they don’t believe It’ll hold any ‘fruit’. But I believe If I go up this natural tunnel I found, I’ll find something.

I know most of the people’s names here. We’re a small fishing sector so nothing much happens even though we have two guards. I've never seen them use their stilus before, apparently Miss Hari is really good. It seems like Miss Hari and her deputy are off duty right now, I don't see them at their posts at the exit.

I go through the exit and immediately take a right, there's a ‘NO ENTRY’ sign a bit ahead but of course, I will ignore it.

Any pavement around no longer continues as I pass the no entry sign and continue on. It’s quite a walk until the gate, the caves around here always smell musty because of the river. Unlike in town, it's harder to see here and there’s not much light. Though light sometimes gets annoying, It’s hard on the eyes.

 I'm pretty sure no one has gone through the thing for years until me and my friends tried to go. It took all three of us to open it the first time. The gate seems to be untouched from last time. Even though my friends aren't around, they taught me how to pick locks, so I think I can do it. The gate is rusty and old, it feels as if I even touch it, I’ll get tetanus.

I quietly stifle through my backpack and find the lockpicking tools they gave me. As I’m picking it, I hear some footsteps behind me, so I begin to rush myself. Just as the lock clicks open, I feel a chilling hand on my shoulder. I turn my head and see Miss Hari. She’s an older woman with gray hair and three horns.

“What do you think you are doing down here young lady?” Despite her sounding really angry, she’s kept a straight face. She’s super scary. It's fair, I’m not in a place I should be at, and it’s her job to stop me. Those horns look like they want to stab into my heart and carry me over a fire.

“I got lost? And I thought I got locked out of town?” It's an obvious lie. I know the town too much to lie about such a thing. She looks like she’s about to grab me by the scruff of my neck, but before she can even think about doing anything, my legs just start moving. I struggle through the gate as I try to force it open. Miss Hari opens it immediately with no effort at all. Though she’s old and slow, she’s still a guard.

Her feet are heavy and loud, who wears such loud boots? or maybe I just have good ears. I stumble over a few bumps asI run, This is almost fun. As I’m running with her following behind, I hear the slow collection of water. She’s using her stilus. I turn back to see as she collects an orb of water and begins extending It towards me, her arms moving in a fluidic movement. It's so cool. But because I gotta do this, I pick up a small stone and throw it at her. It plonks right on her head and she seems to lose conversation, though the water had to expand, so I got splashed with some icy cold water. Before Miss Hari can prepare herself again, I bolt around the corner and use my prior knowledge of my tunnels to escape.

“I'm one hundred percent gonna get an earful from dad if I’m caught by her. Then again, Probably gonna happen no matter what.” By the time I’m out of breath,  I find myself no longer in the line of sight of Miss Hari. I can hear the echo of her footsteps, she’s got heavy feet. Looking around, It’s dark, but I can just barely see. I wish the caves weren’t so dark. Makes me wonder how the original founders of Raligan.

Thinking about it, are there any other ‘Raligans’ out there, like more cities that we don’t know of? Where do the caves end? It doesn’t matter. I'm finally at the part where the cave goes up. Something about it makes it almost scary. It’s a little steep but nothing I can’t handle. The stones are sharp and a little damp, I wish I had gloves. From what I can see at all, it looks like it goes up forever.

After maybe an hour of climbing, I finally reached some kind of straight. No more climbing for me, maybe. Though I see something weird, a light? It's really bright and coming from the ceiling. The ceiling is really low here, I almost have to squat to be able to pass through. It's out of habit for me to try and stand, but I hit my head, though I’m tough.

The light is now right above me, it's nearly blinding. The more I look at it, the more blinding it gets. I have to blink a few times, my eyes can barely adjust to it. I must see what’s up there, I feel a relatively cool breeze coming from the gap and it's just large enough for me to climb up it. I scrape my arm while climbing up it, though it's not that bad. I have to see what’s up there, what’s causing this absurdly bright light? I never knew anything could be so bright.

As I climb up, it gets cooler and cooler. Eventually instead of stone, I'm climbing dirt, wet dirt. It's gonna be a pain to get out of my fur, but knowing what’s up here is worth it. I very much feel a cool breeze on my face as I get up, a soft, weird texture on my hands as I lift myself up out of the hole. I’m surrounded by greens and browns, The air smells bizarrely fresh for the caves. I feel a small cool breeze on me as I look about. The ceiling is a bright blue and is hard to look at, the place is lit up by a large gem embedded above me. I know what the green behemoths in front of me are, they’re trees. I read about them in a book, there’s only a specific place in Raglan where they grow.

How are there so many here? Why hasn’t anyone tried to venture out here and use this to the people’s advantage? I’ve got no clue. It feels like I'm in a completely different world, like the ones I read in all those story books. The wind is chilly but when It stops, the bright gem seems to be giving off heat. Walking around, the ground is really soft. Seems to be some kind of moss or plant, I like it.

I wonder how I'll map this place in my journal? I guess I should start now. I pull my backpack off only to realize it has a hole in it and everything probably fell out. Just my luck. I’m going to backtrack to find it, probably ripped at the hole I climbed up through. I begin to look for the hole I came up through, though I can’t find it. Everything in this place looks the same, There’s no set paths or tunnels, but open space. How would anyone ever find their way around such a place?

I’m not sure how long it's been, but I still can’t find it. I’ve looked in so many places and just can’t find it. Where am I? This place seems like it's larger than the core, and the core is massive. So where am I? I had no idea there was anything larger than the core. I climb up one of the trees and see that this place seems to span forever. I can’t even see the texture on the blue walls of this place, so they must be extremely far.

I wonder what mom and dad are doing, Miss Hari has probably reported that I went through there, so when I get back I’m going to be in huge trouble at first. But when I tell them about this place, they’re going to be amazed. I might even get a medal of Delvers.

After about another hour, I realize that the bright gem has moved. It used to be almost right above me, but now it's moved to the side of one of the walls. The opposite side has begun to get darker. I’ve never heard of anything like this before. I’ve heard myths of small moving gems, but one as large as this, never ever. I've never seen anything as bright or hot or round as this gem. At best there’s lightbulbs, but I doubt this was made by anyone, It's far too large.

After a little bit more time, the gem begins to vanish and go beneath the ground, the ceiling turns orange, then pink, then purple, and then black. What seems like millions of specks begin to appear on the ceiling of this massive cave. It's astonishing the ceiling can even hold up without support. Looking up at the beautiful sight, I notice another giant gem, or maybe stone? This one I can see the texture on, yet it appears to be hundreds of thousands of furlongs away. That thing alone must be the same size as Raligan, yet it looks so clear.

I hear several sounds from things that I don’t know what they are. I’m not sure what’s going on still, will that bright gem ever come up again? It’s impossible to tell. For now I’m going to wait because it seems like the ceiling is moving. But before I can watch it any more, I fall asleep.