Part 11: The Channelwood Age and the Final Puzzle
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Entry 48
Arriving Where I Left... Again
I didn't even lose consciousness this time. I must be getting used to linking.
Still can't bring myself to keep my eyes open though... or stay standing, for that matter.
The arrival point looked exactly like the rocket back on Myst from the inside, sans sliders and active link porthole.
I figured that my experience with the mechanical age had taught me something: this was a lie. I backed up.
Sure enough.
The area was completely barren, like the earth had been charred.
There was nothing but the howling of the wind,
and a thick blanket of fog obscured my vision into the distance.
Except... is that a...
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Entry 49
The Sound Lock Door
I found a large yellow door in the side of a hill. No doorknob, no keyhole.
Just this set of sliders, which was a different set of sounds.
I slid the first up all the way to get the full range of sounds.
Interesting. Instead of notes, these appear to be actual... sounds from objects... a clock, a train, some water... rumbling... interesting...
With no clues as to the order of these sounds, or even which of them I use, I headed to the left...
Turned around, and took the path to my right.
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Entry 50
Who's got the Buttons?
...and found water that sounded like a slider setting, as well as a tower with a radio dish of some kind, and a small pedestal with a red button and a picture of water drops.
I simply pressed the button on the nearby pedestal, and the picture lit up.
I found the blue page too.
Not seeing anything else to do around here, I headed back towards the staircase I started to walk towards earlier.
Up the stairs, then down the stairs, and up the stairs again, I found that I was hearing a deep rumbling sound, so I looked over the side, and saw some flames shooting up from a pit.
How does Atrus build all of this?
Like the water, the rumble sounded like one of the slider settings, had a dish of some kind, and a small hanging thing with a red light in the middle I hadn't noticed earlier.
I went ahead and pressed the button, and... is that... ticking?
Following the ticking, I found a gigantic broken grandfather clock that was somehow still making sounds just fine.
With the ticking getting on my nerves because I started to want to fix the clock, I decided to just push the button,
and leave.
To the left of the clock (from facing the clock), I found another path around this desolate wasteland that led me to a crystal garden. It sounded kind of like the crystals were emitting the noise, like something out of my favorite TV show, Sta- hey! The red page!
Noting the location of the red page, I activated the button,
and set out to find another button.'
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Entry 51
A Link to the Past
I found a hole with a ladder that was just big enough for a man to fit through, like a Manhole (that sounds familiar), but it was also making a pretty interesting howling sound. I noted the same things as every other button area, pressed the button,
and went to see how deep the manhole goes.
Fully expecting to find another pedestal, I was shocked to find a tower with several radar dishes on it pointing in all different directions. What purpose could this possibly have? Where is this tower sending sounds to? Not having an answer, I opened the metal doors at the base of this tower, and found an answer.
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Entry 52
Signals
Upon further inspection, I have found that the five pictures correspond to the five sounds with the red buttons I pressed, the screen shows where the picture's corresponding dish is pointing, the arrows move the "active" dish. The digital display showed 000.0 to 359.9 degrees.
The "Sigma" button went through all the sounds, but instead of playing sounds, the notes played kind of a... dead air, and none of the images were lit when it did this.
The first button was already selected, so I experimented with it until I heard a static-laden water flow. Tinkering around a tiny bit more, I cleared up the sound until I got just the water.
I repeated this with the rumble,
the clock,
the crystals,
and the manhole.
After they were all tuned, I pressed the sigma button, and got the sequence for the door:
I ran back to the sound lock door and moved the first slider,
then did the rest of the sliders and hit the button.
The door opened! Another age solved! Now to open the MYST book.
Son of a bitch.
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//4th Wall time!
//Just in case you were wondering, Manhole came before Myst in Cyan's history. I like to think it's a small nod to it in this age, but who knows?
//HAL and I should be done with the pod by Tuesday.