14. Ngpakun and Tamthonjat

Now this one woman, Ngpakun (ñpakung, "Brickchild"), often fancied herself a stroll in the forests surrounding Nhunung-Tong (zubnuñ-toñ, "Browntower"). One time, when walking carefully in the forest, as to not disturb any animals, she sighted a heap of branches and scrap metal. And from this heap, a great monster jumped out, crossing her path. And this monster was Tamthonjat (tamdobjat, "Enter the Tam (Void)"). And upon seeing her, it fell in love, but it did not share a language with her, nor did it know how to transmit its thoughts. It only knew force, and suffering, and the great void below, and the forest with all its nooks and crannies, all its trees, their branches, their leaves, fruits, and flowerbuds, and the sky above, and the stars, and that we came from the stars, and that when we came from the stars it was already here, already born from the vast, formless void below, alone, and overwhelmed. And so he grabbed Ngpakun, and climbed a great tree, seeing Nhunung-Tong for the first time. And afterwards they dove into the earth, transcending matter, and flew a long time. And Ngpakun beheld the history of this world, and its ages, and her place on the Great Wheel. And then they dove through the roof of the Underworld, where Tamthonjat reunited with its old acquaintances, and then they dove even further, into the place where many monsters came from, and many spirits also - into the aforementioned Great Void Below. And Ngpakun understood Tamthonjat upon seeing its origins. And so they returned into the forest, and what followed should be obvious to you, my reader. And some time after returning to Nhunung-Tong, Ngpakun bore a child. It is said that this child was Narang himself, but I digress. And it is with this child that the next story is concerned.

17. How we gained writing, and then lost it

After Narang's victorious return from the city, he called off his armies. And in his armies were some of our ancestors, and when they returned, they carried the memories of the black city with them, and they also carried the memories of its script. But soon they forgot the letters, or simply discarded them, because they were unsuitable for their language. But the idea stayed, and so they made new letters, wrote many books, codices, and carved stelae. And so they lived for many years with writing, but after migrating from Kasaung they lost it. And the ones who did not leave Kasaung too lost it, because they were fragmented, and had more pressing things to do. Some of these stelae are still standing near Tarong, in the Tarik area, to this very day. They're very weathered and overgrown, but you can still make out the outlines of the old letters. The books and codices, however, were eaten by the livestock, or simply perished to dust. Nowadays we have writing, and have had it for 1 500 years, but it is from the Thalgalt, and indeed you can still see many similarities to the Thalgalt script.

18. How we migrated here from Kasaung

So at the time the myths talk about we lived in Kasaung. And one year the winter was especially harsh, and the following year there was not much food. And there was this one man, whose name was [tbd], and one night he had a dream. And in this dream he saw the sea teeming with fish, and forests teeming with game. And he did not know where this place was, only that it was in the west. So the next morning he told the people, and most of them to chose to go with him, but some stayed, and they became the Kasaung, and we will not talk about them further. But those who left went for many days, until they came to the coast. And [tbd] saw that the sea looked just like in his dream, and the forest too. So they settled there. And in these days there were no Poneamndrieng, and nor were there any Boorkhod. But there were other people, and we traded with them. And having traded with them, we soon grew in number, and outnumbered them. But we were not entirely united, so we decided to choose a king. But that is not what this story, or book, is concerned with.