Mark’s eyes widened as they adjusted to the dim light, absorbing the astonishing sight that filled the room. It was an old-fashioned study or perhaps better described as a cartographer’s den. Antique maps lined the walls, their edges curling with age, their parchment yellowed and brittle. The depicted continents and sea routes seemed oddly distorted, not entirely in sync with the geography Mark had learned.
A heavy oak desk dominated the center of the room, cluttered with scattered documents, faded ink bottles, old letters, and a variety of other instruments, including a brass compass, an ancient-looking astrolabe, and a beautiful antique magnifying glass with an intricate silver handle. The chair was pushed back, as if the occupant had just risen and would return any moment.
Among the scattered parchments, books rested on the workstation, their bindings aged and covers dust-coated. They ranged from historical texts and maritime chronicles to cryptic tomes in languages that Mark couldn’t identify.
It all seemed to be part of a sophisticated puzzle that Richard had spent his life trying to solve. Mark could almost see his father hunched over the workstation, his eyes scanning over maps, his fingers tracing invisible routes, lost in his own world of enigmas and discoveries.