The Otz Valley lies in a mighty
depression at the south pole. It is sunk thousands of feet below
the level of the surrounding country, like a great round bowl. A
hundred miles from its northern boundary rise the Otz Mountains
which circle the inner Valley of Dor, in the exact centre of which
lies the Lost Sea of Korus. On the shore of this sea stands the
Golden Temple of Issus in the Land of the First Born. It is there
that we are bound."
As I looked I commenced to realize why it was that in all the ages
only one had escaped from the Valley Dor. My only wonder was that
even the one had been successful. To cross this frozen, wind-swept
waste of bleak ice alone and on foot would be impossible.
"Only by air boat could the journey be made," I finished aloud.
"It was thus that one did escape the therns in bygone times; but
none has ever escaped the First Born," said Xodar, with a touch of
pride in his voice.
We had now reached the southernmost extremity of the great ice
barrier. It ended abruptly in a sheer wall thousands of feet high
at the base of which stretched a level valley, broken here and
there by low rolling hills and little clumps of forest, and with
tiny rivers formed by the melting of the ice barrier at its base.
Once we passed far above what seemed to be a deep canyon-like rift
stretching from the ice wall on the north across the valley as far
as the eye could reach.
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