Beyond the gulf I see from the office windows, and beyond the isthmus that separates this portion of the water beyond Neo Tethys, which we share with other nations.

There is a zone that escapes my rules, rules based on the same ones that govern the real world. Vermilion Island walks on water, eluding any attempt at colonization disguised as a flora and fauna research trip, a desperate struggle for survival after a shipwreck, or the desires of both professional and amateur cartography. The first stems from the impulse to fulfill a job, the second from a way to pass the time, traversing one coast and the other, thus tallying spatial reference points.

Life on the planet creates and destroys solid ground, carrying away entire species and civilizations beneath its skin and sweat.

Everyone believes they have seen the island the color of mercury sulfide. A sailor's hallucination? Sunstroke? Unfulfilled desires for conquest?

Saddened by my inability to make it accessible to anyone, I conceived of a character—an extension of myself—who catches glimpses of it from time to time and, though lacking the tools to examine it in detail, imagines it to be larger than it appears. He imagined its sand, the possible species that might have developed in isolation, and, if possible, decomposed bodies, mere skeletons, on its shores.

Inside, he envisioned a structure he named Tzat Tun Tzat, a word composed of three sounds whose origin he doesn't know and which his ancestors forgot millennia ago.

Tzat Tun Tzat is designed with several zones where it's easy to get lost. Each chamber appears abandoned and dusty, with few signs of decay. There is one area containing only corpses: the bones of male bodies between fifteen and forty years old.

A recurring element within the labyrinthine structure: humanoid columns representing sailors wearing antique clothing and accessories...

For now, I can't think of anything else.