The Lost Treasures of the Stellar Lumen

"You excited for the big trip Marsha?"

"Sure am Dad!"

"Are all the bags ready to go for tomorrow morning sweetie?"

"Just about there dear, only two more to finish packing" replied Frank who is Marshas father. As Marsha jumps off the couch and runs into the kitchen to help put dishes away, she exclaims, "Virginia here we come!" As Frank finishes packing the two remaining suitecases for the trip, he reminds Marsha to head to bed after she is done with the dishes to have a full nights rest for the long drive tomorrow.

Time for the big day, get ready for a five hour drive. Goodbye Clifford Kentucky, here we come Virginia!", they all chant and rave. Into their family's travel, as one hour goes by they pass Huntington, then the second hour passes, they drive through Green Sulphur Springs. As the third hour comes almost to the home stretch, they continue on through George Washington, and Jefferson National Forest. The last two areas the family drove through to reach Virginia where Frank's sister lives, is East Lexington and lastley Gladstone.

Five hours passes and the family arrives at Franks older sisters place, Varna- happy to reach their destination, where they will be staying during their vacation.

Aunt Varna steps into the entrance way and greets Frank, Marsha and Edna at the front door and assists them with their luggage. "Thank you for the help and the warm greeting, I know Marsha has been looking forward to seeing you for quite some time now" exclaimed Edna.

Now that we have all the luggage put away, I have already prepared dinner for you, so why don't we all get seated for dinner. I dont doubt you guys are hungry after a long drive like that. I've made cabbage casserole, potatoes, cooked veggies. I even made my famous homemade blueberry turnover. I'm sure there won't be many left overs." Verna indicated.

THE NEXT DAY

As everyone sits down for breakfast Frank asks, "What shall we do today?" "Lets go swimming, the sun is out, it's summer..... were on vacation at Aunt Varnas- what better way to spend the day together at the beach!" Marsha suggested with excitement in her voice. "That sounds like a wonder idea" said Edna.

While Edna and Varna finished eating and clearing the table off Marsha and her dad started to get everything needed for the day at the beach. "Towels- check, bathing suits- check, sunscreen-check, sunglasses- check, and umbrella- check. Looks like we are set to go.", Frank said. Fifteen minutes later Frank, Marsha, Edna and Varna arrived at Lake Accotink where they would spend the day enjoying the warm weather and time together.

"Hey mom and dad, can I play in the water", asked Marsha. "You sure can kiddo, go enjoy yourself", Frank replied. As Marsha plays and splashed in the cool waters a beach ball gets tossed in front of her. As she grabs the floating stripped blue, pink, and white beach ball a young boys voice yells over as he swims her way. "hey that's our ball!" Almost face to face now the boy continues, " I'm Sam, would you like to play with me and a couple of my friends?" handing the ball to Sam Marsha replied with, "Sure I would love to." As Sam passes and tosses the beachball back and forth between his friends, in the midst of all the excitement he notices he can no longer spot Marsha in the water anymore. In a panic as Sam turns his head to the right he recognizes a girl waving her hands in the air and realizes its Marsha. He swims over to her and asks worried, "Are you okay?" "Yes I am, I decided to dip my head underwater to cool off when I noticed my hand touch something in the water, when I grabbed it from under the after, look what it is!" "A little black book?" he asked. "That's what it looks like to me!" she said. "I was calling for you but I guess you didnt hear me" "no i didnt" Marsha replied to Sam. "I'm glad I found you and you're okay. How about we go get something to eat and we can wait for the book to dry and see what is inside it!" Sam suggested", "sounds great" she agreed.

"Order number 275!" the server calls out from inside Wings 'N Thingz food stand. Attentively listening to Marsha telling them the story of finding the little black book inside the lake Frank, Varna, Sam and Edna all missed their food order number when it was called out. "Order number 276!" the server calls out the next food order, without paying attention Marsha walks up to the food truck and takes the food tray order 276. As Marsha turns around to take the food trays to the picnic table a tall thin man stops her dead in her tracks and says, "excuse me miss but I think you have our food orders mixed up, "looking down at the food on the trays she notices that she in fact has grabbed the wrong food order. "You're right, this doesn't look like spicy wing comb with the root beer I ordered nor any of the other orders for a matter of fact." Pulling out the food order receipt out from the gentleman's wallet, he shows Marsha the matching order number from the receipt to the number on the receipt placed on the tray. "Well it looks like I do indeed have the wrong order, thank you Mr...", "Jeff, you can call me Jeff" the man tells Marsha. "I'm Marsha" she tells Jeff. "How about I help you bring your food trays and walk with you back to your picnic table."

"Dad, Mom, Sam, Aunt Varna this is Jeff, we got our food trays mixed up and he offered to help me bring our food back". "What is this you have here?" Jeff asked as as he noticed the book laying face down on the picnic table. "I found a little black book at the bottom of the lake and I've been waiting for it to dry out to see what it has in it", Marsha told Jeff. "May I have a look inside, maybe I can help you.", Jeff asked. Opening up the book Jeff notices what he recognizes as coded writting.

"From the looks of it this whole book is written in code." "So what do we do now?" Sam asked in a worried tone. "You're just in luck you two, I know a man who is a cryptologist, his name is Louis." "What's a cryptologist?" Marsha asked. "A cryptologist is someone who studies codes as the ones found in this book, a cryptologist can also solve the coded writing." "Do you think he can help us?" Sam asked. "He sure can! Tomorrow I can take you to him and show him this little black book and he can tell you what it says." "Alright, awesome! I can't wait" Marsha exclaimed. "Me too!" Sam agreed.

"Hello and Welcome to Code Master, my name is Louis and I am the owner of Code Master. How can I help you today?" "Yesterday I discovered this little black book in the water and as I was waiting for it to dry, Jeff here helped me bring my food tray order over to my table when I showed him the black book and mentioned he knew of you and said you could translate the book for us", Marsha explained to Louis. "Well it looks like here you have what is called Atbash Cipher, and what that is, is the alphabet is reversed in the same position as the original alphabet. This type of ciphering was once used for the Hebrew alphabet." "Wow that's very interesting!", Sam said with excitement in his voice. "Do you know when the first cipher was used in record history?", Jeff asked Louis. "Yes in fact, the first cipher used in record history was in Mesopotamia", Louis explained. "Where is that?", Marsha asked. Replying to Marshas question Louis replied, "Mesopotamia, known for its historic area is a city between the two rivers known as the Euphrates and Tigris river, north of Bagdad in Iraq. Also the word Mesopotamia means between two rivers in the Greek language." "Wow that's alot to learn from a little black book found just yesterday sunken beneath water for who knowns how long, right kids?", Jeff said. "Right!" Both Marsha and Sam said in sync.

"So can you translate what it says on the first page Louis?" Sam asked eager to find the hidden message. "Well, if I do this quickly on my computer program that I have for translating it will solve it for me- you ready kids and Jeff?" Louis asked, then proceeding to type in the encrypted message into his computer program system. After less than a minute the results shown. "It looks like this message is telling you that there is a remote location you must discover to solve the rest of the this book. It looks like your destination is Daniel Boone National Forest. Now that you know how to decrypt the book, the best of luck to you kids and may your findings await you!"

"Thank you for all your help I knew you were the right guy to come to". Jeff said to Louis as they shook hands smiling. "Yes thank you for helping Sam and I in our unsolved adventures! I can't wait to see where this little black book leads us once we get to Daniel Boone National Forest!", Marsha said. With a smile on his face watching the three of them leave his store Louis yells, "You're most certainly welcome my friends, until we meet again - Oh wait!" Louis yells running out the door behind them, "here is my number in case you have any questions for me or need any information." Marsha smiles and replies with, "Sure thing!"

"I am very curious what we will discover at Daniel Boone Forest." Sam commented. "Yeah! Maybe a hidden magical playpark where the play park comes to life!" Marsha imagined. "Well let's get ready to explore!" Marsha's parents Edna and Frank responded. "Can Jeff come too?" Marsha Begged. "Sure! Why not?" Frank chimed in.

As they enter the gates of Daniel Boone's National Forest campgrounds, waving back at the campground host as they are welcomed, Marsha notices a symbol in the little black book that appears to be the same as the symbol on the dirt road sign looking outside the car window to the right hand side. "Hey Dad, turn here, see the symbol on that sign just ahead of us?" Marsha blurted out. "Yes indeed I do Marsha" Frank acknowledged, the one shaped like a circle that's colored grey with no words with an arrow pointing to which way to follow the sign", Frank continued. "The book says to follow the arrows on the dirt road and stay to the right side when the road splits into "V", shortly after that." Marsha took a moment to decrypt the remaining sentence in her notebook "....turn right at the stop sign and keep driving until you see another road sign in the shape of a cabin." "You're doing a great job at decoding the book Marsha" Sam praised, "can I take a look at what the next part says?" Sam asked Marsha. "Of course you can Sam, here you go Sam" passing the book over to Sam sitting in the back seat beside her in the car. "It looks like it says here, turn into the driveway when you see cabins in a row and across each other on either side of the road" as Sam continued on reading and decrypting in the same notebook as Marsha used, he pronounced "Cabin number 3 cabin number 3!" he repeated twice in excitement.

Pulling into the parking lot spotting cabin number three, "Well I guess this is our destination" Marsha's mom observed. As they got out of the car one by one noticing all the campers and hikers with their rucksacks and trekking poles, a campground employee saw them observing the area and made her way towards them while Sam was sitting on a rock looking in the book for his next clue.

"Hi there folks I'm Jackie, welcome to Daniel Boone campgrounds. What brings you here today?" "Believe it or not, a little black book" Frank went on, "we were brought here by clues decrypted in this old book that my daughter discovered in the bottom of the lake the other day, and as it is written in code my daughter Marsha here and her friend Sam and Jeff here went to a cryptologist and it was said in the book that this is the destination where it lead us." "Oh my, what an adventure you have been on! Well I must not make you wait any longer then fellow guests. I will be right back with your cabin key." As they waited for Jackie to return with the key Sam ready out loud the last clue.

𝘓𝘰𝘰𝘬 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶'𝘭𝘭 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳, 𝘢𝘴 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘩𝘦𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘣𝘦 𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘩𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘺.

"Ok folks! Looks like your ready to unearth the long foretold mystery that may or may not lie beneath these four walls of cabin number three! Here is your key! Enjoy your stay." "Is everyone ready?! On the count of three, one, two....three", they all counted out loud together, then opened the cabin door with the key. As they enter the cabin there stood two bunkbeds on each side of the cabin walls and a double bunk bed at the foot of the cabin.

Marsha bends down to look under the bed and pulls out a suitcase. "Purple! My favorite color." she exclaimed as she opens the suitcase she finds a note inside folded in half with a stamp on it. As she opens the letter she sees:

　ＢＬＦ　ＳＺＥＶ　ＵＬＩＭＷ　ＮＶ！　Ｒ　ＤＺＨ　ＫＯＺＸＶＷ　ＳＶＩＶ　ＳＲＷＷＶＷ　ＦＭＷＶＩ　ＧＳＲＨ　ＹＶＷ　ＵＬＩ　ＤＳＬＶＥＶＩ　ＵＬＦＭＷ　ＧＳＶ　ＯＲＧＧＯＶ　ＹＯＺＸＰ　ＹＬＬＲ　ＫＯＺＸＶＷ　ＲＭ　ＧＳＲＨ　ＨＦＲＶＧＸＺ　ＺＨＶ　ＺＩＶ　ＧＬＰＶＭＶＭＮＨ. ＰＶＶＫ　ＬＭ　ＧＳＶ　ＨＶＺＩＸＳ　ＮＢＵＶＯＯＬＤ　ＧＩＺＥＶＯＶＩＨ　ＺＨ　ＲＭ　ＧＳＶ　ＸＩＲＫＧＬ　ＤＬＩＯＷ　ＲＧ　ＲＨ　ＰＭＬＤＭ　ＧＳＺＧ　ＧＳＶ　ＭＶＣＧ　ＴＩＶＺＧ　ＧＬＰＶＭ　ＭＺＢ　ＸＶ　ＩＶＺＯＨＶＷ　ＧＬＮＬＩＩＬＤ.

𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘦! 𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘦𝘥 𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘩𝘪𝘥𝘥𝘦𝘯 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘸𝘩𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘣𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬, 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘪𝘵𝘤𝘢𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘬𝘦𝘯𝘴. 𝘒𝘦𝘦𝘱 𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘤𝘩 𝘮𝘺 𝘧𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘢𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘳𝘺𝘱𝘵𝘰 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥 𝘪𝘵 𝘪𝘴 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘦𝘹𝘵 𝘨𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘰𝘬𝘦𝘯 𝘮𝘢𝘺 𝘣𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘰𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘰𝘸!