THIRD mysterious monolith discovered on California mountaintop as internet ponders meaning of bizarre structures

The new monolith – resembling the ominous structure in Stanley Kubrick’s ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ – was found on Pine Mountain in Atascadero, California by local residents on Wednesday morning.

“I guess this is the thing now, right?” resident Gary Lyons, who regularly hikes the mountain, said in a video he captured after stumbling upon the odd find, first obtained by Storyful News.

Be prepared to see these everywhere.

The structure appears almost identical to other monolith-like protrusions recently found in the Utah desert and near Romania’s mountainous Piatra Neamt region – both of which have since vanished without a trace. While eco-activists copped to taking down the Utah monolith last Friday – arguing that the site was drawing tourists along with litter and pollution – the disappearance of the Romanian version remains a mystery.

Unlike its cousin in Utah, however, the obelisk discovered in California was not fixed to the ground, and “appears to be hollow at the top,” according to a local report.

Also on rt.com ‘Leave no trace’: Mysteriously disappeared Utah monolith was STOLEN by environmentally friendly thieves (VIDEO)

The true purpose of the unusual monuments has left netizens bewildered, becoming a hot topic of debate on Twitter for days on end. The battle was rekindled again on Wednesday with the fresh find, prompting a litany of different theories. Many, however, appear convinced the phenomenon is merely “some marketing bulls**t” or a “PR stunt.”

Some refused to allow the dream to die, hoping against hope that the monoliths are a sign of alien life, or perhaps will usher in the “next age” of enlightenment for mankind – anything but a guerilla marketing campaign.

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