Blake and Mortimer adventures are characterized by a quest, most often involving adventures underground till the final ending, free and back to the surface. The story structures include some similarities: when the adventure begins certain important but unseen events have already taken place; at the beginning of "The Yellow Mark", for instance, the titular character has already made himself known through various activities which the reader only learns about when Mortimer reads a newspaper about these events. Some of the adventures also end with the characters reflecting on what they have learned from their experiences: after his travels through time in "Time Trap", Mortimer concludes that rather than dwell on the "good old days" or look forward to a "brighter future", one should be content with the present.