Nico walked through the silent corridors of the Pilastro facility. After the integrity check he had been forced to suspend, his head wouldn't give him any peace. His footsteps on the stone floor echoed hollowly, piercing his skull and causing a dull pain. Even the sunlight hurt him, each ray of light hurting him mercilessly. He squeezed his eyes shut to avoid it every time he passed a window.

  Around him, from time to time, a few NPCs passed by in the process of healing, if you could call it that, a slow and uncertain process of repairing the wear and tear of their code. Or the members of the Archivist's hive mind paraded by, all wearing the same white robes and shaved heads, identical and silent like a single organism breathing through many bodies. Nico walked and felt the stares of the white robes: now that he knew they were a hive mind, he also knew that every stare from one of them was the Archivist's stare on him, constant, vigilant, impossible to evade.

  He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to see if the pain was subsiding. He shook his head, knowing that he needed to resolve his memory problems as soon as possible. Although the others hadn't taken it badly, knowing that Nico would need several integrity check sessions to restore his memory, the Archivist had explained to them all that, with targeted exercises, Nico would be able to recover the damaged fragments, but that these efforts would cause him headaches and that his mind was still sensitive, unstable, and would need time to stabilize.

  “With discipline and gradual progress, the fragments will return to their place,” the Archivist had said in that neutral voice, “but the process will require tolerance of pain.” In any case, none of his friends had made a fuss: Peter considered the break a vacation, Leo likewise, an opportunity to rest; Kia now had the library, and so was isolated in her orderly world of pages. Nadia and Garrett had been quiet and shy lately, and Nico didn't know exactly what to expect from them, but no one seemed to complain; they had all stayed there for him.

  He brought his trembling hands to his temples to apply a light massage, but it didn't help. Nico knew he had to speed up the healing process of his mind: he needed to act on those integrity checks, let them work through to the end, and finish quickly, because they urgently needed to stop Erebos before he reached the Center. Now he knew this, he had learned it clearly, and he shook his head, thinking that perhaps the others already knew it, but he, now, after that conversation with the Archivist before the integrity check, was certain of it. We have to get to the Center, stop Erebos, or try to do so before he reaches the Center and manages to control the connections and enter the real world.

  He took a deep breath and shook his head, dismissing that thought: he hadn't made it, he had had to disconnect from the integrity check, and he still couldn't believe what he had seen. It was probably some interference, some memory from the Archive that had entered his mind during the process, as the Archivist had told him, because otherwise there was no explanation for how he could have seen someone else's memory as if it were his own. He still remembered that musical voice, a clear and harmonious vibration that he seemed to have heard somewhere else before, but he couldn't remember where, and this disturbed him more than the invasion of that memory that wasn't his.

  Nico shook his head, trying to banish the memory, and his temples began to throb again as if a thin needle were piercing his skull. He brought his hands to his head and stopped in front of a window, observing with eyes narrowed to slits to shield them from the light, the gardens and the apparent calm that stretched beyond the glass, while the Archivist's white robes and recovering patients walked at a measured pace. He didn't see his companions and wondered what time it was, but shook his head: he didn't want to see any of them, not now.

  He continued walking along the corridors, observing tapestries depicting hunting scenes, coronations, rural scenes of daily life with farmers bent over the earth or wild nature with animals or plants. He walked, letting his mind wander, without steering his thoughts, without forcing them in a particular direction, and little by little the headache that had tormented him since he had suspended the integrity check subsided, until it remained as a slight numbness behind his eyes, a heavy blanket resting on his head, present but bearable.

  Then, in the distance, he saw Kiah emerge from the corner of another corridor and turn, walking about ten meters ahead of him, along the same corridor and slightly ahead of him. Kiah hadn't seen him. She had a mountain of books reaching up to her chin, clutched in her arms and held precariously with both hands, and she was carrying them with obvious effort, yet her walk was radiant, almost triumphant, as if that weight were actually a treasure. Nico smiled and continued walking, following her with his gaze, then Kiah stopped in front of a door and pushed it open with her hip, slipping inside with a quick movement.

  Nico stopped in front of the large wooden door with wrought iron decorations, made of old, slightly worm-eaten wood, and without thinking too much about it, he entered.

  As he crossed the threshold, the thick smell of dust and worn leather enveloped him while his eyes slowly adjusted to the dim light. Nico looked up and was impressed by the multitude of ancient books: the shelves were very high and seemed to soar up to the sky, arranged on mezzanines connected by narrow ladders that could be climbed to reach the highest volumes. The walls were entirely covered with dark shelves, and between the spaces between the columns, he saw chocolate-colored curls rustling and disappearing around the corner formed by a shelf.

  Nico walked between the shelves, looking around with his eyes raised and his nose itching slightly from the dust suspended in the air. He continued until he found, near a massive counter, an adept of the Archivist who, clean-shaven but wearing a pair of thin glasses, his face marked by a network of wrinkles like a spider web stretched across his skin, was leafing through and rummaging through books, taking notes behind the counter with slow, methodical movements. The adept did not even glance at him, and without thinking too much about it, he advanced deeper into the library.

  The light was dim, diffused only by a few isolated lamps that cast flickering cones on the floorboards and by a huge skylight above that let in a pale blade from above, illuminating the endless shelves from above. Thanks to that faint vertical light, Nico advanced along the corridors formed by the shelves in search of Kiah, aware that it would be impossible to find her just by looking in that labyrinth of paper and wood. He then relied on his hearing and, after a few steps, heard his friend muttering something in the distance, a quick and concentrated murmur, as if she were reading or commenting to herself.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  He moved toward the murmuring until he heard a sudden thud. When he turned the corner formed by two shelves, he found Kiah in an open space where several massive tables were arranged, and saw her settling in front of what Nico thought were about twenty enormous tomes, bound in leather that was now torn and cracked by time. She was sitting and leafing through a book, probably looking for a specific page.

  Nico watched her for a few moments without being noticed, as she began to read and a finger twirled frantically around one of the curls of her unruly hair.

  Nico approached with measured steps, and when she looked up, Kiah's eyes widened in surprise, then a quiet smile spread across her face. Nico smiled back, but immediately lowered his eyes to the edge of the table, as if that eye contact was already too much.

  “How did it go?” Kiah asked him in a soft voice, in a slight murmur, respectful of the silence of the library.

  Nico shrugged without answering, then glanced sideways at the shelves behind him, avoiding his friend's gaze. Kiah tilted her head slightly, watching him for a moment, then nodded slowly. “Okay... you don't want to talk about it, that's fine, I understand. It must have been exhausting. But did you at least manage to sleep last night?”

  Nico's eyes widened and he looked at her for a moment. “Last night? Why... what time is it?” he asked, and immediately looked away again.

  Kiah shook her head, a curl slipping over her forehead. "You didn't come back to sleep? I thought they brought your dinner to your room because you were tired, I mean... none of us wanted to disturb you, so we didn't come knocking at dinner or even breakfast. I had to stop Leo because he wanted to come and get you...“ She paused, pressing her lips into a thin line as she stared at him with a hint of concern. ”I'm sorry, I didn't know you'd been with the Archivist all this time."

  She frowned slightly, then leaned toward him and hesitantly held out her hand, but dropped it almost immediately, uncertain. She shook her head slowly and added, her voice tense, “Are you feeling okay?”

  Nico shrugged again and nodded slowly, his eyes fixed on an indeterminate point among the tomes piled up in front of her. Now he understood the reason for the fatigue that weighed on him like an invisible burden. He gave a small nod, as if to end the conversation. He felt Kiah's eyes studying him, then she shook her head slowly and did not insist.

  Nico moved a little closer and rested his hands on the table. Nodding toward the mountain of books, he asked, “What are you doing?”

  Kiah gave him a beaming smile. “You know, I've been doing some research, piecing together some fragments from ancient chronicles, and I think I've found something.”

  Nico looked up just enough to let her know he was listening, and she continued, her enthusiasm accelerating her words: “There are chronicles, diaries, notes... everything, kept here, and in some of them I found reconstructions or first-person accounts of what I believe to be the first manifestations of Erebos.”

  Nico raised her eyebrows and, this time, looked Kiah in the eye without flinching. She continued, “Yes, the first manifestations of Erebos date back many years, at least according to the game's chronicles.”

  Nico nodded, his lips pressed tightly together as he listened.

  Kiah ran her index finger over the titles of the various books in front of her and pulled one out of the pile. The book she needed was in the middle, and the gesture caused the rest of the volumes to tumble around the table with a dull, disorderly thud, one of them nearly sliding off the edge. but Nico, with an instinctive movement, caught it and placed it back on the disordered pile, holding it with his palm for a second before letting it go.

  Kiah opened the book she had chosen and placed it on top of the other one she had already opened, then explained, leaning over the yellowed pages:

  “This is the diary of one of the Archivist's followers. They have a strange way of writing, the Archivist's followers... they talk as if it were...”

  “Like a hive mind,” Nico interrupted, leaving the statement hanging in the air like something he hadn't yet decided whether to really share.

  Kiah frowned, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Exactly... and how do you know that?”

  Nico shrugged, and a sad smile appeared on his tired face; immediately afterwards, he shook his head slowly. “I spoke to one of them.”

  Kiah nodded slowly, his gaze sliding past Nico, as if he were weighing up the implications of that sentence, then returned to the book and, with a decisive nod of his head, said: “Listen, this isn't a Nerakth attack. This adept simply stumbled upon a man with a wound on his wrist that was dripping black, oily liquid...”

  Nico nodded, feeling his legs grow heavy and his head start to buzz again, while the light blanket he had felt on his forehead earlier had turned into a huge weight. He pulled a chair out from the table and let himself fall onto it, collapsing his weight against the backrest.

  Kiah jumped. “Are you okay?”

  Nico shook his head, his eyes closed: “I'm just tired... but I want to know what you found.”

  Kiah nodded and went back to looking at the book, occasionally glancing sideways to make sure he was still paying attention, then said, following the lines with her finger: "See here, I thought that was the first mention of Erebos in these archives, but it's not... this dates back even further. I think this can really be called the first manifestation of Erebos. It happened in a forest. It's the story of a farmer who was transporting his goods, wine, and decided to take a path through the forest, although it doesn't say what the name of this forest is, so that's a problem... However, the farmer says he saw something dripping.

  He paused for a moment, then read with the precise tone of someone faithfully reporting the written words: “Here: ‘A substance as black as oil or pitch was dripping from the branches, and I walked away with my donkey and my load without looking back.’”

  Kiah looked up and sought out Nico, who was watching her with half-closed eyelids. She pointed at the book with her finger, tapping the page. “I think this is a huge step forward. If I can find more information like this, if I can find more news about this anonymous forest, if I can figure out where it is, I think this could really be a huge step forward.”

  Nico nodded, letting his mind wander over Kiah's words, but he felt his body growing heavier and heavier, while the murmur gradually became more distant, like a lullaby. He felt tired, exhausted, and let his mind wander without holding it back, a weary smile touching his lips as his eyes remained closed and his body slowly slipped into torpor.

  Then he said, in a voice that barely came out, a barely audible whisper: "You know... during the integrity check... I saw that moment again, remember?

  When we were in Taynor. It was the first time we had a beer together: you, me, and Leo... and you know... I saw Dan again too."

  His voice trailed off at the end. Kiah may have said something, but Nico didn't hear it, and he let sleep envelop him completely.

  [AUTHOR'S NOTE]

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  Log closed: the system observes.