The corridor stretched before them, the red sigil painted many more tis along the walls, glowing faintly like a heartbeat pulsing in the dark.
Miles felt the shift in the air imdiately.
This place was different from the rest of the Black Market. It was quieter, heavier, as if the very stone walls were watching them. Every step they took seed to echo just a fraction longer than it should, lingering in the stale underground air.
Mara walked ahead, her silver hair catching the dim light of the sigil’s glow. Sarissa followed closely behind, her movents careful but without hesitation. Miles, bringing up the rear, couldn’t shake the feeling of unseen eyes tracking them.
"You sure about this?" Mara asked again, her voice hushed but sharp. "The Archivist isn’t soone you just drop in on unannounced."
"We don’t have a choice," Miles muttered, keeping his pace steady. "We need to know what we’re dealing with, also... Your friend back there said that they might be interested and let us in, if we had sothing of value, and I do..."
Sarissa barely reacted to Miles’ words, but her posture changed ever so slightly, tauter, her fingers flexing near her weapon as they reached the end of the passage.
A heavy iron door lood before them, marked with deep carvings resembling intertwined roots and jagged symbols. The sigil on the walls pulsed in tandem with the engravings, the energy coiling around the threshold like an unseen lock.
"I... Where do I know these symbols from...?" Sarissa muttered under a breath, and Miles imdiately retorted.
"The Hall of The Seers."
A tense silence fell over them as Mara stepped forward and knocked, not with her knuckles but with the flat of her palm.
Three sharp strikes, followed by a pause, then two more. A low hum reverberated through the stone, and for a mont, there was silence.
Then, with a slow, chanical groan, the iron door slid open.
Beyond the entrance was a vast chamber, its walls lined with bookshelves that stretched impossibly high, vanishing into the shadows above. Scrolls, tos, and loose pages cluttered the wooden desks and tables scattered across the room.
The air slled of ink, aged parchnt, and sothing faintly tallic – blood?
Unlike the rest of the Black Market, this place was ticulously arranged, every object placed with intention.
At the far end of the chamber, seated behind a massive, rune-carved desk, was a woman draped in layers of dark fabric, her hood concealing most of her face.
Only her mouth and the lower part of her nose were visible, her lips curled slightly in what could have been amusent or irritation. A pair of thin, delicate hands rested atop an open to, fingers lightly tracing the text as if committing it to mory.
The Archivist.
"You bring guests, Mara." The Archivist’s voice was smooth, even, but carried an undertone of sothing unreadable. "Unexpected."
"Yeah, well. These two have sothing interesting to ask you. Figured you’d want to hear it." Mara smirked, clearly tense. She stepped aside and gesturing toward Miles and Sarissa.
The Archivist’s fingers stopped moving. Slowly, she lifted her head just enough for her eyes to be seen. Deep, milky pools that reflected the low candlelight around the chamber with a violet-ish hue. They landed on Miles first, studying him with unsettling patience, before shifting to Sarissa.
"You seek knowledge about sothing the surface has never heard about." It wasn’t a question.
"We unlocked a clue to the [World Quest]," Miles stated plainly, stepping forward. "But it led us to sothing far beyond what we expected, yes."
The Archivist said nothing, simply tilting her head as if urging him to continue.
"It led us to a [Lesser Demon]," Sarissa added, her voice cold and steady. "It’s that demon who holds the first [Hidden Piece]."
A long silence stretched between them.
Then, The Archivist exhaled slowly, closing the to before her with a quiet thud.
"I see."
Miles exchanged a glance with Sarissa before pressing on.
"We need information. Anything on the where it might be located, on the [Lesser Demons], on what the [World Quest] truly ans for the ga."
The Archivist tapped a finger against the closed book, her gaze never leaving them, and after a long, heavy pause, she said:
"And what makes you think I would share such knowledge?"
"Because this isn’t just about us. If the [World Quest] is tied to beings of that caliber, it’s only a matter of ti before more of them show up. If we’re not prepared—"
"You will all fall," The Archivist interrupted, her voice even. "Yes. That much is obvious, but not sufficient, I’m afraid."
’Shit!’ Miles clenched his jaw. "I... Have knowledge to exchange for the information."
She stood, the atmosphere around her shifting ever so slightly, the heavy fabric of her cloak shifting as she moved.
Without another word, she strode to one of the towering bookshelves, trailing a hand along the spines of countless volus before selecting one. With practiced ease, she flipped through its pages, the parchnt rustling softly in the vast chamber.
Was it just Miles, or was the way she touched and flipped through the tos a bit strange?
He waited, tension coiling in his shoulders. He didn’t trust her – not fully, at least – but he had no other leads. If she held even a fragnt of the answers they needed, he had no choice but to hear her out.
Finally, she stopped, her finger, pressing against a line of text.
"The [Hidden Pieces] are fragnts of a larger whole. You likely assud as much." She turned the book toward them, revealing an aged illustration of a shattered emblem, each fragnt scattered across an unfamiliar map. "Three hundred and sixty-five in total, hidden in places bound by the world’s rewritten laws."
"And the first one is in the hands of a [Lesser Demon]." Sarissa’s voice was unreadable, but her eyes burned with calculation.
"Then you are already far behind." The Archivist’s lips curled ever so slightly.
"You an-" Miles’ stomach twisted.
"You are not the only ones searching for them," The Archivist confird, closing the book. "There are others who have begun to piece together the puzzle. So for power, so for knowledge, so for reasons known only to themselves."
"And here I thought you two were ahead of the curve." Mara whistled lowly.
"The world is a larger, vaster place than you might currently think, child." The Archivist hushed in a flat tone.
"Do you know anything about the [Lesser Demons]? Are they connected to the quest, or just an obstacle?" Miles took a slow breath.
"They are both." The Archivist’s fingers lingered on the book’s cover. She turned, walking back to her desk and lowering herself into the chair. "The [Hidden Pieces] are not re artifacts. They are tied to entities that are both older than the world itself and should not exist. Beings that were left behind when the world was rewritten. [Creatures], [Beasts], [Monsters], and now, [Lesser Demons]... But these are not the only classes separating the enemies’ armies by power level and intellect."
After a mont, she added.
"There are also the regular, yet stronger [Demons] and [High Demons], but what lays in your way is much, much more ancient, fixed and powerful than just that. So of Them slumber, bound in chains, while others... Have begun to stir."
"If they’re waking up, then what happens next?" The mory of Shinji’s pact flashed in Miles’ mind, the image of the writhing cocoon of flesh, of the countless eyes blinking open in unison. He swallowed hard.
The Archivist leaned forward slightly.
"That, Harbinger, is the question that will determine whether you survive long enough to see the end."
Miles tensed at the title. She knew.
He didn’t get the chance to ask how. Before he could speak, The Archivist tapped the desk once, signaling the conversation’s end.
"This knowledge is yours now. What you do with it is up to you." And after a brief mont of tense silence, she added. "What is the knowledge you have to give in exchange?"
’Fuck! If she knows about my [Classpect], what else does she know about ?’ Miles gulped hard.
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