The hall stretched wide, the stone floor extending far ahead, yet Vencian could see where it ended. The scale of the place was overwhelming, though it carried a strange order. Sheets of parchnt floated high above, suspended in vertical rows, filling the ceiling that climbed beyond sight. Between them rose tall pillars, arranged in exact intervals, their alignnt giving the vast chamber a rhythm of silence.
At the center stood a raised platform. Upon it rested a lectern carved from stone, waist-high and broad, neither altar nor podium but sothing in between. A shallow groove ran across its surface, holding a slim stylus black as obsidian. A faint glow pulsed from within it, subtle but constant.
He stepped up to it, standing before the lectern. This was not a library, not in the way one would expect. It was the archive of Ilvor Therix, a man who had traveled across continents, gathering knowledge and locking it in a form accessible to those who ca after him. The records hung above, waiting for the right question to bring them down.
The thod was simple. One needed only to carve the query onto the lectern stone with the stylus. If the knowledge existed within reach, it would descend. If not, the stone would erase the question.
Vencian had questions. Far too many.
He lowered the stylus to the surface and etched his first: Where can one find a ritual to summon a soul from another world?
The words glowed faintly, then flickered. The script twisted as though rejecting its own form before vanishing altogether. Nothing followed. The silence that returned was heavier than any spoken refusal.
He set his jaw and wrote again. What does it an when a man awakens with mories not his?
The sa reaction. The words dissolved. The stone offered nothing.
"That’s one the tower was never going to give." he said, keeping his eyes forward. He didn’t let Quenya see the sting of disappointnt.
She shifted beside him, voice low. "Well, it was worth asking,"
He tried again.
Has a soul ever been drawn from beyond this world?
The stone accepted the question without hesitation, but the parchnts above remained still. No movent, no answer.
Vencian’s grip on the stylus tightened. His mind pressed forward despite the wall forming before him.
He gave it another go.
Every question tied to his transmigration was denied. None of them led anywhere. He forced himself to try again, changing direction.
Information on different types of blood ritual.
The script stayed this ti. The glow pulsed once before fading. He understood. The answer existed, but not here. It belonged to a higher level.
He shifted the wording. Blood rituals throughout history. The sa response. Available, but not within his reach yet.
So that was the difference. So knowledge were simply not there as though it had never been written. Other pieces were acknowledged, but locked away, reminding him of his place in the hierarchy of this tower.
The weight of exhaustion pushed against his thoughts, but he ignored it. He carved another query. Has there been record of beings who choose one mortal to follow?
The stone stayed blank. He tried again with broader phrasing, but the result did not change. No recognition. No answer.
His hand hovered, hesitation creeping into the edges of his determination. He forced one last attempt. How does a mortal borrow power from another being through a pact?
The groove lit with sharp light. For the first ti, the parchnts stirred. The rows high above broke formation, several drifting downward until they gathered over the lectern. They arranged themselves neatly, settling into place before him.
Urith script covered the top sheet. A heading marked the subject: Archean and Arkspren.
Vencian let out a sigh he had not realized he had been holding. It was not what he sought, not the truth about his own existence. Yet it was sothing, and for now, the tower had decided this was what he would receive.
Quenya leaned toward the parchnts. "Maybe it knows what you need, not what you want."
He shook his head. "Or maybe we’re just chasing the wrong trail."
Vencian gathered the parchnts from the lectern and carried them toward one of the corner pillars. He lowered himself to the ground with his back against the stone.
A handful of others were scattered across distant corners, three or four figures in quiet study, each lost in their own search. None paid him attention.
The fourth floor is said to be the threshold at which most of the scholars get stuck. It’s said that the trials for the floors above this one are far harder to pass. Strange as it may seem, the trials are combined questions to test the IQ of the person.
Vencian suddenly felt bitter at the thought. He was just an average failed graduate in his previous life, surviving through _thick_ and thin. Yes, he did possess the body of the genius and his mories, but they were not procedural mory. The skills, the sharp way of thinking, the habits that made the boy great—none of it belonged to him. His own clumsy mind still lagged behind.
That was why the idea of tackling the next test didn’t even twitch in his head. The sting of the last disaster was still clinging sharp in his mind.
Vencian spread the parchnts flat and read.
The first lines said Ilvor wrote these notes when Solshifters had nearly vanished. The divine blessing that once allowed people to wield power had vanished after the last war with the Unford. The text used the common phrase for practitioners—those who used Old Magic—but it added that nobody ever invented a new form. People had only preserved fragnts.
Solshifters... Beings from this world’s mythology.
As a student of Archaic departnt he has informations of this world’s history whether it was a myth or real event. Solshifters were described as soone who helped the angels in the war against the Fallens and the Unfords.
They have a specific Chapter dedicated in the scriptures of True Light.
The parchnt moved on. In the southern continent, researchers had studied the residue left when a Solshifter died. For a while after death, a Solshifter’s abilities clung to the place and objects around them. The scholars found ways to extend that lingering into what they called permanence. The procedure itself was withheld by the text, a point the author marked as lying above this floor.
Quenya tapped the edge of a page. "Higher floors," she said. The motion sounded like resignation, not surprise.
The next section used harsher words. The preserved residue had been transford into sothing the writer labeled Archeans. The description made moral disgust clear. These Archeans could be bound to humans. When a person ford such a bond, the text nad the human an Arkspren.
Vencian tested the phrasing with his mind, searching for any hint that such bindings explained pacts like his. The page said the transfer of power was partial and staged. Abilities moved across in pieces over ti. None arrived complete at once.
Quenya leaned forward and folded her hands around an invisible cup. "So they borrow, but never borrow the whole," she said. "The powers are provided in pieces over a course of ti."
He allowed a small nod. "As long as they et the requirents for it," he offered. He had learned how their powers worked and the proper way to confront them in battle. Yet he had never encountered one himself, and he hoped he never would.
The final note on the sheets repeated what had shown earlier: the crucial thod for making preservation permanent was kept out of reach on higher floors. The tower had given context, not the chanism. It gave nas and consequences, and left the rest for those who climbed further.
Quenya closed her mouth, then added softly, "The tower controls the flow. It chooses what we know first and what cos after."
Vencian felt the truth of that. He could shape his calm into confidence for anyone watching. Inside, he cataloged the missing pieces like wounds he would treat later. The parchnts lay between them
He returned to the text. After naming Archeans and Arkspren, Ilvor added warnings. Archeans were not natural creatures but vessels, made from remnants that should have faded. Their continued existence was described as a violation, a twisting of what the Solshifters left behind.
Vencian’s fingers pressed into the parchnt edge. "If Ilvor calls them violations, then what does that make us?"
Quenya’s voice cut into his thoughts. "We aren’t bound the sa way. This is their system, not ours."
She tilted her head slightly. "Or maybe we’re worse because we don’t even know the rules."
He didn’t answer. Doubt flickered, but he buried it under the act of reading.
The lines that followed ntioned that Arkspren rarely gained full control of Archean power. At best, they channeled fragnts. So bonded for life, others were consud, leaving only husks.
He sighed. "Nothing that I didn’t already knew."
Quenya drew her knees up to her chest. She could see the frustration he hid but was out of words. Her emotions were no better than him. "I think the question was too broad. Maybe we should try again."
Vencian nodded. "Alright. Let’s finish reading the remainder first."
He forced himself back to the script.
The last page concluded with unfinished notes. Ilvor had written that the preservation thod remained sealed in higher floors, deliberately withheld until a disciple proved themselves beyond the ordinary. The tone implied he had doubted anyone could reach that level without paying a price.
Vencian folded the sheets carefully. They had given him nas and context, but not the knowledge he ca for. He set them aside with a muted sense of defeat.
He pushed off the pillar, gathering the parchnts to return them to the lectern. But as his eyes lifted toward the center platform, movent caught him.
Soone stood where he had been only a short while ago.
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