Once, there was a man who discovered something unbelievable. Something vast, impossible, secret.

  Pisces’ hidden library.

  For five years, he had returned to it, over and over, obsessed with its mysteries. He had read every book, reread them, searching for **something—**something buried between the words, something that refused to reveal itself.

  It had started on a warm afternoon.

  He had been walking through the forest, as he often did, trying to clear his mind. His walks could stretch for hours—sometimes six, sometimes more—depending on how far he let himself wander.

  The library sat atop a massive hill in the middle of that forest. Not many people came that deep into the woods, and so the hill was his alone. There were others like it—scattered mounds and ridges across the landscape—but this one?

  This was the tallest.

  At first, he had simply circled its base. Then, over weeks of cautious exploration, he began to climb. The path was steep, the terrain treacherous, but he kept going. Until, one day, he reached the top.

  If you ask about its height—well, you could compare it to a skyscraper. Maybe twice as tall. He was never good at guessing distances. But he knew this:

  It was a hell of a climb.

  The top of the hill was unlike anything else around it.

  The forest vanished, leaving a small, unexpected clearing. And in that clearing?

  Ruins.

  A forgotten structure, half-buried in the hill itself. It might have been a castle, a church, a temple—its original form was unclear, its architecture strange and crumbling.

  The bricks were worn and gray, eroded by time, but one word remained perfectly visible, carved into the stone.

  Pisces.

  The name blended into the wall, almost as if it had grown there naturally.

  The sight of it had stopped him cold.

  He had explored these woods for years. No one had ever mentioned a ruin like this.

  Perhaps because no one knew it existed.

  The hill was hidden away, covered in dense trees. It wasn’t a scenic place, not worth the effort of climbing. Even the roads leading here were in disrepair. No highways, no trails—just rough, wild land.

  And so, it remained abandoned.

  His.

  The entrance wasn’t a door.

  At least, not exactly.

  It looked more like a window—a stained glass pane, its edges shattered, its frame old but intact. A handle rested at the side, inviting him forward.

  There were other windows, higher up, but none within reach.

  So, out of curiosity, he got onto his knees and crawled inside.

  Inside, the world changed.

  The library was massive.

  Larger than any building that should fit inside the ruin. As vast as a theater, lined with towering shelves.

  Upon entering, there was only a narrow hallway, followed by a set of steep, vertical stairs. He had descended carefully, step by step, until he reached the main hall.

  The floor was tiled—worn green and yellow squares, aged but too new to belong to a place like this.

  Light streamed through stained glass windows, casting shifting colors onto the shelves below.

  And yet—some of the windows weren’t showing the sky above.

  He had looked up, squinting, and seen it:

  Some windows reflected a different world.

  The clouds moved out of sync with the real sky. Some showed stars, even though it was daytime.

  Others—

  Others displayed colors that didn’t belong to this world at all.

  He had strained his eyes, trying to see what was beyond them.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  And then—

  He stepped forward.

  And he began to read.

  The books were old.

  Not just old—ancient.

  He ran his fingers along the spines. Hardcovers, all brown, all worn down by time. The pages inside were yellowed and brittle, some edges curling inward like dried leaves.

  He pulled out a random volume, brushing off the dust.

  “The Life of Caruncle Periwinkle as Narrated by Ellen Valmonte.”

  On the first page, a single handwritten note stood out:

  “To Jazmin, my one and only love. — Ellen”

  His stomach twisted at the intimacy of it.

  He placed it back.

  Reached for another.

  “The Life of Caruncle Periwinkle as Narrated by Ellen Valmonte, Vol. 2.”

  A frown.

  He returned that one as well and stepped back, scanning the shelf.

  Every book was the same.

  Volume after volume. A hundred, maybe three hundred, maybe more. All of them telling the same story.

  Caruncle Periwinkle.

  He hadn’t even heard the name before.

  And yet, this place was filled with him.

  Over time, he had read everything.

  And then read it again.

  And again.

  The life of Caruncle Periwinkle was one of war, revolution, and triumph. A man who toppled an empire, led an independence movement, and changed the fate of twenty nations. The revolution he sparked had reshaped an entire continent.

  And he didn’t stop there.

  The library contained more than just his biography.

  It had academic records of the nations that came after him. Detailed accounts of his comrades, his enemies, his family. Political treatises, personal letters, maps of a world that did not exist.

  A world that—as far as he could tell—had never existed.

  Because when he searched for Caruncle outside these walls, there was nothing.

  No records. No mentions. No books.

  Caruncle Periwinkle was fiction.

  So was Ellen Valmonte.

  And yet, someone had written hundreds of volumes about them.

  Why?

  That day, as the light faded, he forced himself to stop reading.

  If he left too late, he’d have to walk through the forest at night.

  And navigating these woods in darkness wasn’t just unpleasant—it was dangerous.

  He had tried staying overnight before.

  Tried burying himself in blankets, tried keeping warm with layers.

  But Pisces' library was cold.

  A deep, biting cold that seeped through everything.

  He had spent nights shivering on the stone floor, waking up feverish, barely able to breathe.

  He had learned his lesson.

  Sometimes, no matter how badly he wanted to stay, he had to leave.

  He climbed the stairs, slipped back out through the stained-glass window, and landed on solid ground.

  Then, he froze.

  Someone was standing in front of him.

  A woman.

  She was too close to the entrance.

  He straightened, brushing dirt off his clothes, eyes flicking up to her face.

  She was older than him. Late thirties, maybe early forties.

  Jet black hair. Grey eyes.

  She was smiling.

  Her clothes were odd. Animal hide for a top. Loose shorts. No shoes.

  She looked like she had walked out of a different time entirely.

  And she was staring straight at him.

  “How much did you read?”

  The woman’s voice was calm, steady. But her smile didn't move.

  He glanced around.

  The clearing was empty.

  The sun was setting.

  The air had turned cold.

  “I—what?” he asked, not because he hadn’t heard her, but because he needed a second to gather his thoughts.

  “How much did you read?” she repeated, same tone, same unnerving smile.

  Something about it made his stomach clench. Maybe she was sick.

  Or maybe—

  No. No, don’t be stupid.

  He swallowed. “I—uh, I guess I read… a lot?” His voice dropped, his words hesitant. Was he embarrassed to be caught crawling out of an abandoned building? Or was it the way she seemed to already know what he was doing?

  “Do you… know about this place?” He motioned vaguely toward the ruin behind them. “The library?”

  Her smile widened.

  “Yes,” she said. “It’s something I’ve studied for a long time. A very long time.” She finally closed her eyes, crossing her arms, giving him a brief reprieve from that unblinking stare. “Quite the place, isn’t it?”

  “Y-Yeah.” He scratched the back of his neck. Why did he feel guilty?

  “How long have you been coming here?”

  “Uh… about five years.”

  “I see.” She nodded, as if filing that information away. “Then you must be familiar with the language.”

  “The… language?”

  “Yes. Were you able to decipher it all?”

  He blinked. “It was in English.”

  She frowned.

  “What?” he asked. “I mean, everything I read was just… normal? I didn’t find anything strange.”

  “I see.”

  A long silence.

  Her eyes were closed, but she was thinking, deep in thought.

  He shuffled his feet. He wanted to ask her about the library, but how? She was the first person he’d met who knew about it, but she was also the most unsettling person he’d ever spoken to.

  So instead, he went with the safest option.

  “You know… it’s really interesting,” he said, cautiously. “Not just the library itself, but the books. The details in Caruncle’s life. The world-building, the history—it’s all so…”

  “Right.”

  She opened her eyes again.

  And locked onto him.

  “But if it was all in English,” she said, tilting her head, “then you must have read most of it.”

  He froze.

  “W-Well, yeah.”

  Her gaze flicked up and down, examining him, studying him.

  “In that case…” Her smile returned. “Tell me, what would you change?”

  “…What?”

  “About Caruncle,” she said. “What would you change?”

  “Y-You mean, as a character?”

  “Caruncle was a real man.”

  He laughed nervously. “Right. A ‘real man.’”

  Her smile widened.

  “Tell me,” she said again, “what would you have done differently?”

  Something shifted in the air.

  His stomach hollowed out. His body felt lighter, like he was about to float away.

  It was getting dark.

  Too dark.

  This conversation was wrong.

  He had always been bad with strangers. And even worse with situations like this. His brain was already spiraling, making up ridiculous backstories for her, trying to rationalize what was happening.

  But then—

  A thought.

  A really stupid, really funny thought.

  If she was what he thought she was, then wouldn’t it be hilarious to see the look on her face if he said—

  “I would have done a lot better,” he said, smiling shyly, staring at his shoes.

  Her expression froze.

  “…Better?” she repeated, her smile twitching. “How so?”

  “I think Caruncle sacrificed more people than he needed to. If it had been me, I would have protected them.” The silence that followed was too long.

  Then, slowly—**too slowly—**she frowned.

  “…A lot of those people were fated to die,” she said, the edges of her lips curling back into something wrong. “Caruncle blamed himself, but there was never another way.”

  “Well,” he swallowed, “I guess Lorenzo never learned how to keep a low profile.” Her entire body went still.

  “…Low profile?”

  “There were things Caruncle didn’t see coming,” he said, finally looking up. And then—he smirked.

  Just to see what she would do. She chuckled. Low. Dark. Then her face hardened. The air shifted again. She was staring into him. He tried to look away. He couldn’t.

  “You know what?” she said, voice light, almost amused. “Why don’t you go ahead and show me?”

  “…Show you?”

  He felt like he was tilting, off balance, falling.

  He needed to leave. Now.

  Maybe if he asked her to come down the hill with him, maybe if they walked together, maybe—

  “Uh, wait,” he blurted. “I don’t think we introduced ourselves. What’s your name?”

  She smiled.

  “Jazmin.”

  The moment she said it—

  Everything went dark.