Time passed strangely in the Archives. The essence lighting never changed—a constant amber glow that offered no hint of morning or evening. No windows showed the movement of the sun. Northern and his clones read, absorbed, cross-referenced, built mental maps of information that spread and connected and formed patterns across centuries of recorded history.
He didn't notice when hours became half a day.
Didn't notice when he would subconsciously create more clones to reach more books because all available copies were already occupied. The pursuit of knowledge, as it seemed, was something Northern had failed to consider would be so... consuming. He'd expected useful information. Strategic advantages. Instead, he found himself genuinely fascinated—drawn deeper and deeper into texts he had no practical reason to read, simply because they existed and he could.
Enough to have him so lost.
So much that he noticed nothing aside from the steady accumulation of knowledge.
