"What is not recorded cannot be erased. But what is recorded ... can be buried. »»
-Registration erased above the black deposit door
The carriage stopped with a damp creak noise.
Ashen went down.
The western district was another Edelstadt.
Here, the walls were crying. The cobblestones were swallowed by the lichen.
The statues of forgotten saints leaned their heads, eaten away by rain and memory.
Facing him: an old half-moon building.
A collapsed dome. Split stairs.
And a black iron grid, sealed by three seals of red wax.
A rare voice rose from the shade.
- " Password ? »»
Ashen did not answer. He handed the copper badge.
A clicking.
Then a long mechanical rattle.
The grid opened.
The air inside was heavy. Responsible for mold, ink ... and a silence too dense to be natural.
Ashen descended the steps.
Reception room
A man was waiting for him behind a lead window.
Old. Dry. Almost dissolved in his gray blouse.
- "The new one?" »»
Ashen nodded.
- "Files x12 to G40. Zérophy index. Classification of High Minister. You read, you sort, you throw or record. If a name seems too alive, put it in the black box. No questions. No personal notes. No memory. »»
- "Who else works here? »»
- "Two archivists. A gravedigger. And three shadows. »»
- "Shadows?" »»
- "You will understand. Or not. »»
Man handed him a rusty key.
- "Salle 3. Bench number 7. Start of surveys at dawn. »»
Ashen had said nothing, but everything was tense.
He followed the corridor.
The walls were oozing an old humidity. Scattered frescoes showed without eyes.
Hall 3
The room was large.
Thousands of documents, classified as gray batteries, some seelled by tanned human leather.
Ashen took place on bench 7.
A file was already waiting for him.
-"Investigation R-V-014 / Question-Erased subject / Witness: V. Valemyr / Date: 1234-AH. Name withdrawn by imperial decree."
He blinked.
Her finger trembled for a second.
He opened.
Lines drawn in cold, straight, emotionless ink.
"The Duke says he does not remember the existence of a fourth child. The collective memory seems altered. The birth registers have been cleaned. Any attempt to reconstruct the profile leads to logical differences. The name' Ashen 'does not officially appearThe High-Minister Class this file in the Soul Anomalies section. "
He stopped. His throat was dry.
He put the folder in the black box.
Then he opened another.
"Theory: Some souls persist beyond the torment of the formHypothesis of a trans-moral "mad" mentioned in the censored poems of the broken wheel cycle. "
Ashen closed his eyes. His hand was shaking.
But he did not speak.
Not a word.
Not a tear.
Just a sigh.
And then a smile. Light. Empty.
He continued.
Leaving, he met one of the other archivists.
A woman. Young, maybe. Impossible to say.
She did not speak. She stared at it for a long time, then drew a circle in the air with her finger.
Ashen does not react.
But he felt his mask - that of the madman - slightly shudder against his skin.
He accelerated the step.
He didn't want to understand yet.
Not immediately.
"You can't kill what refuses to be forgotten. »»
- Prohibited manuscript, extract from the codex of fractured souls
He was coming back every day.
Same hour. Same silence.
The archives had become a routine.
A strange shelter.
A stable grave.
Ashen ran, read, classified.
But since the opening of the V-014 file, one thing had changed.
Silence had… slipped.
As if the walls themselves were waiting.
Salle 3 - Banc 7 - Burning files
That morning, he found an unlisted document.
No seal. No code.
A simple black envelope, placed in its place.
Ashen took it. He hesitated.
Then opened it.
Inside, a page.
A single word, drawn from dark red ink, like old blood.
"Come back."
His breath was cut.
He returned the page.
A poem. Fragmented. as scribbled between two spasms.
"The cursed name that does not exist,
Drags his chains between the strata.
He laughed, he killed, he yelled.
And yet, no one remembers that he was born.
Because the fire that consumes kings,
Is never noted in laws. »»
Ashen closed his eyes.
He had not dreamed.
Someone knew.
Someone remembered.
Lower level - The submerged deposit
That evening, the archivist in gray blouse stopped him.
- "Salle 6, Level D. We allow you to search the black funds. »»
- "Why now?" »»
- "Because the ministry wants to see ... how far you hold. »»
Ashen descended the stairs to spiral, lampion in hand.
The walls were crying tar.
Old inscriptions were trying to reform.
Names appeared there, trembled, disappeared.
Among them, stealthily:
Ashen.
Ashen.
Ashen.
He arrived at an iron door, open.
The smell of mold was so strong that it became acidic.
On a shelf, he saw a connected register of dark leather.
No title.
He opened it.
And read.
"List of identities unrecognized by history"
Classification: Persistent unknown
• File #044 - "Fou", real name unknown.
• Status: multi-layer transmigrant
• failures: 100,000,000,000
• Description: subject impossible to erase. Break memory laws. Clings to existence out of pure will.
• Risk: Absolute.
• Code: "Do not name. Do not look. Do not laugh."
Ashen felt blood withdraw from his veins.
He went back.
A voice echoed.
- "You read your own ghost. »»
The indicator.
Sitting on a pile of books, dressed in a worn coat.
-"Why am I here?" »»
- "Because you refuse to die. Even when you should. »»
- "I didn't ask anything. »»
- "None of the yours asks. You are born. You burn. You laugh. You start again. »»
Ashen closed the register.
- " Tell me. Am I the only one? »»
- " No. But you are the only one to have laughed so hard ... that even the memory trembled. »»
A silence.
Then the indicator descended.
- "Do you want to know what I see for you, Ashen?" »»
-"Tell it. »»
The indicator looked at him.
His eyes were not eyes.
But mirrors.
- "You're going to go up. Not in the classes. Nor in the ranks.
You will go up in the forgotten strata. Where the refused names live.
You will find traces of those who have been erased.
You will prove that memory is a war.
And that the dead, sometimes ... lie. »»
Ashen fell.
- "Why me?" »»
- "Because you are dead. One hundred thousand billion times.
And yet ... you are there.
It's time to learn why. »»
The indicator handed a fragment of mirror.
Ashen saw his own reflection.
But it was not him.
It was them. All his reflections.
The 44.
And everyone laughed. Or cry. Or shouted.
But all ... looked at him.
Ashen closed his hand on the mirror.
And left the room.
"What history does not say ... silence protects it. »»
- Fragment of a prohibited text, burned by the threshold temple
The ash district was not talking.
He whispered.
Ashen had been slipping there for days, tracking the forgotten, the faces half erased, the murmurs.
But that day, it was not a face he found.
It was a paper.
An old manuscript rolled in a bone tube, slipped between two stones behind an overturned altar.
There was neither seal nor signature. Just a word scribbled in black ink:
"If I am found dead, don't think an accident. »»
Ashen opened the tube.
The parchment inside was shaking under his fingers.
For a moment, he hesitated. Then he read.
Confidential letter - Unknown recipient
"The agreement with the High Care is finalized.
His Majesty Maelrath gave his assent.
The non-believers will be identified, identified, then purged.
The large temple of the threshold receives absolute authority on the operation.
The decree will be published in the form of health reform.
The word "infestation" will be used.
The list of first targets is already transmitted.
Aimed districts: ash, vein-morte, black border.
A silent purge.
No trials. No burial.
The missing will have no names.
Because only those whom the king looks at ... exist. »»
Ashen remained frozen.
The words were clear.
The chilling intention.
A secret purge, approved by Maelrath.
Disguised as public policy.
Orchestrated with the church.
A shiver went back along his spine.
He reread the last lines:
"Because only those whom the king looks at ... exist."
He remembered this sentence.
It was a temple prayer.
But here ... she became a sentence.
Ashen put the letter in his round.
He didn't know what to do yet.
But he knew what it meant:
His return was not a coincidence.
The indicator knew.
Maybe even ... forever.
And Ashen was not an investigator.
Not a simple forgotten recuperator.
He was a witness.
A survivor placed in the heart of a larger puzzle than his own pain.
So he left the neighborhood.
And walked north.
His goal was no longer a forgotten name.
But a name too powerful to dare to write it:
Maelrath.
"Those who see the fire from the inside ... no longer retreat in front of the flames. »»
- Word of the poet, half forgotten
The carriage advanced slowly through the golden alleys of Edelstadt, its wheels creaking on the irregular cobblestones.
Inside, Ashen stared at the indicator.
The man was calm. Drape of a night cape, his veiled silver mask, as always. He hadn't talked since the start.
Ashen held the bone tube in his hand.
-You knew, right? he whispered.
No answer.
Ashen put the tube slowly on the wooden table between them.
- You knew what the king is preparing. You sent me there to find this letter.
The indicator slowly turned his head.
- Did you open it?
- Obviously. You made me play the messengers, but it is a message that talks about death. of purge. Of lies.
A silence.
Then the voice of the seer, always soft, always low:
-And now that you know ... what are you planning to do?
Ashen inspired. His hands were barely trembling. He was calm. Too calm.
- I want to understand. Why me? Why now?
- You have had me from Edelstadt, since even before my reappearance. For what ?
The indicator lightly leaned back.
- Because you are dead, Ashen.
Ashen did not answer. The mask on his face hid his expression, but the air changed.
- Not once. Not a hundred times. Not a thousand times.
- You died a hundred thousand billion times.
Ashen blinked.
- What are you talking about ?
- Each fragment of you, each possibility, each reflection ... broke through eternity. And each time, you are dead. By fire. By the rope. By vacuum. By your own hand.
- And yet, you're still there.
A strange cold descended into the passenger compartment.
- Do you want to know why it's you? Because you alone ... keep getting up. Again. Again. Again.
The indicator leaned his head.
- You wear the memory of a world that has forgotten everything. And the flames of those who have been erased.
Ashen clenched his fists.
- You chose me. For what ? To use the blade?
The indicator did not answer right away.
Then he whispered:
- No. Not a blade.
- A witness. An anomaly. Someone who has nothing to lose, and therefore ... everything to offer.
Ashen slowly lowered his head.
The letter weighed on him as an old weight. Words were still running in his head.
"The missing will have no names."
- I don't want to remember for the pleasure of suffering.
- I want to know if it makes sense. If ... I can prevent something.
The light raised a hand, fine and almost translucent.
-So listen to me well.
- What you found is just a fragment. A prelude. The real plot… exceeds the purge. He is woven in time. In the very frames of memory.
- The king wants more than a purged kingdom. He wants a purged memory.
Ashen suddenly raised his head.
- Does he want to ... erase history?
The indicator lightly nodded.
- Exactly.
- And you, Ashen ... you are a defect. A living error in the great rewriting.
A silence fell in the carriage.
Then the indicator's voice was firmer:
- You have to go further.
- Not in the streets. But in the dead archives.
- Under the temple. Where even the priests are afraid of entering.
- You will find there ... what they want to forget. And maybe what you need to become.
Ashen closed his eyes for a second.
He felt the weight of all his memories, all his dead, all his cries.
Then he blew.
- I guess ... that I have never been free.
No one really is, replied the warning light. But those who know that they are chained ... can learn to shoot on the channels.
The carriage stopped.
The light opened the door.
- The archives are waiting for you. And if you fail ... Edstadt will not even remember having erased you.
Ashen went down.
The ink wind was blowing the city.
And in the distance, the temple seemed to breathe.