Elias Ward did not believe in fate.Or at least, that was what he told himself, night after night, as he walked the dim streets of Hollowford with his hands buried deep in his pockets and his thoughts heavier than the streetlamps' glow.
At twenty, Elias's life was an unremarkable list of unfinished beginnings. He had tried university and failed spectacularly within the first year, weighed down not by inability but by a constant, corrosive sense that none of it mattered. He had worked in cafés, in bookstores, even as a cleaner at the railway station for a few weeks, and each time he left quietly, drifting away before anyone had truly noticed him. Hollowford was the sort of town that swallowed the unremarkable whole, and Elias had resigned himself to being one more indistinct face in its grey crowd.
But that night, rain glossed the cobblestones like dark glass, and a tug he couldn't explain urged him down a street he had never taken before. It was narrow, crooked, and seemed wedged between two buildings that leaned together like old conspirators. He paused at the entrance, looking both ways as if someone might scold him for intruding, then stepped in.
The street bent sharply, leading into darkness where the lamps no longer reached. Yet he walked, each step echoing louder than it should have. He thought of turning back, but the tug—like invisible fingers at the back of his mind—kept him moving forward.
At the end of the alley, he found it.
A door.
It should not have been there. The stone walls pressed close on either side, and yet, impossibly, there stood a tall wooden door of blackened oak, set into the bricks as if the alley itself had been built around it. There was no handle, only a keyhole shaped like an eye. Elias stared, rain dripping from his hair, and a chill ran down his spine.
He laughed nervously at himself. It's just a door. Hollowford was full of strange leftovers from older centuries—forgotten basements, sealed passages, relics no one had bothered to tear down. Probably this was one of them. And yet—
The eye-shaped keyhole gleamed.
For a moment, Elias swore it looked back at him.
He stumbled away, heart pounding, but his foot struck something hard. Bending down, he found an old brass key half-buried in the gutter. Its head was circular, engraved with a symbol he did not recognize: a spiral turning inward, endless.
He held it in his palm, and for the first time in years, Elias felt something stir inside him that was not boredom or despair. It was fear, yes, but also possibility. A story waiting to be read.
His hand trembled as he lifted the key. Rain pattered softly against stone as he slid it into the lock.
The door clicked.
And the world changed.
The first thing that struck him was silence. Hollowford's distant traffic, the hiss of rain—gone. He stepped forward, lantern light flooding from nowhere, and found himself in a vast hall of stone.
No, not stone. Shelves.
They rose around him in impossible tiers, climbing higher and higher until they vanished into shadows. Endless rows of books stretched in every direction, their spines cracked with age, their pages glowing faintly like embers. The air smelled of dust, parchment, and something deeper, like the scent of storms bottled in ink.
Elias spun in place, dizzy with awe. He could not see the ceiling, nor the end of the hall. The library was infinite.
"This isn't real," he whispered, but the sound of his own voice seemed swallowed by the shelves.
On the nearest pedestal lay a book larger than any he had seen. Its cover was bound in leather dark as midnight, its edges glimmering faintly. As if drawn by instinct, Elias approached. The letters on the cover shimmered, rearranging themselves until they spelled out words he could understand:
The Archivist
His throat tightened. He reached out, fingers brushing the cover. Warmth pulsed through his skin. The book opened by itself.
Light poured out—not flat light, but vivid, textured, alive. Shapes swirled, landscapes unfolding like painted scrolls come to life: deserts beneath burning suns, seas littered with ships made of glass, cities floating above the clouds.
And then he heard it.
A whisper.
Not from the book, but from everywhere at once, vibrating in the marrow of his bones.
"Archivist."
Elias stumbled back, shaking his head. "No. No, you've got the wrong person. I'm nobody. I—"
But the book turned its pages with a life of its own. Symbols danced, formed words he could not read, and then an image bloomed: a city crumbling, towers collapsing into dust, figures running in silence as shadows devoured them whole.
The voice whispered again:
"Enter."
Elias's heart raced. Every sensible part of him screamed to shut the book, to turn back, to run until the memory of this place faded like a dream. Yet his hand moved of its own accord. He touched the glowing page.
And the library vanished.
He fell.
Air whipped past him, his stomach lurching, the world a blur of colors until he struck ground hard enough to knock the breath from his lungs. Groaning, he pushed himself up and found himself lying on cracked stone streets beneath a blood-red sky.
The city around him was in ruins.
Once, it must have been magnificent—white towers carved with runes, bridges of marble arching across canals, banners fluttering from gilded spires. But now, everything crumbled. The towers leaned and split, flames licked the air, and the streets were littered with broken statues. In the distance, shadows writhed like living smoke, devouring whatever they touched.
Elias staggered to his feet. "Where… am I?"
A scream split the air. He turned and saw a child, no older than ten, trapped beneath fallen masonry. Without thinking, Elias rushed forward. He heaved at the stone, arms shaking, until the slab rolled aside. The boy scrambled free, his eyes wide with terror.
"Run!" the boy gasped, pointing at the smoke.
Elias turned—and froze.
The shadows were coming.
They weren't smoke, not truly. They were holes in the world, patches where reality itself peeled away, leaving only emptiness behind. As they advanced, stone dissolved, fire winked out, even sound seemed to vanish.
Elias grabbed the boy's hand and ran.
The streets twisted, debris everywhere, but instinct guided him. The boy panted, keeping pace. Behind them, silence devoured everything.
At last they burst into a square, where a handful of survivors huddled—men and women clutching spears and lanterns, their faces grim. They stared at Elias as if he were an apparition.
"Another one," muttered a woman with silver hair. "The book sent him."
Elias blinked. "What—what are those things?!"
"The Unmaking," the woman said, her voice heavy. "They come when a world is about to end. Nothing escapes. Nothing lasts. Unless…" She studied him with piercing eyes. "Unless the Archivist has returned."
Elias opened his mouth, then shut it. He wanted to deny it, to say they were wrong, but deep inside he already knew. The library, the book, the whisper—
He was the Archivist.
And this dying world had summoned him.
To be continued…