The second book had changed everything.
The moment the chalice dissolved, the hope it brought dissolved with it. The hall grew louder, heavier, as though the Library itself had absorbed their despair and pressed it back on them.
They were learning. Not what they wanted to know, but what the Library demanded they learn:
Nothing here lasted.
The broad-shouldered man sat apart, knife laid across his knee, book clutched tight against his chest. Anyone who drifted too close earned a sharp glance, a promise of violence. He didn't need to say it aloud: the book was his.
The girl with cropped hair argued in whispers with others, anger sharp in her voice. She wasn't just angry at him. She was angry at the rules. At the silence of the Library. At the number 73 that stared down at them like an eye.
The thin girl with wide eyes rocked on her heels, muttering to herself. "One use… one use only… then it's gone. Not enough. Never enough."
Every face told a story. Desperation. Greed. Fear.
The young man leaned against the far wall, eyes closed but mind awake. Listening. Waiting.
"Why hasn't the number changed?" someone demanded suddenly, voice cutting through the whispers.
Dozens of eyes shot upward. 73. Still glowing. Still unbroken.
"It should've changed! That boy collapsed—what if he's already—"
"He's not dead," someone else snapped, pointing to the fallen boy, who slept fitfully on the floor. "Look, he's breathing."
"Then what is it? What's it waiting for?"
"The first one. Always the first one," muttered a trembling man. "It's waiting for the first body."
That silenced the room again.
Whispers coiled into theories.
The number marks time.
The number marks lives.
The number marks failures.
The Library had not told them, but already it was teaching them to fear.
The young man finally opened his eyes.
He studied the room — not the words, but the way people grouped.
Three huddled near the knife-holder, drawn to his strength. Not loyalty, but survival. They wanted protection.
Five clustered around the cropped-hair girl, united by her fury and sharp tongue. She gave them something the Library would not: answers, even if only guesses.
The thin girl had two beside her, quiet, withdrawn, but willing to listen as she whispered patterns and theories, like she could puzzle the Library apart.
The rest floated in between. Fractured, undecided, drifting like debris.
No one stood with him.
He preferred it that way.
---
Time stretched. Hunger deepened. The first real fights broke out.
One was over the sleeping boy's blanket — or what passed for a blanket, a strip of cloth someone had torn from their robe. The shouting turned to shoving, shoving to fists. Blood spotted the floor before the knife-holder barked laughter and brandished his blade.
The fighting stopped instantly.
Not because they wanted to stop. Because they remembered.
Violence wasn't forbidden here.
Not yet.
The young man watched the blood smear on the stone. A small mark, already drying, but more telling than the glowing number.
The Library didn't need to kill them.
It only needed to wait.
Later — or maybe earlier; time was senseless — a sound rattled the hall.
Stone grinding against stone.
Every head whipped around. Another seam split across the far wall, revealing a niche.
Another book.
The rush was immediate, a flood of bodies pressing toward it.
But they hesitated at the edge. The memory of the boy collapsing, of the chalice dissolving, held them back.
The knife-holder didn't hesitate. Knife flashing, he shoved bodies aside and seized the book.
Its cover was plain. Its pages fluttered open.
[Utility: Fire]
A candle sputtered into life in his palm, flame dancing.
Shouts erupted — fear, awe, hunger. Fire meant warmth, cooking, light. Fire meant survival.
The knife-holder grinned, teeth catching the glow. "Looks like I'm in charge now."
But the candle flickered. Wavered. The wax melted too quickly, dripping over his fingers.
Within minutes, it guttered out.
Gone.
The book dulled to blankness.
And the crowd broke.
"You wasted it!"
"You hogged it all!"
"Why should you decide who lives?"
The factions sharpened. The cropped-hair girl's group accused him openly now. The thin girl whispered louder, muttering about balance, about rules, about how the Library wasn't giving them tools — it was giving them tests.
The young man stayed silent.
But in his chest, something cold stirred. Not fear. Not anger. Something heavier.
Understanding.
That night — or what felt like night — no one slept.
Some sat in circles, whispering strategies. Others pressed their backs to the walls, clutching scraps of cloth or shards of stone like weapons.
The fallen boy moaned in restless dreams.
And above them, the number still glowed.
73.
Unchanging. Waiting.
The young man leaned back, eyes half-closed, mind turning.
The Library had shown them two things: need, and the cost of filling it.
Soon, it would demand more.
And when it did, trust would be the first thing to die.