Chapter 43 — The World, Still Walking
Much later—so much later that counting stopped being useful—someone found a road that didn't lead anywhere special.
It wasn't hidden.
It wasn't protected.
It just… continued.
Travelers walked it for practical reasons at first. It was flatter. Quieter. Less argued over. Over time, they began choosing it without knowing why.
No shrine marked its beginning.
No sign explained its purpose.
If asked, locals shrugged. "It's just a good road."
Once, a woman sat by its edge at sunset, boots dusty, pack half-empty. She watched the light slide across the ground and felt a strange, gentle certainty—that she didn't need to arrive tonight.
Or tomorrow.
Or ever, if she didn't want to.
She stood eventually and kept walking.
Somewhere else, a debate ended without a winner and everyone went home.
Somewhere else, a law was quietly ignored until it softened into custom.
Somewhere else, a child grew up never learning that the world had once demanded explanations for every breath.
No force ensured this.
No guardian watched over it.
It simply… persisted.
If Arthur existed at all by then—and some said he did, in the way stones exist—he was nothing remarkable. Just another figure on the road, pausing when tired, moving when ready.
No shard hummed.
No margin stretched.
No story leaned forward, eager to conclude.
The world did not need an ending.
It needed continuity without command.
And so it walked on—
uneven, unfinished, unafraid—
carrying its unanswered questions not as burdens,
but as space.