The following morning, Tyel woke up almost earlier than usual. Tyel knew that on this day, he had to go and search for something to create a hole inside the wall of the city, and he couldn't lose any time.
"It feels strange to wake up to a new day," joked Tyel. After repeating the same day around four times, he had finally reached a new one. 'I wonder if I die here, if I'll be brought to the start of this day or the start of yesterday…' With this thought, Tyel's body shook in fear. 'I've already lived that day too many times, I want to live a new one.' With that, Tyel went to the kitchen to have breakfast and to get ready for work as usual.
Before going out, Tyel looked at the knife he had left on the table yesterday night, the same one he had brought to the base and the same one he had used to cut off his head in the previous loop.
Tyel grabbed it slowly and positioned the knife inside his boot. 'I'll bring it in case things get bad…' Tyel went out of his house and reached the prison.
Suddenly, right before entering the prison, at the entrance exactly when Tyel passed through, a bell rang, and some robots immediately went near Tyel.
"Oh, what happened?" asked Tyel, confused.
"This rings when you're entering with something metallic inside the prison. Please let us see what it is, and if it isn't anything dangerous, we will let you go," said the robots. Tyel had an annoyed look on his face.
'I guess I can't even bring the knife with me…' thought Tyel as he slowly took the knife out of his boot and pointed it toward one of the robots. "Yeah, yeah, I'm here to destroy the prison, just go on and kill—"
Tyel wasn't even given the time to speak before the robots immediately shot at him without hesitation. Some guards who knew Tyel directly looked at the scene with horror in their eyes.
"Déjà Veil."
"Ouch, getting shot hurts so much… I should have cut off my head instead," whispered Tyel, as he could clearly remember the pain when the bullets pierced his skin. It felt as though Tyel's body had just started to bleed and the shattering of the soul that happened yesterday had reset. 'At least I'm sure that it is the same day as last time…'
'Well, at least I know that if I enter with something made of metal, that weird thing will ring…' thought Tyel as he turned on his side and began to sleep again.
The following day, Tyel looked at the knife left on the table and decided to leave it there, as he knew that bringing it with him would just make him die faster. 'I mean, I still have the pistol with me in case things get bad, I can always shoot myself with that…' With that, Tyel closed the door behind his back and started to walk again toward the prison.
"Oh, you're earlier than usual today, Tyel," said one of the guards as he noticed Tyel entering the changing room for the guards. In this city, the guards weren't allowed to take anything related to the prison back home; they had to leave their uniforms and pistols there. If someone were found with one of these things at home, they would be executed on the spot without being listened to.
"Yeah… I woke up earlier than usual, I couldn't sleep at all this night," said Tyel playfully as he removed his shirt to change into the uniform.
"Eh, my wife had the same problem today, but luckily once I got out of the house she had fallen asleep, so I'm glad that she could sleep peacefully," said the guard as he positioned the pistol in its spot perfectly and started to walk out.
"Well, Tyel, we'll catch up later. Are you going to drink with the others tonight?" asked the guard as he turned toward Tyel, who remained silent for a moment.
"I don't think I will. As I've told you, I haven't been able to sleep peacefully, I'm feeling too tired," answered Tyel, as he had just finished unbuttoning his uniform and grabbed his pistol too.
"Remember not to make any errors on the job. Remember what happened during the recent attack and that three prisoners escaped?" asked the guard, stopping to wait for Tyel to reach him while he adjusted his pistol in the uniform.
'He must be talking about the time we rebels went to save Liro, Vane, and Lily…' thought Tyel as he reached the other guard and realized someone was missing. 'The fact that Zrelekai was experimenting on Darian was known by the guards… maybe the fact that he escaped wasn't revealed yet?'
"Oh yeah, I wasn't on duty that day, so I don't know exactly what happened," answered Tyel as he reached the other guard and the two of them went outside the changing room.
"After the three prisoners escaped, Joki, who was on duty in the garden at that moment, became a prisoner, even though he fell unconscious and couldn't do anything to prevent it," said the guard. The moment they came out, he lowered his voice so no one could hear them.
"That is why I told you to pay attention during work, even if you're tired… even if it isn't your fault, they will always find a way to go against you," said the guard as he moved away from Tyel, as they were assigned to two different places.
"Thanks, Heimrad. We'll catch up later," said Tyel as he waved toward his friend, who did the same while going away. "Bye, Tyel!"
'Now I just need the perfect moment to go away and search for something… still, if it is made of metal, it would be hard to let it get through the entrance,' thought Tyel while he walked toward his position near the workers to check on what they were doing and how they performed their work.
The air for the workers was always the same, heavy, like any other time. Most prisoners were moving their hands in fear, scared that they might do something bad and the guards would shoot them, while the other prisoners, more used to this kind of work, performed like usual.
"This… this can't be happening to me… some days ago I was working for you, and now you're treating me like this…" whispered a prisoner who caught Tyel's attention. As he moved his eyes toward the sound, he noticed that the one whispering to himself was Joki, the guard who recently became a prisoner.
Joki's movements were slow and he could barely do anything; his hands were shaking and he could barely stand on his feet. But as he thought of the same things he had done to many prisoners while he worked as a guard, he realized that he had to work and could not remain still even for a second.
'It's our fault that it happened, Joki… 'thought Tyel as he looked at the ground, feeling a bit sorry for his old colleague. 'We rebels promise you that soon this will all be over… and you will all be free again.'
As the hours passed, lunch time finally arrived. Some guards would usually eat before the arrival of the prisoners in the canteen, and others after. Today Tyel had to eat before the prisoners, and this time was a sort of free hour for the guards; they could relax and go around, and if they preferred, return to work.
Tyel arrived earlier than usual in the canteen. "Hey, Sir Tyel, you want the usual, right?" asked the woman behind the counter. Tyel nodded his head. "Give me a smaller one today; I don't want to stay here long," answered Tyel. The woman felt a bit surprised hearing that.
"A smaller hamburger for you, Tyel? What happened? Are you feeling alright?" asked the woman as she grabbed the small hamburger and gave it to Tyel.
"Well yeah, I'm not feeling too well with my stomach," said Tyel as he positioned his left hand on his stomach and grabbed the hamburger with the other.
"Well, at least you get to eat better than what the prisoners will have today…" pointed out the woman, as she knew that today was not the best day for the prisoners to eat something good, unlike the others.
The moment Tyel finished eating, he immediately went outside the room so that he could go somewhere and search for his object.
'And now here comes the problem… what do I even need to search for?' With this thought, Tyel started to wander in the prison, and as he reached the laboratories, he happened to hear a conversation between two scientists.
"Zrelekai is mad… the extraction of the stone nearby is going really slow, but the rock there is too hard for us to dig deeply. I don't get why he can't just create the rock for us…" said one scientist. Tyel, happening to overhear this conversation, started to walk slower so that he could understand what they were talking about, as any information would be useful for his research.
"I told you, he isn't interested in studying that type of stone. And why don't you use the vibration core instead? It can soften the stone for us so that we would be able to dig easily," asked the other scientist. Tyel heard the name, but it didn't ring any bells in his head.
'Vibration core? What's that supposed to be?' thought Tyel as he became interested in the conversation and remained still, pretending to check something on the wall as he kept hearing the dialogue.
"Are you crazy? Zrelekai created it multiple years ago and it couldn't work perfectly well, so he simply put it in the great magazines. It is probably somewhere in that place full of dust. Better search for another solution or…" The scientists gave each other a fearful look as they realized that if this experiment they were doing for Zrelekai didn't end well, their lives would end instead, and not as well as the experiment.
Then, after Tyel heard this conversation, he remembered Darian's words: "Zrelekai might have created something like that and probably forgot that it exists."
'Even if you've spent only a few days with him, Darian… he has told you so many things…' thought Tyel. He couldn't lose any time, he had already spent forty minutes searching for information, and now he only had twenty minutes before going back to work.
The great magazines were an extremely huge room positioned right below the cells. They could be used by anyone, but the guards said they saw Ashikunz come out of there randomly, so everyone was always scared to actually go there to spend time, thinking that the Krukin might appear behind their backs and kill them.
The great magazines are used by Zrelekai, as the other scientists are scared to go down there too, and he uses this room just to store useless old things he doesn't need anymore.
'I wonder how many things I'll find there…' thought Tyel as he reached the great magazines. 'Even if the rumors are true, I'll survive. I mean, I can always revert the day,' thought Tyel, realizing that even if Ashikunz were to randomly appear, he could always save himself.
As Tyel entered the great magazines, everything around was full of dust. There was barely any space to walk, and the whole room was filled with multiple boxes and old furniture. Tyel grabbed the torch that was given to every guard in case of missing light and started to search around for this vibration core.