The heavy iron door to the library's basement creaked on its rusted hinges, a sound that usually made Azmoz's skin crawl, but tonight, he barely noticed it. His heart was hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He didn't even bother to turn on the overhead lights, which flickered and buzzed with a dying electricity that never failed to give him a headache. Instead, he gripped the heavy flashlight he'd swiped from the security desk, its cold metal casing grounding him as he stepped into the damp, lightless void below.
He needed to know more. The sensation of the purple book merging into his skin had left him with a thirst that water couldn't quench. It was a gnawing, hollow feeling in his gut, a demand for answers that only the darkness of the collapse could provide. He reached the edge of the structural failure, where the floor had simply given up and surrendered to the earth. The jagged edges of broken concrete looked like the teeth of some prehistoric beast in the beam of his torch.
Azmoz climbed down into the hole, his boots crunching on grit and pulverized stone. He ignored the way the dust coated his throat and made him cough. He was looking for a sign, a clue, anything that he might have missed when he first discovered that glowing book. He held the torch low, sweeping the light across the debris.
He searched and searched, moving heavy chunks of masonry and peering into every nook and cranny of the subterranean space. He squeezed his lanky frame behind old, rusted pipes that smelled of oxidation and ancient rot. He dug through piles and piles of sand that had poured in from the foundations of the city above, his fingernails becoming caked with grime. Every time his light caught a glint of something metallic, his heart leaped, only for him to find a discarded soda can or a twisted piece of rebar.
The air down there was stale and thick. After about an hour of frantic searching, Azmoz sat back on a pile of dirt, his chest heaving. He wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, leaving a dark smear of mud across his brow. There was nothing here. No secret chambers, no hidden altars, just the skeletal remains of a building that should have been demolished decades ago. The basement was empty, and the silence began to feel mocking.
Maybe the book was everything, he thought, looking down at his sleeve. Maybe the place doesn't matter anymore, only what it left inside me.
He gave up on the hole and climbed back up to the main basement level. If the physical world wouldn't give him answers, he would have to look for them the old and only way he knew: inside the very books he was paid to protect. He ascended the stairs, his legs feeling a bit heavier now that the initial adrenaline was fading, and re-entered the main library floor. The vast rows of shelves stretched out before him like a labyrinth of forgotten thoughts. The smell of old paper and binding glue was usually comforting, but now it felt like a challenge.
He started in the history section, looking for anything related to the Great Descent or the monoliths that Sister Martha had whispered about. He ran his fingers along the spines of the books, the leather and buckram cold against his skin. As he moved past a section on local architecture, he felt something. It was a faint sensation, a tiny prickle that started at the base of his right wrist and traveled up to his elbow. He stopped dead in his tracks and looked at his arm, pulling back his hoodie sleeve.
The purple tattoo was still there, its lines intricate and sharp, but the sensation was gone. "Strange," he muttered to himself. He tried to rotate his arm, flexing his fingers and stretching his muscles to see if it was just a pinched nerve or a cramp from digging in the basement. Nothing. It felt perfectly normal. He shook his head, pushing his glasses up his nose. The tape was starting to peel again, and he pressed it down firmly.
"OPEN," he whispered, testing the command he had learned earlier.
The air shimmered, and the purple book manifested in front of him, floating with a low, ethereal hum. The predatory insects etched on the cover seemed to watch him with their multifaceted eyes. Azmoz flipped through the pages with a trembling hand, but it was exactly as it had been before. All of the pages were blank, shimmering with a faint violet light that revealed nothing. There were no new instructions, no map to his destiny, just the same cryptic symbols. Disappointed, he dismissed the book and watched it dissolve into purple goo that sank back into his skin.
He turned back to the shelves, his frustration mounting. He needed to find something relevant. He moved toward the biology section, thinking perhaps the book reacted to scientific classifications. As he reached out toward a dusty volume titled Entomology of the Outer Rim, there it was again. That sensation. This time, it wasn't just a prickle; it was a distinct, magnetic pull that made the hairs on his arm stand on end.
Could it be some particular book causing this? he thought, his eyes widening behind his cracked lenses. He slowed his movements, hovering his hand over a row of binders that hadn't been touched in years. The closer he got to a specific, thin volume bound in grey cloth, the stronger the pull became. It was a buzzing vibration now, a physical resonance that made his skin itch.
He reached for the book and took it out of the shelf. As soon as the spine cleared the other books, he saw it. Tucked in the dark corner where the book had been resting was a spider. It was a small, unremarkable thing, its legs long and spindly as it huddled in the center of a dusty web. The moment Azmoz's eyes locked onto the creature, the sensation in his arm didn't just buzz—it exploded into a full-on throb of energy.
Excited and confused, Azmoz didn't even think before summoning the book again. "OPEN!" he commanded, his voice a bit louder this time, echoing through the empty library. The book appeared instantly, but it didn't wait for him to touch it. The pages began to flip violently, caught in an invisible wind. They blurred past his eyes until the book suddenly slammed open to a page that had previously been empty.
Azmoz gasped. On the right side of the book, a large and incredibly life-like illustration was forming. It wasn't just a drawing; the ink seemed to move, shimmering with a glossy sheen that matched the exact spider sitting on the shelf in front of him. Every hair on the spider's legs and every glint in its tiny eyes was captured in perfect, terrifying detail. On the left page, text began to bleed into existence in a sharp, glowing font that looked like it had been carved by a laser.
Description -> Common spider: A commonly found spider on planet Xylos. Known for its predatory nature and silk-spinning capabilities. Though small, it is the foundation of many complex swarms.
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For a boy who had lived a monotonous, gray life of dusting shelves and being pushed around by school bullies, this was more than just exciting. It was a revelation. The world wasn't just a place where things happened to him; it was a place where he could interact with the hidden layers of reality. An unwanted smile appeared on his face—a sharp, jagged expression that felt foreign to his features. He felt a surge of power, a sense of belonging that he had never found in human company.
He reached out a finger toward the spider, wondering if he should touch it, but the creature scuttled deeper into the shadows of the shelf. He didn't mind. He had already gained something. He quickly flipped the book to the very last page, his fingers flying over the parchment. He wanted to see what had changed. He wanted to see himself.
He stared at the numbers. They were clean, precise, and undeniable. Ten experience points just for finding a spider. His mind raced with the possibilities. If a common house spider could give him ten points, what could a larger insect do? What could a nest of them do? He looked around the library, and for the first time, he didn't see a dusty prison. He saw a hunting ground. Every corner of this decaying building was likely crawling with life that the rest of the world ignored—life that he could now use to fuel his own evolution.
He felt a cold, calculated hunger growing in his chest. The bullying, the isolation, the poverty—it all felt like a distant memory compared to the glowing text in front of him.
He closed the book, watching it vanish into his arm once more.
Azmoz walked toward the next aisle, his footsteps silent on the worn carpet. He didn't need the flashlight anymore. His eyes felt sharper, his mind clearer. He began to look for the next buzz in his arm, the next tiny life form that would help him climb the ladder of power. The night was still young, and he had so much more to find.
He stopped near a ventilation grate that was thick with cobwebs. His arm throbbed again, more insistently this time. He knelt down, peering into the dark slats of the metal cover. He could hear the faint, rhythmic clicking of mandibles from somewhere deep inside the ducts. It was a sound that would have terrified him yesterday, but today, it sounded like music.