That night, Ien dreamed of spirals.
He walked up a staircase that twisted endlessly beneath an open sky. Books lined the steps—books without titles. Some had faces on their covers. One had his.
He reached for it—and woke up to silence.
Not normal silence.
Outside his door, someone was breathing. Slowly. Rhythmic. But not human.
Then a voice spoke, low and precise:
"Ien Solmir. Archivist Third-Class. You have been selected for Witness Protocol under the Choir of Echoes. Open the door."
Ien didn't move.
"Open the door," the voice repeated, "or your memory will be confiscated in absentia."
He backed away.
The door didn't open. It peeled. The wood folded like paper and vanished—revealing a space with no walls, no ceiling, no floor.
Only singing.
A single, echoing note stretched into infinity. Cloaked figures floated there, draped in translucent robes that shimmered like rain on glass. Their faces were blurred. Their mouths moved in unison.
The Weeping Choir.
Their voices entered Ien's mind like needles, pressing into thoughts he didn't know he had.
"The Spiral turns where it should not.
One walks where none were meant.
Unfold him."
They moved toward him, arms stretching and shifting like sound waves.
Ien grabbed the spiral charm.
He focused on it—not with fear, but with certainty.
This is real. I am real.
The Choir stopped.
Their voices changed.
"Fixed. He is fixed. An anchored paradox.
We must not Touch what still Binds."
Then they vanished.
The room returned to normal.
The door was whole again.
Ien sat on the floor, heart racing. His hand ached—no, glowed. The spiral pulsed stronger now.
He pulled out a notebook and began to write.
Not a journal. Not a report.
Symbols. Glyphs. He didn't know where they came from.
But the ink began to rise off the page, curling upward like smoke.
One word stayed behind:
Unraveling.
He didn't sleep after that.
But far beyond his little attic, something ancient began to stir.
And the world began to remember a name it had once erased.