Chapter 7: Sector 12: Memory Dust
The sky turned violet as Zero crossed the fractured bridge into Sector 12.
Unlike the forest, this place was industrial—black towers, sunken streets, and crumbling data pylons still flickering with ghost-light. The air felt thick. Not with fog or smoke—but with… static.
[SECTOR 12: OBSIDIAN LIBRARY DETECTED]
[SYSTEM ALERT: MEMORY DECAY ACTIVE]
"What does that mean?" Zero asked aloud.
[CAUTION: RETAINED MEMORIES MAY CORRUPT. TRAUMA LOOP INSTABILITY AT 37%]
He didn't like the sound of that.
The Obsidian Library rose from the earth like a jagged spine—its spires crooked, half-swallowed by sinkholes. Its outer walls were carved with names, long since worn down to unreadable scars.
Zero entered through a broken side gate.
Inside… silence.
Stacks of stone. Floating cubes of data. Pages that turned themselves in the air. And everywhere: dust.
It coated the floors. The shelves. His boots.
But this wasn't normal dust.
It glowed faintly.
And when he stepped on it—
He remembered things he never lived.
A woman's scream.
Running through fire.
Holding someone's hand.
Losing it.
Falling.
Bleeding.
Then smiling.
Then—
He stumbled, gripping a wall. His vision blurred.
[WARNING: ARCHIVAL MEMORY IMPRINT ACTIVE]
"What… is this place?" he whispered.
"A grave," said a voice.
Zero turned.
A woman stood atop a stairwell, wrapped in gray, skin thin like parchment. Her eyes were lenses—rotating slowly. Her fingers left trails in the air as she descended.
"I am the Archivist."
She reached the bottom.
"You are looking for the Anchor Core," she said.
He nodded slowly.
"Do you have it?"
"No," she said. "But I remember where it broke."
She gestured, and the shelves peeled apart—revealing a lower level, sealed in obsidian glass.
"You will go alone," she said. "It only opens for those who are already breaking."
Zero hesitated.
"What happens if I go down there?"
She tilted her head.
"You'll forget the question you came to answer."
Still… he stepped in.
The stairwell sealed behind him.
Darkness.
Only flickering lights along the edge of the spiral staircase.
As he descended, he heard whispers—not aloud, but in his skull.
"You weren't meant to remember."
"You're not the one she loved."
"The System lied to all of us."
"You were just the container."
He pressed on.
At the bottom: a room filled with black sand.
Not dust. Not memory.
But shards.
Tiny fragments of memory, shattered like glass.
And in the middle of it all—
A pedestal.
On it: a box.
And inside that box: a cube. Cold. Humming.
[ANCHOR CORE // NAMELESS]
[CONTAINS: FOUNDING INTENT OF SYSTEM_0]
He reached out—fingers trembling.
Then—
"Don't."
Zero froze.
From the shadow between shelves, something moved.
Too tall. Too thin. Too human-shaped.
But its face was made of flickering words—constantly shifting.
"You open that," the creature said, "and you will not survive what you see."
Zero narrowed his eyes.
"Who are you?"
It smiled.
"I'm the part of you that already did."
To be continued…