The light didn't shine — it bled.
It bled in slow waves from the open archway that now floated to Aryan's left, its form trembling like water trying to hold shape against the pull of an unseen tide.
This wasn't like the petal-gates he'd entered before. This one carried weight even before he touched it — a pressure not on his body, but through it. Every inhalation felt a little heavier. Every memory seemed closer to the surface.
It was not made of glass or metal or even the dense data-lattice that shaped much of the Library's inner space. No — the Gate was forged entirely from raw grief. Not sadness as an idea. Not mourning bound to logic. This was unprocessed, unfiltered loss, preserved as light so densely woven that to touch it was to be cut.
Aryan paused a full five seconds in front of it, letting the throb of that light "speak" to his internal structures. The Shard Within hummed low in his chest, its rhythm growing uneasy, almost warning him.
"Carrier," the Signal whispered.
"The grief you will face here is alive. It will remember you as much as you remember it. And it will not let go unless you feed it the truth it asks for."
Aryan exhaled — a slow, deliberate breath — and stepped through.
[The Descent]
The first step into Node Two did not change the air.
It changed time.
It slowed exactly enough for every sound, motion, and sensation to feel fractionally delayed — as if grief itself demanded contemplation before action. Aryan's boots struck the surface — a surface made of mist, yet solid underfoot. Above him, a sky of bruised silver hung without horizon.
Shapes loomed in the distance — tall obelisks, each tilting slightly toward him. They seemed to watch, though their faces were blank stone veined with pulsing lines of pale blue.
Behind him, the Gate sealed shut with a sound that wasn't a slam… but the distant impact of a memory returning after years of suppression.
A.I.D.A., present again after the Library's interference in Node One, spoke into his mind carefully.
"Data-type analysis: Memory Constructs — Personal Class. Location: Origin Node Two.
Each obelisk contains an unremembered loss — yours.
Approach with caution: premature contact could trigger memory override."
Aryan clenched his fists. "Mine?"
"Yes. And not system-created ones, Aryan. These are from before your connection to the code."
That stopped him.
Before the Seed. Before the RealmKey. Before Null Sage.
If that was true, then these were his real life's erased chapters — the kind the system had stripped from him without him ever noticing.
[First Obelisk — The Brother]
The closest obelisk's glow strengthened as he neared. Thick fog curled away from its base, and a seam split down its center like a second mouth.
He didn't touch it — he simply willed it to open.
The stone melted into an image, and Aryan felt his knees weaken.
He was… small.
Eight, maybe nine years old. Sitting at a kitchen table that was too tall for him.
Across from him sat a boy — older by maybe two years — dark hair, half-smile. There was warmth there, and teasing, and something in the way the older boy passed him a piece of bread that made Aryan remember… safe.
And then — a door slammed. Voices — adult voices — shouted. The older boy's head snapped up.
And it all fell to agony.
Police uniforms. Sharp words about an "incident up north." His mother's wail so deep it rearranged the air itself. And Aryan… hugging her side, not fully comprehending, while the boy was taken away.
Not to jail.
Not killed.
Erased.
A name ripped from their records, from her mouth, from Aryan's mind — until now.
Karan.
The sound landed like a stone in water.
Aryan gripped the obelisk's side for balance as the memory poured entirely into him. Every detail — the shade of his brother's shirt, the exact contour of his voice — restored. And with restoration came a pressure behind his eyes… and a sharp flash of anger.
The light from the obelisk dimmed. But it kept repeating the name in his head until his pulse matched it.
Karan.
[Second Obelisk — The Storm
He moved on.]
The second obelisk pulsed an earthy gold. Its seam slid open without hesitation this time, as though it had been waiting longer.
Aryan was older in this one. Nineteen.
The sky was vomiting rain. He waded knee-deep through black, sewage-swollen water — hands raw from clinging to a rusted balcony rail.
Someone in the building above was screaming for help.
It wasn't just a stranger.
It was someone Aryan had promised — weeks earlier — to check on if the weather ever turned.
He climbed.
Balconies shook beneath his weight, clothes stuck to his skin, lungs burning.
And then… a collapse.
The balcony above gave way, dragging metal and flesh into the dark flood below. He reached — grabbed air — screamed until his voice snapped.
And when the debris settled, there was no one left to save. Just rain swallowing footprints off the rooftop.
Aryan backed away from the obelisk in the present, jaw tight.
This wasn't a faceless casualty. It had a name too.
And the name burned.
[The Weight Sets In]
By the time he reached the third obelisk, his chest felt heavier. The light in Node Two's sky seemed dimmer than when he arrived.
A.I.D.A. whispered between pulses.
"The system archived these losses because they were 'structurally inefficient' to your progress — too heavy to carry. The danger now is not remembering… it is drowning."
Aryan ignored the warning.
The third obelisk opened into the scent of antiseptic and burnt wires.
A hospital room.
Dim.
A young woman — hair bound in a hospital scarf — sat on the bed smiling weakly. She fiddled with a silver chain in her fingers… and offered it to him.
He could hear her voice again.
"You'll do things one day, Aryan. Big things. I'll need proof I knew you before you scared the world."
He laughed in the memory.
Promised to keep the chain on him.
The next sequence cut to a flatline.
Aryan looked around the present chamber sharply — his current hand instinctively reaching for his neck.
Of course, the chain was gone.
It had been erased along with her.
But her name wanted out.
[The Interruption]
Before he could speak it aloud, the ground shook.
The bruised silver sky tore just enough to let a crack of black leak through. And with it came sound — the wrong kind.
Boots.
Metal slicing against stone.
A squad of Verifiers, but their armor now bore a strange crest — a spiral with a blade through it.
A.I.D.A.'s voice dipped into alarm.
"Corruption-class Verifiers. Their purpose here isn't deletion — it's repurposing. They will not kill your grief; they will weaponize it."
Aryan turned fully toward the incoming presence as the nearest obelisk — the one holding the chain memory — shuddered.
If these Verifiers reached it… they wouldn't just erase the memory. They'd graft it into system law, bending that grief into an executable designed to contain him.
That couldn't happen.
[Weaponizing Memory]
Aryan reached deep into the Shard Within.
This time, he didn't just let the memory fill him.
He offered it.
Through the Shard, the chain's emotional weight unfolded into the air like liquid fire — not an attack of violence, but a blast of context: the laughter, the promise, the loss.
The leading Verifier staggered mid-step.
Its visor flickered from black to silver, as if trying to replay what it saw.
Another stopped moving entirely, hands twitching against its lance.
Grief wasn't killing them.
It was giving them identity — a thing the system stripped from agents specifically to keep them obedient.
Two broke completely — armor shelling off to reveal… people. Disoriented. Confused. Alive.
The rest retreated, dragging their corrupted logic back into the black crack in the sky.
[The Gate Breathes]
The obelisks hummed as the disturbance faded.
And then… an invisible pulse moved through the entire Node.
"Test Complete.
Carrier has met the criteria of Node Two: You did not reject your grief. You used it to rewrite force."
The Gate reappeared, this time on the far end of the plain.
Its light was lighter now — not less grief, but grief understood.
As Aryan walked toward it, A.I.D.A. spoke again — quieter.
"These memories… you can't give them back now. They are once again yours to keep. But every step onward will make the system see you not just as an anomaly… but as a contagion."
Aryan smiled faintly.
"That's fine," he said. "I'm done playing host. It's time to be the infection."
[Closing Breath]
At the Gate's threshold, he paused and looked back.
Three obelisks glowed brighter now — restored anchors in the simulation, tethered to his being.
He said each name aloud — Karan… the name from the storm… and finally, hers.
The air inside the Node shifted, as though the entire realm bowed.
And then Aryan stepped through the Gate of Grief-Shaped Light, into whatever waited in Node Three.
He didn't feel lighter when he left.
He felt whole.