"That's it for today, students. I hope you're ready for the final exam."
Mr. Parker placed his marker on the desk and looked across Class 1-A. A few hands went up immediately.
"Yes, sir."
"I've been preparing."
"I'm almost ready."
A loud groan came from the back.
Mr. Parker turned toward it.
"Interesting response."
The student straightened. "Sorry, sir."
"Don't apologize to me. Apologize to the exam paper when it arrives."
Laughter spread through the room.
Mr. Parker shook his head with a faint smile. "Seriously, you still have two weeks. Don't panic and try to relearn an entire year in one night. Review what you know, find what you don't, and work on that."
Noah leaned toward Chris.
"That's exactly what I'm doing."
Chris didn't look up. "You're going to fail."
"I've been mentally preparing."
Kai glanced over. "For what?"
"Success."
Kai stared at him. "Good luck."
Mr. Parker caught the exchange.
"Since you three seem so confident, perhaps you'd like to explain the difference between the two methods we discussed today."
Noah immediately looked down.
"No, sir."
Chris had to cover his mouth to hide a laugh.
"Thought so," Mr. Parker said.
He answered a few more questions about the exam schedule before the final bell rang. The class erupted into movement as everyone packed their books.
Mr. Parker gathered his things. "Study properly, get enough rest, and don't stay awake all night memorizing."
"Yes, sir."
He left, and the door barely closed before Chris and Noah began stuffing their books into their bags.
Too quickly.
Tyler watched them.
"What are you guys planning?"
"Nothing," Chris said.
"Going home," Noah added far too quickly.
Tyler raised an eyebrow.
"Very convincing."
Kai quickly interrupted.
"Didn't you guys have to go to your club?"
"Yeah."
"Then why are you asking us?"
"I was just asking."
Before the conversation could continue, Eris stood up and swung her bag over her shoulder.
"Yes, Tyler. I have a lot of work today."
Tyler looked at her.
Eris immediately began counting on her fingers..
"I need to finish the report, organize the borrowing records, sort the discussion notes, and teach Mika everything she needs before the handover."
Tyler looked at the mountain of paperwork in her arms.
"Do you ever say the words 'I'll deal with it tomorrow'?"
Eris stared at him.
"No."
"That's your problem."
She ignored him and continued listing tasks.
"And I still need to...."
"Calm down. You're making the paperwork nervous."
Chris snorted.
Eris shot Tyler a look.
He smiled innocently.
"Fine. I'll help."
Her expression immediately brightened.
"Good."
Tyler glanced toward Chris, Noah, and Kai.
They were all smiling.
Badly.
"What are you three hiding?"
"Nothing," Noah said.
Tyler pointed at him. "That answer makes you look guiltier."
Before Noah could respond, Eris picked up her bag.
"Come on. We have work."
Tyler followed her out, still wondering what those idiots were planning.
The Literature Club was on the third floor, in one of the quieter sections of the school. Tyler had walked the route so many times that he barely noticed it anymore, but when they reached the clubroom, the old memories came back.
When Tyler and Eris had joined in their first year, the club had only five members: Tyler, Eris, Hanna, Jane, and Lyrus.
There had barely been enough activity to justify calling it a club.
The room had been crowded with boxes, old books, and furniture that nobody seemed interested in moving.
Somehow, it had become their place.
Over the years, more students joined. Some came because they genuinely liked literature. Others followed friends. A few simply wanted somewhere to spend lunch.
Now thirty-two students were registered, though only around seventeen or eighteen usually attended.
Today, with exams approaching, only seven members were present.
Tyler opened the door.
One student looked up.
"You're late."
Eris checked the clock.
"Five minutes."
"Still late."
Tyler dropped his bag beside a chair.
"Don't encourage her."
"I'm the club head."
"For now."
Eris gave him a warning look.
"Exactly."
The afternoon settled into an ordinary club meeting. They discussed their current book, argued over the characters, and compared interpretations of the ending.
Eventually, Eris closed her book.
"All right. There's something else we need to discuss."
Everyone looked toward her.
She turned to Mika Hayashi, one of the club's more active members.
"Since graduation is coming, I'll be stepping down as club head."
Mika straightened.
"Already?"
"You knew it was coming."
"I know. It just feels soon."
Eris smiled.
"That's school. You join a club, blink twice, and suddenly you're handing it over."
Mika looked nervous.
"Are you sure I'm supposed to take over?"
"Of course. I'm not handing you a kingdom."
A few members laughed.
Eris reached into her bag and pulled out a thick, worn notebook.
"This has the member records, activity notes, borrowing lists, recommendations, and everything else. I want you to have it before exams get hectic."
Mika carefully took it.
"There's so much."
"When we joined, there were only five of us."
Tyler looked at the notebook.
"Hanna, Jane, Lyrus, you, and me."
"Exactly."
Mika looked up.
"What did you even do?"
Tyler answered immediately.
"Argued about books."
Eris added, "Moved boxes."
"Complained about moving boxes."
"And complained about the room."
Tyler smiled.
"We were very productive."
The room laughed.
Eris looked around.
The clubroom had changed dramatically since those early days. Bookshelves filled the walls, the tables were arranged for discussions, and the notice board was covered with recommendations and club activities.
"Don't feel like you have to run it exactly the way I did," Eris told Mika. "The club has changed already. When we joined, there were five members. Now there are thirty-two registered. Let it keep changing."
Mika nodded.
"So I can do things differently?"
"Of course."
Tyler raised a finger.
"Just don't turn it into a homework center."
Eris nodded firmly.
"Exactly."
Tyler looked at her.
"During exam season, that's basically what it's going to become."
"Then make them read at least one book while they're pretending to study."
Mika laughed.
"I'll try."
Eris smiled.
"You'll do fine."
She pushed the notebook toward her.
"Let's get you started."
The Literature Club gradually settled after the handover discussion.
Mika remained beside Eris, asking questions about member records, borrowed books, activities, and the responsibilities she would soon take over. The other students returned to their conversations, leaving the room filled with the quiet rustle of pages and occasional laughter.
Tyler moved toward the window.
The late afternoon sun stretched across the clubroom, warming the wooden floor and catching the edges of the bookshelves. A light breeze slipped through the half-open window and stirred his dark hair.
He picked a book from the nearest shelf and returned to his seat.
The History of the Ruvner Kingdom.
He had chosen it because he wanted something different from the novels everyone else had been discussing.
Ruvner had existed from roughly nineteen hundred years before the beginning of the God Era, and had lasted for around seventeen hundred and fifty years , meaning it disappeared around one hundred and fifty years before the God Era started, during a period of warfare.
Archaeologists knew the kingdom had existed.
They had found stone walls, watchtowers, harbor foundations, roads, storage chambers, bronze weapons, fishing equipment, and enormous anchors. They had uncovered sculptures depicting humanoid figures surrounded by waves, some carrying spears and others holding objects resembling fishing tools.
But beyond that, the evidence became uncertain.
Tyler turned another page.
The Fall of Ruvner.
Fire damage had been found across several excavation sites. Weapons had been recovered in unusual numbers, and human remains suggested that the kingdom had ended violently.
But who had attacked it?
That remained unknown.
The book listed several theories: a mainland invasion, a naval conflict, an internal rebellion, perhaps several wars occurring close together.
Tyler frowned.
The archaeological record stopped there.
The religious account was far more certain.
According to Ignaros tradition, Ruvner had been the stronghold of the Sea Tribe, an ancient people said to possess strange abilities connected to the ocean. Over time, they had supposedly fallen under demonic influence.
Ignaros had marched against them.
The fortress could not be conquered by ordinary forces, so, according to the story, he destroyed the island itself. Fire consumed Ruvner, the Sea Tribe was massacred, and the kingdom vanished.
Tyler read the passage twice.
"God walked into the fortress and burned the entire island."
He murmured the words under his breath.
It sounded like a legend.
Then an old memory surfaced.
A dark cathedral.
Candlelight.
A horned figure standing before him.
A voice offering power in exchange for his soul.
Tyler's expression tightened.
Before his first life ended, he would have dismissed stories about gods, demons, supernatural races, and miracles as mythology.
He couldn't do that anymore.
But neither could he accept every religious story simply because he had encountered one impossible being.
That was the problem.
He turned the page.
The book stated that no archaeological evidence had conclusively proven the existence of the Sea Tribe. No remains belonged unmistakably to a separate species. No writing had been identified as theirs. No technology existed that could only have come from an aquatic civilization.
Nothing definite.
Tyler leaned back.
"Then who were they?"
That question bothered him.
If the Sea Tribe had never existed, then the religious story was wrong. But if they had existed, why was almost everything about them gone?
Had the destruction of Ruvner erased the evidence?
Had survivors escaped?
Or had centuries of retelling transformed ordinary people into something far more frightening?
He kept reading.
Ruvner had traded with mainland settlements. Researchers had found foreign objects on the island, while Ruvner had exported pearls, shells, preserved fish, and other marine goods.
So the kingdom hadn't been isolated.
People had visited.
People had left.
Yet so much of its history had disappeared.
Tyler's gaze drifted across the page.
The same pattern appeared throughout ancient history.
The Sea Tribe had missing records.
The Cave People had missing records.
Entire periods existed only in fragments.
And where archaeology stopped, religion often supplied an answer.
Sometimes the two matched.
Sometimes they didn't.
Tyler closed the book halfway.
Then another thought surfaced.
There were four great religions.
Four recognized gods.
Ignaros.
Solaris.
Veyra.
Lunara.
Every child knew their names.
Their temples existed everywhere. Their histories stretched back thousands of years.
But the being Tyler had encountered belonged to none of them.
He remembered the cathedral again.
No familiar symbol.
No connection to the four gods.
No explanation.
Only the horned figure.
The being had known what Tyler wanted.
It had offered him power.
And it had demanded his soul.
Tyler slowly looked down at his hands.
"Who were you?"
Nothing answered.
He opened the book again and scanned the final pages on Ruvner.
The conclusion was frustratingly simple.
The kingdom had existed.
It had flourished.
It had been destroyed.
Its people had disappeared.
Much of its history remained unknown.
Tyler almost smiled.
"At least you're honest."
Across the room, Eris glanced over.
"What?"
"Nothing."
She looked at the book in his hands.
"Ruvner? What made you pick that?"
"Curiosity."
"Since when are you interested in ancient history?"
Tyler looked back at the page.
"Since I realized people keep leaving important parts out."
Eris laughed softly.
"That sounds like you."
She returned to helping Mika.
Tyler lowered his eyes again.
Maybe the Sea Tribe had been real.
Maybe they had simply been ordinary people transformed into monsters by centuries of religious storytelling.
Maybe Ignaros really had destroyed Ruvner.
Maybe the island had fallen in an ordinary war, and the legend had grown around it afterward.
Maybe the Cave People had existed.
Maybe they hadn't.
There was no way to know yet.
But one question refused to leave him alone.
If the Four Gods were truly the only beings capable of granting supernatural power...
Then who had given Tyler his?
He closed the book.
Outside, the sun was beginning to sink, casting long shadows across the school grounds.
For the first time, ancient history didn't feel ancient.
It felt incomplete.
And somewhere inside those missing pieces was an answer Tyler had not yet learned how to ask for.