The transition between the third and fourth carriage felt like stepping through a wall of ice. As the heavy iron door groaned open, Kashem was hit by a smell he knew all too well, yet it felt hauntingly misplaced—the scent of old, decaying paper mixed with the sharp, electric tang of a server room.
This was not a normal train carriage. It was vast, impossibly wide, as if the interior dimensions of the Dead Express ignored the laws of physics. Thousands of shelves stretched upward into a dark, vaulted ceiling that seemed to disappear into a swirling grey nebula. These weren't just books; they were glowing crystal cubes, ancient scrolls, and rusted hard drives from different eras, all humming with a low, vibrating frequency.
"The Library of Lost Data," Kashem whispered, his voice echoing in the massive space.
He took a step forward, his boots clicking on a floor made of polished obsidian. Behind him, the door hissed shut, and for a moment, he felt a crushing sense of isolation. He was alone in a graveyard of information.
According to the veiled woman, the first 'Key' to stopping the 1884 disaster was hidden here. But how was he supposed to find one specific piece of data in a library that contained the memories of a deleted world?
Kashem walked deeper into the aisles. As he passed the shelves, the crystal cubes began to flicker. Images flashed within them—faces of people he didn't know, cities he had never visited, and headlines of wars that had been erased from history.
Suddenly, the lighthouse mark on his arm began to pulse with a warm, steady heat. It wasn't the burning pain from before; it felt like a compass needle finding north.
"The Signal," Kashem realized. "It's reacting to something."
He followed the pull of the mark, weaving through the towering stacks of forgotten knowledge. The humming grew louder, turning into a high-pitched whistle that made his teeth ache.
He stopped in front of a section labeled: [SECTOR 1884: THE CHITTAGONG DISCONTINUITY].
On the middle shelf sat a single, leather-bound ledger. Unlike the glowing crystals around it, this book looked ordinary, yet it radiated an aura of absolute cold. Kashem reached out, his hand trembling. The moment his fingers touched the leather, the library around him vanished.
He wasn't on the train anymore.
He was standing in the middle of a construction site. The sun was scorching, and the air was thick with the smell of sweat and hot iron. Men in turbans and British officers in white uniforms were arguing over a set of massive blueprints.
"The bridge cannot be built there!" a young Bengali engineer was shouting. "The soil is shifting. There is something beneath the earth—something that doesn't want to be disturbed!"
"Silence, Roy!" a British officer barked, his face red from the heat. "The Queen wants this rail line completed by the end of the month. We don't care about your local superstitions. Dig deeper!"
Kashem watched in horror as the workers began to drive a massive iron pylon into the ground. As the metal struck the earth, a deep, resonant boom echoed through the valley. It wasn't the sound of stone breaking; it was the sound of a scream. A dark, oily substance began to seep from the ground, swirling around the pylon like a living thing.
"The First Glitch," Kashem whispered.
Suddenly, the scene began to distort. The sky turned a sickly shade of purple, and the workers began to flicker like corrupted video files. One of the men turned toward Kashem. His eyes were gone, replaced by glowing blue Roman numerals.
"The Analyst sees the truth," the flickering man said, his voice a distorted glitch. "But the truth has a price."
The man lunged at Kashem, his hands turning into sharp, digital shards. Kashem scrambled backward, but the ground beneath him began to dissolve into blue static.
"Authorization!" Kashem yelled, remembering the veiled woman's words. "Authorization: Zero-One! Access granted!"
The lighthouse mark on his arm erupted in a pillar of light, shattering the vision. Kashem blinked, gasping for air, and found himself back in the Library. He was clutching the leather-bound ledger to his chest, his heart racing like a runaway engine.
He opened the book. Most of the pages were blank, but the very first page had a name written in blood-red ink: ABHAY ROY - CHIEF ENGINEER, 1884.
Under the name was a set of coordinates and a warning: 'The train is not a vehicle. It is a seal. If the seal is broken, the void will consume 2026.'
Kashem felt a chill run down his spine. The 1884 disaster wasn't just an accident; it was a failed attempt to lock something away. And now, the lock was breaking.
"Found it," a voice rasped from the shadows.
Kashem spun around. Standing at the end of the aisle was the Conductor. His mechanical eye was whirring at a furious speed, and the gears in his jaw were grinding.
"The first Key has been claimed," the Conductor said, his voice full of dark anticipation. "But the Library does not let go of its treasures for free. To keep that book, Analyst, you must leave something behind. A memory for the engine."
"I'm not giving you anything!" Kashem shouted, clutching the ledger tighter.
"The engine does not ask," the Conductor hissed.
The shelves around Kashem began to tilt. The books and crystals started to fall, turning into a whirlwind of sharp edges. The Conductor stepped forward, his rusted cage glowing with a hungry light.
Kashem realized he had to get out, and he had to do it now. He looked at the mark on his arm. If he was the Lantern-Bearer, he had to do more than just watch. He had to lead.
He focused all his willpower into the mark, imagining a path through the storm of data. The blue light flared, forming a protective shield around him. He took a deep breath and bolted toward the exit, the Conductor's metallic laughter echoing behind him as the library began to collapse into the void.