The thirteenth floor was quiet.
Not the kind of quiet that lingers in libraries or abandoned corridors, but the stillness of a thought unspoken, of time halted mid-sentence. The air was not stagnant; it was watchful, filled with an invisible tension that made Veyne's skin prickle.
The door shut behind him with a soft sigh.
Before him stretched a long, spiraling hall lined with shelves. Books. Scrolls. Wax-sealed codices. Some glowed faintly, others wept ink that pooled beneath them. The ceiling arched impossibly high, shifting with slow, silent motion, like a living lung.
A rustle echoed.
Then a voice. Calm, ageless.
"You do not belong here, Devourer."
Veyne turned.
A figure emerged from the shadows. Neither man nor woman, not young nor old. It was robed in layered parchment, bound in brass clasps. Its face was a mask of cracked vellum inked with forgotten alphabets.
"I didn't ask to be here," Veyne said.
"You are here because you carry contradiction," said the figure. "Memory and hunger. Choice and compulsion. You are unwritten and rewriting."
Veyne narrowed his eyes. "And you are?"
"I am the Archivist. I catalogue all truths that have ever entered the Tower."
"Then you're missing a few," Veyne muttered.
The Archivist turned. "Follow, and perhaps we'll correct that."
They moved deeper into the maze. The air changed. Books vibrated as they passed, whispering half-syllables of languages Veyne had never heard. One book slammed shut as he neared, the binding shuddering like it had seen a ghost.
Eventually, they reached a chamber at the center.
A pedestal stood alone. Upon it—a single, blank book.
"Yours," said the Archivist. "The Tower is rewriting you. But you can write back."
"Is this a trap?"
"No. It is a confrontation."
Veyne approached, fingertips grazing the leather. It pulsed beneath his touch, syncing with his heartbeat.
Revelation Instinct activated.
[Floor Type: Narrative Trial – Self-Assertion]
[Objective: Author a truth so potent it becomes Tower Law]
He stared at the book. A pen materialized beside it, fashioned from bone and blackened silver.
"What happens if I fail?" he asked.
"You forget what made you resist," said the Archivist. "You become a perfect page. Blank. Obedient."
Veyne sat.
For a long while, he didn't write.
Instead, he remembered.
Not just the Tower. Not just the screams and hunger and lies. But before. Her laughter. The scent of spring rain. The child he once tried to protect, even after the city fell. The oath he made by candlelight. The rage he felt when it was broken.
He dipped the pen.
And he wrote:
"I am not a mistake. I am not a monster. I am the one who remembers when the Tower tries to make us forget."
The book flared. Fire and ink and memory entwined. A voice, not the Archivist's, howled in fury.
The Tower.
The chamber trembled. Books flew open. Shelves collapsed. The Archivist raised their arms, steadying the storm.
"Enough," they said.
The book sealed shut.
The Archivist's eyes—inked pits of black—studied him. "What you have written will ripple. Not just forward, but backward. You may find events shifting to accommodate the truth you've crafted."
Veyne blinked. "Time?"
"Perception of it. Cause and effect are looser here."
A nearby tome floated to the surface, opening to reveal a map of earlier floors—now annotated, altered, rewritten. His choices, reinterpreted in the shadow of this new truth.
"Do not forget," the Archivist added, "the Tower is learning from you as well."
"Let it learn to fear me," Veyne said coldly.
[Trait Gained: Self-Inscribed – Immune to narrative alteration and false history floors]
[Skill Gained: Inkbind – Etch temporary laws into the Tower's reality once per floor]
A second pedestal emerged behind him, holding a quill made of bone and starlight.
"One last question," Veyne asked as he walked toward the exit. "Why help me?"
The Archivist's voice was a whisper wrapped in silence. "Because even the Tower fears forgetting."
Veyne stepped into the archway, the book sealed under his arm. Its cover no longer blank—emblazoned with a sigil only he could see.
As the arch closed behind him, a final echo followed:
"All stories hunger to be heard. Even yours."