The Crimson Library was a place that shouldn't exist. It wasn't on any map. No gate marked its entrance. No elder spoke of it. And yet, Harvey stood before it, the faint pulse of ancient runes glowing beneath his feet.
He had followed the whispers embedded in the system's hidden log, traced every redacted clue, and solved a coded trail buried under layers of magical firewalls.
"Welcome, last inheritor," the voice had said when the hidden door opened.
Now, he entered the library.
The air inside was heavy—soaked in magic, history, and blood. The walls were formed from obsidian bricks, etched with runes that shimmered in dull crimson. Books floated in the air, some chained shut with cursed locks, others weeping dark mist that hissed when it touched the floor.
Harvey walked calmly, his coat brushing against the carved floor, his shadow elongated by the flickering torches that lit themselves at his presence.
A figure emerged—hooded, faceless, more spirit than human.
"You seek forbidden truth, Harvey Arclight," it said, its voice echoing from everywhere and nowhere. "There is no return once you read what lies here."
Harvey didn't flinch. "I've already crossed that line."
The specter vanished, and the ground trembled. A black pedestal rose from the center of the room, a single tome atop it. It was bound in leather that looked suspiciously like skin, and it pulsed with something alive. Ancient magic. Older than kingdoms.
He reached for it. The system flared in warning.
> [System Alert: You are attempting to access a Forbidden Class Memory Tome. Sanctioned by the Outer Council.]
Proceeding may result in temporary sanity collapse.
Proceed? Y/N
He pressed Y without hesitation.
The moment his fingers touched the cover, his vision split. Voices screamed in his ears. The echo of gods fighting. A world swallowed by magic storms. Symbols he'd never seen burned into his mind, then rearranged themselves until they made sense.
He saw the origin of the System. Not created by the Empire. Not even by mortals. It was something born from a war between forgotten entities. A regulatory weapon—coded with cosmic law.
And he saw something else.
The Spellbreaker Protocol.
A hidden layer of the System, buried under millions of encrypted lines. Designed for one user only.
Him.
Memories surged—alternate timelines. Futures that never came to pass. His regression had triggered it. The death of his first life had rewritten fate, but the system had… adapted.
The system wasn't just helping him.
It was watching him.
Testing him.
Preparing him.
A code fragment etched itself into his memory.
> [Spellbreaker Path: Unlocked]
You are no longer bound by standard magical laws. You may now dissect, erase, or rewrite existing spells at the source code level.
Warning: Every action from here onward will attract the attention of the original Creators.
Harvey exhaled slowly, sweat beading his forehead. But his eyes were calm. Colder than ever.
"They watched me die once," he whispered. "Let them watch me rise now."
Behind him, the doors of the Crimson Library slammed shut.
The next phase had begun.
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