The bells of the Iron Lung Cathedral tolled three times, their heavy, metallic vibrations shivering through the floorboards of the clinic. In the lower districts of Oakhaven, sound traveled through the smog like a physical weight. It was a reminder that the Great Pump was still working—that for another hour, at least, there would be enough oxygen for the poor to breathe.
Caspian Thorne wiped a mixture of black ichor and lukewarm water from his brow. His hands, gloved in stained surgical rubber, didn't tremble. They couldn't afford to.
Before him on the rusted operating table lay a "Void-Stray"—a creature that looked like a cross between a deep-sea ray and a starved wolf. It had drifted out of the Grey Void and snagged on the island's defensive harpoons. Usually, the Church's Inquisitors claimed these kills, but this one had fallen into the "Gutters," the lawless slums hanging from the island's underside.
"Is it... is it dangerous, Doc?"
The voice came from Kael, a nervous boy who acted as Caspian's lookout. He was hovering near the reinforced lead door, his hand gripping a makeshift pipe.
"Everything from the Void is dangerous, Kael," Caspian said, his voice muffled by his copper-filtered mask. "Even the silence it brings."
Caspian picked up a scalpel etched with silver runes—a "Purification Blade." It was an expensive tool, one he'd spent three years of bribes to acquire. As he pressed the blade into the creature's translucent belly, the air in the room suddenly turned freezing.
Thump.
Caspian froze. The creature was dead. He had seen its brain matter splattered across the docks.
Thump.
The sound didn't come from the table. It came from the back of Caspian's own skull. A rhythmic, heavy pulse that made his vision swim with prismatic colors. He felt a familiar, cold itch beneath his skin—the "Spirit-Hunger" that plagued those who stayed too long in the lower districts.
"Doc? You've been still for a minute," Kael whispered, his voice sounding miles away.
"I'm fine," Caspian lied. He bit his tongue, the sharp tang of blood grounding him.
He peeled back the creature's skin, expecting to find the usual mess of blue muscle and gelatinous organs. Instead, he found a cavity filled with shifting, crystalline sand. And in the center of that sand sat a small, triangular prism. It pulsed with a soft, golden light—a light that shouldn't exist in a world that hadn't seen a sun in five centuries.
Don't touch it, his instinct screamed. Report it to the Inquisitors. They will give you enough oxygen-credits to live like a king for a year.
But Caspian saw the way Kael's chest heaved, struggling for a full breath of the thin, recycled air. He saw the grime on his own walls and the rot in his own soul. He didn't want credits. He wanted truth.
As his fingers closed around the prism, the world vanished.
The clinic, the smell of ozone, and the sound of Kael's breathing were replaced by a silence so profound it felt like a physical blow. Caspian found himself standing on a floor of polished obsidian that stretched infinitely in every direction. Above him, there was no sky—only a vast, grey expanse filled with floating, faceless statues.
This was the Silent Gallery.
Caspian looked down at his hands. They were no longer covered in ichor. He was wearing a long, velvet robe the color of a bruised twilight. On his face sat a mask—a porcelain visage that depicted a man mid-sob, yet with eyes that seemed to laugh.
"Welcome, Curator," a voice whispered. It didn't come from any direction; it was as if the very air was speaking into his mind.
Before him, a massive scroll unrolled itself in mid-air. It wasn't made of paper, but of translucent skin. This was the Vellum of Souls.
Caspian's eyes scanned the shifting text, his mind reeling as information was forced into his consciousness. He saw the "Sequence 9: The Mourner." He saw the requirements: Digest the heart of a Void-born. Recite the Lament of the Unseen. Witness a death that no one else remembers.
The "Acting Method." The secret the Church had used to ascend to godhood while keeping the masses in the dirt. They weren't holy; they were just the first to learn how to "act" like the monsters they had consumed.
Suddenly, the Gallery shuddered. A ripple moved through the obsidian floor.
"Someone... is calling," Caspian realized.
He saw two flickering lights in the distance of the infinite hall. Two souls, wandering the Void, drawn to the light of the Prism he now held. Without thinking, Caspian reached out his hand and pulled.
Two figures materialized in the Gallery.
One was a woman dressed in the high-collared silks of the Aethelgard nobility, her face hidden by a veil of shifting grey smoke. The other was a man in a tattered military uniform, his body appearing as if it were made of cooling embers.
They both stumbled, gasping as if they had just been pulled from deep water. They looked at the infinite hall, at the faceless statues, and finally, at Caspian sitting atop a throne of blackened bone that had manifested beneath him.
"Where... where am I?" the woman whispered, her voice trembling with a mix of terror and awe. "I was in my oratory... praying to the Iron Lung..."
Caspian felt a strange, cold calm wash over him. The "Curator" persona wasn't just a mask; it was a shell he could step into. He leaned back, resting his chin on his hand, the porcelain mask's weeping eyes fixed on them.
"You are in the place where secrets come to rest," Caspian said, his voice echoing with a resonance that made the Gallery vibrate. "You may call me The Curator. And you have been brought here because you seek something the world above cannot provide."
The man in the embers knelt, his head bowed. "I seek vengeance for a regiment that no longer exists."
The woman in the veil clutched her throat. "I seek the truth behind the Breath of God."
Caspian felt the Prism in his hand thrum. He realized he could see their "Spirit Threads"—the fragile tethers connecting them back to their physical bodies. He could cut them, or he could strengthen them.
"Information for information," Caspian declared. "Power for a price. This is the Silent Gallery. Our first meeting is a gift. The next... will cost you."
With a wave of his hand, he sent them back. The Gallery dissolved into grey mist, and the obsidian floor fell away.
Caspian snapped his eyes open.
He was back in the clinic. The prism in his hand was now dull and grey, its light extinguished. Kael was still standing by the door, but he was looking at the clock.
"Doc? You've been staring at that corpse for ten minutes," Kael said, sounding worried. "Is it... is it a 'Blight-beast'?"
Caspian looked down at the creature. He felt different. His lungs didn't burn for air. The smog didn't smell as foul. He reached into the creature's chest, pulled out its small, blue heart, and—before Kael could scream—he bit into it.
The taste was like cold lightning and ancient grief.
As he swallowed, the first line of the Vellum appeared in his mind's eye, glowing with a faint, ghostly light:
Sequence 9: Mourner — Digestion initiated.
"No, Kael," Caspian said, wiping the blue blood from his lips with a terrifyingly calm smile. "It's not a Blight-beast. It's a ladder."