Elias noticed the change the moment he stepped outside the Archive.
The air felt the same. The sky looked normal. People walked past him as they always did. Yet something was wrong, like a picture that had been hung slightly crooked.
He stopped and looked toward the clock tower at the end of the street.
It was closer than it should have been.
Not broken.
Not moved.
Just… closer.
Elias shook his head and kept walking.
At the market, small things began to feel off.
A bread seller smiled at him.
"Good afternoon, Master Elian."
"My name is Elias," he replied.
The man blinked once. "Yes, that's what I said."
He spoke with complete confidence, as if nothing had been wrong.
Elias walked away, his stomach tight.
Names mattered. In a world ruled by writing, even a single wrong letter could change who someone was.
Inside the Archive, the problems grew worse.
A map showed a narrow street that no one remembered. Other archivists treated it as if it had always been there.
A family record listed a third child who had never existed—yet everyone who read it believed it was correct.
Elias tried to fix it.
He copied the older version back into place.
For a few hours, it stayed normal.
Then it changed again.
Not back to the wrong version—but to a different one.
It was as if the text itself was searching for the best way to exist.
Cold fear settled in Elias's chest.
This was not a simple mistake.
The world was adjusting.
That evening, Elias was summoned by The Written Order.
The meeting room was spotless. Every word carved into the walls glowed faintly, locking the space into a single approved version.
At the center stood High Scribe Althoren.
"You found something in the Obsolete Stacks," Althoren said.
"A book with no record," Elias replied. "No one knows where it came from."
"A book without a record should not exist."
"But it does."
"For now," Althoren said.
He stepped closer.
"This world stands because we agree on one version of it," he said calmly. "Too many versions create chaos."
Elias felt the warning beneath his words.
"Is the book dangerous?" Elias asked.
Althoren was silent for a moment.
"Some things are harmless," he said at last, "until someone reads them."
That night, Elias dreamed of shifting streets and unfamiliar faces.
When he woke, something felt missing.
He didn't know what.
And that frightened him more than anything else.