The Inklands

The first thing Aouli noticed was the silence.

Not the silence of absence. Not a dead silence. This was something else—attentive. As if the world itself were holding its breath, waiting to listen.

The sky above was a pale silver, like the belly of an unlit moon. There were no stars, no clouds, no sun—only shifting gradients of gray. The ground beneath their feet was ashen-white and impossibly soft, sinking slightly with every step like snowfall that never melted. It left no footprints. Instead, each movement stirred up tiny motes of dust that shimmered and whispered in their wake.

Kaero crouched down, scooping a pinch of the ash into his hand. He sniffed it, then let it fall through his fingers.

"Smells like burnt parchment."

Aouli knelt beside him. The ash had no scent to him, but as he touched it, he felt... something. A pulse. Not physical. A memory. A voice. A name. Long forgotten.

He pulled his hand away.

"The ash remembers," he whispered.

Kaero straightened, dusting his palms. "Wonderful. Another world made of feelings. As if we hadn't had our fill of poetic trauma."

But his voice lacked the usual sarcasm. It was too hushed, too cautious.

They walked.

After a while, the ash gave way to something else: a slow-moving black river, wide and almost still. Its surface glistened with swirling patterns that never repeated. Unlike water, it had weight. Viscosity. The closer they got, the more it smelled of ink—sharp, bitter, and strangely organic.

The banks of the river were studded with bones. Not human—something older, maybe larger. They curved upward like reeds, and from their tips hung scrolls written in languages neither of them recognized.

Above the river, the air shimmered.

Words formed there.

Just floated in midair, letter by letter. Not spoken. Not heard.

Written into space.

"Every name forgotten. Every final sentence. Every unsent letter. We keep them all."

Kaero looked around slowly. "Okay, I hate this."

Aouli didn't answer. His eyes were fixed on the center of the river, where something glowed faintly—a single platform, circular, made of obsidian. At its center stood a tall robed figure, motionless.

The robe was stitched with runes that shifted constantly, changing script, cycling through alphabets like a turning dial. The figure's face was hidden, but from beneath the cowl, light pulsed softly—warm gold, not fire, not electricity.

Aouli stepped forward.

Kaero grabbed his arm. "This place isn't like the Liminal. It's sentient."

"I know," Aouli said.

And he walked toward the river.

The moment his foot touched the inky surface, it held him.

Not sank. Not resisted.

Held.

The ink curled gently around his boots, supporting his weight, stretching with each step like a living membrane. It was warm—uncomfortably so—and with every pace he took, more of the ash behind him melted into it, rippling outward in expanding circles.

As Aouli reached the platform, the robed figure turned.

It did not walk.

It glided, robes trailing behind like a tapestry.

"Welcome, Light-Bearer," the figure said, its voice like quill on parchment, smooth but dry. "And scavenger. Keeper of ends."

Kaero frowned. "Yeah, hi."

The figure turned toward Aouli again.

"I am Veriss. Keeper of the Inklands. Echo of Preservation. I remember what the world forgot."

Its eyes were not visible, but Aouli felt them. Heavy, ancient, layered with the weight of a thousand unwritten truths.

"Why did you bring us here?" Aouli asked.

Veriss tilted its head. "I did not. You opened the path with your step."

He gestured to the ink beneath them.

"This realm is written in will. In thought. In confession. Every step you take is an admission."

Kaero glanced down at the swirling river, then back up. "That mean you've been eavesdropping?"

Veriss chuckled—a low, dry sound. "I am recording."

Aouli took a step forward. "You're another Echo."

"Correct," Veriss said. "But unlike the others, I do not test. I do not wound. I do not burn."

"What do you do?"

Veriss raised a hand.

From the ink, a pedestal rose.

Upon it, a thick, leather-bound tome. Blank.

Beside it, a small, delicate vial of ink the color of midnight, and a single quill fashioned from something that looked suspiciously like bone.

"I offer you the chance to define yourself."

Aouli stared at it.

Veriss's voice softened.

"Before you plant what you carry—before you speak for Gaia—you must decide what story you are telling."

Aouli reached out.

He touched the cover of the book.

And a thousand images burst behind his eyes.

He saw Gaia's death again.

Kaero's broken world.

The cathedral of memory.

The scream in flame.

His own first breath of light in the void.

But it wasn't memory—it was pattern. The book wanted to see how he saw himself in all of it.

And it wanted a story.

Not of her.

Not of the seeds.

Of him.

He looked up at Veriss.

"I'm not a writer."

"You are now," the Echo replied.

Aouli picked up the quill.

It was cold.

And he began to write.