Burning Beneath

The golden glow clung to the air, thick and weightless, as if the light itself had substance. Sam stood amidst the strange trees, their forms twisting like ink bleeding through ancient parchment, their branches fanning out into delicate, feathered wisps. Everything around her felt unreal—dreamlike yet solid beneath her feet.

At the center of it all, the feathered pen stood upright, embedded into the open pages of an immense book beneath her. It wasn’t just a quill—it pulsed with an unseen force, humming like a thought just before it formed into words. Sam hesitated. The quill was waiting.

She reached out.

The moment her fingertips brushed the pen, the world rippled. Not like water, but like a page being turned. The golden trees blurred, their forms dissolving into whirls of ink and light. The sky itself curled inward as if unseen hands were folding it away.

Then—silence.

And in the silence, a new world unfolded.

The first thing Sam noticed was the sheer scale. Bookshelves spiraled upward into infinity, curling like roots of an ancient tree, their spines glowing in colors she had never seen before—deep crimson that shimmered like embers, silver-blue that pulsed like the ocean under moonlight, gold so bright it hurt to look at directly. The floor was not a floor at all, but floating stone pathways suspended in the air, twisting in impossible loops, leading to nowhere and everywhere at once.

Sam took a slow breath. The Hidden Library.

She turned. At the center of the room, a single pedestal stood beneath a hovering lantern of golden light. Upon it, a book lay open, its pages shifting as if written in real-time. Above it, the feathered pen now floated, its tip moving rapidly as it scratched a phrase into the air—words forming from nothing.

Find me.

Sam’s stomach tightened. The message again. The same cryptic instruction that had led her here.

Her gaze flickered to the books around her. They were watching. Not literally—but she could feel it. As if each book contained not just knowledge, but will. Some hummed softly, waiting to be chosen. Others pulsed in agitation, eager to be read.

She reached out, fingers hovering over the nearest shelf. A book shifted forward on its own, responding to her presence. Its cover glowed faintly with golden veins, like something alive beneath the leather.

Hesitant, she pulled it free.

The title burned into focus. The Crimson Flame.

Before she could react, the book opened itself, and the world around her shattered into fire.