The Black Briar Library (An Eldritch Library Deck Builder)

-Synopsis: The Black Briar Library is a place that exists between Dreams and Reality, connected to the Akashic Records the massive library collects the stories of any person that catches the interest of its Eldritch Chairman.

Of course 'Collecting' means many things, and is left up to the discretion of the Library's many librarians. A group of misfits and outcasts whose solace was in the quiet depths of the libraries that housed the fantastical stories they loved so much that the Chairman couldn't help but welcome them.

Which is why the Chairman turns to you and asks, will you be one of her Librarians? Will you record the story of the Black Briar Library itself?

-Tags: [Switchable Protagonists], [Each Campaign = A Story Derivative], [Dimensional Travelers]

The Black Briar Library

--- ??? ---

Books of all shapes, sizes, and colors lay upon the atrium’s gray tile floors, and where they don’t lay on the floor they are carefully placed upon towering black bookshelves with rose vines lovingly carved into them.

A light shines through the atrium, filling in everything with color despite the fact that there is no visible source for it, and the shadows linger in such a way that the direction they come from cannot be determined.

Just past this light exists a foggy darkness where anything can linger and lurk, a shifting of shadows stating quite clearly that something is doing just that.

That something’s eyes stare for but a moment before disappearing.

“Hello there!” A cheery voice greeted, revealing a young dark haired woman that had most certainly not been there just a few seconds prior. “You’re looking a little… lost, is there something I can do to help you?”

The young woman waits for an answer, but none comes forth.

“Ah, I see… You’re dreaming not Dreaming…” The young woman frowned, looking a little disappointed, a look that slowly shifted into curiosity. “If you’re not a guest, then I wonder how you wandered into here?”

Once more there was no answer to the young woman’s question, but this time she was significantly less concerned by this fact.

“You must really like reading if you made it here… Hmm…” The young woman crossed her arms and began tapping her head while mumbling, “Thinking… Thinking… Thinking…”

The young woman’s eyes suddenly burst open as she grew an excited smile. “Oh! That’s an idea! Hold on just one moment please!”

With that request stated, the young woman ran off, disappearing into the darkness just past the atrium’s lights.

“Here you are!” The young woman called from behind, appearing opposite the direction she’d left via not one second later with a flyer in hand. “I know you can’t really answer me right now because you're just dreaming, but I figured if you’re here then that means you must really like stories! And well I could really use a bit more help around here… so if you want maybe you could think about working here at the library where you can get as many stories as you want! Maybe, if you want, pretty please?”

The young woman held the flyer out for a moment, the words upon it a jumbled mess, before hitting her knuckles on her head. “Oh right, of course you can’t read the flyer humans can’t read in their dreams…” She sighed, before mumbling a quiet, “I always forget that…”

Not letting this miscalculation get her down, the young woman coughed into her hand. “Alright, well since I can’t really hand this to you now, I’ll send it to you! The library’s delivery boy, is the goodest boi in all of the Black Briar!”

The young woman gave an embarrassed look. “I just, uh, need to figure out who you are first…”

Who are you? (Choose our starting character.)

[]-The Exhausted War Veteran

-Starting Deck: Smoke of War (Spell Focus)

-Library Days: Early (1-2 Existing Librarians), High Library Development Influence.

[]-The Runaway Dark One

-Starting Deck: Familiar Darkness (Minion Focus)

-Library Days: Mid (3-4 Existing Librarians), Mid-Library Development Influence.

[]-The Normal College Student

-Starting Deck: Black Briar Basics (Mixed Focus)

-Library Days: Late (5-6 Existing Librarians), Low Library Development Influence.

Winning Vote

[]-The Exhausted War Veteran

---

Chapter 1: A Magical Job Offer

--- Gregory Fischer ---

Slowly his eyes opened up as he dragged his dazed mind from the delightful depth of dreams that he’d been a part of and back into the world he was sadly more familiar with.

Despite being awake however he found himself laying on his mattress for another thirty minutes, his exhausted body wishing to fall back asleep even as his mind forced him to stay awake in spite of the ache behind his eyes.

Eventually a mix of his various morning needs was enough to get him to reluctantly roll out of bed to start taking care of them with a trip to the bathroom and a cold shower.

Stepping out of the shower he pulled on a pair of half faded jeans, a white button up, and to at least pretend he was capable of being an adult a black vest before slipping on his glasses and taking a look at his reflection.

A thirty-something man with brown stubble on his face and rings around brown eyes looked back at him with an exhausted grimace as he tied his shoulder length hair into a ponytail, the most effort he could put into his grooming today.

Pushed on by a hollowness in his stomach he made his way to his kitchen before throwing a couple slices of leftover pizza in the microwave for breakfast. The paper plate went into the trash because actual plates were too much work to clean, and the paper ones were cheap.

With all of that taken care of he stepped out of his spartan white apartment filled with used brown furniture and a couple of overflowing bookshelves, before making his way downstairs to the small repair shop below.

“Finally up?” Toni asked, the mechanic looking up from where she was tinkering away at a metal cylinder. “Was starting to think I was going to have to drag you out.”

“Yeah… not today.” He grimaced, running a hand through his hair as he reached for the cigarettes in his pocket.

Toni spun around in her chair before giving him a once over with her hazel eyes. “Well at least your clothes are clean today.”

“Look who’s talking.” He scoffed, flicking his fingers towards her oil stained overalls as he lit his cigarette.

“The difference is that this is a work outfit.” Toni scoffed right back, before pulling out the scrunchy she was using to hold her long ginger hair out of her way. “Also I got something for you in the mail.”

“I got mail?” He asked in confusion since the only person who knew where he lived was Toni and he just gave her all of his money since the building and everything in it was in her name.

“Yeah, a job offer.” His one friend told him as she offered him an envelope from her desk before seeing his face. “It’s not the usual kind, it’s for a library or some shit.”

“A library?” He repeated, not with interest but with much less hostility than his normal reaction to a ‘job offer’ as he opened the envelope, uncaring that Toni had already read it.

(Dearest Guest Gregory Fischer,

Having caught our interest as a loyal guest, we at the Black Briar Library would like to invite you in aiding us in the preservation and distribution of stories from across creation.

Should you be interested in this offer, please go to your preferred library promptly for a face to face interview where you can inquire any details you desire.

Sincerely The Head Librarian, Briar Black.)

“This isn’t from the local library, and that’s the only one I actually visit.” He frowned, getting the feeling that this was going to be more like his usual ‘jobs’ than he wanted as he eyed the emblem of a black rose surrounded by black thorns at the bottom.

“Sounds like it’s for some kind of literary preservation group or something, figure it shouldn’t be too dangerous if it involves books.” Toni shrugged as she watched him.

“Depends on the books.” He grumbled, scratching at the stubble on his neck as he tried to remember where he’d heard of this ‘Black Briar Library’ before. “You sure you’ve never heard of this group before? Because I can swear I have, I just can’t place where.”

“Maybe you heard about them at the actual library? You spend enough time there.” Toni pointed out.

He didn’t think that was it but, “Maybe…”

“You going to look into it?” Toni asked with a careful neutrality that covered up both her concern and frustration to everyone but him, and that was only because he knew it could be there.

“I needed to get some new books anyway.” He sighed, because usually the library and its books were an escape from his work and all the other troubles he had with the real world.

Mixing the two left a distinctly bad taste in his mouth that his cigarettes couldn’t quite overcome.

“Good.” Toni nodded before putting her hair back into a ponytail as she went back to her work. “If you do accept their job, be sure to stop back here before you go anywhere else.”

“I’m not an idiot.” He scoffed as he started towards the shop’s backdoor, not really ready to deal with the people that would be cluttering the main street just yet.

“Yes you are!” His only friend called after him.

Once out on the streets he found himself taking an instinctively long drag of his cigarette, the chemicals within soothing the rampant nerves he got whenever he had to leave one of the two places he actually felt comfortable. (At least the back alley isn’t as overcrowded as the main street…)

Not that that made him feel any better as he could still hear the hustle and bustle right around the corner and that brought him a whole other kind of anxiety, even if he preferred the anxiety of the unknown to the anxiety of people. A quantity that was nowhere near unknown.

The fact that it took him two more cigarettes to actually get moving was part of why he’d taken the backdoor rather than the front, because Toni -in her well meaning if blunt way- would’ve forced him to get moving after the first if she knew he was still lingering.

(Going to need to get more soon…) He frowned, realizing he was already half-way down his last pack, the skull marked carton only having a handful of the white sticks left. (Might need to accept this job just to pay for them…)

With a sigh he stuffed the carton back into his pocket and started making his way towards the library, his eyes focused upward towards the numerous tall buildings that made up the cramped city streets, watching the dark gray smoke coming from his cigarette rather than the people that were around him. More than aware that if he focused on them he’d end up stressing himself out far worse as he played numerous possibilities and impossibilities out in his head.

The hike to the library was a long one that took him over an hour to make, a time he could easily half twice over if he was willing to take a bus but… (That many people in that small of a space with me is… it’s just a bad idea…)

And so after an hour of taking as many backstreet and sidealley shortcuts as he could -both to get there at a half-way decent time and to avoid the crowds- as well as killing three more cigarettes, he found himself staring up at the steps to the city library.

His only real sanctuary outside of Toni’s shop.

Making his way up the steps, he found once more that in spite of the large amount of foot traffic on the road proper he was the only one actually going into the library. (Something about how people would far prefer to simply read on dataslates and similar than to read actual books.)

Even Toni thought his preference for an actual book in his hands was odd, mostly keeping her mouth shut since it was one of the few things he was actually willing to leave the house for. Sometimes with a drop of enthusiasm even.

And so like many times before he stepped into the library, savoring the way the marble walls dampened the sound from the bustling city surrounding them. (Wait…)

His eyes darted around the library he stepped into, because unlike the small one he was almost intimately familiar with, this one was far grander. The smaller library’s warm browns and bright whites had been replaced by cool gray and dark black as the atrium stood a dozen times larger and with a hundred times as many books as the library he was used to.

The door clicked shut behind him as he’d carelessly let it hundreds of times before, only sounding significantly more ominous and final with the way it echoed through the building.

“Shit!” He cursed before rushing back and forcing the door open, afraid he’d… find the library steps that he’d just walked up and the rest of the city as busy as it ever was.

(Fuck…) He grimaced, realizing he was having one of his episodes, before turning back to the library and… finding that it was still the dark library he’d walked into and not some kind of hallucination. “The hell?”

Blinking, he stepped outside before closing the door and opening it once more to find the scene unchanged. “Okay…”

Taking a few steps back he gave the outside of the library a once over and noted how the building was definitely incapable of containing the one he’d seen. (Not that means much given some of the things I’ve seen…)

He once more stepped into the library before doing the (stupidly suicidal) thing and closing the door behind him.

After counting to ten, he opened the door once more and saw that he was still able to leave and go back to the city if he wanted to. Meaning that he wasn’t trapped here, (or that whoever set this up can’t kill it on demand…)

Ignoring his paranoia he left the door open as he made his way into the library, his eyes darting around trying to take in every detail to figure out what was going on, before pausing as he noticed the image of a large black rose surrounded by black thorns on the floor.

“The Black Briar Library…” He realized upon matching the insignia with his surroundings.

He took another look around the massive shelves, his eyes briefly focusing on the shadowy patches of darkness between them where he could swear he saw something move before moving on. (Definitely not an ordinary library…)

This wasn’t the weirdest thing he’d ever seen in his line of work, but it was getting up there, if in presentation alone.

“Hello?” He eventually called as he reached into his pocket and pulled out the folded up letter Toni had given him. “My name is Gregory Fischer and I was given this letter about a job offer!”

There were a series of thumps behind him.

He turned around swiftly, his hands half raised into a stance before noticing a trio of pillars standing in a quarter circle each with a medium sized book on it.

Cautiously he approached the pillars and once he was close enough to read their covers he couldn’t help but scoff, “Putting my name on a bunch of books… real cute.”

The fact that he could see himself using these titles for books about him was only mildly unnerving, the fact that he could take a guess at the subject matter of each book based on the titles was the thing that really bothered him.

He blinked as a white page fluttered in front of him carried by a breeze he couldn’t feel.

Snatching the page out of the air he read, (The interview has begun, Please Select A Book.)

He inhaled before exhaling. (I knew this was going to be a pain in the ass…)

Please Choose A Book (Hint: Starter Deck)

[]-Ashes of War, The Remnant of Gregory Fischer

[]-Flames of War, The Guilt of Gregory Fischer

[]-Smoke of War, The Deception of Gregory Fischer

---

Book I: The Remnant of Gregory Fischer: Chapter I

--- Gregory Fischer ---

Deciding that this wasn’t the weirdest interview he’d been through given his current profession, he looked the books over once more while re-reading the titles in what he knew was chronological order. (The Flames of War… No, don’t want anything to do with that again. Smoke of War… I… I don’t think I want to know how much they know about that…)

Which left him with the third and final book, the one that he knew represented the current state of his life, (Ashes of War, the Remnant of Gregory Fischer…)

The moment he took the book off the pillar, the other two books disappeared in a brief flash of light, so small that he’d think it a trick of his mind if he didn’t know better.

He looked around the empty library before sighing as he realized this ‘test’ wouldn’t be over until he actually read the book he’d chosen.

With no small amount of reluctance he opened the book’s cover before it sprung open on its own, numerous pages flipping across, far more than could actually be contained in a book that could fit in one hand. As these pages flipped with an ever growing speed, some of them managed to escape their bindings and flutter through the air, soon followed by more and more until he was completely surrounded by a veritable storm of paper flying through the air.

“Once upon a time, there was a soldier named Gregory Fischer.” An echoing voice said, the paper parting just enough to show a picture of him in his brown uniform saluting.

“Who’s there?!” He yelled over the fluttering paper as the picture flew away.

“Gregory was a good little soldier who followed orders, no matter how much he hated them.” The voice continued as the paper parted once more to show him standing over a street littered in bodies flames eating away at the edge.

“Who the fuck are you?!” He cried, his mind unable to help but wonder if this was all some elaborate set-up of some kind. Pay back for the things he’d done, the things he regretted.

“Until he was given an order he couldn’t follow.” The pages parted once more to show him holding a file in his hand with a terrified look as he stood in front of a smiling man in a suit.

A chill went down his spine as he realized what this was about.

“So he didn’t.” The voice declared as it showed him burning the file from before.

“I didn’t.” He admitted, steeling himself. “And I don’t regret it!” (If they’re coming for me because of that… then I’ll deal with it.)

“The men he viewed as his brothers abandoned him for failing to follow his duty…” The voice continued uncaring for his words as it showed him sitting in a canteen by himself, a clear gap between him and everyone else.

“What… what’s the point of this?!” He asked the voice.

“Shame filled him… Not because of the order he rejected, but because of all those he didn’t…” An image of him clutching his head while surrounded by smoke appeared, the smoke parting just long enough to see things he’d rather not remember.

“Why are you doing this?!” He pleaded, closing his eyes as he couldn’t bear to see anymore reminders of his sins.

“Unable to do the job he was made for, they threw him out onto the streets… A broken burned out husk of the man he once was…”

“Shut up, shut up. Shut up!” He begged, eyes shut to hold in the tears and hands over his ears to block out the words.

“This is where our story will begin.”

His eyes shot open as he glared upwards, “What sto-ry…”

(W-what?) He blinked, finding himself back in his room, the library and the pages from before nowhere to be seen. (Was… was that all just a nightmare?)

He shifted before frowning as he realized he was still dressed in his clothes, clothes he could not fall asleep in since the collar would always choke him, reminding him of when- (Don’t think about it.)

On guard he took a look around his room before finding several oddities, the most notable being how his walls were made of blank white pages. (No, that’s not right… The pages have something written on them…)

He got up from his bed and made his way to the wall where he ran his fingers over the pages and noted how the script, while visible enough to see, looked as if it had been written and then erased. The words too faded for him to actually make anything out.

“I’m still in the library…” He realized with a frown before taking another look around.

The book was on his bed.

He swallowed down his apprehensions before making his way over and cautiously inspected the only real clue to whatever was happening to him. (The name ‘s changed…)

Instead of reading ‘Ashes of War, The Remnant of Gregory Fischer’ the book’s title had changed to ‘Gregory Fischer, The Black Briar Librarian’.

“Not if this is what I’m going to be dealing with.” He scoffed, hoping the voice or whoever was running this shit show heard him.

Knowing that there was only one way forward (since they didn’t give me a door out of this room) he picked up the book.

Not quite trusting the book, he opened the cover fully ready to throw the book away from him, but unlike what he expected, this book did not force itself open and start spewing another storm of script into the air.

The only thing he found behind the cover was a dedication of sorts.

(For Gregory Fischer, The Man Who Burned So Others Wouldn’t Have To.)

The scars on his arm ached, as he felt something in those words…

“So that’s what this is…” He huffed, not sure how he felt about… any of this.

Instead of dealing with any of that, he ignored the knot in his chest and turned the page to the table of contents.

The table of contents was divided into five sections: Synopsis, Current Story, Volumes Collected, Personal Library, and Working Draft. Under each of these sections were several more chapters, though the actual names of said chapters were illegibly written in a script that almost seemed to move across the page. The exception being Ashes of War under Working Draft.

(Okay… Now the question is what any of this means…)

He flipped a few pages, landing himself in the Synopsis where-

(A scream tore loose from his throat, almost as loud as the roar of the flame that devoured his arm.)

(Smoke flooded his lungs, choking him with every breath as he stumbled ever forward in pursuit of his goal.)

(All around him ashes floated through the air, painting the world gray as they left him alone with the dead.)

-he slammed the book shut, his heart pounding against his ribcage as if were trying to flee from the memories that had just been forced out from the depths of his mind.

Desperate hands searched his pockets for his cigarette, before pulling one out and lighting it with a panicking fervor for any relief from the panic that consumed him.

He inhaled deeply, the cherry burning bright before exhaling a cloud as dark as his terror.

Once he felt something halfway resembling calm -a state that took him at least five more sticks- he turned his attention back to the (dangerous) book he’d left on the book. Its closed cover innocently gazing up at him.

He stared back at the book until his latest cigarette was nothing but ash, before with shaking hands he opened the book once more and stared at the word Synopsis.

It took but a moment for him to realize what Synopsis really meant, (the Synopsis of Gregory Fischer… My… My entire life…)

He may’ve only seen a few brief glimpses of his past, but they were in such clarity it was as if he was reliving those moments. (Whatever magic makes this place up… It’s compressed my entire life into a single book…)

Frightful eyes read over the table of contents with far more reverence, realizing that the page numbers for each section were made of the same moving script that made up the illegible chapter names.

Taking a gamble, he put his thumb half way down the book before focusing on Current Story and flipping the book open once more.

He couldn’t help but flinch, expecting another deluge of traumatic memories as the book’s contents were forced upon his mortal mind.

When no such trauma came forth he took a cautious look at the page he’d opened and found a detailed pen sketch of himself sitting at a desk while reading his book. Opposite this was more of the eldritch script from before, only this time he could parse through some of the contents as he read over what looked like a list of some kind counting or describing something.

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

Given how his name was written across the bottom of the pen portrait he had a fairly decent idea what these things were in reference to, even if he had to guess what some of these words meant due to the eldritch magic plucking the closest word from his mind rather than explaining them.

(“Species: Human, Genre: Sci-fi/Fantasy, Classification: Cyberpunk/Practitioner/Scrapper, Derivative Addendum: None.”) He wasn’t entirely sure what all of that meant, but from what he could understand it was all sort of fitting with what he knew about himself.

At the very least it was significantly easier to understand than everything else on the page as words were replaced with symbols that he could vaguely recognize. (Slash, Blunt, Pierce, Mind, Spirit, Fire, Ice, Electric, Light, and Darkness… With a skull over Mind, a shield over Fire and Ice, and an equal sign over everything else… So Mind is bad while Fire and Ice protect and everything else is even?)

That didn’t seem quite right, even if he could see an angle where he understood it.

Beneath that odd assortment of symbols were a number of small squares, most of which were empty but a handful of which had small ink sketches similar to his own alongside what he was fairly certain was a page number in whatever eldritch script this book was using.

He focused on the first symbol and flipped the pages, figuring the book would open to it just as it had to whatever this overview of himself constituted.

When the pages stopped he found himself staring at another pen drawn image that he vaguely recognized as himself -if with the details blurred- performing a rather straightforward punch.

On the opposite side was even more eldritch writing, though far less detailed and with far less information than the one that had been focused on his entirety. (“Opening Strike. Cost: 1 Blank Page. Blunt Melee. An opening strike to unleash greater combos, the foundation of something greater for all martial artists. A Quick Read for Scrappers, Bruisers, and Infiltrators.”)

After reading that he reexamined the picture, before recognizing that the image was of the exact same punch his style of fighting used to engage his opponent while still being capable of flowing into any other set of strikes.

(So… the book is also dissecting my abilities?) He frowned before flipping back to the Current Story and seeing that he only seemed to have five as far as the book was concerned. Which was all kinds of wrong given how he had learned, developed, and mastered his style of fighting during the war.

Just to prove that point he set the book back on his bed before attempting one of his more advanced combos and promptly stumbling through the final few motions. “Okay… maybe I’m a little rustier than I thought…”

He was sure his ‘work’ had kept his edge from dulling, (then again most of my jobs are pretty straightforward… Never need to bring out anything really fancy…)

With a frown his eyes glanced back at the book and the few skills he had that it recognized, before clenching his fists. He wasn’t a prideful man by any measure, often thinking worse of himself than anyone else, but…

He let out a sigh, not entirely sure what the point of all this was. He already knew he was nothing more than a remnant of what he once was. (Isn’t that what the first book underlined?)

Deciding dwelling on his failings wasn’t going to get him out of wherever he was he went back to inspecting the other sections of the book, only to find both Volumes Collected and Personal Library to be empty.

The final section, the one labeled Working Draft, however had what could best be described as a brainstorming page with a central circle where ‘Ashes of War’ was written with a number of circles branching off from it.

Above this central circle was one labeled Prologue and focusing on it caused him to remember the words the voice had told him during the storm of pages with perfect clarity as well as the images he’d seen. An effect very similar to when he’d tried to read his own Synopsis if not quite as powerful.

Three other circles broke off from the central concept, each one with a few other words connected to them but rendered illegible due to the way the eldritch script moved across the page. These circles were labeled Act 1: Depression, Act 2: Opportunity, and Act 3: Rekindling.

A series of events that made him more confident in his guess at just what the person orchestrating all of this wanted from him.

He took another look around the copy of his room, fully aware that he was currently trapped in ‘Act 1’ and if he wanted out of this place he’d have to work his way through all three acts somehow. (But how?)

If he had to actually overcome his depression, then he might as well roll over and die given how long he’d been battling that particular demon with no success.

A loud thunk drew his attention behind him, where he found a small black pen colliding with his boot.

With a frown he plucked the writing instrument from the ground before looking between it and the book in his hand. Namely the handful of blank spaces that remained untouched in spite of all the eldritch script dancing across the page.

“This… is either a really good or a really bad idea…”

What do you write in your book? (1-3 Word Prompt.)

[]-Write-In Comments Submitted By Readers

Death by cigarettes

Burning a library

---

Book I: The Remnant of Gregory Fischer: Chapter II

--- Gregory Fischer ---

He put the pen to the page and found his mind drawing a blank, as if all creative muse decided that now was the time to abandon him instead of aiding in his writing as requested.

With a sigh he ran a hand through his hair before reaching for another cigarette, hoping that lighting the stick would light something in his imagination. And lo and behold it did…

Unfortunately, the single muse he’d gotten apparently decided to be something of a smart ass as the only thing he could think to write as he finished off his latest cigarette was the fact that his story would probably end with ‘Death by Cigarettes’.

As he wrote the final letter of that message he watched eldritch script begin to creep and crawl away from the words he’d written, slowly consuming the entire page before spreading out into the very air around him.

He watched the writing cautiously, waiting for it to do something, anything that might help him figure out how he was supposed to get out of this apartment. All around him the cloud of script began to condense into piles of discarded cigarette packs and buds, littering the room in a level of waste that (honestly isn’t as bad as my worst.)

(Okay, so writing something in the book causes something to happen around me.) He realized, waving a hand through the air to try and shoo away the cloud of script that was slowly consuming the illusion of his room. (I just need to figure out how to work this into an escape…)

He inhaled before letting out a cough and covering his mouth with his shirt. (Damn, it’s getting smoky in here…)

Despite some of it being spent to add to the ever growing pile of cigarettes, the cloud of eldritch script seemed to continue growing. Something that he could have dealt with if not for the fact that the cloud almost seemed to be pursuing him as he backed away, making it harder and harder to breathe as he continued to cough.

(What the hell? This isn’t how smoke behaves…) He gasped, unable to help but bend over as the coughing grew bad enough that he ended up dropping both the book and the pen.

In front of him the book didn’t shift a single page even as it bounced twice and the pen went rolling under the bed.

This was how he was reminded that he’d written ‘Death By Cigarettes’ into the book.

“Ah, fu-cah!”

He dropped to his knees, scrabbling for the pen, his breathing grew ever more painful and shallow with every cough that tore through his throat.

Bit by bit his thoughts grew hazy as his hand blindly grasped around for the pen only to grasp onto empty cigarette packs and burned out butts. (Shit, shit, shit! Where is it? Where is it?!)

The world around him grew darker and darker, half because of the ever growing cloud of writing and half because of the ever shrinking air in the room.

His hand wrapped around something cold and hard, and with what strength was still in him he brought the pen to the book and began blindly scribbling away at the page, unable to form a thought coherent enough to actually write anything down.

As the last of his strength left him and he found himself without the strength to hold himself up any longer, the pen slipped out of his hand and he collapsed to the ground.

The eldritch script continued to float through the air for several more minutes, even as it slowly faded away alongside the numerous cigarette packs and butts that littered his room.

It wasn’t until the last of it had finally disappeared into oblivion that he found the strength to once more pick himself up, even if he lacked enough to do much more than fall onto his ass and lean against his bed for support as he simply enjoyed the fact that he could breathe.

He stared up at the ceiling for several moments before deciding. “I’m going to burn that library to the ground. In fact…”

Yet again he took the book and pen in hand, he felt a brief moment of fear because of how close this wretched thing had brought him to death. Something that he’d no doubt be inviting once more if he were to write anything else in this book, his instincts warned.

Rather than listening to those thoughts, he promptly stamped them out before using them to feed the smoldering rage in his chest as he wrote ‘Surviving Death’ underneath Act 1: Depression, followed by ‘An Invitation Arrived’ under Act 2: Opportunity, and finally under Act 3: Rekindling he wrote ‘Burning A Library’.

Once more the eldritch text erupted from the book, this time with far more force than the slowly creeping death that was the cloud of smoke.

All around the room first aid kits and spent bandages appeared alongside bullet holes, blood spatter, burn marks, and dead bodies wearing kevlar, making the whole space look like a war zone shortly after the worst of it. (Really starting to feel like home…)

In spite of the fact that he’d nearly died to them he still pulled a cigarette out and lit it, the chemicals hidden within the burnable stick the only thing keeping him from trying to set this building on fire. Whether from fear or rage he wasn’t sure. (We’ll find out when I snap, I guess.)

Opposite him, the handless door to this room swung open, leading to the rest of the house looking just as torn up as the current room and leaving him with little doubt what he’d find out there.

And so with a reluctance of expected horrors he walked through the building, making his way down to Toni’s workshop where he stopped in front of the door. (So help me if they have a dead clone of Toni in here…)

Knowing what he was probably going to be walking into, he put his current cigarette out on the doorframe before pulling out a special pack of smokes he always kept on him and taking a steeling inhalation of the chems coating the inside of his cigarette.

Not even two breaths later he could feel a warmth filling his lungs as he pushed the door open and stepped inside to find a scene even more out of a horror story than the rest of the house. The entire workshop having been torn apart with bloody tools littering the ground and corpses dead upon the heavier machinery their blood still dripping onto the ground. (Fuck, is this what the book considers ‘surviving death’?)

As luck would have it, despite his worst fears, he didn’t find a copy of Toni’s body anywhere, instead her main workbench had a massive burn mark with a half cremated corpse underneath it. On the wall some of the ashes had been wiped away, leaving behind a very pointed message.

If you want the girl

Come to the Black Briar Library

“Someone is really testing my patience.” He growled, before looking towards the sky. “Just so we’re clear, I’m willing to put up with whatever sick test all of this is, but if you’ve actually taken her I am going to burn all of you- Fuck!” He screamed as a knife embedded itself into his back.

A ripping sound filled the air as the knife was torn out of him, pulling several pages of fluttering paper away as it did so. (The hell? Wait, no time.)

He turned to his attacker and found a man in black kevlar facing him with a knife in hand.

“So, you friends with the corpses?” He asked as he rolled his shoulder checking to see how much damage that knife had done to him, only (aside from the pain it doesn’t feel like it actually did anything to me. Is this all part of the illusion?)

The man didn’t say anything before rushing him with the knife once more.

Gregory threw the book at his assailant, causing the man to deflect it with a sweep of the arm at the cost of leaving himself unprotected for an opening strike to the chest and the series of strikes that followed it.

Unlike what he’d expected, the final strike of his combination did not meet flesh, but instead tore through the air as the man erupted into a flurry of pages.

He narrowed his eyes at the pages as he inhaled a lungful of his cigarette, the cherry barely moving as he did so, before opening his mouth and- promptly coughing as he choked on the smoke.

“The hell?” He gasped, eyes wide. “That, that hasn’t happened since boot camp…”

Something slammed into his forehead, sending him stumbling back a step even as he caught the book that had hit him, finding that it was his own book -(of fucking course)- and that it had once more fallen open to the page describing the opening strike he’d just used.

With a frown he turned back to ‘Current Story’ before looking at the five marks that he was guessing described the various abilities he had. Not one of which really made use of his Smoke or his Fire.

“My skills may be… rusty, but there is no way in hell I lost a decades worth of abilities. Especially not ones I know I could use just a week ago.” Admittedly, he hadn’t been using that for combat so much as helping Toni with something, (but still…)

Just to check this he clicked an icon that looked like his cigarette smoking, the thing that he’d thought had represented the skill he’d just tried to use only to find instead of his abilities…

(“Basic Chem Smokes.

Cost: 1 Fantasy or Sci-Fi Page.

Consumable

The culmination of research into creating a combat enhancement formula. Highly addictive, both due to the power and the chemicals within. This is but the simplest of the series.

Quick Read. Increase Power and Speed of the user until their next reading Turn.

Checkout Renewal Fee (1 Fantasy or Sci-Fi Page).”)

He inhaled before exhaling and deciding that while his ‘special smokes’ weren’t common knowledge, they also weren’t something that a group with the Black Briar Library’s apparent resources couldn’t easily find out about. (What is surprising though is the fact that these aren’t the smokes I had on me… Though it would explain why I couldn’t do what I was planning.)

Just to be sure he double checked the pack he had on him and found that they were still the actual mix of Black Cough, Anima Blue, and Red Fury that he usually carried on him. (So why didn’t the one I use work how it was supposed to… Wait…)

He recounted the number of Chem Smokes in the pack. “This is the same amount I had this morning… Then…” He pulled out the cigarette he was currently smoking. “Where did you come from?”

As if to answer this question the burning cigarette came apart, turning into several pages of paper that fell out of his hand before merging into the book he was carrying. (I see…)

Once more he pulled one of his smokes from the pack -this time not doing so blindly- and lit it before inhaling deeply and breaking into another coughing fit, even as a familiar chem filled warmth entered his chest.

“Still not what I was going for…” He gasped, as he checked the pack of cigarettes and yet again found that the one he’d just removed had been returned to its previous place. (Alright, so this library is even more screwy than I already thought it was…)

Flipping back to his Current Story, he checked the remaining three slots that apparently represented not his skills in general but rather the things he was allowed to use for this increasingly annoying test. (Let’s see, all in all I’ve got ‘Opening Strike’, ‘Swift Dodge’, ‘Heated Fist’, ‘Basic Chem Smokes’, and…)

He paused and reread that last one, before checking his arm and frowning when it looked no different than usual. (I’m… I’m just going to ignore that one for now…)

“Either way, none of that included the rest of the strikes I used on that guy.” He sighed, running a hand through his hair as he tried to figure out what exactly was happening here. (I guess if Heated Fist is here then that means it’s only applying restrictions to some of my abilities?) “But what’s deciding what gets restricted and what I’m allowed to do?”

Regardless of anything else, he was fighting with a handicap he didn’t understand (and that’s the kind of thing that can get you killed.)

Then again, he was already planning on burning down the library for putting him through all of this, and given everything it seemed capable of (that might be a suicide mission all it’s own.)

Shaking his head he made his way to the door to the workshop before walking into it as it refused to open for him. “Gah, what is it now?!”

He flipped the book open to Working Draft, trying to figure out what the stupid thing wanted from him now before once more finding the words he’d added to the second act. “An invitation arrived… Right…”

Looking up from the book, his eyes searched the room for wherever the invitation could be hiding, (since apparently it’s not the literal invitation on the wall.) Eventually he found an envelope sitting atop a small pile of pages that he was guessing had once been a part of the construct he’d killed.

After picking the envelope up and finding it to be the exact same one Toni had given him earlier that day, just with more ash and blood on it, he also noticed that the pages underneath the envelope looked familiar for some reason.

He folded and tucked the library invitation into his vest before also picking the pages up and going over them. Idly he noted that the door to the workshop had swung open not when he picked up the library invitation, but instead when he picked the actual pages up. (Meaning this is what they wanted me to actually grab.)

Going over the pages he found that similar to the other ‘Skill Pages’ in the book, these ones described one of the many skills he knew and should’ve been able to perform rust or no rust. More specifically he found that the technique depicted by the pages was a simple-

---

Scene Choice

A/N: Before we go into the Boss Fight, pick a Card.

[]- Parry.

[]- Grapple.

[]- Kickback.

---

Book I: The Remnant of Gregory Fischer: Chapter III

--- Gregory Fischer ---

(“Simple Parry.

Cost: 1 Blank Page.

Defensive.

A basic defensive maneuver that deflects an incoming strike, while hopefully leaving space for retaliation. A step further than blocking, but only the beginning of the defensive arts.

Reactive Read. Negate an incoming attack.

Checkout Renewal Fee: 1 Blank Page, for Scrappers and Infiltrators.”)

Once more he understood most of what was written down, but there were still words that he lacked context for no matter how familiar they were becoming. (It doesn’t matter. I’ve got enough to work with for now.)

Deciding it was best to hold onto the page, given how it was the thing the Library actually wanted him to collect, he moved to put it in his book for safekeeping. Only when he brought the page close to the book he began to feel a force trying to pull it out of his hand.

With a frown he tugged the page away from the book and felt the force stop before growing stronger as he brought it closer to the book. (They’re almost magnetic with each other…)

Figuring this was part of what the Library wanted him to see, he let the page go before watching it get sucked into the book where it seamlessly merged with the rest of the book, looking no different than any of the other skill pages he’d read within.

Just to check that he went back to his Current Story, and found that (yep, six marks for my… Skills? Equipment? Both?)

He shook his head as he closed the book, knowing that either he’d figure out what was going on with the book or he’d burn down the Library and the point would be moot. (Preferably the latter…)

With nothing else left to do here, he turned his attention back to the exit door hanging open while leading out into a void that he was even more reluctant to deal with than the overcrowded city that he lived in.

He pulled out one of his regular cigarettes, and found that the pack was almost empty. (If they gave infinite refills of these then I might’ve forgiven them for all of this shit.)

Still he lit up one of his cigarettes, more to calm his nerves than infuse himself with power, before stepping out into the void as confidently as he could, ready to kill whatever he found on the other side.

Outside of the Library’s recreation of Toni’s workshop he found himself on an empty black street with a recreation of his city’s library in front of him. (If this was how the city was actually laid out it would make my life a hell of a lot easier…)

Not letting his guard down, his eyes instinctively searched the street for any hidden enemies as he crossed it, only to find the half-hearted recreation of the city to be apocalyptically empty. (Well, at least I don’t have to deal with people, small mercies I suppose…)

As he started up the stairs to the library he found his eyes drifting up to the sky above, before really wishing he hadn’t.

While the world around him was illuminated well enough to pass for the evening, the sky above him was an abyss of nothingness darker than black and emptier than the void. At least until you realized the abyss was moving.

A massive bloodshot eye opened, staring down at him before a maw full of fangs grinned at him.

“Nope.” He decided, running up the stairs two at a time so as to get some cover between him and the thing that could crush him like a roach.

He shoulder tackled the door to the library open, before slamming it shut behind him, and (really hoping that was just some kind of mind fucky illusion.)

With his luck he knew it wasn’t but…

He shook his head, and took in the library he was inside of noting how instead of being the actual Black Briar Library it was a recreation of itself made from pages scrawled in so much text that might as well be black.

Cautiously, he started forward until he was standing in the middle of the atrium over the insignia of a black rose. “Well, I’m here. I got your invitation. I’m playing your little game. What do you want to do now? More men in black to try and kill me?”

Silence was his only answer.

Finishing off his cigarette, he dropped it on the ground and put it out under his heel. “Fine, I’ll figure it out myself.”

Aware that the book had been the source of or answer to everything that had happened to him thus far, he pulled it out and began flipping through the pages until he once more found the ‘Working Draft’ section. (Okay, I survived Act 1, and I got the invitation from Act 2…) “So why isn’t the Library Burning for Act 3?”

He was missing something.

(Alright, so… Library, Book, Story, Chapters, Drafts, and Acts… Clearly there’s a theme to all of this… I survived death, thus beating Act 1: Depression. I got the invitation in Act 2 from those guys trying to kill me… Which tied Act 1 and 2 together… So to progress, I need to… continue the narrative?) “Which means burning the library down in vengeance.”

While he wasn’t one for book burning, he could happily make an exception in this case. (What’s more they didn’t take that particular option away from me either.)

He flipped his book open to the page depicting his Heated Fist with a smirk.

(“Heated Fist.

Cost: 1 Fantasy or Science Fiction Page.

Blunt Melee Fire.

A technique born by fusing Martial Might with Technology or Magic to infuse one’s fists with the power of the flame. The first true step to mastering the Fist of The Flame.”)

He clenched his fist and drew on the power of the heat that was always smoldering within him, be it real or a hallucination. The air around his right arm began to shimmer, the heat bending the light around it before eventually actual flames began to lick away at him.

Even if it wasn’t as much as he’d been hoping for, (there’s plenty of kindling here to make it work.) All he had to do was introduce the fire to the pages around him and-

He paused as he watched the shadows around him dance in the flame’s light, quickly realizing that something was wrong about them. (The angle is all wrong, as if the flame was coming from-)

With wide eyes he spun on his heel, and just barely managed to deflect a flaming fist before it could impact him. Not that that did anything to prevent the follow-up strike from hitting him in the chest and sending him flying with a trail of burning pages erupting behind him.

“Fuck!” He gasped as he hit the ground and bled the momentum to roll back onto his feet. “Alright, who the hell…”

He couldn’t help but trail off as he saw the figure in front of him.

For before him stood a man whose flesh was covered in flames that slowly devoured him as his face was trapped in a richter of rage and hate that wanted little more than to burn the entire world around.

A face that he had worn once upon a time…

(His world was nothing but pain and rage as he lashed out at anything in arm’s reach, uncaring if they were friend or foe…)

A face that was his…

“So we’re doing more of this memory lane bullshit.” He swallowed before standing once more and taking a stance against his burning doppelganger, all the while trying very hard not to think about what had sent him into this particular rage.

Around him the library shifted and swirled as his doppelganger’s flames slowly devoured it all before leaving them standing on a burning street with bodies littering the ground unmoving.

Small bodies.

He flinched.

The Hellish Echo of who he was rushed forward with a fist full of flames, and all he could do was raise his guard to defend against the onslaught of strikes that devoured him. Unable to bring himself to do much more in the face of his… (failure.)

Another blow impacted his face, hard enough that he knew it should’ve broken something, but while he did feel the pain (I deserve) his body kept no damage as more and more pages burst from his body.

With every blow the flames consuming his doppelganger grew brighter and brighter, the heat building to a sweltering point he hadn’t felt in years.

As the flames began to flicker white, the Hellish Echo’s fist hit him once more, only this time instead of pages erupting from his form he felt his glasses crunch as the fist hit his face, filling him with a pain far more real than anything he’d felt since stepping foot into the Library.

The moment real heat touched him, instinct took over and twisted the flames away, minimizing how much of his flesh they could eat away at before he twisted to move via his Smoke. Only instead of the Smoke following his will, he found the world around him shifting with the fluttering of pages before finding himself behind his Hellish Echo with a trail of paper leading between them.

(W-what?) He blinked, regaining some lucidity as he found his Book once more in his hands.

One of the pages fluttered in front of him and he realized he recognized the page’s contents from within his own book.

(“Swift Dodge.

Cost: 1 Blank page.

Mobility.

The most important thing any combatant can learn is how to move to avoid being hit. Even better if they can do so swiftly.

Reactive Read. When attacked, move a short distance away.

Checkout Renewal Fee: 1 Blank Page, for Scrappers and Infiltrators.”)

He frowned as he read that, more so when the page faded into nothingness as it touched the ground. (That… that’s not what I thought that meant… That was almost like my Smoke Dash but… with paper…)

Paper was not something he could work with. At least not the way he could Fire and Smoke.

This… oddity was enough to have him reevaluating the world around him. A world that while extremely similar to one of his more traumatic memories, was also just off enough to remind him that this was all some kind of fucked up illusion from the Library messing with him, not the usual night terrors that he subjected himself to.

Something that just served to piss him off once more. (And I can work angry…)

With a growl he snapped his book shut before tossing it to the side, not really caring if it burned or not as he glared at the Hellish Echo whose right arm was wreathed in white flames that seemed to lash out at the very world around them.

He inhaled before exhaling as he once more took his stance. “Alright, let’s try this again.”

The Hellish Echo snarled a sound inhuman, before rushing forward with another Heat Fist from the blazing white arm.

Instead of letting it hit him this time, he parried the blow off with his own right arm before using an Opening Strike on the Echo’s solar plexus and following up with a flurry of body shots that ended with a hook to the Echo’s jaw.

The Hellish Echo stumbled back a step before swinging its arm with a clawing motion.

One that he more than recognized as he ducked under a wave of flames before delivering a Heat Fist infused uppercut of his own.

A blow that touched nothing but smoke as the Hellish Echo Smoke Dashed away, before entering a boxing stance and punching out a series of crimson fireballs in his direction.

More on returning instinct than anything else, he pulled on his own power to use Smoke Dash, only to instead use the odd Swift Dodge again to avoid the spell series that detonated behind him as he closed the distance between him and the Echo.

Reappearing in front of the Hellish Echo he slipped one of his Chem Smokes into his mouth before ducking under a sloppy hook from the Echo and taking it a step further by twisting its flames to light his own cigarette.

Inhaling deeply, he felt the power of the Smoke flood his body as he firmed his footing on the ground before delivering another Heat Fist to the Hellish Echo’s stomach, the flames blooming twice as far as any of his previous blows.

The Hellish Echo skidded back on its heels, not being sent flying like he himself had, before turning a snarling glare upon him.

“What? Getting tired?” He asked in between rough breaths of his own as took note of the slowly spreading patches of burned flesh on his doppelganger.

This question seemed to only enrage the Hellish Echo further if that was possible, as it took a stance he recognized even if he hadn’t used it in years. The doppelganger drawing its blazing arm back with its right leg as the flames dancing around it began to circle around the echo.

He couldn’t help but scoff, even as phantom pains began to eat away at his body, “Trust me, when I say…you really don’t want to do that…”

Rather than heeding his warning, his doppelganger’s arm grew even brighter, enough so that he couldn’t look at it directly as he rushed forward, knowing that he could not let that spell hit him.

The Hellish Echo punched, causing the entire world to flash a blinding white as a destructive white flame devoured everything in front of his doppelganger rendering everything it touched nothing but ash.

Something that he was quite content to not witness again as he dropped to the ground and dove through the far less dangerous red flames that had gathered around the Echo’s feet. Even if he could still feel them burning him as he worked his magic to keep the white flames as far away from him as possible.

When the light finally died down he found himself lying on the ground in a world much darker than before as all but the most stubborn of cinders had been snuffed out by the white flame that had for a moment devoured all the air on the street, leaving it hard for anything to breathe.

Next to him his Hellish Echo fell to its knees, all of its fire having been consumed by the Morningstar it had unleashed.

With what strength he had left he forced himself onto his own knees so that he could get a better look at the damage.

The massive crater filled with embers stretching down half the street was something he’d expected, as was the fact that Hellish Echo was now down an arm.

“Warned you, you didn’t want to do that.” He sighed, looking at his right arm. Something he hadn’t been expecting to get a page in his book even if he really should’ve.

(Toni’s Prosthetic Arm

Cost: 1 Science Fiction Page.

Tech Equipment (Arm).

A simple creation of a technological genius. The mere beginnings of what she could create, only held back due to fear of burning what remained of her friend.

Restriction Read: This Page may only be equipped to a Cyberpunk unit with an (Arm) equipped or an ability equipping an (Arm).

If this unit has any Heat stacks, increase the power of their Melee attacks and abilities by that amount.)

With a wistful sigh he lowered his metal limb before climbing back to his feet and looking down at his Hellish Echo. The doppelganger no longer consumed by rage or fire, looked completely and utterly burned out a mere husk of what it had been a few moments prior.

He lit one of his last two cigarettes before offering the last one to his doppelganger, knowing that if it felt anything like he did then he couldn’t hurt it anymore than it already was. (My anger always did burn hot and fast I suppose…)

To his surprise the doppelganger actually took the cigarette and put it to its lips before struggling to light the flame, something he always did with-

He gripped the end of the Echo’s cigarette and snapped the fingers of his right hand, lighting it.

They both just sat there for a moment, watching ash drift through the air, the only remnant of the things that had gotten them into this fight in the first place.

“Do… do we… quit burning?” His younger self asked, sounding as lost as he had for years.

Which is why he actually thought about it for a moment, perhaps for the first moment even.

He didn’t think about the events that burned him out until he became little more than a husk of himself, because he thought about those daily. But rather he thought about where he was, where he’d been since the day he burned.

The way he just went through the motions of it all, waking up, pretending for Toni’s sake, working so that she could live as she wished in spite of him holding her back, drowning himself in stories so he wouldn’t have to think about his own.

He stared into the cherry glowing at the end of his cigarette for another moment, before telling his younger self,

[]- “Yes.” (It has to…)

[]- “No.” (It won’t…)