This is the essence of the world.
It swirls in eddies and rivers, connecting every single facet of existence to every other. If you imagine it as the arteries, vessels, and billions of capillaries of some ancient immortal being, you will be utterly wrong but rather poetic in your wrongness.
Very few creatures can actually view the Essence in any of it's forms beyond what the menus and system allow. It remains hidden from most everyday eyes, the bedrock to the world, unseen and unheard but affecting every aspect, even if only to ensure that the walls do not collapse in on themselves.
But there are a few creatures in this world who can see the essence, either through quirks of their class or through long arduous study of the firmaments of the world. A few dragons have the ability. The Five, of course, and one or two genie subclasses, among others. Apollyon, in his wandering dungeon, has made a study of the essence, and has learned better than almost any other creature how to understand its ripples and rhythms. But while there are many creatures who can view the essence and some who can even understand it, there is only one race in the world besides the five who can directly affect it.
These creatures are known as Narrator Fairies, although they were not always known as such. Sometimes they can be found in great groups, roaming across the countryside collecting and collating data for some mysterious purpose. Other times it is simply one or two flitting about here and there, making notes and records on their on various pieces of paper or in their magical notation devices. And few people question them as to their purpose. They are simply Narrator Fairies, and they are always doing things like that.
What the common man may not know is that it is they who are tasked with the introduction of the new into the essence. Whenever a new invention is created, whenever a gnome breaks the laws of reality in a new and interesting way, whenever a goblin sorceress creates a new spell or an elf enchants his favorite spade in an unexpected way, a narrator fairy will be there. It is their solemn duty to log the name and record the item into the essence, connecting its newness to the old web of of existence.
It is unknown, even to the Five, where exactly narrator fairies came from. Some say that the essence itself but gave birth to them as a necessary function, otherwise there would have been no way to connect the evolutions of the world to the already-extant essence. Others say that they were a random project by a long dead master, looking to delegate their own core processes into the system itself. Some say they were always there, just no one really noticed them until much later.
What is important is that narrator fairies exist, and that they were created for a purpose. a very specific purpose.
And then they were given their current jobs because that very specific purpose would not come up unless a very specific set of circumstances were to come about. And for the last untold millennia, they have kept to their jobs. Most of them do not even remember their original purpose.
But some do.
No one knows where the narrator fairies live, save the narrator fairies themselves. Their home is hidden even from the essence, though it is connected to it. And since it is hidden from the Essence, it is hidden too from any prying eyes that may come looking for it. Apollyon could have sussed the location out, were he to trouble himself, but it would have taken considerable amounts of power for comparably little gain.
And really, why bother? They were simply narrator fairies, small bits of the system designed to grease the wheels and keep it turning. And so the home of the narrator fairies has gone unnoticed and unseen for untold generations, known only to themselves. And of course, as is befitting their nature, their home is a library.
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Garnet Commathief was bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored Boredy mcBoredbored. So bored. So bored she was honestly starting to wonder if she wouldn’t rather have been born a dwarf or something, just so she wouldn’t have to spend anymore of her days sitting at this stupid desk anymore. Forging sounded like it could be fun. All those… Ehm… Hammers? And Stuff? Well, it still would be better than this.
The narrator fairy sat at her desk in the east vault of the Final Library, typing into the special machine all the field reports from the other fairies in section 3Z8II.noe of the Northern Continent–and excuse me, but wasn’t that just the dumbest name for a continent? Really, who came up with these names? Sure, it was the continent in the north, but the name was just so bland. Honestly, if she’d been in charge back then, she would have at least made sure to name everything in an interesting way. “Nurambiasa”, maybe. It was at least better than ‘the northern continent.’ Bleh.
But no one had asked her for her opinion of course. So instead of recording awesome reports about the awesome continent of Luriannai, here she was just recording into the essence the words and observations of the various narrator fairies out and about in sectopm 3Z8II.noe of the Northern Continent. And being bored.
It was drudgery work, was what this was. The Provosts would have normally assigned it to the younger initiates. They should have assigned it to one of the initiates. Forcing a third-tier Assistant to enter in the newest cattle numbers from a random coordinate marker town on a boring map was just wasting a valuable resource, was what it was. In any sane world, it would have been her overseeing a room like this, as her younger brothers and sisters did this boring dull tedious work.
Oh hush, her Other Voice said. You know it has nothing to do with that and everything to do with the fact that you tore the binding on Elder Hyacinth’s favorite volumes of bawdy tavern songs.
Okay, yes, sure, maybe that had something to do with it. But it hadn’t really been her fault that the binding had torn. True, perhaps she shouldn't have been reading them while also riding her favorite bookworm through the stacks. And maybe she should have kept a better grip on it when that Horsefly had bolted and come running right around the corner at her. And okay, maybe–maybe, mind you, she shouldn’t have reflexively thrown the book at the fly as it shot past. But really, it hadn't been her fault. And who really expected the fly to have been chased by Dash and Em and their posse with their fly hunting slide-rules. The ones with the sharp edge and the over-extender slide. That could really do some damage if they, say, accidentally hit a totally-by-accident thrown volume of Elder Hyacinth’s favorite bawdy songs that someone who’s fault it totally wasn’t had thrown at the stupid horsefly as it thundered past?
Honestly, who could have foreseen that?
Elder Hyacinth had not seen it her way, however. And so here was poor innocent wrongly-accused Garnet sentenced to a total of 40 hours of dull tedious boring interminable drudgery work, recording the words of other more interesting narrator fairies into who into the annals of the Library.
“And so the final tally of cattle in quadrant C-1992-f: Twelve hundred cows, forty three bulls, all of the long-prong variety. Two hundred and thirty seven female calfs, one hundred and fifteen male.”
She groaned as the voice in her hearing helmet continued to drone on, listing off ages of the bovines, their colorations, and their relations to each other. But despite the boring tedious dull interminable repetitive nature of the task, she entered it all dutifully into the machine in front of her, her fingers flying over the keys, tapping in the words with the speed that should have been expected from a third-tier Assistant like her.
And then finally, finally, this dull boring tedious repetitive interminable tiresome tape was over. She ejected it from her Speak-And-Spake, set the cartridge in the ‘done’ tray next to her console, let out a deep sigh. Gods, that had been the worst. Still, at least it was one step closer to freedom. She hadn’t looked at the clock all day, just to make sure that when she looked at it finally it would be lots closer to the end.
She risked a glance up now, secure in the knowledge that surely hours must have passed since she last–
Twenty three minutes.
Garnet groaned and head-desked. Gods, she still had 29 hours to go! She was going to shrivel up and die from boredom at this rate.
“Having trouble, miss Commathief?”
The voice made her straighten up so fast she could later swear that she’d gotten whiplash. It was like thorns and gristle wrapped around an iron bar that had spent fifteen months in the bottom of the icebox next to a dead body.
“No Miss Capslock!” Garnet all but barked out, feeling like a brand new fledged as the Iron Lady strode up next to her desk and peered over the rim of her half-spectacles at her.
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The Iron Lady was the absolute mistress of her domain, and her domain encompassed all the recording vaults of the Final Library. To say she looked ‘severe’ would be like saying the great Allabluster Cliffs of the–ugh–Northern Continents were ‘a little bit rocky’. From her iron-gray hair done up in a severe braid to her severe sharp features and her severe green eyes and her severe mouth that always seemed to be frowning at some severe lapse in discipline. She was Not To Be Trifled With.
“Good,” The Iron lady said, peering even more intently at poor Garnet. “Back to work please, young miss. These updates will not enter themselves.
“No miss Capslock. I mean yes, miss Capslock! Uh, I mean, I’ll get right back to work, miss Capslock!”
Garnet grabbed for the next dictation cartridge and nearly broke a nail with how fast she inserted it into the slot on her machine, barely daring to glance out of the corner of her eye to see if the Iron Lady had gone away yet.
She had. Stalking further down the rows of desks in the vast room that was the East Vault, eyeing the other narrator fairies hard at work. Oh thank Punctuation. Garnet was safe. For now.
But she’d best get back to work before Miss Capslock came back.
She turned back to her machine and twiddled the knobs, lining up the parameters displayed on the cartridge with the appropriate settings, then adjusted her hearing helmet and hit the playback button, suppressing a sigh and getting back to the drudgery that was her life for the next week or so– Hey!
“And then Sam was all like “Okay, I’ll give you this one chance you boney idiot-head, and then he let Rakky actually use the harness and–”
Garnet perked up. She knew this voice!
“So yeah, the battle is tomorrow and we’re all getting ready for it because we know that the real King Boney’s forces aren’t gonna be coming to talk to us, y’know? But I guess I’m rambling. Okay. Right. Professional pants on, Pearl.”
It was Pearly! Pearl Wordsinger, her old Roomie! Garnet leaned closer and pressed her hands against her hearing helmet, that at least relieved the boredom somewhat. Wow. Pearl. She hadn't heard from Pearly in, what was it now, eight years? Ever since her friend had stormed out of the Library, flaunting the wishes of Chairman Umlaut and the entire board. It had been the talk of the stacks for weeks afterwards! Especially when the rumors had surfaced that Pearl had actually gone on an adventure after leaving the Library. And then she’d gotten a job? With humans? No Narrator Fairy in centuries had had that kind of gall!
Poor Pearl. Her father had set everything up to give her a cushy little assignment out in Breckenwald, counting gemstones and hobnobbing with hob nobles, and she had thrown it back in his face. Still, Garnet could understand that, at least. Pearl had gone off on some diatribe about wanting to earn her own way, and not benefit from her father's position as chairman of the board. It was something that sang in Garnet’s heart, if she were honest with herself. To be out and about, no rules except the ones she made herself, not accountable to anyone–
But she was still sending reports back? Garnet blinked and looked down as if seeing her machine for the first time. Pearl hadn’t gone back on her heritage, had she. She was still doing a true Narrator Fairy’s job, recording what she saw, and presumably she was still speaking things into the Essence as well.
But still, Garnet thought, to simply abandon the library to become a secretary at some grubby little dungeon construction company? It was positively scandalous. She glanced up and down the recording row, checking to see if any of her neighbor fairies were watching her. None were. Probably Miss Capslock had scared them into doing their jobs with single-minded focus, just like she had done with Garnet. Of course, now her focus was on Pearl too, because hey, how often do you get to hear an old best friend and roommate suddenly show up in your ear rattling off about her fascinating adventures? So, with one more glance around to make sure the Iron Maiden had moved on, she bent forward over her machine and pressed her hand against her hearing helmet, and listened to what her old friend Pearl had to say.
And quickly grew enraptured. Pearl was still having adventures. She listened spellbound, as her friend described fighting creatures just like the stories they had read together by the light of the glowbugs. She had fought a lich. She had gone on adventures with humans and orcs and goblins. She had followed someone named Sam into the deepest parts of the system and had learned of–
WWAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!
Garnet shrieked out a curse and felt her whole body spasm as a squeal of alarm ripped through her hearing helmet and into her poor, abused oral nerves. Still swearing, She ripped the helmet off her head and almost threw it across the room before some better sense arrested her arm mid-motion and turned a hard throw into a gentle release so that the expensive bit of magical equipment just thumped down onto her desk, still shrieking like Garnet had just taken the last romance book in the section.
And it took her another second, her ears still ringing, to realize that the shrieking alarm wasn’t the only thing happening. Her machine was flashing red and had apparently locked down on Pearl’s dictation cartridge. Okay, now Garnet was starting to freak out. The squeal might have just been a malfunction, some kind of feedback loop or something. BUt this? This was not simple malfunction. This was enemy action if she’d ever seen it. Someone had programmed the machine to act like this!
And what was weirder, she’d never heard of something like this happening before. And from the way the entire room had gone quiet save for the squealing coming from her machine, and from the way a hundred pairs of Narrator Fairy eyes had just swiveled to stare at her, she was guessing they had never heard of something like this either.
Oh god please don’t make me do more community service. It wasn’t my fault this time! Er… This time either. Right. Right, that’s what I meant.
And then there was the Presence next to her desk. The stern iron face, the iron gray bun, and those half-rimmed spectacles loomed over her. Garnet swallowed and slowly, meekly, turned to face Miss Capslock once more.
“It wasn't my fault?” She tried, lamely. But it wasn't, was it? What had she done? What could possibly have happened?
“Yes dear I know,” The iron maiden said, glaring not at her but at her machine. “It… happens from time to time. There are certain words that are flagged in our systems that, when found in our reports, set off certain alarms.”
“Certain alarms?” Garnet blurted, staring up at the Iron Lady. “That one nearly pushed my ears together? What kind of flagged word would set off something like that? A new release by Thaddeus McDowel?”
“Leaving your dubious taste in authors aside,” the Iron Maiden said icily,” I do not know. Scoot over, child, and let me see your machine. Helmet please,” she demanded, thrusting out an imperious hand.
Garnet moved probably faster even than when she’d dodged the horsefly earlier, grabbing the helmet off the desk and handing it to Miss Capslock even as she got out of her seat.
The Iron Lady sat at what had been Garnet’s desk and tapped a few commands into the keyboard. The squealing stopped, though the flashing red light did not. Then the older Narrator Fairy donned the hearing helmet, adjusted her spectacles, and pressed the ‘play’ button. Garnet stood by, shifting nervously, wondering just what in the world was going on here. The Iron Lady’s face was calm–and severe–as she listened to Pearly’s words for the first time.
Then something happened that made Garnet’s heart freeze in her chest. The Iron Lady, the fairy who could bend iron with her gaze, the past master of the Stern Expression Jutsu, the woman to whom an entire fleet of airbatallion warships could attach mooring lines to and never move… Blinked.
And then her face went white as a sheet.
Garnet swallowed hard and started mentally reviewing where the exits were in the room as Miss Capslock leaned forward, eyes wide, and concentrated on what she was hearing. Whatever was on Pearly’s tape hadn’t just surprised the old lady, it had… Scared her?
“Um,” Garnet said haltingly. “Is everything okay, miss Capslock?”
“What?” The Iron Lady jerked and her head spun around like an owl, and her wide eyes sorta made her look like one too, Garnet noticed. “What did you– Oh. Miss Commathief.”
Watching Miss Capslock pull herself back together was like watching an avalanche take a deep calming breath. The shock and fear vanished in a wave from her face, leaving just her standard stern expression behind–but Garnet could see the cracks. A crinkle around the eyes, a twitch of the lip, and something deep in her eyes that spoke of internal screaming.
“Yes,” the older fairy said with barely a half-second pause. “Yes everything is fine. Forgive me dear, I was just a little surprised is all.” She turned back to Garnet’s machine and, with swift precise movements, ejected the recording cartridge and tapped in a series of commands that made the blinking red light vanish. “It appears to be just a malfunction with the recording cartridge. It happens from time to time. I’ve cleared your machine, though really we should have one of the Fixermen take a look at it…”
Then Miss Capslock stunned Garnet further.
“Why don’t you take the rest of the day off, miss Commathief? We’ll get you a new machine tomorrow.”
Day off? Take the day off?
Okay. Clearly the cartridge from Pearly had had some kind of weird mind control stuff on it. It was so sad when old roomies went evil, but hey, sometimes things happen. So now she just had to alert the elders and they’d prepare their spells and maybe wind up the fleet to go deal with this new threat.
But, just in case it wasn’t that… “Uh, I have community service?” Garnet asked, tentatively.
She felt her brain kick her for saying it. Are you mad? it seemed to say. She’s giving us a free out! Take the win, Garny!.
“Oh, I think you've done enough for now,” The Iron Lady said, and to Garnet’s still-slightly-ringing ears it sounded as if the older woman was speaking from a very far distance away. “I'll see to it that elder Hyacinth is placated. Now, run along. I hear there's a new bookbinding contest over in the third wing. Supposed to be very popular with you younger types, if I recall? Off with you, miss Commathief. Don’t dally now.”
Garnet stared as the Iron Lady collected herself, gathered up a few strands of hair that had come loose from her bun and wrenched them back into place, and headed for the exit, Pearly’s recording still clutched in her white-knuckle grip.
The old bird wobbled as she walked.
“What in the world was that all about? asked one of the younger fairies next to her, staring as the Iron Lady made her exit.
“I don't know, Garnet said,” also staring.
And then the piece of Garnet that she was constantly having to fight against, that piece that said surely it was okay to borrow Elder Hyacinth’s books on Bee Propagation without asking or that surely no one would notice if she took just one more piece of cake at lunch, rose up.
Something had spooked Miss Capslock bad enough that she was wobbling. Something Pearly had said had caused the Iron Lady to nearly burst her hair bun. Things like that just didn’t happen in the Final Library. It was a place of constants, of routine, of dull boring repetition.
And suddenly here was this.
“I don’t know,” Garnet said again, feeling the thrill of something starting deep in her gut. “But I think I'm gonna find out.”