Chapter 106: The Network.
With a rapid click, he immediately connected to the interface. In front of him innumerable conversations opened. From the most useless and idle topics, to the invaluable guides.
But his destination had always been one. Adding a keyword in the searcher: Ruins.
The headache that constantly pulsed in his temple did not allow him to be too careful or analytical, so he had decided to ignore the headed articles.
His attention tracked to the most invisibilized posts, where the debates turned into violent crosses of articulated words and, above all, started from a real experience.
I Survived the Ruin (Until I Entered the Ruin)
It was a hilarious title. Typical of the culture that was gestating silently on the network. He immediately accessed its information, with an unnoticed smile growing on his face.
This piece of shit must have been bitten by the witch.He thought with monotony, trying to make the pain in his temple disappear.
[Boop! Agent 01, at your service. Yesterday I had a very strange experience. I was contacted by the cosmic forces of good! Or something like that, they called themselves the Envoys of the Solar Wheel]
With rhythmic movements he struck his chin. A thoughtful expression formed on his face, over the pain. The author of the small post apparently sought to be comic, over imparting real information.
"Do you want to earn money, huh?" he murmured.
[But they betrayed me! They were not the forces of good T.T, they used me to open the path toward the ruin. That colossal stone creature, that slept under centuries of history (support me with a small donation if you are liking the post). Miraculously I survived, but I never expected what would come afterward...]
With a sigh of tiredness, he was about to close it. The greedy authors who sought to monetize with the minimum effort were very common. And usually lived from lies.
His only reason for remaining reading the rest of the article was its slight coincidence with the facts. The ruin had opened and the chaos had rapidly reproduced in the open field. With numerous factions fighting to enter.
But there was a concrete point that had kindled the flames of curiosity inside him.
Envoys of the Solar Wheel.
A name very in accordance with his latest experiences. The game had a special and almost poetic way of naming its main factions. There could exist a secret that enveloped that fact.
[I became a shepherd of sheep. When did that profession stop existing? Anyway, I was a very poor shepherd of sheep! Please, heavens, my bad fortune pursues me even to a virtual scenario. As a shepherd of sheep, I totally enveloped myself in the role (although it sounds strange, I had lost my memory)]
At that instant, the truth was revealed. Despite the dramatization and satirization of the situation, on the part of the author, it should not be totally enveloped in falsehood. Since he had contributed a significant detail upon mentioning the loss of memory.
"Even the trolls of the network can surprise you."
[Little by little I managed to recover my memories. Immediately I wanted to throw that old wool attire, leave and preach my modern gospel! (I knew the language of the locals, I am not a total ignoramus). But by misfortune or misfortune, I discovered the truth of the trial: we had to fulfill the task assigned by an important man, Baron Miracle]
"Prometheus..." His murmur resonated through the dark room.
"This is complicated." He said finally, with his headache accentuating. There existed so many connections that it became deeply complex, difficult to direct or guide oneself.
Gabriel had never been good with studies and the slow analysis of academic data. In fact, he did not even know what that was.
His only fascination for knowledge came from the books, which for so long he had treasured.
But his ignorance was not such as to ignore a line of thought so evident: Prometheus.
There existed a fine line of knowledge that still needed to be undermined and discovered, concentrating on a common name.
[Guess what the trial of your humble servant was? Raise a fat sheep, with a perfect fleece and grant it a sensational piece of clothing! But I could not work so servilely for another... (Actually I failed, raising a fat sheep is more difficult than you believe T.T). I have not had another contact with that strange organization and who contacted me has disappeared]
That was the end of a long and hilarious post composed by a greedy author of money. He could not be blamed. It was a more honest way of earning money than simply stealing.
The rest of the article simplified itself into credits, exaggerated thanks, and a direct connection to a donation system.
"We all want to earn money, friend."
As it cost him no money or any effort, he recommended it. In that way it would be widely recommended by the algorithm. Or that was supposed.
His comment box had no useful comment. Only a message that was spam.
In that way he fought against the rampant and threatening headache he felt. Navigating through the network, gathering data and forming a wider vision about the ruins, on a solitary frugal night.
In his insatiable search, very few posts included the existences of the witches. The casual players, who dedicated themselves more to presuming, had failed mostly in the first trial.
There existed no information about the Infernal Circles.
It reminded him of the fat sheep of the first post he had read. No shepherd of sheep would openly presume of his fat sheep, unless he wanted to be robbed. Or that he supposed, he had never known a shepherd.
In his memory the facts superimposed themselves. There existed a possibility: all the participants had lost their memory upon participating in said challenge.
But that would convert itself directly into a world bomb. Lose the memory? The bureaucracy would work for the first time before the public pressure— Although he knew that it would probably not be so, since very strange things enveloped the game.
Like Pseudo-Tyrants dissected in laboratories of ultra-hermetic secrecy...
"Unless there is censorship." He said in a low voice, squeezing his cognitive potential with the force of a barbarian.
Unless, casually, all the players who had participated until the end decided that the matter was too important as to even tell it to an intimate friend.
That class of facts did not happen by chance. He understood very well that a universal act of that nature was in the majority of cases organizational.
"This seems like a damned chess match."
With tiredness, he closed his session. He had accumulated enough drowsiness to return to the bed and resume a cycle of normal sleep.
But before leaving and enjoying the comfort of his bed—which was not comfortable at all, he left an interrogative that navigated wildly through the network.
Did anyone survive the Infernal Circles?
[.] The description only included a period.
With his small plot and rebellion in course, he closed his eyes resting his head on the pillow. The tiredness invaded him with impetuous force, attracting him to the lands of Morpheus.
***
The neon light crossed his cracked window, with a soft wind smelling of manure entering through the same.
"Day of waste," he murmured from the bed. The industrial factories had begun to discard their defective elements, punishing the marginal neighborhoods with a terrible smell.
For the first time in a long time, he got up with energies. His body felt strangely renewed and energetic. But the hunger that punished him was inhuman.
He ate insatiably on his table, emptying his small refrigerator of its leftovers. There was no longer any kind of food in the corners.
Tasks of today: money to eat.He thought with his stomach making a vulgar sound.
He was in agreement, apparently.
He fixed his attention on his interface, connecting again to the network. He needed to check the small theory that had arisen in his mind.
"Eureka." He said with his eyes clouding in contemplation.
He was right. One of the responses was the censorship.
His post, small and unnoticed from an anonymous account, had disappeared overnight. Without warnings, notifications, or reasons. Practically it had never existed.
Navigating through a river of falsehood.
That already confirmed a very important point. The vital information apparently threatened certain invisible interests.
"Mom always said that they were the bureaucratic powers."
It was a joke, because he had no mom.
He quickly dismissed the discovered secret. He had never needed attention or external validation. Revealing at that moment the great conspiracy would only be worth him an ostracism difficult to avoid.
With a stretch of the entire body, he began to do his exercise routine. Light but that strengthened the body.
His body was already relatively muscular from the thinness and an unknown influence.
He finished sweaty and slightly tired, directing himself immediately to the bathroom that the apartment block shared. He needed to lighten the tension of his muscles with a calming bath.
With a soft touch, the water dispenser began to flow. He washed his face trying to erase the exhaustion he had suffered in the last days.
But his smile stagnated when he raised his face. His eyes had become dangerously crimson, with his hair speckled by soft white hairs.
It no longer seemed a summer afternoon after the end of a snowy winter.
The winter was beginning.
"Not again."