The autumn rain of Eldria fell relentlessly. The old stone building that divided the town in two—Thornberry Manor, known to townspeople for nearly a century as Eldria Public Library, the region's greatest repository of knowledge. I'd heard it was built in the 1920s. Each time Elara Winters passed through its solemn, ornate front entrance, she was seized by the same sensation. Time flows differently here. As if this place existed outside the world. The library's basement archives. The floor was rust-colored tile, the walls damp stone, and water occasionally dripped from the ceiling pipes. That sound alone kept this space tethered to time. Elara's hands were buried in documents. Worn books, newspaper microfilm, amateur handwritten notes. All of it concerned the "Great Erasure"—the unexplained historical discontinuity around the year 820 AD, when all historical records prior to that point suddenly and completely vanished. Was it deliberate? A natural phenomenon? Who? Why? Researchers didn't make it an academic subject. School textbooks disposed of it in three lines. "Records from ancient times were lost." That was all. "Ms. Winters." At the voice, Elara looked up. Howard Peck, the librarian. Sixty-two years old. Born in this town, raised in this town, working in this library for thirty-five years. Behind his metal-framed glasses, his eyes narrowed. "It's almost closing time. As usual." There was a faint smile. One tinged with exasperation, his typical expression. "The Great Erasure again, is it?" His tone was somehow amused. As if telling a joke. As if he saw Elara's obsession as nothing more than some eccentric hobby. "Just five more minutes." Elara slipped her finger between the pages of the book. Peck shrugged. He'd already given up on Elara's stubbornness, it seemed. "Five minutes then. Otherwise I'm locking up." With that, he headed toward the stairs. His footsteps echoed in the empty reading room above, then faded. Elara's eyes fell to the notebook before her. Four hundred years before the Great Erasure around 820 AD. The Palimpsest Civilization—an ancient civilization said to have flourished before the Great Erasure, now almost entirely disregarded by the academic world, its name derived from the Latin for "overwritten parchment"—followed by a historical discontinuity. All records vanished simultaneously. There was no physical evidence. But there were traces. The history "before" and "after" the records contradicted each other, as if they belonged to entirely different worlds. It was intentional. Someone, something, had deliberately manipulated it. (What did Father find?) Her father, a historical researcher. He'd vanished abruptly when Elara was seven, in the middle of a project. Mother wouldn't tell her anything. Still didn't. He must have known something about the "Great Erasure." She couldn't help but think so. When Elara stepped outside the library, the autumn rain had intensified. Laughter leaked from the café "Half Moon" along Main Street. First-year students from her high school, probably. Talk of romance, tests, trivial school events. Their world of interest was completely divorced from hers. While they laughed. While they engaged in idle gossip. Elara pursued something vast and dark and mysterious. The sensation of walking through town alone felt stronger than usual. Perhaps she walked a different world. In the same time, the same town. Yet she saw different things. Thought different things. The slope leading to Winters Manor on the northeast hill felt longer than usual. Climbing the stone steps, the Victorian-era mansion appeared. Built in the 1890s. A three-story main structure with one spire. Grandmother Margo was born here, raised here, spent most of her life here. And Elara was here too. Opening the front door, a distinctive smell greeted her. The scent of old wood. Traces of candles. And faintly, the smell of medicine. Before heading to Grandmother's room, Elara stopped in the hallway. A medicine bag sat beside the door. A doctor's prescription. Today's date. (Again. Today too.) She approached and knocked softly on the door. "Grandmother Margo? Are you alright?" A hoarse voice came from within. "Ah. I'm fine, Ella. Just... my body feels heavy. I'm sorry, but... would you help me clean out the attic? There's so much dust, and I've been putting it off for so long." The door didn't open, only her voice came through. Exhaustion seeped from it. "Understood. I'll take care of it." Elara answered. When she entered her room, the first thing she did was search for Father's notebook. A small box in the back of her desk. Inside it, a leather-bound notebook, brown and faded with age. One of the few items Father—Richard—had left behind. Turning the pages, she found scrawled notes. "Traces of the Great Erasure" "Traces between dimensions?" "Chronicle Prism?" Beside the last words was a hastily drawn figure resembling an octahedron crystal, with a small annotation beside it: "A key transcending time and dimensions—left by whatever caused the Great Erasure?" The ink had bled, making much of it illegible. The most crucial parts were the most smudged. Intentional, or merely age? Elara traced the letters with her fingertip. (Why wouldn't Mother tell me anything?) About Father's disappearance. The investigation afterward. Everything was painted over with silence. From how frequently the words "Great Erasure" appeared in Father's notebook, he must have been approaching some truth. And that truth might have been dangerous. It was all speculation. No concrete evidence. Yet that speculation burned on within Elara. The ladder to the attic was beyond a hidden door. Steep and made of old wood. She climbed carefully, one step at a time. On the second step, her shoe slipped and she grabbed the railing in panic. The feel of old wood. A rough surface. For a moment, she thought she'd hit the ceiling. Eventually, her head emerged into the attic space. Dim. Faint light filtered through a skylight, but it wasn't enough. She pulled out a flashlight and illuminated her surroundings. Trunks. Old furniture. Things wrapped in cloth. A wooden Santa Claus figurine. Decades of life's traces, unorganized, piled upon each other. Elara moved slowly through them. Items from great-grandmother Henrietta's time, probably. An old fur coat. Lace handkerchiefs. A leather box. The life of a woman from eighty years ago, frozen here. Eventually, she found a large trunk. Dark brown leather. Metal clasps rusted. Henrietta's name was written on the side in faded handwriting. Elara knelt before the trunk. It wasn't locked. When she opened the lid, a musty smell rose up. Old fabrics. Letters. Photographs. And at the bottom. Something hard. Wrapped in cloth many times over. Elara carefully removed it. She unwrapped the cloth, one layer at a time. Unreasonable tension ran through the task. When the final cloth fell away. Elara's breath stopped. There was an octahedron. Crystal. Within its transparent interior, a substance like liquid light pulsed, breathing. The light slowly brightened, slowly dimmed. The movement seemed alive. Elara's hands trembled. (This is it.) The symbol drawn in Father's notebook. Its shape matched this crystal perfectly. "Chronicle Prism." Father's annotation echoed in her mind. A key transcending time and dimensions. Whatever that meant, Father had been searching for this. And Father had vanished. Elara held it aloft with both hands. Heavy. Heavier than expected. That weight felt not merely physical, but historical, temporal. (What is this? Why is it here? Why was Father searching for it?) The questions wouldn't stop. But no answers came. So she had to find them herself. Elara slowly raised the prism to chest height. That's when it happened. The moment her fingertips touched the crystal's surface. The world burned white. Light. Overwhelming, inescapable light. Her entire vision was painted white. Within that light, the prism pulsed violently, its interior liquid light expanding explosively. Words from Father's notebook flickered at the edge of consciousness. A key transcending time and dimensions. Was this its power? Heat. Pain. Elara's body felt sucked into the vortex of light. She couldn't tell which direction she was moving, up or down. Everything rotated in white chaos. "Grandmother Margo!" She tried to call out, but the words wouldn't form. Consumed by the light. Yet consciousness didn't fade. Rather, it felt sharpened. The world peeling away. Eldria. Grandmother. Everything. The next moment. A hard sensation. Her knees struck something. Stone. Cold. Painful. Elara opened her eyes. This wasn't the attic. A vast space. An infinite sky. Its color wasn't blue. A soft shade close to pale purple. Elara remained on her knees, looking up at that sky. Far, far, impossibly far away, islands floated. What supported those islands? Looking at her feet, she saw gray stone ground. Vast and uneven, its edges appearing to be sheer cliffs. Below the cliffs. Clouds. An infinite sea of white clouds. She couldn't see what lay beneath. Didn't want to. Elara looked at her hands. The prism lay silent in her palm. Completely drained of light, now appearing as nothing but a cold crystal. The liquid light within had vanished entirely. (How to return. How to return.) Despair crashed over her like a wave. She tried touching the prism again. But nothing happened. Completely unresponsive. It appeared now as merely an object, something that would never move again. Elara remained on her knees, collapsed where she stood. She couldn't breathe. Or had forgotten how. The world before her was filled with light and color. Yet none of it was familiar. Not Eldria. Not school. Not Grandmother's house. Everything had receded. And yet, something burned in her chest. Before fear. Before despair. It was curiosity. (Beyond the Great Erasure. The world Father was searching for. Is this it?) Her legs gradually regained their strength. Elara stood up. Gripping the prism, she walked toward those floating islands. The fear hadn't vanished. Rather, it grew with each passing moment. No way to return. Even now, the distance from Eldria continued to widen. Yet still. (I can only move forward.) Elara continued walking. Across the gray ground before her. Toward the sea of clouds. In her line of sight, the floating islands swayed gently. Where was she heading? What awaited her? Everything was unknown. And that's precisely why. Elara couldn't stop walking.