Murmurs.
Indescribable murmurs echoed in the dark.
They were inextinguishable, constantly barking and screaming all kinds of foul things. The voices, male and female, overlapped and produced different inhuman sounds.
They continued to whisper... constantly dripping with eerie and ineffable words.
It seemed like they would continue forever.
Then—
"Could the next Unintegrated Aspirant step forward, please?" A voice, old and groggy, pierced through Lazarus’s ears, forcing him awake despite the constant murmurs and unknowable whispers that had begun to spread inside his mind.
This forced him to open his eyes, revealing clear crimson irises nearly shrouded by jet-black hair.
His look of surprise was the only thing that contorted his pale but otherwise handsome face. His youthful appearance, coupled with a healthy degree of muscle and fat, was the least surprising aspect of the new reality he awoke to.
In front of him was an ornate altar, one elevated a few meters above the ground.
Clear white steps were the only way to access the threshold, and standing atop it was a man dressed in a classical scholarly robe.
Surrounding this altar were rows of seats.
Many of them were occupied by all kinds of people around the same age as him.
The scene nearly reminded him of something, but before he could think, he heard the same old voice call out: "Please step forward, Unintegrated Aspirant Number 708."
Lazarus paused and looked around.
Then he noticed the impatient gaze of the old man resting on him.
"Ah..." Without understanding much of what was going on, Lazarus rose to his feet and walked towards the altar.
As he did so, he noticed all kinds of gazes on him.
Then, he heard the whispers.
"Who does he think he is? Why did he make the Honorable Sir Wiston repeat himself?"
"What an inconsiderate guy. Can’t he see how many of us are waiting? Is he a hotshot by any chance?"
"Not that I know of. I don’t recognize him."
"I do. His parents were Historians, but I heard they perished in a corrupted Fable a few years ago, leaving him an orphan."
"Oh? He is the child of Historians? Doesn’t that make him extraordinary?"
"Not really. They were pretty low-level. I heard his mother barely reached Adept status after many years. She was the team leader inside that Mundane Fable when the accident happened."
"I see... So he’s not from a noteworthy heritage? Why would he act so arrogantly, though?"
"Shh! Don’t let him hear you. Even though his parents were weak, they were still Historians. That makes his status higher than most of us who don’t have such a background."
"Y-you’re right. Based on the Genetic Principles, he will undoubtedly awaken as a Historian. It won’t be a good thing to offend someone like him..."
’So that’s how it is...’ Lazarus sighed in recognition while he remained muddle-headed.
He couldn’t help but feel like he was forgetting something.
Something important.
He silently ascended the stairs and kept moving his shaky feet until he was right in front of the slightly frowning man. Only then did he stop, lowering his perplexed gaze in a bid to remember what he had forgotten.
As Lazarus was still embroidered in these thoughts, the aged voice spoke aloud.
"You will now be shown a vision. If you can properly grasp even a small portion of the knowledge presented to you, a connection will be established, and you will achieve some degree of Integration. I believe you know what this means..."
"Yes," Lazarus responded almost automatically. "Integration means I can become a Historian."
This was very reminiscent of when he experienced Integration the first time.
’Wait... first time?’
Before Lazarus could properly mull over those thoughts, he felt a warm feeling shroud him. His eyes automatically closed to welcome a foreign sensation.
It felt as though something was being inserted into his body.
Although the entry felt forceful at first, by relaxing his mind and guiding the stimulation, he slowly acclimated to it.
Then, something began to outline itself within the world of perpetual darkness.
It felt like a flicker of light.
One that you could find from a dancing flame on a matchstick.
But white... extremely white.
"What do you see?" The aged voice resounded in his ears.
"A white flicker of fire," Lazarus replied honestly, even though he was still troubled by many tumultuous thoughts.
"Share your vision with me. Let me confirm."
Although this was intrusive, the words of the old scholar struck Lazarus as rather reasonable.
After all, certain desperate Aspirants could resort to lying about their vision, so it was imperative that the Overseer confirm their words.
Right as Lazarus considered this, he felt an intrusion in his Mind’s World.
This strange presence was unfamiliar, but it did not feel malevolent or corrupt by any means.
Instead, it maintained a passive state and simply observed, not attempting to further invade his most sacred space.
After a few seconds, the presence retreated, and the vision ended.
Lazarus opened his eyes immediately.
"Sub-Integrated at 1 Percent. You’ve barely passed..." A sigh left the Honorable Sir Winston’s lips as he uttered those words.
His expression didn’t show surprise, but he did appear disappointed, especially since Lazarus had made the respectable Historian call for him multiple times.
This wasted valuable time, one that could have been overlooked if he possessed some talent.
But a Sub-Integration at only 1 Percent was the bare minimum.
It showed the lowest talent for Historians.
Still, this was far better than scoring less, which was what normal humans could achieve.
At least, he had crossed the most important threshold for a Historian.
"You may leave. Join the rest in the next hall."
Lazarus wanted to ask where that was, but before he could speak, the old scholar had shifted his gaze from him and called for the next person.
Rather than waste any more of the man’s time, Lazarus walked off the stage and took a decent look at his surroundings. He rightfully assumed that he could easily find the place he was meant to go if he took in sufficient clues.
Just as expected, he found a secluded door only a second after casting his gaze around.
This door was different from the exit, and it had a certain polish to it—certainly not one that Unintegrated Aspirants would be allowed to enter so carelessly.
While he noticed this, he also observed a few people snickering at him.
Some controlled their laughter while others openly mocked while glaring at him.
Lazarus didn’t know these people, and he didn’t care about their attention, so he retracted his gaze while focusing on what was most important.
’Alright!’
As he took a single step forward—towards the next hall—he suddenly had a thought.
’Hold on... What am I doing here?’
Right as he had this thought, an influx of his memories entered his mind at once. He quickly remembered all the hundreds of years he had lived and how he died right at the final battle to determine humanity’s future.
He recalled the death of his one and only lover.
The corruption of his best friend.
The destruction of his hometown.
All of it came crashing down at once, forcing his eyes to bulge while processing all the information.
’This...’
He looked around him, at the unfamiliar faces, some of which began to offer him eerily strange stares. It looked like their heads were bulging, as if they would explode at any moment.
Quickly retracting his gaze, he stared at himself. ’Is this an illusion? It’s certainly not a Fable. This body... It’s not mine. Or rather, it’s not the one I remember, even in my younger state. My Mind’s World is also not the same. It does not possess the corresponding trait that is unique to me. Wait... no...’
At this critical juncture, as Lazarus absorbed all the knowledge from his past life, he quickly realized something.
Something very dangerous!
—Knowledge!
Suddenly, the world around him began to warp, crumbling right before his eyes. The faces that stared at him started melting, almost like their bodies were made of oily paint or hot wax.
Some of them burst, revealing all kinds of bizarre colors covered in pus.
The strange display began to distort the world around him.
It rapidly closed in on him.
’I shouldn’t have this much knowledge while my Anchor is still immature!’
Before he could even think about anything else, he found his body turning illusory, vanishing from reality at a rapid pace.
Lazarus understood this phenomenon all too well, because he had seen it before.
He was being assimilated!
Because of his excess knowledge, one that his body could not support due to its terribly low Integration, he was being pulled into the Celestial Library.
He would no longer exist in this world.
’How unfortunate. It appears I somehow survived and reincarnated into a new body. But before I could even do anything, I will be meeting my end here...’
But did Lazarus feel bad about this?
No... Not at all.
Even with the disturbing atmosphere around him, he maintained a calm state.
’Achieving something as miraculous as reincarnation is one thing, but the mere fact that I can exist in a new body at some unknown time in the future means that humanity was able to survive the final battle.’
This thought was enough to make the former legend smile.
"Haa..." Lazarus shut his eyes and met only darkness once again.
This time, there was no light.