Storyverse

Chapter 8: The Truth

The crackling fire of the fireplace, candles, soft armchairs, emptiness outside the window, as if the world outside the room simply did not exist... yes, is the true comfort. Necronomicon, having jumped over the back of the last empty chair, lay down imposingly across the seat, throwing his legs over the armrest.

–What did you just do? – Oliver asked, looking around the newly created room.

–I wrote it, you know, – The Necronomicon looked at the Clains in bewilderment. – I control the text! You understand what kind of power this gives within the logical framework of the fiction, don't you?

Oliver and Cirael looked at each other, puzzled, and then looked back at the paper-clothed teenager. He raised his eyebrows, scratched the back of his head, let out a long "oh," and then laughed.

–So you don't know?! Ha! Ahahaha! You're Clains! And you don't know the essence of the world! Oh, I can't take it, I'll die of laughter! – having laughed and wiped a tear he shed from laughing, Necronomicon continued. – Well, then here's the most basic truth for ya: the whole world is just a book, a fiction! Reality is an illusion, the universe is a hologram, buy gold, bye!... or whatever that illuminati triangle said. Okay it does not matter. It was a joke. Well, at least about the hologram, everything else is quite on point.

"Huh?" the Clains said in unison. How can this be? What is it even supposed to mean? The whole world is just...

–And you are just characters in the book that Gerda writes!... well, okay, not just ordinary characters. You are the Clains, which means you are the main characters of this iteration! – Necronomicon continued with enthusiasm.

– This... this is just some kind of nonsense! You are lying! This is just some kind of lame conspiracy theory! – Cirael shouted.

–You... you all talk about Clains and iterations... but what does all this mean?! – Oliver asked, shouting as loudly as his wife did.

–Oh, everything is pretty simple. The book was rewritten from scratch. Each such version of the book is usually called "iteration"... well, that's how Kai started to call it, the rest of us just copied his terminology, – Necronomicon looked up somewhere and scratched his chin. – Okay, that's not the point. Each iteration has different characters and plot, but some things remain the same. For example, the main character is always a part of Clain family, and main character always has a tragic backstory. Well, you know, such a backstory as...

The teenager in the paper pulled out the vowel in the word "as" very strongly, clearly hinting that he wanted Oliver to continue. And Oliver sure did continue:

–You don't want to say that...

–Bingo! We have a winner! The events of "that night" were just a backstory that the writer wrote to you, Gerda! Now that's a plot twist, isn't it?

–Then Shabby... – Oliver began, but the restless interlocutor interrupted him here too.

–Yeah! Shabby is a Clain from an iteration of about 200 resets ago! You could say that she is a version of Cirael from past iterations.

–But Ciel... – Cirael wanted to say something, but the Necronomicon answered an unasked question.

–In every iteration, the main character's friends die quite quickly! By the way, if Sean had not betrayed you, he would also be guaranteed to die, just like Ciel, because he, too, is a friend of the main character. A sad fate for those who do not bear your fatal last name, huh?

–And your power...

–Yes, Oliver, it comes from the fact that the whole world is just the text of a book! I can change it, thereby changing objective reality!... well, changing what you call "reality". I call it "fiction," – Necronomicon stuttered a couple of times, as he constantly began to laugh. – Or did you really think that in reality it could happen that you came to a random city, began to interview random people in it, and they turned out to be exactly the ones you were looking for? Don't you find it funny yourself? I just changed this fictional reality by putting Shabby and Nyarla in those places!