MTLNOVEL Chapter 27: Chapter 24: The Author’s Truth
The moment Klein turned the page, the world folded.
The library, the bookshelves, even Yeaia—everything became paper.
Thin, fragile, two-dimensional.
A single gust of wind could have torn reality apart.
But instead of wind, there was only silence.
And then—
Ink dripped.
Like black rain, it stained the paper world, spreading in delicate, intricate patterns. Words formed where there had been none, curling across the endless white void.
A narrative was being written.
And Klein realized—
"This isn't a book."
It's a stage.
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A Forgotten Name
Klein and Yeaia stood in the center of an empty manuscript.
Blank pages stretched out in every direction, an endless expanse of unwritten possibility.
And above them, words appeared.
Not printed, not written by any human hand—but spoken.
"You have come far."
The voice was neither male nor female, neither young nor old.
It simply was.
Klein glanced at Yeaia. The androgynous Beyonder tilted their head, their red-highlighted hair glowing faintly in the unreal light of this place.
"I don't like narrators who don't introduce themselves," Yeaia murmured.
The voice chuckled.
"I have had many names. But none that have lasted."
Ink spilled from the empty sky, twisting, forming a shadow that was almost—but not quite—human.
A figure, wrapped in a robe made of parchment and letters, descended onto the page.
Their face was a blur of forgotten words.
Their presence—ancient beyond time.
Klein's fingers tensed against his cane.
"The Hidden Author."
The figure stilled.
For a moment, the name seemed to carry power.
And then—it was erased.
The letters unraveling before they could be fully spoken.
Klein's eyes narrowed. "You were erased from history. Even your name can't be spoken anymore."
The shrouded figure inclined their head.
"Yes. Because I wrote something that should never have been written."
Yeaia's expression flickered with curiosity.
"And what, pray tell, was that?"
The pages beneath them turned.
And a new scene unfolded.
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The Story That Was Forbidden
The paper world changed.
Ink flowed across the pages, constructing a new setting—a tower of books, suspended in an endless void.
At the top of the tower, a man sat alone, writing.
His features were blurred, indistinct, but his presence was heavy.
Klein and Yeaia watched as he wrote—each word sinking into the fabric of reality itself.
"I was a scholar, once," the Hidden Author said.
"I sought to understand the great forces that governed our existence. The Pillars, the Outer Deities, the Will of the Fool..."
Ink dripped onto the page.
And suddenly—
The man at the desk stopped writing.
The world around him froze.
And something looked back at him.
Not a god.
Not a concept.
Something greater.
And Klein felt his breath hitch—because he recognized it.
"You saw the manuscript of reality itself."
The Hidden Author nodded.
"I wrote a book about it."
"And that was my mistake."
---
The Erasure
The scene shattered.
The tower, the scholar, the ink—all of it dissolved.
Only the Hidden Author remained, standing with their parchment-wrapped form unraveling.
"I tried to share what I had discovered."
"But the world itself rejected me."
"I became a contradiction—a writer who had written something that should not exist."
They spread their hands, and for a brief moment, Klein saw it.
The echoes of a book that had been erased.
A story that had been unwritten.
And yet—some traces remained.
Yeaia stepped forward.
"So what now?"
"Do you want us to finish the book?"
The Hidden Author laughed.
"No."
"I want you to decide if it should exist."
They raised a single ink-stained page.
The last remnant of the forgotten book.
"Will you turn the page? Or will you destroy it?"
The world held its breath.
And Klein realized—this was no longer a story.
This was a choice.
A choice that could rewrite reality itself.
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End of Chapter 24
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