Shortly after midnight, the Catalogue shuddered against Kuon’s chest.
It wasn’t a mere vibration. A faint, blossoming heat was leaking from between the pages. Kuon sat up in his bed and pulled the book from his robes.
He had expected a blue light—the same cold, analytical glow that emanated from his artificial eye. Instead, the radiance seeping from the Catalogue's spine was gold.
It was a deep, rich gold, like honey held up to the sun. The light crawled along the edges of the pages, weaving through the lines of text as it spread. Kuon rested the Catalogue on his knees, narrowing the blue light of his artificial eye to focus solely on the golden glow.
The light was pulsing.
Like a heart. Like a breath. Inhale, exhale, then inhale again. The rhythm overlapped with the vibrations of the Repository walls, syncing perfectly with the faint resonance echoing back from the seams of the stone.
"...What is this?"
Kuon’s voice was barely a whisper. The blue light of his eye flickered, attempting to merge with the gold only to be repelled. The two colors refused to mix, remaining side-by-side on the page, each guarding its own domain.
Koyoi stirred.
The Drop inside his pouch had reacted. As if answering the golden light, the stone grew warm, pressing against Koyoi’s chest from the inside.
"Kuon, something is glowing—"
Koyoi stopped mid-sentence when he saw the Catalogue on Kuon’s lap. The golden light was breathing across the pages. It was a brilliance that possessed an ancient warmth, fundamentally different from the light of the blue artificial eye.
Asahi sat up as well. His hand instinctively reached for the hilt of his sword, but he lowered it once he determined there was no threat. Leaning back against the wall, he watched the golden glow in silence.
"...Is that not the light from your eye?"
"No. My light is blue. This is coming from the Catalogue itself."
Kuon turned a page. The golden light wasn't concentrated on any specific entry; it seeped uniformly from the entire volume. The spine, the binding thread, the frayed corners of the pages—everything pulsed with that same golden rhythm.
"It’s breathing," Koyoi whispered. He pressed the pouch to his chest and leaned closer to the book. "This light... it’s the same rhythm as the Repository walls. When I touched the wall earlier, I felt this exact same vibration."
Kuon lifted the Catalogue and held it near the wall. As the golden light brushed against the stone, thin lines surfaced upon the rock. The lines traced the structure of the Repository, branching out toward the ceiling like a network of veins.
When he pulled the Catalogue away, the lines vanished. When he brought it close again, they reappeared.
"It’s responding. The Repository recognizes the Catalogue."
Kuon’s voice grew tense. The light of his artificial eye narrowed to a sharp point as his depth of analysis increased.
"The Catalogue isn't just a copy. It contains a fragment of the Repository’s consciousness."
Koyoi looked at Kuon’s profile. Caught between the blue and golden lights, his face looked paler than usual.
"Consciousness... you mean the Repository is alive?"
"I don't know if 'alive' is the right word. But it reacts. It breathes. It changes its light based on external stimuli. That isn't something a mere collection of records can do."
The golden light intensified.
The Catalogue’s breathing deepened, and waves of light overflowed from the pages to crawl across the floor. When the radiance touched the frozen shelves of records, the frost on their surfaces began to grow damp. It wasn't melting; it was shivering. The frozen records were struggling to wake up in response to the Catalogue’s breath.
"...Look."
Asahi pointed to the shelves. Beneath the frost, the characters were trembling. Trapped in the ice, they were nonetheless struggling to answer the light, writhing behind their frozen veils.
Kuon pulled the Catalogue back against his chest.
The golden light flowed through his arms and into his body. For a fleeting second, the rim of his artificial eye was stained gold before snapping back to blue. Kuon closed his eyes and bit his lip.
"...I’ve carried this with me everywhere. When I slept, when I read, when I analyzed. I thought it was just a tool."
His voice was low and dry.
"I was using a living thing as a tool."
Without a word, Koyoi sat down beside him. The warmth from the Drop in his pouch reached out, drawing close enough to touch Kuon’s arm.
"Maybe you took such good care of it because you thought it was a tool. I always saw how gently you turned the pages, Kuon."
Kuon opened his eyes. The golden light was still pulsing. Synchronized with the vibrations of the Repository, it continued to breathe quietly in the palms of his hands.
Asahi stood up and flicked the frost on a shelf with his finger. The ice remained hard, but the trembling did not stop.
"If it’s alive, then you simply change how you use it. That’s no reason to throw it away."
Kuon returned the Catalogue to his lap and opened the glowing pages. The rows of characters swayed slightly with every breath, and each time he read a line, the walls of the Repository offered a low, resonant response.
The Catalogue was not a copy.
It was a fragment of consciousness that the Repository had severed from itself and sent out into the world. It had slept in Kuon’s hands, been illuminated by his artificial eye, and now, finally, it was beginning to remember what it was.
The golden light began to thin, eventually sinking deep back into the pages.
The breathing continued. The vibrations in the walls did not fade.
Kuon tucked the Catalogue back into his robes, feeling the lingering golden warmth against his heart through the cloth.