The headache does not come immediately, and that is how Kairo knows something is wrong.
From the outside, the morning unfolds exactly as it always does. The sun creeps over the rooftops of Matra at the same lazy pace, light spilling into familiar alleys, while the workshop fills with the usual sounds of waking life—footsteps, muted voices, tools being set down where they've always been.
Nothing in the world signals danger.
From the inside, however, the absence is impossible to ignore.
…Why is it quiet?
Not the city.Not the people.
His mind.
For the first time in days, there is no background pressure pressing gently behind his thoughts, no faint warning pulse reminding him where the threshold lies. He probes cautiously, letting his attention drift toward magic the way it always does, half-expecting resistance to rise and push back.
Nothing answers.
The silence feels wrong, not comforting, like stepping onto ground that should creak and finding it utterly still.
Kairo doesn't like it.
He finishes his chores faster than usual, hands moving on autopilot while his attention remains inwardly fixed on that unsettling calm. Before anyone can notice or assign him something new, he slips away, taking the familiar path toward the alley he's claimed as his quiet space.
The alley feels different today.
Not hostile.Not heavy.
Expectant.
He settles cross-legged against the stone, slate balanced on his knees, charcoal poised but unmoving for a moment as he breathes slowly and deliberately.
"Baseline first," he murmurs to himself, the words serving as a reminder rather than a plan.
He draws the reinforcement rune with practiced ease, lines clean and precise, then activates it without sound or additional intent. The rune responds immediately, mana flowing in the same controlled, predictable pattern he has grown accustomed to.
Stable.Efficient.
Good.
Kairo exhales slowly, tension easing from his shoulders.
"Okay," he mutters under his breath. "No trap yet."
He redraws the rune.
The shape is identical, every curve and angle placed with the same care, and the activation follows the same pattern. This time, however, he allows his thoughts to drift—not toward improvement or deviation, but toward understanding.
Not how it works.
Why it works.
The thought barely finishes forming before—
Pain.
It is not sharp and not crushing, but deep, a pressure that builds behind his thoughts rather than his eyes, heavy enough to steal his breath. Kairo gasps, fingers loosening as the charcoal clatters against the stone, his vision swimming as he struggles to stay upright.
"No—this is different," he whispers, the words dragged from him more in disbelief than fear.
From the third-person view, nothing looks wrong. The mana around him does not spike or destabilize; instead, it goes perfectly still, as though the world itself is holding its breath.
Everything waits.
Images flood his mind.
Not visions, not scenes, but raw concepts slamming into one another without order or permission. Sound-shapes layered with meaning. Symbols that are not runes, but something older—structures that feel familiar in the way forgotten words do, recognizable without being remembered.
Sa.
Not as a syllable spoken aloud.
As a root.
Continuity.Binding.Persistence.
His thoughts race instinctively, trying to organize the flood, to categorize and frame it into something manageable, and the moment he does, he regrets it. The pressure spikes instantly, turning from heavy to overwhelming, and Kairo groans softly, clutching his head as if he can physically hold the fragments in place.
"Too much," he mutters through clenched teeth. "Slow down."
The instant he pulls back—
The flood recedes.
Not gone.
Waiting.
From the outside, the boy slumps forward, breathing hard, sweat beading along his brow and soaking into his clothes as his hands tremble against the stone.
From the inside, Kairo is shaking.
"That wasn't random," he realizes slowly, carefully, afraid that the wrong phrasing might provoke it again. "That was… offered."
He swallows hard.
"And I almost choked on it."
He does not touch the slate again for a long while.
Instead, he sits there and grounds himself the way he's learned—breathing steadily, feeling the rough stone beneath his palms, the cool air filling his lungs. He stays like that until the pressure fades completely, until the silence in his mind no longer feels brittle.
When he finally opens his eyes, something flickers at the edge of his vision.
Not the usual interface.
This is… different.
A translucent overlay unfolds slowly, not snapping into place like the system panels he's grown used to, but arranging itself as if it's being written rather than displayed. Lines of light layer over one another, forming something that resembles a manuscript more than a window.
[ Genesis System — Legacy Interface Detected ]
[Conceptual resonance confirmed]
[Initializing:Memoirs of Sanskrit]
Kairo freezes.
"…Memoirs?" he whispers, the word echoing strangely inside his head.
From the outside, the mana around him shifts—not intensifying or condensing, but aligning, as though unseen pieces are settling into a configuration they have been circling for a long time.
The overlay does not dump information.
It breathes.
Fragments appear and fade in slow succession: roots rather than spells, meanings without instructions, relationships without conclusions. There is nothing to read in the conventional sense.
Kairo doesn't read it.
He feels it.
And it hurts.
The mental strain hits like a wave.
Not violent.
Relentless.
He grits his teeth, forcing himself not to chase every fragment as it passes through his awareness. Instead, he observes, letting the pieces drift by without grasping, without demanding more than his mind can currently hold.
"This isn't knowledge," he realizes dimly. "It's context."
The moment he accepts that—
The pressure eases.
The overlay stabilizes, its chaotic motion slowing until a single fragment lingers, brighter and heavier than the rest.
Sa — continuity through alignment.
There is no explanation, no example, no guidance attached to it, just the meaning itself, bare and complete.
Kairo exhales shakily.
"So this is what you've been circling around," he thinks, awe threading through the exhaustion. "Not spells. Not runes."
Language.
Pure, conceptual language.
The moment stretches, fragile and suspended.
Then his knees buckle.
From the outside, Kairo slumps forward, catching himself on one hand before collapsing fully, his breathing ragged as sweat soaks through his clothes. The overlay flickers—not in warning, but in acknowledgement.
[ Genesis System — Cognitive Load Alert ]
[Mental energy critically low]
[Advisory: disengage]
"Oh, I was planning to," Kairo mutters weakly.
He closes his eyes.
The overlay fades instantly.
The world rushes back in all at once—sound, sensation, gravity crashing over him as if the city had been holding its breath alongside him. His body sags, strength leaving him in a way that feels final rather than dramatic.
He does not remember walking back to the workshop.
Only collapsing onto his bedding, his mind blessedly blank as sleep takes him hard and without ceremony.
When he wakes, it is dark.
His head aches, but not sharply or punishingly, more like the dull fatigue that follows hours spent wrestling with a book far too dense for his current level. He rubs his temples slowly, taking stock of the sensation.
"So that's the cost," he thinks. "Not mana."
Understanding.
He sits up, breathing carefully, and realizes the memories are still there.
Not as words.
As impressions.
Sa feels deeper now, broader, less like a trick and more like a principle that stretches outward in ways he can't yet see.
"And that was just one fragment," he murmurs.
The thought is equal parts thrilling and terrifying.
He does not activate the Memoirs again that night.
He doesn't need to.
Somewhere deep down, he knows they will respond when he is ready—and not a moment before.
From the outside, nothing has changed.
From the inside—
"I wasn't just experimenting," he realizes quietly.
"I was qualifying."
His lips twitch faintly.
"Great," he mutters. "I unlocked homework."