Everything in my body burned, even as I tried to stand I had to put all my energy into it. I turned around to face where I got pushed from, the door to the stairs was still opened yet the light from outside was nowhere to be seen, just how long was I out? I turned around again only to be faced with a long corridor and from the looks of it another door at the end, or perhaps maybe an elevator. I walked through the hallway as I did I begun to notice doors on my sides, then I remembered, I'm in the old corporation, obviously, they held other abnorms here, what I didn't expect was to hear music, it felt, entrancing yet, I looked to my gun, I felt a sense of aggression, no, I can ignore it, I'll do whatever it takes to ignore it, I covered my ears in hope to block the music and continued walking. The music started to get more muffled and eventually stopped, i turned and noticed a pool of blood coming from one of the doors, i took a few steps back and it felt like I stood in something, I looked at my legs and saw...ash? I looked at my original direction and noticed a small figure walking out one of the doors, I was ready to fire but noticed a match or some kind of fire behind the figure no it couldn't even be described as a figure, the thing that resembled a little girl was all ash. The girl looked at me and walked away, I questioned why it wasn't hostile, and yet I realized, maybe it's because I never did work on it, I heard that certain things like a bad work can cause things to breach and kill, or maybe, she was targeting something else. In the middle of my thinking, the music came back and it was much louder than before the pool of blood leaking from the door grew as well, I decided even if it hurt me I needed to know what was behind the door. I walked back to the door covering my ears as much as possible, I grabbed onto the door, here goes nothing.

"O..Oliver!?" He stood there, looking entranced throwing bodies into this machine blending them or just turning them to music, I looked and saw the next body he was going to throw, it was Shina, Oliver looked at me, his eyes, they looked behind helping "Oliver stand down" I took out my gun and aimed at him, even if was futile I didn't want to kill him. Oliver took out his gun, the gun he told me about, the one that could end us all, with one hand he aimed it at me. I came to the decision, either way, I would die, so the best course of action is rushing him and that I did, when I reached him I jolted his arm up causing the gun to fire and hit the ceiling, yet it ricocheted off of it and hit my ankle. I shouted in pain "Damnit!" Oliver pulled the weapon away from my grip and with all his force jabbed the stock into my chest forcing the air in my lungs to escape me, Oliver placed his foot on my neck while he was moving the gun to face me again "Oliver, please stand down" he faced the gun towards me not caring where it hit, as long as it killed

"Oh fuck this" I heard a voice behind Oliver shout and with that, a bat was swung at his head knocking him out "You okay"

"Yeah, thanks Shina" I stood up and faced...not shina?

"I don't know who Shina is but I'm taking a guess it's the guy who was going to get shredded, you don't know how this thing works do you?" The man looked over at the machine which stopped playing music

"No, I have a gist of what it does, anyway, what're you doing here?" I kept my distance from him, from his looks and scars he didn't look friendly

"Isn't that a rude question to ask when you're not allowed here either?" We both stood in silence till he spoke again with a sigh "I was looking for something, it's hard to find nowadays since it's no longer given to employees"

"Hold on, do you work at the new L corp as well?" After I said that he looked surprised, putting his hand over his mouth

"So, she was right, there is a new one" he tried mumbling but I heard him regardless

"huuuhhh" I heard groaning on the floor, yet I kept looking at the man, i knew the person getting up was Shina

"Now then" He stuck his hand out "You can just call me Ao, and yes before you say it, I know my hair matches my name" his hair was blue, I kinda smiled, at least he has a sense of humor

"Leo" I said as I grabbed and shook his hand

"You know, I thought, these abnormalities were gone" He looked mad "Making me fight books, the hell? should've known that was crazy"

"Books?" Shina said, it was clear he was still in pain "How the hell are books harmful"

"It's not the books themselves, just the contents, although most of those hellish things are in that goddamn library"

"So...you heard of it too?" Oliver, who woke up, used his gun to support himself which was mostly failing "I heard they became an urban myth recently"

"Of course you'd remember, and before you say anything, the new names Ao" New name? so the name he said was a fake

"How..many names are you gonna go through, or..you finally saying your real name?" After Oliver's words, I began to realize they knew each other "Still taking that god-forsaken drug? You know what it did to that sephirah" Ao walked and kneeled beside Oliver

"She had a name you know" Ao gave this cocky smirk as me and Shina stood guard waiting for him to try something

"Yeah, well" Oliver put a hand on Ao's shoulder "You weren't there when it happened, hell I should be dead those goddamn meltdowns, one after another" Oliver took a breath " it felt like time was rewinding only until you go through that, will you understand why I hate them"

"Hey, what drug are you on about" I questioned them, if it wasn't being made, or at least given out anymore, it must have a setback. Ao stood up and walked towards me, taking out a syringe

"They come in different forms of use, but I use this....ever heard of Enkephalin, it's made out of the abnormalities due to us suppressing their pain, or so some like to believe, sadly it's empty so you can't give it a go" So..that's why we do those types of things to abnorms, we take the happiness out of them, or so Ao says

"No!, Leo, no matter what, you don't take that drug, its drawbacks are far worse than the good things it can do, one of the sephirahs..no two of them were practically abusing it, it causes so much hallucinations and paranoia that it's practically suicide if you get off from it." Oliver spoke fast and worried

"Heh, it was more a joke, I'd just use it for myself anyways af-

"Then why use it?" I interrupted Ao out of curiosity

"hm, I guess" Ao showed off a genuine yet heartbreaking smile "So, I won't remember the atrocities I've committed" Both me and Shina were stunned "Anyways, I'll be on my hunt for some more, who knows "Ao walked out the door saluting us off "Maybe we'll meet at the Library someday" He showed off some sort of paper, waving it as he walked away

"of course he'd get an invitation" Oliver mumbled, actually, on further inspection of him, he looked like he was still in pain "Damn it, my medicine" After he said that Shina took out a box

"Here, you moron" Shina handed Oliver the box. He pulled out a syringe and injected it into his leg, Oliver stretched a bit and continued on his way

"Welp, tag along if you want but I gotta look at something here" Me and Shina both ran at him shouting a bunch of questions

"Hold on, what's the library?"

"Who's Ao really?"

"How are the book's content harmful?

"What's a sephirah meltdown?" We continued asking questions till we made it into some sort of room, Oliver sighed

"Sit" We listened to Oliver and sat down on the chairs scattered around some sort of meeting table "Explaining might take a while so you better be ready, we'll start with the lobotomy corp questions. "Ao was another agent, he was known for getting the job down no matter the cost, as mentioned before, he's practically an addict to that drug, hell, I'm surprised he's still finding more. A sephirah meltdown was when one of the sephirah, well-turned to this weird monster-like being, hell, it freaked me out when I saw it for the first time, not only that, but they'd cause us many issues. The drug that Ao takes is from the abnormalities, there are many theories on how but Ao believes it's from us suppressing the abnormalities pain and sucking out the happiness from it, that drug is rarely given out anymore and it's worth so much to the point where Ao steals it rather than buying it. Lastly, our Lobotomy corp, I guess you can say it's illegal, not like the other one was either, but ours was never funded by any other corps or from LC's original head, instead, one guy salvaged the old LC's tech and made a new one, wanting to make a fortune out of Enkephalin, it's the whole reason we were hired, he's holding my trauma and medical bills over my head, Shina is just to aggressive to the point where people won't believe him, and Leo's never-ending loyalty will make it so he won't betray them unless warranted" Me and Shina just looked in shock, there was so much about our current LC and the old one that we didn't know

"Hold it, what about the library that you two talked about!" Shina put his hands on the table and stood up

"Ahh right, that we-" Oliver cut himself off as he put his hands in his pocket, he grinned and took out a piece of paper, it looked exactly like Ao's when he waved it, it read as followed

Dear guest: I formally Invite you to the library

the library's books can provide you with all the wisdom,

Wealth, Honor, and power you seek.

However, An Ordeal will await you in the library.

If you cannot overcome this ordeal,

you will be converted into a book yourself

-Angela

ADDRESSEE

members of the original Lobotomy Corp

We all sat there waiting Oliver to continue talking

"So, you wanna walk around talking to people and getting flimsy info for the library, or you wanna risk your lives for it" I looked at the Addresse part of the invitation Old members of LC? Am...I related to LC somehow, I tried my best to remember how I was related to the old Lobotomy Corp, then I remembered, I remembered why these memories of mine were erased. I looked over at Oliver...Oliver....

Wasn't human

Hello everyone, sorry for the long wait, I had to play LOR (Library of Ruina so I could write this chapter as I wanted to experience the game myself, actually it's on gamepass on xbox if you have that console or a pc or laptop with xbox cloud or whatever, so maybe play it so you won't get spoiled for that game as there will be spoilers for LOR from this point onwards