Almost everything seems to be in order in Riale's room. There's just one thing that's out of place. A book.

It's a very distinctive book.

Chains float from its spine, fanning out and fading into nothing the further they stretch from the book. Near its spine, they weave together into one great, reinforced chain weave. The cover of the book is a deep, inky black, leathery and worn in texture. It looks old, older than any book Riale's seen before. The edges of its pages are colored with age and use. Hints of scratches dot the cover, but ultimately, it's in good condition. It's easy to see the symbol on the cover of the book, pristine and clear as daylight, even in the darkened room. Its many colors swirl in an unnatural way, shifting like water in a sea, but the symbol itself is unmoved.

"...What the fuck," he repeats, staring at the book with deep suspicion.

"My, what language. I'm almost tempted to be scandalized. Is that any way to treat your book?"

He doesn't move.

"Now, now," sighs the someone from behind Riale. "Don't be that way, I can't hurt you."

He lets out his caged breath and takes another.

"If you wanted my attention, you have it," he says with studied mildness.

"Excellent! I do appreciate it." The someone floats into view, leaning lazily on air and waving carelessly. He's - well, very decorative, and clearly takes a lot of pride in perfecting that art. His clothes fit him exquisitely, oranges and reds evoking the absolute prettiest inferno of all time.

His shirt's unbuttoned just enough to reveal the beginnings of a dark chain, welded to a circular iron disc placed just in view under the collar of the shirt. The chain lazily floats off and fades into nothing, vaguely in the direction of the book. The disc looks crudely stapled to his chest, somewhere where his heart might be found, if one were to look. He doesn't seem to find it troublesome, though he flicks the chain away with a finger when it floats into his vision.

"Now, how would you react if I were to tell you that the world's going to end?"

"That... explains my observations perfectly," he says. "And... where do you and I and this book fit into the picture, exactly?"

"Not a second spent in mourning for the world, just straight to the point? Ah, well. I'd tired of the tears and disbelief years ago, anyway." He floats slowly towards the book, eyeing it with distaste. "Well, if you were hoping for a way to save this world, I can't help you. This world's doomed. Nothing you can do to save it."

He hovers over the book, looking bored.

"You can, however, be sure to make the next one a bit less unstable. Which is what this is," He flicks the book, like he flicked the chain. His finger meets a flash of orange light and is repelled, and the strange fiery man frowns minutely. The book remains unmoved. It didn't even shift from the tiny blow. "With it, you can create another world, that will live after this one dies."

"That seems... worthwhile if not entirely adequate," he says, contemplating the book.

The man laughs, softly.

"Oh, 'not entirely adequate' is such a dreadful understatement. But yes. Correct."

"Fine. Until I figure out a way to save the world I've got, I guess I'll learn how to make a new one."

He snorts a little, looking unimpressed.

Riale raises his eyebrows. "Yes?"

"Everyone always believes that they can save their world. I've long grown bored of the exercise. When you inevitably fail, please, do so in an interesting manner."

"Wait and see," he says softly, with a hint of anger like an icy crag peeking between rolling waves.

Then he inhales, exhales, and puts the anger away, leaning forward for a closer look at the book where it sits on the foot of his bed. "All right, where do I start?"

"How does anyone begin a book? Open it to the first page."

"Thanks," he says dryly.

He picks up the book and opens it.

The first page is blank.

So is the second page. So, in fact, are all the pages he flips through.

He looks up at the sarcastic apparition and raises his eyebrows again.

The sarcastic apparition smiles brilliantly back.

He floats to the end table next to Riale's bed, and picks up the lamp. He looks at it, with only a faint hint of interest.

"Think about this," he deposits the lamp in front of Riale, next to the open book, "and how it works. What it's made of, what makes it function, what it's meant to do, how it's used. And think about recording all of it in the book. In the most clear, straightforward terms you can use."

"Okay..."

He studies the lamp. It's a lamp. It has a metal base shaped like a small decorative urn, a light-stone set above the base in a three-pronged metal claw, a round metal shutter that comes up around the light-stone and a little pull-chain that operates the mechanism to move the shutter. Around that, there is a lampshade made of white glass in an iron frame, shaped like a stylized upside-down flower. He tugs the chain a few times, clicking the shutter up and down, holding the concept of the lamp in his mind as fully as he can. Then he touches the book again, on the surface of the open page.

There's a sort of pulling sensation, and ink wells up under his fingers, forming an exquisitely detailed drawing of the lamp. It looks so real you could almost pick it up and take it out of the book. He picks up his fingers and rubs them together thoughtfully: there isn't so much as a spot of ink there.

...Then he double-takes, because the lamp on the page is glowing. Its stone gives light fully as bright as the original.

His sarcastic apparition eyes the lamp on the page.

"As first tries go," he says, "that's certainly one of the better ones."

"Good to know. Okay, so I can..." (he eyes the lamp and its two-dimensional counterpart) "...put things in my book. At what point does this add up to a world? And how long do I have?"

"How can you create something you don't understand? You, dear writer, are to solve the greatest puzzle at all. Half the game is gathering all the pieces. At the end, you put them together, arranging them in a way that makes sense. How everything that makes up the world fits together, how one thing affects everything else. The more blank spaces you leave, the more that is extrapolated to fill the void. Try to keep those to a minimum, extrapolation rarely goes well. Rather leads to the instability plaguing your world." He inspects his nails, picking at them for some nonexistent dirt.

"You must have noticed by now that it's the first day of the year. The first day, of the first month, of the last year. The world will end on the last day of the last month. What year is it, by the way?"

"3645."

"Ah, so the last creator's toil was not in vain. Your predecessor would be pleased. Do try not to disappoint his legacy, that's an admirable number."