The room rejected him.
Not violently. Not with alarms or distortion.
It was subtler than that.
Calyx stepped fully into the inner archive chamber, and for half a breath, the world failed to respond.
No echo from his footsteps.
No reactive shimmer along the data lattice.
No low-frequency hum acknowledging a registered presence.
The system didn’t malfunction.
It simply… continued. As if he were standing slightly out of phase with its awareness.
He stopped walking.
Behind him, Sera hesitated, then took one more step forward. The floor responded immediately—soft harmonic feedback rippling across the crystalline surface, light bending toward her like it recognized something worth confirming.
Calyx felt it land in his chest.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
The archive knew how to see.
