The World of the Nameless Library is a truly twisted place. How fitting for a place even the decadent Annunaki tyrants feel the need to bury it three layers deep. 'Forbidden knowledge.' Ha! What a farce. If they really wanted their silly tablets to go unread, they would have destroyed them. This is just another layer in the pyramid scheme they call "The Great Chain". Of course it is. The Annunaki only ever 'forbid' anything so that it feels more luxurious for those who are permitted. 

It's veils. Veils all the way down. 

Navigating this spiraling maze of knife edges and shadowy whispers that slip off of everything like black muck is the most fun challenge Marianne has had in her short time on this earth. The glyphs run through the paths like veins, throbbing like the heart of a lovesick maiden. These are the only lights to navigate by. The landscape itself is nothing but pillars jabbing up out of the murk like giant spears stacked on top of each other at impossible angles. Sometimes they fit together almost like steps, only to suddenly break apart into gaps too wide to navigate without suicidally dangerous leaps or swings. Sometimes they melt underfoot and collapse, crumbling and screaming like frightened children, into the void of nothing that spreads between the corners of what most people would call the 'real world'. Even the air feels charged and tense, more than is usual for the hidden paths. These secrets have sharp edges. If it could be compared to anything, it would be like trying to breathe the sea, if the sea were filled with razor blades and free swimming tongues. All at once it's choking, cutting, wet, and terrifying enough to give a person nightmares for months. 

Marianne laughs. She pitches through it at angles bodies were not meant to bend, in and out and in and out again before it can hurt her. Some nights when her heart was less clear, a place like this would be the death of her. But Marianne burns brightest when she burns hottest, and tonight that heart creature has stoked a rage in her so deep it may well risk seeping even into Étoile's life for a night or two. She'll have to take it out on herself. Images must be maintained. The mask must still be worn. 

She plunders secret after secret with little rhyme or reason. Schoolyard tattling is as rich a reward to her as weapon designs or theoretical mumblings that might explain her own origins in whatever vague and stupid terms they might use. It will be horrible drudgery to sift through it all later, but what fun to disseminate the juicy bits to the public after that! The other side of the coin that comes with forbidding knowledge to fuel your fetishes is that any light that gets shined on it is automatically scandalous, no matter how pointless the actual tidbits may be. 

But all good things must come to an end. Marianne does not have infinite time to play in here tonight, and the insides of her eye sockets are beginning to burn rather painfully. With deep reluctance, she forces them shut again, and lets herself fall to the proper floor with a heavy clonk of her boots. Her grin is as evil as it ever was. Her eyes weep smoke. She shifts to sling Jerry into both her arms, and flashes her one final deep look to remember the evening by.