Object 1111: The Holder of Me

In any city, in any country, go to any mental institution or halfway house you can get yourself to. When you reach the front desk, ask with no hesitation to visit someone who calls himself "The Holder of Me". The worker will just stare blankly at you, as if puzzled. Ask him a second time. Again, the worker will just stare at you, without moving. Now just wait. For your health's sake, don't ask a third time.

The worker will finally, slowly, stand up and will guide you through a door that opens on a narrow straight pathway brightly lit from above, too long to see the ending. On the walls of the pathway, there are uncountable paintings: their expressions are of utter and complete pain, mouths screaming in despair and foreboding unfathomable horrors. Your gaze seems attracted to their faces, but you must stay strong and divert your eyes: do not gaze at any of the paintings for more than 2 seconds, or the subsequent unbearable scream of madness from it and from the others would lead you to rip off your ears first and your brain thereafter.

The first painting on your left depicts the worker that led you to this room. Walking down the corridor you'll notice that the paintings depict every person you met in your entire life, complete strangers first and then, as you advance through the corridor, casual acquaintances, friends, intimates, relatives, and finally, at the end of the pathway, your parents. When you reach these last two paintings, turn back: if you still see the corridor then you were not ready, and pray that starvation and dehydration kill you before insanity ensues, because you'll never leave the corridor again.

If your spirit is indeed ready enough, you should instead see a wall with an empty figure on it, surrounding a sheet of complete darkness. Walk through the frame and you'll be in a dark room: you can feel that the room is very large, but do not move and don't say anything. What lurks in this room doesn't like to be disturbed too early. When your eyes have adapted from the light to the darkness, you'll notice that there is a figure in the distance. He stands motionless. Slowly advance toward it, it will do the same: eventually, you'll notice that it mirrors every movement you do.

Once you notice this, stand still, close your eyes, and say, "I'm here." Open your eyes: the figure will be closer, and you'll be able to see that it resembles you, although you still won't be able to discern his face. Don't walk toward it, and don't move. Close again your eyes and say, "I'm here to know." Opening your eyes will reveal that the figure is two meters away from you. You can see that it looks like you, except that his eye sockets are empty and bleeding, as if something tore its eyeballs away. Again, don't go toward it and don't move. Close your eyes for a third time, turn around, and say, "I'm here to know myself." Then slowly walk backward. If your back hits a solid surface then you're free to scream until the pain kills you, your eyes exploding with a loud and bloody "pop" and your spine torn away from your back.

If you don't hit anything where the figure should have been, then continue to walk until an unbearable pain from feet to knees, as if someone was crushing your legs, will cause you to fall facedown on the floor. Don't open your eyes and don't even try to stand up. In the darkness, you'll be able to hear a distant laughter, as if someone or something was mocking you. While still on the floor, ask the question, "Who am I?" The laughter will then come closer, increase in tone and pitch, and become hysterical, and as your ears are pierced by it and it completely surrounds you, threatening to lead you mad, every moment of your life will pop in front of your closed eyes in a swirling pattern of colors, sounds, smells, and tastes, sharp and vibrant, beautiful yet grotesque and gloomy, exposing all your secrets and all your hidden shames, leading you to understand the Nothingness of your pathetic existence in front of the greatness of Everything as if your soul was literally ripped from your heart and leaving you on the brink of insanity.

When the images cease, the pain at your legs will disappear and you'll be able to stand again. If you're still sane, in front of you on the ground, there will be a cracked mirror. Every time you look through it, you hear the faintest echo of laughter coming from it.

The mirror is Object 1111 of 2538. Now you have the knowledge of who You are: can you hear it?

Object 1144: The Holder of Precision

In any country, find a mountain or canyon. Find a place where the foundation and stone are weak. Tear at it, rip it apart. If the foundation doesn't crumble in exactly 28.5 seconds, stop. You have failed, and will not have another chance at his Object. If you succeed, however, a nearly perfect doorway-shaped hole will appear. The hall, if you look down it, will be the darkest of blacks. Walk down this cavern. Walk through for one of two amounts of time - 13 minutes and 12 seconds or exactly 30 minutes. Either way, it does not matter.

Before you begin your journey down, make sure of a few things. Make sure your hair, if you have any, is perfectly kept, your clothes match, and that you have and can maintain perfect posture. If any of these things are not so, you have two choices. One is to walk down the hall and accept a painless death, or, before you enter, rip out your hair to nothing, remove your clothes to be consistent, and straighten your back. If you do this, in front of the door, you will be able to walk to him, as your exterior will be consistent.

While you walk down this hall, change nothing about your appearance, and do not cry from the previous pain. You may think whatever you will, this Holder has no interest in your mind, at least, not yet. Walk straight forward for the amount of time I specified. It should be obvious that consistency, accuracy, and above all else, precision, are important to this Holder. Do not rest at any point in your walk, as this wouldn't be consistent. Keep your eyes forward, and your stride consistent. There is a large part of your journey coming up, exactly halfway through your journey. If you notice yourself step down one stair, fall down in tears, as your death, but more importantly, your torture, is inevitable; may hell pity your soul.

If you see light, in lieu of the step, you have a chance to escape, if you can run for 4.32 seconds at a perfectly consistent speed. You will have three chances to do this. If you succeed on any, you will find yourself on the other side of the mountain, unscathed, for now, but unable to obtain this Object forever. In addition to this, your days will forever be numbered, to exactly 20 years, and these will not be good years, not horrific, but never again good.

If you manage to keep perfect precision, after one of the two preset amounts of time, you will see a bookcase, exactly 9.75 inches in front of you.

Don't move for exactly 10 seconds. Now, reach out your arm only with your shoulder joint until your arm is exactly 90 degrees. Failure to do this will trap you here in the darkness until your death. Grab the book in exactly 3 seconds. If done correctly, this will cause the bookcase to melt away. Your precision can drop exactly one notch. Keep your eyes open and look around the room, then close them. Do not open them for approximately 11 seconds. In these 11 seconds, you will have a mental image.

You will see a silhouetted man sitting in front of a stone circle. This man is fairly short, and of average width. He is the Holder of Precision. He will be seated in a pitch-black room, that, even with its nonexistent visibility, you can tell is perfectly round; on even the most atomic of scales, this room is not one quark unequal in its shape. Finally, you will see the pile of logs beside him, though you cannot tell how many.

Open your eyes and walk up to this man. Look directly at the log-pile. If there are less than seven, your skin and flesh will bake into your bones, your nerves will rot away, yet feel like they are burning for millennia. You will become a log to his fire, one of the Seekers who has failed at this point. Like them, you will be destined for the fire. If, however, there are exactly seven, count yourself lucky. The Holder should hand you a pinecone, take it. You now must scurry around this room to find a flare, a small vial of an odd oil, and paper. You will have precisely eighteen seconds to do this. If you somehow manage to find them, you have been incredibly fortunate; if not, while you search, he will silently run and stab you in the back, killing you in precisely 2.23 seconds, and the bleeding stopping in 3.02 seconds - he will use this blood as his oil. Now, create a fire using these materials and the seven logs in the perfect center of the stone circle.

Stare into his gray eye, as he has only one. You have little time, though the precise amount is lost. Back him into the corner and strangle him to death, feel no remorse, as this man is beyond evil. Once he has fallen, shove your arm roughly into his eye, this will prevent him from having the precise 2.3 seconds it would take for him to manage to take you down with him. Grab the first thing you feel, which will always be the orb. If it is cold, then you were never meant to wield it. You will wake up in your room. There is no physical consequence if this happens, though you will feel the need to tell someone, anyone, about the Objects. If you allow that to happen, They will rip you apart. If the orb is slightly warm, take it, just as the Holder's blood begins to boil in his flesh.

The orb takes the form of a large, spherical, fire opal, with a near-invisible line protruding from it. This line has no power against the Holders, or He Who Tries to Bring Them In, but it will be able to help you fend off their allies. There is no blade, merely a point. Should you slash at anything, the length of the line will disappear until its length, precisely 18 inches, comes out of contact with your foe. Should the small point stab them, it will pierce them without fail.

This stone is Object 1144 of 2538. It will allow you to see the precision of nature, of the Objects, and of yourself. Can you match this precision?

Object 1150: The Holder of the Gun

In any city, or in any town, go to a shop selling guns and ask the assistant to see "The Holder of the Gun". If he gives you a look of pure horror, then run, just run. Don't stop, he will kill you as soon as you stop. If he gives you a look of disgust, he will show you to a room.

When you enter the room, there will be a gun on a table, a type of gun that has never been heard of before. Don't touch it, you will be dead in an instant.

Find the shop assistant and ask how much it is. If they don't say anything, leave quickly. If they said any price, don't pay it. That number will be how long you will live. If they say nothing after that, take the gun and ask to shoot it. He will say no, but shoot anyway. After shooting it, a low rumble will be heard, like nothing you've ever heard before. Wait two minutes, then another gun will appear. Don't touch it. Ask the same man to tell you what round. He will tell you it's your blood.

You will die if you don't ask the last question. You will be gone, all your blood will disappear.

The second gun is Object 1150 of 2538.