Page 126 - SurprisingTruthFinal

The Surprising Truth About Lying
trained in the architecture of deceit, found no
framework for this truth.
The structure was impossible. A strange, many-
sided shape built of pure, frozen light. It didn't burn
like fire or gleam like metal; it simply existed, a cold,
calm presence hanging over the dying storm below.
Henry watched its flat, empty white light actively
swallow the toxic purple and green clouds of the failed
Project Helios, draining their dangerous glow.
A shard, he thought, giving the terrifying geometry
a name. It was sharp, massive, and cold: a fragment of
deadly, absolute order breaking through the chaos of
reality. It wasn’t good. It wasn’t evil. It was just there to
fix things.
Henry felt a profound geological certainty settle
over him: the Earth was a clock, and humanity had just
broken a fundamental gear. This shard was the spring
being forced back into alignment.
As he watched, paralyzed by awe and terror, the
intense emotional and physical exhaustion of the last
few weeks, the lack of sleep, the fear, the realization of
his own hypocrisy, finally overcame him. The air was
thin and caustic, and the sheer mental weight of being
the sole witness to the end of history dragged him
down. He pitched forward onto the cold concrete.
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