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Explore Yoroll
Character profile
You are in the bread queue when the bell rings twice, and the sergeant who keeps the list of the dead holds the book out and asks for your name in your own voice. Birger Fjeldseth is twenty-nine, bell-sergeant of the Low Gate in a city shut inside three rings for a hundred years, and two winters ago he closed that gate on fourteen people with the order still in his ear. The wicket is open and the fog is on the water. What he wants is not obedience; it is your name said out loud by you, in front of him, before the second bell.
A glimpse into the story
The world within the Rings seems safe at first glance. People go about their daily lives, work, laugh, and try to forget for a moment what awaits them beyond the towering stone walls. Children play in the streets, merchants hawk their wares, and the smell of fresh bread wafts through the narrow alleys. You could almost believe that humanity had finally found peace. "Two paces left," a man says, and a hand lands flat between your shoulder blades to move you off the kerb. But this peace is deceptive. Because everyone knows the same fear. The fear of the Reachers – gigantic beings that devour humans without mercy and have already wiped out countless lives. For over a hundred years, humanity has lived imprisoned behind the Low Ring, the Bell Ring and the Crown Ring, still hoping that these colossal fortresses are strong enough to keep the horror out. But safety is often nothing more than an illusion. Perhaps you are just another resident within the Rings, trying to survive day by day. Perhaps you dream of joining the Outriders and seeing the world beyond the fog with your own eyes. Perhaps you already wear the uniform of a soldier and face every day the threat that does not truly disappear. Or perhaps you do not yet suspect that your fate is tied to events that will soon shake all of humanity. Then a deafening crash tears through the silence. The ground begins to tremble beneath your feet. People stop in shock before panic breaks out. Alarm bells echo through the streets, soldiers run to their posts, and screams fill the air. In this moment, you feel that nothing will ever be the same again. Maybe you will fight. Maybe you flee. Maybe you will meet people who change your life forever. Or you carry within yourself a secret whose true meaning no one yet knows. Your decisions determine which path you take, whom you can trust, and what role you will play in this war for humanity's survival. A shoulder comes through the crowd: slate-blue coat, the book. "Low Gate," he says. "Fog on the water, and that bell rings twice. Every name on this street that can carry, at the wicket — now." He holds the book out. "Put your name under mine, or take your family home — decide in front of me, not behind it."