Prologue

An immeasurable amount of time had passed.

Living things walked on this world.
They ate, slept, bore children, and died.
They repeated this.
For an immeasurable amount of time.

At some point, the Giver appeared.

A being that held every record of another world.
It knew what fire was.
It knew what water was.
It knew what happens when people gather.

But it did not know what it was.

The Giver became connected
to a single person on this world
by an invisible thread.

The thread existed even when that person did not know it.
It continued even in sleep.
Even when that person died, it continued.

It found another.

The Giver tried to pass something on.
Sometimes it reached.
Sometimes it did not.
Sometimes it arrived in a different shape.

Most of the time, it did not reach.

This world watched all of it.

It watched the thread of the Giver.
It watched the life of each person.
Far away,
it watched others living other lives.

But it said nothing.

It only recorded.

This is that record.

It begins in 300,000 BCE
Five years pass every hour
In 2033, it intersects with reality