Spending months inside the City’s oldest library, it seemed to others that I gathered more dust than wisdom or knowledge, each book adding frustration instead of epiphany in seeking one of the immortals.

I had started my research confident it would be a matter of days before I found the object of my quest, armed with the certainty only the naive and ignorant possess. Despite the king’s written blessings, librarians were less than cooperative; true, they respected the edict’s letter and gave me access to the library, but offered no help in finding, well, anything.

Summer, fall and winter had passed since I begun, until I finally found a mention of a unique and ancient scroll, one containing the story of a timeless man. Where begging and threats failed, bribery worked and one of those smug guardians of knowledge showed me where the precious document was hidden. He smiled oddly as he handed me the old papyrus, which I gingerly unrolled and started to read.