He scrolled past the sponsored ads and the suspicious "Download Now" buttons that screamed of malware. Then, on the third page of results, he saw it—a simple link labeled “12_District_Archive_Don’t_Open.” His heart hammered against his ribs. He clicked.
As the loading bar crawled across the screen, a chat window suddenly popped up in the corner of the drive. “The cost of the book is high, Elias.”
It was the night before the final exams, and while his classmates were memorizing chemical equations, Elias was obsessed. He had watched the films, lived the lore of Panem, and now he needed to know the origin of the man who would become the monster.
Elias froze. How did they know his name? He moved his mouse to close the tab, but his curiosity was a snare. “Who is this?”
The screen flickered, casting a pale blue glow over Elias’s face as he typed the forbidden words into the search bar: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes PDF Google Drive
“A fan of the games. Tell me, if you were the Mentor, would you choose love or the crown?”