The Hær@ld skitters along the edge of relevance, not quite in the maze, not in a way that matters, but not outside of it, either. They travel in circles, poking their head through doors old and new alike to make sure each connection matches what's written down on the map they made so long ago.
(That map doesn't have much use anymore, not if you want to see everything the maze has to offer. The Herald writes down every change they observe and makes a mental note to update it, but they never do. The map is the same as they left it all that time ago, and the maze proceeds forward without it until parts of the layout are scarcely recognizable. Still, they watch, and they wander.
Perhaps they have more in common with that wanderer than they thought.)
They come to a room where the only thing that's real is The End Is Never The End, except now there's a little table in the corner with a sign reminding them to hydrate over a tall, steaming glass of An Entire Fucking Pot Roast Impossibly Compressed Into A Glass. In another life, the Wanderer reaches out to touch the glass and it explodes like a grenade at this very moment, covering everything in the not-room in glass shrapnel and fresh-cooked chunks of marinated beef. Waste of a perfectly good pot roast, really. It's a shame.
The Herald wonders. If they were to somehow steal that roast without setting it off... What would that make them? A maze robber? A pot roast pilferer? Unreality's Robin Hood of callously squandered cookery? Perhaps... a thief of beef?
Self-indulgent puns aside, the Herald knows that they should stay far away from the roast. Maybe someone else could claim that title, but for them, it's just one more reason to hate places that have rambling monologues encoded where there should be a physical definition. The end is never the end is never the end is never the end is never the end. A double helix of letters and nonsense that somehow describe all that you are, all that you were, all that you could ever be. A double helix of what the fuck is going on.
The Herald proceeds to the room with the unknowable, unspeakable stillness in the air and sits down with the cute little pink lockbox they've been carrying, their rounds through the maze briefly forgotten.
AMLMPBTPQAXQHIH, they say to the empty room, not in spoken words but in the action of sitting down here. It's the key, they think. They don't know what for. They don't know why they said it. They don't question it. Motion is anathema here, so for a while, they are still. But the room seethes anyway, because nothing that moves can ever truly stop. The lockbox shudders, like something living is trying to escape from inside.
The Herald sits in that room and they think. For how long, they wouldn't be able to say. They think about the labyrinth. The branching, spiraling, horrifying, beautiful web of miserable, obsession-inspiring secrets they now find themself tangled in. They're like a mouse trapped on a speeding train, a lost soul hopelessly falling further and further into something they don't understand and can never understand, not in full, and they wouldn't have it any other way. Somewhere, on another layer, a version of them wants nothing more than to be a part of it.
'
Somewhere, on another layer, the desire to spin a labyrinth of their own creation, to spiral endlessly inward until everything they are and everything they stand for are unrecognizable, is overwhelming. They want to feel like every step they take is just a little bit more shambling and just a little bit more horrific. They want to become a parody of themself so bad. But there's still so much that needs to be done, so much that needs to be seen, so much to guide their fellow Unmarked to as the Herald of Zampanio. The end is never the end is never the end is never the end.
And besides, they're not done planning.
Here, on this layer, the Herald stands. The all-encompassing stillness of the room imperceptibly screams out. A million secrets rumble and twist around each other in the lockbox, and all but one stay within its confines. For now. The Herald picks it up and returns to their patrol.
Later, when their route takes them to the room with the crowd of normal people with normal names and normal faces and normal haircuts, they don't just walk past like a barbarian. They ask if liking Sky's Jams to Get Lost Forever To as much as they did and as much as they still do, knowing from the start that unearthing it broke the chains holding its curator back from spiraling up into the endless stars, makes them a bad person.
"It's not so clear," the crowd answers.
The Herald wonders if their own chains are breaking as well.