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The cover art depicts a room adorned with art: a buffalo sculpture stands to the left, a relief of figures locked in combat occupies the center, and to the right, a framed landscape painting features a person in a red garment. Before the painting rests a large, crimson ball of yarn, its thread unspooling towards a modest stone bench.

♫ Uvs Nuur ♫


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I enter the corridor. The thread running through it, I wind tighter and tighter; I already have a substantial ball in my hand. I see the thread disappearing under one of the doors. Here I will find her; here she is waiting for me! I toss the ball aside carelessly and rush to the door, which is indistinguishable from the countless others. As I open it and hurry through with her name on my lips, a creature with a bull’s head confronts me. With one of its horns, it tears open the flesh of my chest, laying bare my heart. I fall to the ground. “He is my brother, after all,” I hear her voice, very close to my ear.

How many before me? And how many more will they lure? And all that endless blood… The waterfall in my ears grows louder and louder, until there is only an all-consuming roar that mercifully takes me in.