Collector of the Missing

— The Collector of the Missing to Rei

The **Collector of the Missing**, is an Umbra Elder who had been a collector of tomes when alive. The Collector died 601 cycles ago, his face buried in one of his tomes. The resting place of the Collector is a medium-size cave, in the Graveyard, on the top of the lava ball that feeds the lake of lava in the Luminous Peak, and served as the Collector's personal library. He is both a form of historian and writer and a collector of historical texts, fiction and anything else that interested him.

The Collector is the second-to-last Elder that Rei has to speak to in Ahrric's side questline "A Dark Pilgrimage".

## History

The Collector of the Missing was a historian while alive, a writer and an avid reader. He made his home in a medium-sized cave in the Luminous Peak, below the lake of lava, which served as his personal library. It was also here that the Collector eventually died 601 cycles ago, allowing his consciousness to join the mycelium network. When he died, he did so with his nose buried in a tome.

As with the other Elders, safe from the Antecedent, the Collector was disappointed in the Umbra gardener Ahrric for not yet having performed the Ritual, dying and joining the Eternal Garden with them. The Collector believed that the acolyte Ahrric was long past due in joining them. The Collector was also not fully impressed by Ahrric's ability to bring others into the mycelium network, the mycelium record indicating that he had only managed to bring one lost soul into the Eternal Cycle. The Collector wished to tell Ahrric that this was not enough as he believed a garden had to be not just well-tended but also full of diverse lifeforms.

When Rei came to speak with the Collector of the Missing in her quest to gain more knowledge of the Ultravoid so that she may save her planet from its inevitable collision course with the place - not knowing, due to the time loop, that it had already happened and her planet was no more, at first the Collector mistook her for Ahrric when she had awoken him using the Spore Song blessing. At first, the Collector, still believing Rei to be Ahrric, voiced all his complaints, in a polite manner, he had for him. He then detected another soul, realising he was not speaking to Ahrric. He told Rei that voices were whispering in his ears that she was not what she seemed, saying that they told him "What the Void divided shall no Umbra unite." The Collector said that though he found the statement cryptic, incomplete and pointlessly poetic, qualities that according to him were common with “the voices of timeless beings”, he had never known them to be absent a kernel of truth, and told Rei that she would find no more help with him.

Rei demanded to know if any other Voidrunners besides herself were alive. The Collector agreed to grant Rei one favor, as he empathized with her for her the aura of extreme guilt and desperation that he felt she had, and consulted the mycelium network for answers, stating that it kept a "fastidious record of all biotic visitors to the Void." He found mention of another traveler who had carried the same burden as Rei, someone who had brushed off the Umbra's aid in favor of attempting to rekindle the light of a dead star. However, that was all that the Collector knew and he did not know if any other Voidrunners remained alive, apologizing for the fact that endless life tended to make his kind into “hysterical historians.”

The Collector exhausted the last of his hospitality towards the Voidrunner and told Rei to leave, saying that her soul was not fit for collecting and implored her to see to rectifying that to ensure her place in the Eternal Garden in the future.

Rei then left the Collector's cave.

## Physical appearance

The Speaker for the Silent's body is all violet. Out of all five Elders, her head and face is the most like other, regular Umbra due to the fact that she has a long pointy nose or mouth jutting out from the area of her face where a human might have their mouth and nose. However, no one knows if this is a natural formation, since Ahrric seems to habe it too but his is either covered by or is in fact some sort of face-mask or rebreathing apparatus. The Speaker, like other Umbra, is very tall and lanky. A very tall and wide web of fungus juts up drom the top of the Speaker's head, pointing straight up into the air, making her resemble a humanoid version of the undereager fungus Clavaria zollingeri. When her mind is awoken, the Speaker's eyes glow white and her head is surrounded by a waving aura of orange-yellow energy.

## Personality

The Collector of the Missing is a highly inquisitive and bookish Umbra. Also, although he is disappointed in Ahrric like the other Elders, safe from the Antecedent, and has pressured him into performing the Ritual and dying to join them in the Eternal Cycle like they have, he seems to be somewhat less aggressive in his pressuring and attitudes towards Ahrric, for example not talking about him in an insulting manner, as the others had.

The Collector seemed to have a great interest in history and knowledge.

## Location

The Collector can be found in a medium-size cave right below the lake of lava in the Luminous Peak.