If I stood here for days with my tablet and stylus—or a canvas and easel and every color imaginable—I would never be able to capture what I see in front of me now.

Lights.

Those are the first things I focus on when I blink and my eyes adjust from being out of the darkness of the corridor. Hanging from the soaring ceiling are dozens, maybe hundreds, of mismatched lights. Single, illuminated, naked bulbs dangle next to stained-glass domes. Elaborate chandeliers gleaming with thousands of crystals sending prisms of color across the dark ceiling and onto the ground far below. The fixtures all sway slightly, as if pulled by a gentle current of air, making the shimmering glow appear as if it’s alive—like dozens of luminous moths circling overhead. The effect lends a magical quality to the space, which is already hard to accept as reality. The sight is accompanied by the faint clicking I heard before—only the sound is slightly louder now and interspersed with a soft bell-like chime. This whole room makes me feel like a character stepping into a fairy tale. Despite recognizing the objects in my sight, I see nothing familiar.

I pull my eyes downward and try to take in the rest. Low wooden walls fill much of the space, lined up like oak and ash and mahogany dominoes throughout much of the front and center of the room. There are freestanding walls that edge the large area and stretch at least two stories, maybe more, into the air, as well as another dozen or so on the side opposite where Atlas and I now stand.

The taller walls have stairs and ladders and platforms to make sure people can reach the top, because each and every single one of the walls and dividers in the room is stuffed full with books. Thousands and thousands of them. All colors. All sizes. I never dreamed there could be so many books left in the world, let alone in the city of Chicago. They are in every crevice and even stacked atop some of the shorter walls. I blink, but they are still there. The books—all of this is real.

Someone in a dark sweatshirt and a baseball cap takes one of the books off a low shelf and then disappears through an exit far to the left. Someone else races through an aisle in the center of the shelves to our right carrying a large blue duffel bag. He places the bag on a counter, rolls out his shoulder, and hurries off again into the maze. Counting the doorway I now stand in, I see four exits from this cavernous space.

“Mind-bending, right?” Atlas’s tone and smile are smug. “Wipe off whatever mud you got on your shoes and follow me.”

He swipes his feet on a tan grass mat to the right of us. Next to the rug are two small racks—one contains dirty boots and running shoes. The other has a stack of beige towels and a number of slippers in various sizes and styles.