Chapter 188 - 164: Boundary Stone

Richard left the small break room and returned to his room.

He spread his notebook open and wrote down all the details he had observed during last night’s ritual, one by one.

He wrote a full six pages. As he started on the seventh, there was a knock on the door.

"Richard."

It was Maggie’s voice.

He closed the notebook and went to open the door.

The freckled girl was standing in the hallway, clutching a small cloth pouch.

"We’re going to the third basement level."

"The Boundary Stone Array?"

"Yes. Mrs. MacNeil gave her permission. She said the Curtain has closed for today, so just taking a look won’t be dangerous."

"Alright."

Richard grabbed his notebook and a pencil from the table and followed Maggie downstairs.

The entrance to the mill’s cellar was still that same low door.

After last night’s ritual, Mrs. MacNeil had reapplied a Silver Belt to the doorframe.

The two of them ducked through. The first level of the cellar was the main hall from last night’s ritual.

The sarcophagus was still in the center, tightly covered in iron chains and silver foil. The residual wax from the seven candles was hardened on the floor.

"This way down." Maggie pointed to a narrower stone staircase behind the sarcophagus.

The stone steps were steep, and each one was a different height—some half a foot high, others a full foot.

Richard braced himself against the wall with his left hand as he descended. The limestone walls were pitted and uneven, eroded by centuries of dampness.

The second level was much shorter than the one above; the ceiling was almost touching his head.

There were several smoke-blackened marks on the walls, and a few pieces of rubble were scattered on the ground.

"Further down."

The entrance to the third level was hidden beneath a loose stone slab in the northwest corner of the second level.

Maggie crouched down, gripped the edge of the slab with both hands, and heaved it upward.

The slab was heavy, so Richard helped her lift it.

Underneath the slab was a vertical stone ladder embedded in the wall. Each rung was only half a foot wide.

The two of them climbed down the stone ladder for about three meters.

When his feet touched level ground, Richard looked up and around.

It was a circular stone chamber.

It was about five paces in diameter, with a perfect hemispherical dome for a ceiling. The stone walls were completely unadorned.

In the very center of the chamber was a circular altar stone.

The surface of the altar stone was polished until it was exceptionally smooth, completely different from the rough limestone of the two levels above.

Richard approached the altar stone and crouched down to look at it.

Twelve circular grooves were carved into the altar stone’s surface, each about a fist in diameter.

The grooves were arranged in an irregular ring, with the spacing between them varying.

An Inscription was carved into the bottom of each groove.

"This is the master schematic for the Boundary Stone Array," Maggie explained beside him. "The locations of the twelve Boundary Stones are all marked on this altar stone."

"What about the Boundary Stones themselves?"

"They’re underground." Maggie pointed at the floor. "Each one is buried in its corresponding position. You can’t see them from the surface."

"This altar stone is the master control."

Richard placed his palm flat on the surface of the altar stone.

The stone was cold, but he could feel a very faint pulse of Ether rising from beneath its surface.

"The Inscriptions are in Pre-Roman Celtic Ancient Script," Maggie said, crouching next to him. "I recognize some of it, but not all."

"How much can you read?"

"About thirty percent." She pointed to the nearest groove. "I’ve seen a few of the root words in this section, but the way they’re combined is different from what I learned."

Richard activated his Spiritual Vision.

Under his Spiritual Vision, the Inscriptions in the grooves became much clearer.

Every stroke and line glowed with a faint, grayish-blue light. The intensity and flicker rate of the light corresponded to the current "health" of that particular Boundary Stone.

The light in several of the grooves was noticeably dimmer than the others.

"Those dimmer ones... are they the most degraded?"

"Probably," Maggie nodded. "Last night’s ritual repaired the upper two levels. This level wasn’t touched."

"Mrs. MacNeil said that repairing the Boundary Stone Array requires a completely different set of rituals, and that’s not part of this mission."

Richard maintained his Spiritual Vision and began to apply a Fixed Gaze to the Inscription in each groove, one by one.

The Fixed Gaze needed to be held long enough to see the direction, turns, and connections of every stroke clearly.

Maggie took a stack of thin paper and a charcoal pen from her bag.

"You hold the Fixed Gaze, I’ll do the rubbings."

"Okay."

Richard locked his Spiritual Vision onto the first groove.

The Inscription had a total of seven lines, with three to five symbols per line.

The symbols’ strokes were predominantly curved, with the occasional square-angled turn.

’Curved lines for guidance, square turns for constraint.’ That was the basic syntax he had learned from the books on the third floor.

"First line, left to right. The first symbol is a double curve with a vertical line..."

As he described it, Maggie copied it onto the thin paper with her charcoal pen.

The two of them worked together in perfect sync.

Richard was responsible for "illuminating" the strokes no longer visible to the naked eye with his Spiritual Vision, while Maggie was responsible for transferring what he saw into lines on paper.

The first groove took them about twenty minutes.

The Inscription in the second groove was longer than the first, and it took them nearly half an hour.

By the fourth one, Richard’s Spiritual Vision began to waver slightly.

He stopped and performed two full cycles of Quadruple Breathing to stabilize his Light Tree Leaves again.

"Are you okay?" Maggie asked, a little worried.

"I’m fine." Richard stretched his neck. "Let’s continue."

The fifth, the sixth, the seventh... There were no windows in the stone chamber, nor any source of light.

The two relied on a thick candle Maggie had brought down and Richard’s Spiritual Vision.

The candle flame was motionless in the chamber; there wasn’t even a hint of an air current.

By the time they reached the tenth groove, a dull ache started to throb in Richard’s temples.

It was a normal reaction to using high-intensity Spiritual Vision for an extended period.

He used Breath Healing to suppress it, and the pain subsided for the most part.

"Just two left." Maggie had already used up three charcoal pens.

The Inscription in the eleventh groove was the shortest, with only four lines.

The Inscription in the twelfth groove was the longest—a full nine lines—and its strokes were more complex than all the previous ones.

Richard pushed his Spiritual Vision to its limit, reading it stroke by stroke.

The last symbol on the final line had a structure he had never seen before.

Three curved lines extended from a single center point in three different directions, each with a small dot at its end.

"This symbol..." He frowned.

"I’ve never seen it either." Maggie drew it faithfully. "We’ll ask Mr. Hutton when we get back."

Three hours later, the rubbings of all twelve Inscriptions were complete.

Maggie stacked all the thin sheets of paper in order and tied them with a thin string.

Richard stood up, his knees popping twice.

He had been crouching in the stone chamber for three hours, and his legs had gone numb.

The two climbed the stone ladder back to the second level, walked from the second level to the first, and finally crawled out through the low door.

The daylight outside made him squint.

The sun was already dipping westward, dyeing the entire wasteland a dark gold.

Back at the inn, they went to Mr. Hutton’s room.

The old gentleman was organizing some documents while sitting by the fireplace, brewing tea.

Maggie handed him the stack of Rubbing Copies.

Mr. Hutton took them and looked through them one by one.

When he got to the third sheet, his hand paused.

Upon reaching the seventh, he set down his teacup.

And when he arrived at the twelfth sheet—the one with the symbol of three curves and three dots—he lifted the Rubbing Copy to his eyes and studied it for a long time.

"Sir, is there a problem?" Richard asked from the side.

Mr. Hutton placed the Rubbing Copies back on the table.

"Do you two know the significance of these twelve sets of Inscriptions within the entire system of Sealing Art?"

The two Newcomers shook their heads.

Mr. Hutton lifted his teacup, took a sip, and placed it back on its saucer.

"The Whitcomb Boundary Stone Array was constructed over a thousand years before the most recent Seal was put in place.

When the Pre-Roman Celtic Inscription Masters erected these twelve Boundary Stones, the Roman Legions were still crossing the Alps."

He tidied the stack of Rubbing Copies and placed them back in the center of the table.

"From that era to today, nearly two thousand five hundred years have passed."

"In that time, they have passed through the hands of at least four different civilizations, each of which has repaired, overlaid, and re-annotated them."

"These twelve sets of Inscriptions that have survived are no longer just Celtic Ancient Script.

Their foundation is Celtic, they contain traces of Romanization, and they are covered with Latin annotations from the Medieval Church."

He raised his eyes to look at the two young people.

"In other words, these Inscriptions were stacked layer upon layer.

Some strokes belong to the very first Inscription Masters, some to Roman-era restorers, and some to the monks who performed the Sealing rituals during the Middle Ages."

Understanding dawned on Maggie.

"So that’s why they don’t match any single system I’ve studied."

"Correct." Mr. Hutton nodded.

"The Gaelic Ancient Script you learned covers the bottommost layer, but the middle and surface layers require a foundation in Romanized Inscriptions and Medieval ritual Latin, respectively."

Richard stroked his chin.

"Sir, are you saying that these twelve sets of Inscriptions need to be completely disassembled and individually restored?"

"Disassemble, restore, re-translate, and annotate." Mr. Hutton counted out the four steps.

"If you can complete this..."

He flipped over the top sheet and pointed to the opening symbol of one of the Inscriptions.

"...you will have fulfilled the practical requirement for promotion to a Practitioner."