Chapter 200: The Chief Responder

The restoration of the Fifth Ring had reached its final set of inscriptions.

The old gentleman had crouched and stood too many times today. He had to brace his left hand against his knee every time he rose, yet his handiwork remained flawlessly steady.

Ms. Maud followed behind him to fill in the wax, and Mr. Spence smoothed silver powder into the gaps. The three of them worked together in seamless harmony.

Richard held up his camera, photographing every step of the process.

He was already on his fifth roll of film. Through the viewfinder of the Colton 120, the inscriptions of the Fifth Ring flared to life, section by section.

Mrs. MacNeil lifted a Silver Jug, letting holy water trickle along the grooves.

"The Fifth Ring is active," the medium said, stowing the Silver Jug back into her leather case.

The very moment she spoke, the Emerald Brooch pinned to her chest let out a trilling hum.

Mrs. MacNeil reached up and pressed a hand over it.

The bird spirit housed within the Emerald Brooch served as a lookout. Now, it fluttered frantically inside, relaying everything it perceived to its master through a thin spiritual thread.

The medium kept her hand pressed firmly against the brooch for two seconds before looking up to meet Mr. Hutton's eyes.

Neither of them spoke; they only exchanged a glance.

Almost simultaneously, the faint crack of Lieutenant Colonel Ord's iron knuckles echoed from the outer ring.

The Gale tradition allowed the lieutenant colonel to "read the wind." He could feel the subterranean ether shifting, flowing in a specific direction.

"Hold on," the lieutenant colonel ordered.

The entire cavern fell silent.

Richard had expected to see a repeat of the shadow-fog riot in the outer ring—plumes of grayish-white ether seeping up from the depths.

But this time was different.

Within the nine stone rings, the five activated halos glowed with a steady light.

Ether coursed smoothly along the grooves, its direction uniform and its rhythm even.

The anomaly lay on the inner side of the silver plate positioned dead center in the Fifth Ring.

While the seal was operating, ether was supposed to flow inward from the outer edges, relentlessly suppressing whatever lay at the bottom of the pit.

Right now, however, the flow of that specific ether current was reversed.

The shadow-fog had caused such a violent disturbance that everyone's attention had been drawn to the hidden tunnel entrance and the outer ring. No one had looked at the back of the silver plate on the innermost side of the seal.

Richard stared at the inverted current for a few seconds, remembering the "Bilabial" and "Dual" cipher sets he had cracked earlier.

The processing speed granted by his active [Speculation] rapidly snapped a logical chain together in his mind.

Mirrored. Bidirectional. One in, one out.

This inverted current and the forward-flowing ether of the seal formed a mirrored structure.

..................

A few days earlier.

In southern Briston, inside a room at an ordinary, cheap boarding house, a sheet of paper lay spread across a desk.

It was the internal schedule for the spring seal maintenance of the Briston Branch Office—a document that should have been locked securely inside the branch's filing cabinets.

Its presence on this desk was telling in itself.

A man sat at the desk.

He looked no different from any of the city's unemployed dockworkers.

But for this operation, his identity was the Chief Responder.

The Chief Responder smoothed the schedule with his fingers.

He had been in this line of work for many years. His preparations before setting a trap were always meticulously thorough.

The Branch Office had a mature set of protocols for dealing with people like him.

But those protocols were designed to handle one or two desperate stragglers wandering in on their own.

What he was about to do had never been part of their expectations from the start.

Someone had procured this schedule for him.

The name down in the Pit Core had been selected for him by other people.

He was nothing more than a single nail in this machine, pushed to the absolute forefront.

The man read through the attendance list from top to bottom.

Lieutenant Colonel Ord. A Minor Adept of the Gale tradition. The strongest combatant.

He would be the most troublesome to deal with; his "wind" could read the subtlest shifts in the air.

Mrs. MacNeil. A Minor Adept medium on the Secret path. The most well-rounded.

With her Seven Spirit Lodging Vessels, she had tools for control, support, reconnaissance, negotiation, and anchoring. She lacked nothing.

Wentworth. The Inspector Squad Leader of the Briston Branch Office, and a Senior Practitioner-level Hunter.

Highly explosive power and incredible speed. A sharp blade for a frontal assault.

Mr. Hutton. An old relic stuck at the threshold of Minor Adept for years, but who couldn't be underestimated either.

The Chief Responder had made annotations beside each name, evaluating them one by one.

The middle of the list comprised several Practitioner-level Hunters and two Secret practitioners requested from Manchester.

The Chief Responder categorized them as the "execution tier." They would take some effort to handle, but they couldn't make any real waves.

At the bottom of the roster were a few final names.

A Provisional Hunter fresh out of the military academy, a rookie brought in to fill a vacancy.

Beside it, the Chief Responder wrote: 'Green. Easily disrupted.'

A retired coroner, an ungraduated apprentice under Madam Marie.

The Chief Responder wrote: 'Dead weight. Small fry.'

The final name was even less remarkable.

Trainee Inspector, student record-keeper, a Newcomer.

The Chief Responder paused beside this name.

His pen hovered over the paper before he jotted down two words.

'Errand boy. Ignore.'

He didn't know who this kid was, nor did he care.

A Newcomer. Someone whose complete Ether Micro-circulation probably wasn't even stable yet. He was just a tag-along heading down the shaft with his teacher to run errands, take photos, and keep records.

He had seen countless bit players like this in his past operations. They never constituted a variable.

The Chief Responder set his pen down and reviewed the entire layout again.

The shadow-fog riot in the outer ring was an open card.

Its purpose was to draw everyone's attention to the outer ring and the hidden tunnel entrance.

The real knife would be thrust from the unguarded inner side.

The Chief Responder never did this alone.

He folded the schedule and held it to the flame of his kerosene lamp.

The fire licked at the edges of the paper, slowly reducing the words to ash.

The Chief Responder raised his hand and looked at his palm.

What should have been beneath his flesh and skin was being hollowed out, inch by inch.

He had initiated the reverse infiltration days ago, aiming to complete that final "Response" at the deepest nadir.

..................

Back in the subterranean cavern, the lieutenant colonel finished reading the currents.

"The shadow-fog at the tunnel entrance is an open card," he stated.

"The real thing is coming from the inside."

Wentworth drew his Enchanted Twin Blades once more.

"How many paths?" the Inspector Squad Leader asked.

Lieutenant Colonel Ord didn't have time to answer.

From deeper within the hidden tunnel came the first note of a chant. The voice was faint and distant, almost drowned out by the echoes of the cavern.

Yet every person present who possessed Inspiration felt their chests tighten simultaneously.

It was a fragment of a name.

A fragment woven from the terror and agony of countless dead—a piece of the name belonging to the thing trapped at the bottom of the pit.

The first Responder Group had appeared.

They appeared on the left side of the tunnel entrance, three human silhouettes slowly condensing out of the grayish-white ether fog.

The leader stood at the forefront, the name fragment rolling from its throat.

The second stood half a pace behind, its chest rising and falling in perfect synchronization with the leader.

The third stood at the very back, head bowed, motionless.

The Lead. The Harmony. The Finale.

"Pony, three on the left! Treat intruders as evil creatures!" the second squad leader barked.

Pony raised his Flintlock and fired a shot straight at the Lead.

The Silver-Lead Bullet punched cleanly through the Lead's chest. A small patch of its grayish-white ether fog dispersed, but its chanting didn't falter.

The second squad leader charged forward, bringing the dark silver gemstone embedded in his rifle butt down upon the Lead.

Silver light cleaved the Lead squarely in half, breaking the chant.

But the moment the Lead's human form dispersed, the motionless "Finale" at the back snapped its head up.

A smile floated onto its face.

Then, its entire body silently dissolved into a strand of hyper-pure ether and sank toward the Pit Core.

Inside Richard's chest, the Tree of Light trembled violently.

"Stop!"

Mrs. MacNeil was the first to react.

The medium spoke almost the exact instant that strand of ether sank down.

Her voice wasn't loud, but it suppressed the entire cavern.

"That's a Responder Group. I've seen similar things elsewhere."

"Three in a group. If you kill it, you're sacrificing it to the bottom of the pit for them."

"Your silver bullets and enchanted blades work backward on them. To kill is to feed."

Every Hunter in the outer ring froze.

"So we don't kill them?" the second squad leader asked, his rifle still raised. "What happens when they rush us? We just stand here and take a beating?"

"They can't hurt you," Mrs. MacNeil said, staring at the tunnel entrance.

"The true anchor hasn't come out yet."

Only then did Mr. Hutton straighten up from behind the inscription altar.

"Madam is right, but there's something worse."

He raised his hand and pointed at the tunnel entrance.

Inside, a second, third, and fourth Responder Group were pouring out in an endless stream.

Group after group, with no end in sight.

"I've seen reverse infiltrations before, too," Mr. Hutton said.

"But that's usually just one or two lunatics slipping in on their own. They never amount to anything."

"But this today... so many Responder Groups, lining up without a single one missing to send themselves in."

"This isn't the work of some desperate madmen."

He raised his eyes.

"Someone has brought an entire ritual out, perfectly organized."

The cavern was silent for a moment.

Right then, another chant echoed from deeper in the darkness.

This voice was different from those Responder Groups—it was deeper, slower, and older.

Within this voice, that fragment of a name was chanted with exceptional completeness.

Out on the outer ring, Lieutenant Colonel Ord's Gale read the shift in the ether for him.

"He's been down here for days," the lieutenant colonel said through gritted teeth. "He was waiting inside this whole time for this exact moment."

The Chief Responder emerged from the absolute depths.

He wore a faded old coat and had a face so ordinary it was instantly forgettable.

He didn't need a Lead. He didn't need a Harmony.

He alone was the Lead, the Harmony, and the Finale, all fused into one.

"That's the core anchor," Mrs. MacNeil said, gripping her Moonstone Pendant tightly.

"All the Responder Groups before him were just paving the way for him."

"Who sent him?" the second squad leader asked.

"I don't know," Mrs. MacNeil shook her head. "And right now, it doesn't matter."

"Only one thing matters... Do not let him reach that point."

Richard stood in the innermost ring, watching the Chief Responder walk toward the Pit Core.

Inside his mind, his [Speculation] was rapidly piecing fragments together.

Reverse infiltration, responding to the name, the shadow-fog riot as an open card, the Responder Groups sacrificing themselves one by one.

But what kind of power had sent this Chief Responder into the Unresponsive Pit—a place heavily sealed by nine stone rings?

And what power was adding fuel for that name down at the bottom of the pit?

As Richard pondered, the Emerald Brooch pinned to Mrs. MacNeil's chest began to trill again. This time, it vibrated violently.

The medium's expression changed. "The Western Suburbs Mining Area outside... they're rioting."

At the exact same moment, Lieutenant Colonel Ord read the source of that current.

"A massive wave of 'Responses' is pouring down from the surface," the lieutenant colonel said through gritted teeth. "Thousands of people are shouting at the same time."

Through the audio sharing that Mrs. MacNeil projected using the spirit, everyone in the cavern understood what was happening outside.

Up on the surface, several coal mines in the Western Suburbs had gone on strike today.

The mine owners had slashed prices and withheld wages. Last month, there had even been a cave-in that killed people, and the compensation had yet to materialize.

A strike was a common occurrence.

But hidden within the crowds, people with ulterior motives were repeatedly leading chants.

They were calling out names—the names of the miners who had died in the shafts, and the names of the supervisors who had stolen their wages.

Voice after voice, thousands of workers echoed them in unison.

The strike had escalated into a riot with an abnormal intensity.

Inside Richard's mind, the two events finally clicked together.

Shouting in unison was itself a massive "Response."

Thousands of people, shouting the same names, in the same rhythm, at the exact same moment—the sheer magnitude of that power was immense.