Chapter 238: Alright

At dinner, Richard cradled his bowl, absentmindedly responding to his sister.

"Brother, what's wrong with you today?" Evelyn pushed a Professor Rabbit in front of him. "You're completely out of it."

"Nothing." Richard picked up the rabbit but didn't take a bite. "Alright, there is something."

"Thinking about the Imperial Capital?"

"Yeah," Richard answered vaguely.

His mother, Margaret, walked in from the living room and glanced at him.

"Go to bed early," his mother said, sorting vegetables. "You haven't looked well these past few days."

"Mhm."

That night, Richard slept deeper than usual.

With [Sleep] leveled to Lv.2, he drifted off quickly and slept deeply.

He had a very long dream.

In the dream, it was results day.

He couldn't quite tell where he was.

It looked like the Greenwood auditorium, but also felt like the grand living room of Ashford House.

The space around him was bright and warm; he couldn't tell if it was sunlight or lamplight.

Someone unrolled a red placard in front of him.

Department of Classics at Imperial Capital University, Preparatory Course. The very first name was his.

Richard Williams.

He was thrilled.

The joy was tangible, spreading warmth from his chest all the way to his fingertips.

Then, people started arriving one by one.

Evelyn was naturally the first to tackle him, holding up that gingerbread rabbit with its little top hat.

"Congratulations, Brother!" Her eyes curved into smiling crescents. "I knew Professor Rabbit would get in!"

Their mother, Margaret, followed behind. Her eyes were slightly red, but the corners of her mouth were turned up.

For once, his father, Rogers, had set down his blueprints to clap him hard on the shoulder.

"My son has made something of himself. Makes his old man look good."

Next was Mr. Hutton, cupping a mug of utterly flavorless tea and nodding. "I knew you would make it in."

And Mr. Holland, gripping a half-eaten chicken drumstick and grinning widely:

"The money I spent on this chicken wasn't wasted."

Warren, Hugh, and Mason were all there;

Grey held up her dark blue umbrella, offering a warm paper bundle from beneath it;

Lillian hugged her glass jar, her grayish-blue eyes fixed on him as she softly said, "Congratulations."

Grandfather, his aunt, Mrs. Dawn and Charlotte, Coleman, Wentworth, Mrs. MacNeil...

And Clement, leaning on his copper-capped cane: "I made the right bet."

One smiling face after another leaned in close.

"Congratulations."

"Congratulations."

"Congratulations."

Applause broke out.

It started as a few scattered claps before merging into a continuous roar, growing louder and louder like rain, like a rising tide.

Everyone was smiling, clapping, and telling him "Congratulations."

Richard stood in the center, wrapped in the warm sea of voices.

He smiled back and nodded.

He opened his mouth, wanting to say "Thank you."

But right then, a corner of his heart suddenly hollowed out.

The table was piled high with food, yet exactly one bowl sat empty;

He couldn't articulate what was missing.

The room was packed with people. Evelyn was smiling, his mother was smiling, Mr. Hutton was smiling.

He recognized every face; he heard every "Congratulations" with perfect clarity.

But he still felt that something was missing.

The smiling faces were still the same; the applause was still the same.

There was just one empty bowl, sitting there perpetually unfilled.

Richard joined in the applause.

He nodded at every smiling face and said his thanks for every "Congratulations."

He smiled just as warmly, looking just as fulfilled as everyone else.

But that hollow place in his heart refused to be filled by the warmth of the room; instead, the emptiness slowly bled outward, spreading further and further.

Just as the applause reached its peak, another sound mingled into the chorus of "Congratulations."

He tried to turn his head to look.

The light all around him suddenly died.

Richard opened his eyes.

It wasn't dawn yet. Outside the window, the sky was a pale, ashen gray.

He lay flat on the bed. He hadn't broken a sweat, and his heart wasn't racing.

But an indescribable emptiness clung to the dead center of his chest, refusing to dissolve.

Richard sat up. It took him a long moment to recognize the cracked ceiling above his head.

The room full of "Congratulations" had vanished, the table of smiling faces had vanished, and even that single empty bowl had vanished.

He glanced at his Panel.

The progress bar for [Sleep] Lv.2 was full.

That night of deep sleep had pushed it across the finish line.

Even with such a long dream, his physical recovery hadn't lagged at all.

Investing points, [Sleep] Lv.2 → Lv.3.

Richard closed his eyes, feeling the changes within his body.

[Sleep - Wild Sleep].

Rapidly fall asleep in any environment and achieve high-quality recovery. Retain danger perception during light sleep.

As the trait lit up, Richard immediately felt the difference.

His capacity for sleep had improved again; he had truly reached the realm of passing out the moment his head hit the pillow, and sleeping deeply and steadily.

And then there was that taut string of "light-sleep danger perception."

Even while asleep, that string in his body would remain taut. At the slightest disturbance nearby, it would wake him before his conscious mind even registered it.

He sat on the edge of the bed, hesitated a moment, and reached into his drawer for his Tarot Cards.

Mrs. MacNeil had taught him that divination could sometimes interpret dreams.

Richard placed his Copper Dish in the center of the desk and sprinkled a pinch of Starfall Sand.

He lit a candle and set it far away on the corner of the desk, its flame standing perfectly steady.

He began to shuffle the cards.

"What does this dream I had mean?"

Following the rhythm of Fourfold Breathing, he let the question seep into the cards bit by bit.

After seven shuffles, he cut the deck and drew the first card.

He flipped it over.

[The Chariot - Upright].

An armored warrior driving white horses stood on a chariot, gathering the reins to surge forward unstoppably.

Richard stared at the card for a moment.

The Chariot represented will and control: twisting two conflicting horses—one black, one white—into a single force, charging toward victory on sheer momentum.

But in his dream, there hadn't been a single ounce of "charging" momentum.

In the dream, he had simply stood in the warmth, with only that single hollow spot.

The Chariot and that dream had absolutely nothing to do with each other.

Frowning, Richard set the card aside, reshuffled, and asked his second question.

"Where did that emptiness in my heart come from?"

After seven shuffles, he drew a card.

He flipped it over.

[The Empress - Upright].

A plump Empress sat on a cushion. Behind her lay a field heavy with wheat, and in her arms rested the ripened abundance of the harvest.

Richard was even more confused.

The Empress meant nourishment, being surrounded by love, lacking nothing and possessing everything.

He had asked about "emptiness," but flipped "fullness";

He had asked what was missing, and the answer was that nothing was missing.

It made no sense at all. Richard's frown deepened.

Undeterred, he shuffled a third time and asked the most direct question possible.

"Was that dream an omen?"

He flipped it over.

[The Fool - Upright].

A lightly packed traveler stood at the edge of a cliff, face turned upward.

He was about to step off, radiating the untempered eagerness of someone who hadn't yet experienced the world.

Staring at this card, Richard grew even more bewildered.

The Fool meant a new beginning, innocence, and leaping into an uncertain journey.

This card seemed to be talking about him.

Someone about to leave home and rush headlong into a brand-new world.

But what did that have to do with whether the dream was an omen?

The Chariot, The Empress, The Fool.

All three cards were perfectly clear, as upright as could be.

Yet placed together, he couldn't read a single thread connecting them.

Richard leaned forward, using [Speculation] to break the three cards down and force a logical chain between them.

On his third attempt, he gave up.

Between these three cards and that dream lay a chasm he simply couldn't cross.

Inside the Copper Dish, the ring of Starfall Sand had lain quietly against the rim the entire time.

It hadn't turned cold as it did around danger, nor had it gathered toward the center as it had when he divined the Ebony Box.

It just lay there flatly, as if saying: there is nothing to warn you about, and nothing to point out.

Richard gathered the cards, shuffled them again, and asked from a different angle.

This time, he flipped over [The Sun - Upright], [Justice - Upright], and [The Hermit - Upright].

Once again, three cards that couldn't be more upright.

Pressing his hands against the edge of the desk, Richard stared at the spread of cards for a long time.

He changed his approach, applying each card individually to his present circumstances.

The Chariot.

Wasn't he currently gathering all his strength to charge toward the Imperial Capital?

Everyone's expectations and several driving forces were twisting together, pushing him forward unstoppably.

That was The Chariot.

The Empress.

Wasn't he currently surrounded, protected, and nourished by the people around him?

That room full of "Congratulations" in his dream—lacking nothing, filled with everything.

That was The Empress.

The Fool.

He was carrying a light pack, about to leap into the brand-new, massive world of the Imperial Capital.

That was The Fool.

The next three cards were the same.

The Sun—he was walking the brightest path of his life;

Justice—the seeds he had planted with his essay were bearing fruit piece by piece;

The Hermit—he guarded a bellyful of unspeakable secrets, feeling his way along the edge of the veil all on his own.

Richard let out a long breath.

The cards hadn't fooled him; they had been completely honest from start to finish.

It was his own fault for posing a prophet's question to a detective's tool.

The cards only ever read "what has already happened" and "what is currently happening."

They couldn't read the future.

...

Meanwhile, Old Biggs was doing something he usually hated doing most.

Divining for himself.

When a person divined for themselves, they always harbored selfish bias—wanting to hear the good and fearing the bad.

If their hand trembled, the stones wouldn't read accurately.

Madam Marie always said that the stones never lied; the one lying was you, in your eagerness for good news.

In his entire life, Old Biggs had rarely divined for himself.

Today, he wanted to.

Those tracked by the black dog for a full night almost never lived past the month.

The black dog hadn't followed him all night, but it had crouched by the small river at the east end of Slag Alley, watching him for a long time.

After the Echo Society's web had been disturbed, no one was closer to it than a coroner who examined corpses every single day.

He had flipped through registries and cross-referenced canal maps, piecing together over ten years of death notices one by one.

He was on the verge of touching the strings.

Old Biggs took his Copper Dish from the cabinet and placed it in the center of his workbench.

Then he took out a handful of Runestones.

Over twenty small stones, gripped tightly in his palm.

He closed his eyes, using his teacher's method to turn the question over in his mind until it was crystal clear.

Asking about no one else, only himself.

"What will happen to me from now on?"

Old Biggs opened his eyes and cast the handful of stones into the Copper Dish.

The stones tumbled a few times inside the dish.

He leaned over and read them once, then read them again.

The Ear of Wheat had rolled out of the dish; harvest would no longer belong to him.

The Double Circles had rolled out; relationships would no longer belong to him.

The Crescent Moon had rolled out as well.

Change, growth, and the days ahead had all rolled outside the dish, landing on the cold workbench.

The Hammer had also rolled out.

Action... he wouldn't have any left to take.

The four most vital stones had all escaped the Copper Dish.

Only two stones remained in the center.

A Water Drop—unfinished business;

A Spiral—repetition.

The two stones lay steadily in the center, resting close together, neither one leaving.

Old Biggs sat before his workbench, staring at the two stones in the center of the dish for a very long time.

A diviner was a detective, not a prophet.

He had remembered his teacher's words his entire life.

A prophet asks what will happen; a detective asks what has already happened.

Divination only ever reads what has already happened, and what is currently happening.

It couldn't read the future.

This meant the outcome of his divination was about to become established fact.

His thread had reached its end.

Old Biggs stood up and laughed heartily.

"Alright."