Chapter 245: Threefold Collapse

The mid-June gathering fell squarely in the first few days of the summer seminar.

The Theogony Salon was no ordinary gathering.

Every time, Hecate's Spell Formula forcibly dragged them into a predetermined dream temple.

The body sat on this side, while the soul went to the other.

A soul departing for elsewhere could not be hidden from a watchful eye.

For the four weeks of the seminar, a Major Adept was stationed on campus, and the gaze of a Virtuoso occasionally swept overhead.

If he were dragged into the dreamscape on that mid-month night, his soul departing for another place...

The Silver Ring could block sweeps from low and mid Ranks. It could even ward off the gaze of the "Mother Who Eats Shadows" when she peered through the passage.

But the artifact wasn't absolute. If actively targeted, its protection could still be pierced.

The Major Adept professor overseeing the seminar was specifically there to "scout for talent."

Having his soul fly off that night would happen right under their noses.

And the Theogony Salon was an anonymous circle drifting completely outside the system.

Getting caught red-handed by a Major Adept acting as a watchdog for the academic system...

Richard didn't dare think any further.

He had to excuse himself from this gathering.

Richard took the Clay Token out of his inner pocket.

The emblem of Hermes's caduceus was stamped into its surface.

This was the new token Hecate had given him during her second invitation, much more official than the temporary Clay Token of the God of Medicine.

By the salon's rules, to make private contact, one only needed to grasp the token, silently recite the recipient's codename, and state the request.

A reply would arrive by the same time the next day at the latest.

Within any two-month period, such private messages could be sent at most five times.

Richard gripped the Clay Token in his palm.

'Hermes.'

The moment he thought the codename, the Clay Token grew slightly hot against his palm.

"I will not be able to attend the next gathering."

Richard kept it brief.

"An unavoidable matter clashes with those few days. I hope you will excuse my absence."

He didn't say what the matter was, where it was, nor did he mention the seminar, the Major Adept, or the Virtuoso.

The token's heat slowly faded.

The request had been sent.

Richard put the Clay Token away and blew out the lamp.

Outside the window, in the night of the Imperial Capital, some distant clock tower struck eleven.

...

The reply came the following night, at the exact same hour.

"Hermes:

I approve your leave."

The first line was clean and decisive.

But there was more. Richard continued reading.

"I can guess why you asked for leave. You currently stand at the threshold of the system, and there are many eyes watching beneath it.

Keeping a low profile at a time like this is smart, not cowardly.

For someone climbing out of the mold, the very first thing to learn is knowing when to lower your head."

Richard's breathing slowed.

His rhetoric still carried that same distinct flavor.

He never spelled things out completely, yet every word struck right at the mark.

Further down, his tone shifted.

"Coincidentally, you are not the only one requesting leave this time.

Nemesis also sent word this week, saying she had an unavoidable matter and couldn't make it."

Nemesis had also asked for leave.

He was already mostly certain that Nemesis was Catherine Blackwood.

And Catherine had enrolled in the summer seminar this year as well. She had just been at the tea party yesterday.

Both of them were attending the same seminar, and both had submitted their leaves of absence during the exact same week...

Richard's suspicion was practically confirmed.

He pushed the thought down and continued reading.

"With the two of you absent, two of the seven chairs will be empty.

I cannot spare any free time on my end, either.

You probably still remember the matter of the Divine Persona Mask.

Richard naturally remembered.

"That is an extremely time-consuming task.

A single mask requires gathering the concepts accumulated by a divine name over thousands of years and weaving them in, thread by thread.

It cannot be rushed, and there is no room for error. I've spent the better part of my focus on it lately.

Since both you and Nemesis are absent, and I am unable to slip away myself...

The gathering for this time is canceled."

Reading up to this point, Richard felt a wave of relief.

This saved him the trouble of finding another excuse for his "absence" at the next gathering.

"Next time will be mid-August.

By then, the torches will be lit. I hope the seven chairs will be a little fuller."

Richard let out a long breath.

A weight was finally lifted from his mind.

For the next month, he could put all his focus entirely on the seminar.

Richard blew out the lamp and lay down.

Outside the window, that invisible clock tower began to chime again.

One strike, two strikes, three strikes... As he counted, he fell asleep.

...

Richard's chest suddenly tightened, yanking him out of an incredibly deep slumber.

He had slept heavily—so heavily that he didn't even dream.

But [Wild Sleep] had left one last window cracked open, specifically to let in danger.

Tonight, something outside the window had rattled it.

He opened his eyes. The Silver Ring and the Eagle Hook hanging over his chest both turned icy cold at the same time.

It was a pure, biting chill that seeped straight through his skin and into his bones.

He recognized this chill. The last time he had felt it was at the Bottom of the Unresponsive Pit, when that Virtuoso of the Gale tradition had cast his gaze over him.

Richard shifted his gaze toward the window.

His guest room in the Ashford Residence was on the third floor. Outside the window was the Imperial Capital's night sky, forever clouded by soot.

The night sky was too quiet. Something was wrong.

In the distance, the whistles of the freight yard, the iron chains of the canal barges, and the night watchman's clapper were all still there.

But beneath the sounds lay a layer of something else, buoying them up and making them float, as if filtered through a thick, soaking-wet cotton cloth.

He spread his Inspiration outward.

Layer by layer, the corners of the city smashed into his Perception.

In the northern block, every wall clock stopped ticking at the exact same instant, their pendulums suspended in midair, refusing to drop;

In a stretch of river that cut through the city, the muddy waves flowed backward for three breaths before snapping back to their usual course;

The flames of the gas lamps along an entire street slanted in the exact same direction, uniformly pressed down by an invisible hand;

Iron railings inexplicably grew scorching hot in the June night;

In a narrow alley not far below, for the span of half a second, all the shadows stood up from their owners' feet before lying back down in unison.

Richard's breathing slowed.

This scene felt familiar.

Back at the round table of the Theogony Salon, Hecate had shown them the residual scraps that leaked onto the material side when the two Virtuosos fought on Hemus Island.

Were Virtuosos fighting in the skies above the Imperial Capital?

Richard pulled back his Inspiration, leaving only the finest thread to probe toward the edges.

There were three masses.

Three masses of collapse, so colossal they defied human scale, were squeezing and colliding against one another behind the veil.

He couldn't see them clearly. If he tried, his Inspiration would be ripped away. He only dared to hazily reflect their general outlines.

Of the three masses, one was being pincered by the other two, fleeing silently in a single direction.

A wisp of freezing resonance began to slither along the reflections in the glass.

Shop windows, puddles, the brass lamps of carriages, the gap in someone's poorly drawn curtains... That wisp of resonance slid from one reflection to the next, drawing ever closer.

In that same second, Richard heard his own name softly whispered from behind him.

He retracted all his Inspiration in one breath, snuffing himself out completely like a dead candle, pinching off even the last wisp of residual smoke.

Within his chest, the inverted tree of light at his Seat of the Sun folded all its branches and leaves tightly against its trunk. He suppressed even his breathing to the absolute minimum.

The Silver Ring on his chest turned freezing cold.

The wisp of resonance paused after finishing his name.

Failing to find its target, it brushed past Richard—the snuffed-out candle—and drifted away.

It was like a blind man fumbling wildly through a room, whose fingertips grazed the wall but missed the painting hanging on it.

The resonance faded away along the reflections in the glass.

Behind the veil, the two pincering collapses relentlessly pursued the fleeing mass, carving their way together toward the far west of the city.

All three masses vanished from Richard's Perception.

The heat drained from the iron railings, and the shadows all lay safely back at their owners' feet;

The gas lamp flames were released, flickering wildly in all directions before returning to their normal state, tugged by the night breeze;

The pendulums of those dozen wall clocks in the north all dropped at once, making up for the lost few seconds;

Few people in the city would ever realize they had lived a few seconds less tonight.

Richard kept his eyes open until the dawn light bled pale gray through the soot.

He rested with his eyes closed until the sun was fully up. Only then did he sit up in bed and adjust the two items on his chest, which had finally warmed back up.

It was a new day, and he had real business to attend to.

After washing up, Richard originally planned to head to the Petrie Building as usual.

But the moment he walked downstairs, the old butler was waiting at the foot of the stairs.

"Young Master Richard, the master is waiting for you in the study."

His grandfather had been quite busy these past few days.

With such a massive disturbance in the city last night, a Gatekeeper family couldn't possibly be unaware.

Richard turned last night's events over in his mind. He didn't ask any questions and followed the old butler toward the study.

Before he even walked in, he sensed there was another person inside.

The ether fluctuations rolling off that person were steady and familiar.

Pushing the door open, he saw his grandfather, Gerard, sitting behind the large desk.

Sitting diagonally across from the desk was a thin woman in a gray cloth dress, holding a teacup.

It was Mrs. MacNeil.

"Good morning, Grandfather, Mrs. MacNeil," Richard greeted them both first.

"Sit," Gerard said, raising a hand.

Richard sat in the chair positioned between them.

Mrs. MacNeil set her teacup back on the table and turned to look at him.

"Little Richard," she said, "how many days has it been since you arrived in the Imperial Capital?"

Richard did the math. "It's been half a month."

"Half a month." Mrs. MacNeil picked up her tea and took another sip.

"You certainly know how to spend your time. In half a month, you've completely forgotten about my teacher."

Richard froze.

He remembered.

When Old Biggs had shoved that manuscript at him, he told him that once he arrived in the Imperial Capital in June, Madam Marie would set aside some time to teach him.

During his half-month in the capital, he had thrown himself entirely into his aunt's tutoring sessions.

What with Ancient Greek, the prep course exams, his meeting with Grey, and the tea party from two days ago...

He had so much on his plate that this matter had been completely forgotten, leaving not even a shadow in his memory.

"...It was my oversight," Richard admitted honestly.

Looking at the boy's somewhat embarrassed face, Mrs. MacNeil sighed.

"I guessed you were too busy and forgot.

Your aunt has you on a tight leash. I called the associate professor a few days ago, and according to that student named Sophia, you get there earlier than she does every single day."

Richard rubbed his nose.

"My teacher won't take the initiative to ask, either.

If you come, she will teach you.

If you don't, she won't so much as say, 'Why hasn't that child come yet?'"

So both sides had been waiting.

Having seen no one sent from Flower Moon Street to summon him, Richard had assumed Madam Marie was simply too busy.

As a Newcomer, how could he dare to rashly show up and disturb a Major Adept?

And Madam Marie would never send someone to invite him. She was only waiting for him to show up so she could teach him a trick or two; if he didn't, that was that.

Thankfully, Mrs. MacNeil was relatively attentive, otherwise the matter would have passed them both by entirely.

"I understand, and thank you for coming to remind me today."

Richard stood up and bowed slightly to Mrs. MacNeil.

"When do you think would be a good time for me to go?"

"Today would be perfect." Mrs. MacNeil also stood up and smoothed her dress.

"I will head back first. Come over once you've sorted things out at home."

"Right," she said, turning back just as she reached the door. "Make sure you bring that manuscript."

Richard knew what she meant. That copy of Divination and Spirit Vision: From Beginner to Adept was borrowed.

Now that he was going to see its original owner, he naturally had to return it.

"Of course. I remember."

Only the grandfather and grandson were left in the study.

Gerard hadn't said a word the entire time.

Last year, when Richard had first entertained the idea of using a master-disciple relationship to make a connection, Gerard had been the one to personally pour cold water on it.

But the current situation was completely different from back then.

Being a student under Madam Marie really didn't carry much weight.

But for Madam Marie, who didn't take disciples, to willingly teach Richard herself—that was another matter entirely.

"You've done quite a good job managing your connections, boy," Gerard said, looking at Richard.

"First Old Mo writes you a letter of recommendation, and now Madam Marie actually remembers to teach you."

Richard stood there without speaking.

"Go on." Gerard waved a hand.

"Listen well to her lessons. I'll give your aunt a call and explain it to her."

"...Yes."

Richard returned to his room and took out the leather box containing the manuscript.

He also packed the Copper Dish, the Runestones, and the remaining half-bottle of Starfall Sand.