Chapter 384: The Invitation

That night, the dorm room door was locked from the inside.

Over the past few days, Richard had gone through the harvest he had accumulated since returning to the Imperial Capital, item by item.

First, to feed the shadow, he fished that piece of high-purity concretion out of a hidden compartment and placed it on the desk.

The shadow floated up from behind the veil. The mass of black was a fraction more solid than it had been in Whitby.

Its tentacles reached toward the concretion, latching onto it and sucking it in, thread by thread.

Because this piece was of high quality, it digested slowly.

Checking his Pocket Watch, Richard saw that after gnawing for nearly an hour, the shadow had only consumed a small corner.

It took another ten minutes for the core's oscillation frequency to drop back to standby levels.

It ate slowly, but grew quickly. The shadow's solidity noticeably thickened before his eyes.

"Slow down." Richard took back the remaining large chunk and locked it in the Frost Branch box.

The shadow naturally couldn't understand, but its tentacles reluctantly retracted.

Richard rubbed his nose, struck by an indescribable sense of deja vu.

When Evelyn's turtle ate cabbage leaves, it had the exact same posture.

If you pulled the leaf away, its neck would stretch out endlessly, chasing after it.

Next was the Half-Set of Rune Stones.

These were practically useless on their own, requiring a massive infusion of ether to take effect.

But Richard held something others didn't: naming.

He lined the six stone fragments up in a row, first using Spirit Vision to "read" them one by one.

Each rune had its own meaning.

Through his Preliminary Rune Research Notes, he had already thoroughly mastered the names of this rune set.

The first, Fehu—livestock, wealth.

Richard applied his Inspiration, completely analyzing the stone fragment from the ether layer down to the physical layer.

The depth, angle, and spacing of the carved grooves, along with the meaning of the rune itself, fully unfolded in his mind.

Then, he deduced its name.

"Fehu."

He faithfully "recorded" the rune's original true name onto it.

Ether flowed along the conductive pathways and landed on the stone fragment. A change occurred immediately.

Under normal use, activating a Fehu rune stone would require pouring in almost all of his current ether reserves just to barely trigger a faint effect.

After naming it, the rune lit up using less than a tenth of the usual ether.

Moreover, the triggered power exceeded the enhancement that normal use would provide.

Richard stared at the glowing stone fragment, his mind racing.

The core of the naming ability was "recording true names."

Rune stones themselves were order "carved" into physical form; each piece possessed a clear, unalterable name.

This was a natural match for his naming ability.

When ordinary people used rune stones, they had to rely on brute force to pour ether into them, forcibly squeezing out that bit of order.

Richard didn't need to force it. He simply spoke the rune's true name, and the rune acknowledged it on its own.

It saved ether and was far stronger.

He tried the second piece.

Uruz—aurochs, strength.

After analyzing and naming it, Richard felt a sudden surge of brute strength in his forearms.

He gripped the corner of the desk and squeezed, causing the large oak desk to groan under the strain.

The third, Thurisaz—thorn, giant, the double-edged sword of defense and attack.

The fourth, Ansuz—god, speech, revelation.

When this one triggered, Richard's thoughts inexplicably cleared for a moment.

The fifth, Raidho—journey, wheel, riding.

The sixth, Kenaz—torch, knowledge, revelation.

Six rune stones, six true names, six effects.

Richard noted down the activation drain, duration, and enhancement magnitude of each piece, stroke by stroke, in his notebook.

The rune stones were inherently "carriers of true names," naturally maximizing their compatibility right from the start.

It was just that these stone fragments were all missing corners—they were merely a Half-Set of Rune Stones.

Richard figured that if he gathered the complete set, the runes could connect into an array, and their effects might double.

That was a matter for the future.

Having finished this, Richard opened his panel.

The wax cylinder and cornflower copper clasp that Heracles had commissioned him to appraise now had their appraisal reports written; it was time to mail the items back.

Before sending them off, he "handled" them once more, as was his routine.

He stole a tiny bit of ether from each item.

The lingering female voice in the wax cylinder that had seeped through from the other side of the veil, the dying obsession of that Germanic youth on the copper clasp... every little bit added up.

Combined with the deposited ether he had extracted from the Half-Set of Rune Stones without affecting their original function, he tallied it all together.

[Available Points: 2.84... 2.96... 3.11.]

His points broke past the three-point threshold once again.

Richard stared at that line of numbers for a while.

He didn't strengthen [Astral Projection], nor did he expand his [Spiritual Capacity].

Ever since he switched to the Mirror Condensation Method, both his and the shadow's breathing method cultivation had progressed by leaps and bounds.

He pulled up the [Breathing] tab.

[Breathing Lv.4, Progress 82%.]

Among the unlock conditions for [Breathing] to reach Lv.5, one was "Master an advanced breathing method."

Between Tide-Shifting Breathing and the Mirror Condensation Method, he had fully adapted to two advanced breathing methods; this condition was met.

He still needed 2 points to upgrade to Lv.5.

Richard saved his points.

He was going to wait for his [Breathing] progress to hit 100%, scrape together 2 points, and upgrade to Lv.5 in one go.

At that time, he could advance his trait to [Gushing Spring].

Channeling ether to heal others—he considered this effect.

Richard leaned back in his chair, thinking of that mass of black at the cave entrance, the two sentences spoken in the dining car, and his grandfather's breathing growing shallower by the day.

Amidst this current unease of an impending crisis, [Gushing Spring] might prove incredibly useful.

It was perfectly quiet outside the window. With the blackout orders in effect, even the moon appeared exceptionally bright.

He dismissed the panel and performed one last set of Mirror Condensation Method breaths.

He held his breath and suppressed it; the ether fluctuations dropped little by little.

Once he reached that baseline, all the information within the dorm room came flooding in.

The ink bottle on the corner of the desk, the coat hook on the wall, the streetlamp outside the window that hadn't been turned off during the blackout... everything was reflected on his layer of Still Water.

Over the course of a week, replies had poured in like a blizzard.

The print shop owner had written a scrawled note to Richard, slipped at the very top of the stack of letters.

"Your call for 'people who have seen a black dog' completely busted my mailbox. Next time, at least give me a heads up.

"I sorted out some of the ones with obviously wrong addresses for you. You can deal with the rest yourself."

Richard moved the massive stack of letters onto his dorm desk.

It was a thick pile of varying sizes. Some were in proper envelopes, while others were merely torn ledger pages folded in half and stuffed inside.

He spent two nights reading through all the letters.

Most could be ruled out; they were either fabricated stories meant for novelty or instances where people mistook ordinary stray dogs for a black dog.

But for the remaining dozens of letters, every single one left his fingertips cold after reading it.

The majority came from Yorkshire.

A letter from a farm woman living thirty miles south of Whitby Town was written in crooked handwriting, clearly penned by someone else on her behalf.

"My husband saw that thing on his way back from the tavern, while passing the church graveyard fence.

"He said it was a dog, two sizes larger than a normal dog.

"It was squatting by the graveyard gatepost, not barking, not moving. A pair of eyes just stared over from that direction.

"The next day, my husband lost his voice and couldn't get out of bed. The doctor said it was a heart problem."

Another letter came from the Cleveland Hills in Northern Yorkshire. The sender claimed to be a gamekeeper.

"The locals call it the Barghest.

"When the Barghest appears before you, it doesn't make a single sound.

"The older generations say it comes to collect. It doesn't collect your body; it collects your 'time.'

"The moment it looks at you, exactly how many days you have left to live is set.

"The longer it looks, the closer the set day is.

"I saw it on that little path in South Valley, on the night of the winter solstice last year. I'm still alive for now.

"But I really can't say for sure."

The handwriting at the end was significantly shakier than at the beginning.

There was also a letter from Lancashire. The sender stated he was a postman from a town north of Manchester.

"Around here, we call them Gabriel Ratchets.

"They aren't like the kind of black dog you mentioned in your request that squats on the ground looking at you.

"They are in the sky. After dark, if you're walking outside sometimes, you can hear a cry passing overhead like a flock of geese.

"But geese honk uniformly.

"This is different. Its rhythm is three long and one short, three long and one short.

"It's like hounds chasing something.

"You can hear the thrill of the hunt in it. The sound runs from one end to the other, and once it passes, someone is bound to meet with an accident the very next day.

"Not necessarily death, but definitely something major."

Richard categorized the dozens of letters by content, using [Speculation: Inner Awakening] to look for patterns.

With [Speculation: Inner Awakening] activated, he turned these dozens of incidents over and over in his mind, examining them from different angles.

He copied down the dates of death from every single letter onto a sheet of paper, arranging them in chronological order.

Once arranged, those dates landed on several specific nights.

The Twelve Nights of Christmas, Ember Days, Halloween, and the nights of several massive storms.

Regarding those specific nights, when he was doing preliminary research on runes, he had vaguely skimmed past a certain term.

The Wild Hunt.

In Northern European legends, the king of gods led a cohort of the dead out on a hunt during these specific nights.

Richard folded the piece of paper up and tucked it into his notebook.

He went to find his Aunt Isabella.

After listening to him explain the entire sequence of events, Isabella remained silent for a moment.

"For this area, you should go find Corbin," she said.

"Associate Professor Corbin?"

"You met him that time in Whitby; runes are his specialty."

Isabella rubbed her temples.

"The Wild Hunt, runes, Northern European folklore... he's vastly more professional in these subjects than I am."

Holding that hunting schedule, Richard headed to Trinity College to find Corbin.

He found himself a pretext: seeking guidance on his rune coursework.

The Half-Set of Rune Stones was conveniently out in the open, acting as a ready-made conversation starter.

Corbin's office was piled high with rubbings and fragments. When Richard walked in, the associate professor was leaning over his desk, examining a piece of stone with a magnifying glass.

"Rune coursework." Corbin set his magnifying glass down after hearing Richard's reason for visiting.

"Get your words straight first. Do you want to learn the pronunciation, the usage, or the origins of the runes?

"These are three distinct subjects. You can't just vaguely say 'rune coursework'—that lacks academic rigor."

Richard was already well aware of this quirk of his.

"Origins," he chose one.

"Then you should have said 'traditional origins research of runes' just now," he corrected.

"My poor choice of words," Richard cooperatively admitted.

Satisfied, Corbin put the stone away and fished a few booklets out from the piles of books.

"What do you want to know?"

Richard took out the Half-Set of Rune Stones, then feigned a casual tone as he brought it up:

"While gathering ghost stories, I heard a lot of accounts about black dogs and 'hunting at night.' I want to figure out if there's any runic origin to this."

Corbin's eyes lit up slightly.

The moment his specialty was mentioned, this usually dry-spoken associate professor became quite talkative.

"The 'hunting at night' you're talking about has a proper name in Northern European folklore—the Asgardian ride."

"What does that mean?"

"Yule nights fall around Christmas. Legend has it that a procession will pass through the sky.

"On this night, farming families must leave a bundle of hay outside for the lord of the hunt's horse to eat."

Corbin tapped a line of text in the booklet with his fingernail.

"Families who leave hay will have good luck in the coming year, while those who don't will suffer misfortune."

Richard's heart stirred.

"Leaving hay... in exchange for good luck."

"Right. This is the earliest fulcrum found in literature for making a transaction with the Wild Hunt.

"You give it something, and it gives you a benefit."

"Are there any other fulcrums?" Richard asked.

"Plenty." Piqued with interest, Corbin dug out an even older booklet.

"Look at this. There's a specific entry in the Rune Poem about Hagalaz—hail."

He pushed the booklet over and pointed to a line of the original text.

"'Haegl byth hwitust corna...'"

"Hail is the whitest of grains, it is whirled from the vault of heaven."

Richard stared at this line, somewhat puzzled.

"Hail... is grain?"

"Savor the phrasing." Corbin's finger tapped on the word "corna," grain.

"What is hail? It is a destructive thing that ruins crops and kills livestock.

"Yet, the author of the Rune Poem calls it 'the whitest of grains.'"

"An object of destruction, named as grain."

A layer of chill slowly crept up Richard's spine.

He remembered that harvest ledger—dozens of lives laid out in a row... it was a harvest ledger.

The ancients who wrote the Rune Poem had understood long ago: in certain eyes, disasters were simply the harvest.

"There's one more you should know."

Corbin flipped to the page for Fehu, which happened to be the very first piece in Richard's Half-Set of Rune Stones.

"Fehu, livestock, wealth. Have you ever thought about what livestock signifies?"

"It signifies... being raised by someone," Richard said slowly.

"Correct." Corbin nodded. "Livestock are things that are penned in, counted, and slaughtered when the day comes."

"What if there is a higher being who cunningly treats humanity as livestock to be 'farmed'?"

Richard remained silent.

Corbin narrowed his eyes to look at him, then continued flipping through the pages.

"I also have a solitary piece of evidence here, just give it a listen."

He brought out a photocopied sheet of Saga Fragments.

"A thirteenth-century Saga Fragment records someone using a white stag to exchange for his wife's name, having it removed from the 'Hunting Register.'"

"Removed from the Hunting Register?" Richard held his breath.

"Yes." Corbin put the fragment away.

"This counts as a precedent for 'name substitution'—using an item to swap out a name."

Richard sat in his chair, his fingers gripping the edges of the Half-Set of Rune Stones.

These fragments scattered across centuries of literature were being pieced together one by one.

"Thank you, Associate Professor."

After taking his leave from Corbin, Richard was called back to the Ashford Residence, where the butler was waiting on the porch with a lamp in hand.

"Has Grandfather gone to rest?"

"The master is in the study." The butler hesitated slightly. "Young Master, there is a matter..."

"What is it?"

Holding the lamp, the butler led Richard over to the two stone pillars by the main entrance.

As the light illuminated it, a tooth-mark-shaped carving emerged on the left pillar.

"When did this appear?"

"Last night." The butler sounded somewhat tense.

"I only saw it when I stepped out early this morning. I originally wanted to find a stonemason to grind it away..."

"But the master stopped me."

"What did Grandfather say?"

The butler repeated Gerard's exact words.

"The master said, 'This is an invitation.'"