I Loaded the Occult Panel

A deathly silence hung over the frost.

Pitting the two most formidable tables against each other was a massive stroke of luck for the Norse table, regardless of who won or lost.

Freyja spoke slowly.

”It’s a good idea.”

”But have you thought this through? Why would they listen to you?”

Loki smiled. ”You all think the Black Earth River table is far too united.”

”What do you mean?”

Loki explained slowly. ”The head of their table is Apophis.”

”That divine name itself is an anomaly.

”In the belief system of the Black Earth River, Set killed Osiris and usurped the throne, but Horus could seek revenge. The gods would judge according to the rules, and order would be restored.”It’s a closed system with rules and a hierarchy. Everyone knows what they should and shouldn’t do.”

Loki lowered his voice.

”Apophis is not in this system. The moment he arrives, he wants to burn everything to ash.”

In those Memphis scriptures so old that the Papyrus had begun to rot, Apophis’s formal title was the ’Giant Serpent from the Waters of Chaos.’

He received no real sacrifices; the only ritual passed down was called ’Striking Down Apophis.’

They would draw a snake on Papyrus, write his name, and then stab it with a knife, stomp on it, and burn it.

This ritual had to be performed every single day, because every day the sun god fought that battle anew in the Underworld.

If the ritual was skipped for even a single day, Ra would fail, and the sun would never rise again.

Freyja understood now.

”So the Black Earth River table is actually fractured from within.”

Loki nodded. ”Of course. Apophis sits at the head of that table, and he is a natural mortal enemy to everyone else seated there.”

”He suppresses them, and they all fear him.”

”The only reason that table has lasted this long is that it’s barely being held together by the rules of the salon.”

His eyes narrowed.

”Because his tablemates hate him to the bone, they’re hoping he runs into a tough opponent and never comes back. That way, they can be freed from Apophis’s suppression.”

”So.”

Loki enunciated each word.

”I don’t need to deliver this news to Apophis myself.”

Freyja now saw the full scope of the scheme.

It was a chain of interlocking traps.

Loki didn’t need to approach Apophis directly; he only needed to stoke the internal conflicts at the Black Earth River table.

”You...” Freyja looked at Loki, speechless for a moment.

Tyr still had his reservations. ”And why would they believe you?”

”I don’t need them to believe me. They will believe their own greed. After all, the intelligence I’m giving them is entirely true.”

The figures on the frost fell silent. The scheme was indeed ruthless and intricate.

But the more complex and precise a plan was, the easier it was for a single link to fail and ruin the entire board.

Hela finally spoke.

”Loki, if this game succeeds, we can indeed reap the rewards without lifting a finger.”

”But have you thought about what happens if a single link goes wrong...”

”If Apophis doesn’t take the bait and instead finds out we’re the ones stirring the pot.”

”Or if those two Virtuosos from Greece fly into a rage and trace it straight back to our table,”

”Then we’ll be facing much more than just a MacFie.”

Those words poured cold water over the others, who had just begun to be swayed by Loki’s pitch.

Loki dropped his smile. ”Do you think we still have a way out?”

”Did you not see the way the lord of the hunt looked at us just now?”

He crushed the bit of frost in his palm.

”Rather than sitting around waiting to die, we might as well muddy the waters.”

”The muddier the water, the better the chance we small fish have of surviving.”

Hearing this, the wretched figures on the frost who had just crawled out of their punishment exchanged glances.

They truly had no way out. Loki’s words were cruel, but they were the truth.

Freyja finally asked, ”So what will you do?”

That was as good as an agreement.

Loki nodded. ”I need time, and I need all of your cooperation.”

”Before the next gathering, I will initiate the first step.”

Lillian sat in place, having not spoken a word from beginning to end.

There were no tears on her skirt, her needles were still hidden in her cuffs, and not a single hair was out of place.

Beneath that mask, Lillian simply stared quietly ahead.

Tyr spoke up first.

”Skadi. You.”

He pointed with his single hand.

”You were present the entire time, you took a sliver of The Morrigan’s power, and you pocketed the divine name. Why are you the only one who wasn’t punished?”

He spoke with indignation, biting down hard on the word ’punished.’

Freyja remained silent beside him, but she also looked toward Lillian, her eyes echoing Tyr’s exact sentiment.

Hela’s half-face turned toward her as well.

Loki didn’t move. He lazily stretched out his legs, looking as though he were about to doze off.

Caught in the crossfire of their gazes, Lillian rolled her neck.

”I don’t know.”

Tyr’s voice rose higher. ”You don’t know?”

He thought Lillian was provoking him.

”Hold on...”

Loki pushed himself up from the frosted slope, dusted off his pants, and lazily walked to the center.

He stopped between them with his hands in his pockets, standing sideways to them both like an incompetent referee.

”Don’t get mad at her.”

He spoke to Tyr.

”Did you think the lord of the hunt let her off because he was in a good mood?

”A Scholar of the Abyss Tradition is more valuable than all of you combined.”

”That’s not fair,” Freyja said.

Loki turned and shot her a look.

”What does fairness have to do with it? Go reason with the lord of the hunt, then.”

Loki then shot Tyr a warning glare.

”That’s the gist of it. A Scholar of the Abyss Tradition is rare in the entire Empire.

”The lord of the hunt will punish the worthless, but he won’t waste a rare commodity.”

Freyja lowered her head, turning her hands over and over as she examined them.

”How enviable.”

The displacement battles on the table soon began anew in the late spring chill.

The positions of the candidates began to shift.

No one ever dared challenge Loki and Hela.

But every seat below them had to be fought for. The winners moved up, and the losers’ heads were taken.

Tyr fought a grueling battle this round.

His opponent this time wielded the power of the glaciers, and every strike was several times heavier than a normal person’s.

Having been tormented the entire previous night, his divine name had been worn down a layer.

He won, but it was a victory earned crawling forward through the mud.

Freyja fared even worse. After winning two consecutive matches, she could barely sit steady in her chair.

Yet after the third round, the eyes of almost everyone at the table fell uniformly in one direction.

Lillian was no longer scraping by with narrow victories as she usually did.

During her first match, the people nearby didn’t take it too seriously.

By the end of the second match, some started to frown.

After her third match ended, Tyr watched for a moment before shifting his gaze, not daring to look any longer.

With every battle she finished, Lillian digested another fraction of what she had gained from The Morrigan, converting it into her own.

To sustain war by means of war—in the Abyss Tradition, this was a very real operational mechanism.

Freyja watched from the sidelines.

Resting her chin in her hand, her expression full of scrutiny, she suddenly asked, ”Where did you study this path before?”

Lillian retrieved her Silver Needles and straightened her cuffs.

”I learned it myself.”

”You can self-study the Abyss Tradition?”

Lillian put the needles away and turned her head to look at Freyja.

”I sought it out bit by bit, learning it piece by piece. No one ever held my hand to teach me.”

Freyja fell silent for a moment at that answer.

”You didn’t have a guide?”

”Only recently.”

Lillian turned her gaze back toward the fog on the other side of the veil.

She didn’t elaborate, and Freyja didn’t press her.

At exactly 5:00 AM, Ms. Holloway appeared outside the attic Lillian was renting and knocked on the door.

Lillian pushed the door open.

”Mentor, is something the matter?”

Ms. Holloway left her no room to refuse, simply delivering a notice.

”Pack your things. We’re relocating.”

”Where to?”

”Prague.”

Hearing the name, Lillian remembered the books she had flipped through in the public library.

From the sixteenth-century chronicles of the Holy Roman Empire all the way to the Empire Post’s overseas dispatches.

Back then, the girl had never imagined she would one day visit these places, but she had simply loved reading those books.

The more she knew, the more solid the floor beneath her feet felt.

”The Imperial Capital is no longer suitable for you. The scent on you is becoming too obvious here. If you take even a few steps outside, anyone with sharp senses will likely catch it.”

Ms. Holloway continued explaining.

”Charles University has an underground library that they’ve been digging downward since the 14th century.

”From the era of Charles IV to the Hussite Wars, digging through every funeral of the Habsburg dynasty, all the way to today in 1915.

”After 500 years of digging, those bookshelves have reached places they shouldn’t.

”Furthermore, the various materials buried beneath the Old Town of Prague are far more suitable than anything you could find in the Imperial Capital.

”Those alchemists of Bohemia planted roots beneath the Vltava River three hundred years ago.

”When those roots rotted, the seeping juices completely saturated the soil beneath the entire riverbed.

”That soil is what you will be working with next.”

Lillian rested her fingers on the window frame, her fingernails still stained with unwashed ink from earlier that day.

”Does Charles University accept foreign students?”

”They do.”

”But you’ll still have to learn another foreign language.”

The corners of Ms. Holloway’s mouth twitched in what couldn’t quite be called a smile.

”The veil is thinner in Prague than in the Imperial Capital, and Austria-Hungary’s attitude toward the Abyss Tradition is different. Vienna can’t control what the underground factions in Bohemia are teaching.”

”Once you’re packed, come with me. The ferry leaves from Dover tomorrow, and we’ll switch to a train in Calais. It will take about three days. I’ll explain the rules on the way.”

After she left, Lillian closed the door and the window.

The girl buried her face in her knees.

She began to take the entire matter apart, analyzing it like a scholar.

The book in the hands of that white-haired giant—she recognized its binding.

It was a designated textbook for the Department of Classics at Imperial Capital University, authored by a professor from that very university.

Richard was also at Imperial Capital University.

The boy who had walked out of that old classroom in Greenwood School was now standing on the same starting line as noble heirs, moving in circles she couldn’t dream of touching in a lifetime.

A Gaelic Scholar professor walking the path of Moon-Hunting.

A classmate in the same university, walking the path of the Scholar, climbing upward step by step.

Lillian’s fingers tightened around the cold needles.

That professor could have crossed her name out as well.

The Abyss, a Scholar, special value... she had considered all these reasons, and they all made sense.

But something was still missing.

And she had filled in that missing piece herself.

She had not a shred of evidence for this thought, but she desperately wanted to believe it.

Walking this path, what the girl desired most was to find a single spark of light within the absolute, empty darkness.

And now, she had written a name on that spark of light.

She pulled a leather suitcase from under her bed and began stuffing her things inside.

She had only two changes of clothes, but she packed a thick stack of four or five notebooks.

And that specimen—she was bringing that along, too.

Finally, she fished out one last item from beneath her pillow.

It was a dried four-leaf clover, pressed between two sheets of transparent paper.

It was the gift Richard had given her in return back when they were at Greenwood School.

Lillian tucked that four-leaf clover into the very last page of her notebook.