I Loaded the Occult Panel

When the Black Earth River Master was young, he guarded tombs in a mud-brick temple on the west bank of Thebes. Whenever he was bored to death, he counted the offerings.

A jar of Barley Beer, three loaves of bread, two goose legs, and a bouquet of Blue Lotus...

Later, the Black Earth River Master ceased to be human. The mud-brick temple collapsed, and the tombs he guarded were excavated by grave robbers. However, his habit of counting offerings persisted to this day.

In recent days, the Black Earth River Master had been counting as usual. He counted exactly how many mirrors he had lost when the Wild Hunt dragged him into a fight. He counted how many riders were in the Wild Hunt’s procession, and how many times the lord of the hunt blew the Horn.

Following three syllables, he even traced his way back to a closed warehouse in a museum and counted every single person who had entered it.

Apophis stood before the mirror. After he reported the news regarding the Envoy and the Wild Hunt, the veil spoke on behalf of the Black Earth River Master. The voice was as dry as a parched riverbed:

”I have never heard of this so-called Envoy.”

Apophis bowed. ”I heard the Envoy established his authority at the banquet of the Nordic gods. In front of a hall full of guests, he called out the identity and details of every single person present.”

The Black Earth River Master spoke slowly:

”There has never been an Envoy before. He only emerged recently.”Apophis did not follow up on the Black Earth River Master’s words. The master asked again, ”Where does the Wild Hunt plan to descend?”

”The recruitment notice posted by the Wild Hunt specified the assembly point. It’s at Gotthard Mountain.”

Fine lines rippled across the mirror’s surface. The Black Earth River Master was pondering the news about the Envoy and the Wild Hunt. After mulling it over for a while, he suddenly brought up the bird catchers in the swamps of the Black Soil River.

In the swamps of the Black Soil River, bird catchers use a very ancient type of net. Two panels of netting are laid flat by the water, and a handful of grain is scattered in the middle. The bird catcher squats behind the reeds, clutching a rope. Once the birds have gathered, a tug of the rope snaps the two nets together.

”After the net closes, the bird catcher doesn’t rush to pull it in. He just squats by the net and watches—watches to see which bird struggles the fiercest, and which bird is protected under the wings of the others.”

Apophis unclasped his hands from behind his back.

”You intend to lay such a net on the lord of the hunt’s path of descent, to see who he will protect?”

”I will have someone make a pocket.”

The Black Earth River Master corrected him.

When the time comes, everyone in the procession will fall. The lord of the hunt is a miser; even when saving people, he calculates the cost.

”Whoever he grabs first will be the one he is most unwilling to lose.”

”This person he is most unwilling to lose—even if they aren’t the one who passed on the syllables—must undoubtedly hold immense value.” Apophis paced back and forth across the room.

He had to admit, this method was incredibly simple and crude.

But more often than not, the simpler the scheme, the less likely it was to go wrong. In any case, Apophis couldn’t pick out any flaws.

The only problem was that it would be exceedingly difficult to execute.

”High Priest, forgive me for asking more.”

”Ask.”

”The lord of the hunt’s procession has at least tens of thousands of riders. How large of a pocket do you plan to make?

”And how will you ensure your pocket isn’t pierced by the lord of the hunt’s arrows?”

This was the crux of the issue. If the Black Earth River Master had possessed this capability in the past, he would have done this long ago.

From the other side of the mirror, the admission came readily.

”I cannot make it myself.”

Apophis stopped in his tracks. ”But I know of a mouth within the abyss,” the Master added.

The mirror’s surface dimmed. Only the faint slanting sunlight remained in the room.

Apophis hung the Bronze Mirror back on the wall. He picked up the long-cold cup of coffee from the table and walked to the window.

This November, Cairo was packed with the wounded.

Hospital trains arrived from the Port of Alexandria every day. Hundreds of camp beds were set up in the ballroom of the Heliopolis Hotel, and beneath the crystal chandeliers lay men carried straight from Gallipoli.

The carousel at Luna Park had stopped; bandages were hung out to dry over the wooden horses’ backs, and tents were pitched beneath the slides.

Young officers from the map department sat on the terrace of Shepheard’s Hotel, unfurling rough maps of the Sinai every noon.

They ate ice while drawing contour lines on the paper. When they got carried away, they would jab their forks into the desert section, arguing over where the wells were located.

Meanwhile, the Black Earth River Master was seeking help from an entity far older—and far more unreasonable—than himself.

Having set out the offerings, he flipped over every mirror in the pyramid, leaving them face down. He kept only one mirror by his feet to reflect his own shadow.

Then he began to call upon that entity:

”You who sink in the bottomless throat, you who are one with the barrenness.” After reciting the first line, he immediately lowered his head to check if his shadow was still there.

Inside the pyramid, the black tide formed by the voices of the dead fell silent.

These voices of the dead, which had accumulated for hundreds, even thousands of years, had never ceased for a single moment.

The Black Earth River Master had long grown accustomed to treating them as background noise, but now they were suddenly gone.

”You who once swallowed a kingdom in a single bite.”

After reciting the second line, he lowered his head to look again.

His shadow was still there, only it had sunk downward.

The Black Earth River Master recalled a broken stele he had read in Thebes during his youth.

The stele read, ”Many people came from the sea. The Hittites are gone, Alashiya is gone, and Ugarit’s letter was only half written.”

That was the Bronze Age collapse.

”The tongue has departed, the stomach has become an abyss; you who leave only hunger to endure in this world.”

The third line was finished. There was already no sound of wind or light in the Deep Realm, but the Black Earth River Master felt everything around him come to a complete standstill.

The pyramid, along with himself, was sliding downward.

In the mirrors he had hidden within his deepest folds, all the reflections slid toward the bottom edges of the frames, crumpling into a mass.

That entity did not come. It only placed its mouth at the entrance of the pyramid.

Within the range of that mouth, every ”upward” movement required a reason, while every ”downward” movement no longer needed one.

In southern Cairo, Apophis was stirring his coffee with a small silver spoon when it suddenly slipped from his fingers.

It slid all the way down the side of the cup and clattered onto the floor.

He reached out to retrieve it, but he couldn’t lift his hand.

Apophis couldn’t find a reason to raise his hand. This was far more terrifying than his hand simply being held down or stuck.

Why retrieve the spoon? The spoon was perfectly fine sitting on the floor.

Wasn’t falling downward much more comfortable than climbing upward?

The moment this thought emerged, Apophis snapped awake. Outside the window, a flock of pigeons usually circled the dome of the mosque in the northern part of the city at this hour.

Today, as they were flying, they simply dropped from the sky.

The pigeons’ wings were still flapping, but they just couldn’t fly upward.

The steps were quickly covered in a blanket of grey and white. Flapping wings littered the ground, but not a single bird could lift half an inch off the earth.

On the street, an old water seller was carrying a goatskin pouch on his back. The copper spout sagged on its own, and water spilled all over the ground.

He stood there, mouth agape, unable to raise his hands.

At the mouth of the alley, a child’s kite plummeted into a neighbor’s clothesline.

Then, the call to prayer rang out from the minaret.

”God is great...”

The entire city was falling downward, yet the call to prayer drifted upward.

Apophis observed this scene from afar.

Most people in academia lacked any faith. He had said in his lectures many times that those who shouted at the heavens never received an answer, for the sky was deafer than a well.

The students would roar with laughter, and he would laugh with them, before proceeding to lecture on the structure of the other side of the veil until the class ended.

At this very moment, however, Apophis realized he had bowed his head toward that tower. He had developed a sense of reverence for the faith he had always despised.

A dozen seconds later, that mouth retreated.

With a swoosh, the pigeons on the steps all took flight. The old water seller cursed something under his breath and slung his pouch back onto his shoulders.

Apophis could raise his hand again.

He lifted his hand, only to find he was clutching a piece of paper.

On the paper was his own handwriting, spelling out a sentence he would absolutely never write.

He had signed something during those dozen seconds, and he had come dangerously close to finishing it.

Apophis hurriedly stood up, held the paper over the fire to burn it, and then picked up his silver spoon from the floor.

After that entity left, the first thing the Black Earth River Master did was count his shadows.

He had seventy-two shadows, and he had expended an immense amount of effort to swallow each one: a tomb painter from Medina, an ascetic monk in the salt lake wadis, a tax farmer’s wife from the Mamluk era, a Franc scholar who had come over with Napoleon...

One, two, three... He counted to seventy-one and realized one was missing.

He couldn’t remember what was missing.

But an empty spot remained there, much like the hole left in a gum after a tooth is pulled.

This Virtuoso of the Abyss Tradition, whom he had painstakingly invited, had not only taken a pile of offerings for nothing, but had also exacted a toll directly from him.

The Black Earth River Master felt utterly helpless. He knew he was drinking poison to quench his thirst.

But he had no choice. The lord of the hunt held three syllables of his true name.

Every time that bastard blew the Horn and revealed half a syllable, he would be in agonizing pain for a long time.

If the other party ever mastered his complete true name... He didn’t even dare to imagine what his fate would be.

”High Priest?”

Apophis had probably just gotten up from his chair.

”How are things on your end?” the Black Earth River Master asked. From the other side of the mirror, there was only the faint clink of porcelain.

”...My spoon fell to the bottom of the cup.”

That was all he ultimately said.

”Hmm.”

He didn’t plan to press the issue, and Apophis didn’t plan to elaborate.

”Then it’s settled. The time will be the night of the winter solstice, Wednesday, December 22nd.”

The mirror dimmed, and Apophis hung the Bronze Mirror back on the wall.

He took his hat, put it on, and pushed the door open.

Horus was standing outside the door. His face was wrapped in bandages, revealing only his eyes and mouth. The bridge of his nose was caved in.

A peregrine falcon perched on his left shoulder, burying its head beneath its wing.

Apophis cast a glance at the bandages wrapped around his face.

”You don’t need to stand guard today. Go get your face treated. Standing outside my door like that, people might think I’m hosting a funeral.”

The brown-skinned professor walked into the alley. The sun was slanting to the west. At the mouth of the alley squatted a child selling dates.

The child looked up at him.

”Sir, why are you sweating?”

Apophis reached up and touched his forehead. His hand came away covered in sweat.

...

Coppersmith Street in the old city rang with the sound of hammers from dawn till dusk. Walking down the middle of the street, one had to shout to speak.

The old bone-setter lived behind a green door in the middle of the street.

The old man was blind in his left eye. He unwrapped the bandages on Horus’s face and leaned in close with his good eye, examining it for a long time.

”Who hit you?”

”A big guy.”

”How big?” Horus thought for a moment, then gestured with his hand. ”Only a bit shorter than a camel.”

The old man let out an ”ah.” ”And you still fought him?”

”I won. Both of us went down at the time, but I stood up first.”

The old man roared with laughter. He reached out, pressed down on Horus’s face, and gave a forceful push.

Horus immediately snapped his mouth shut, veins popping on his forehead from the sheer pain.

Once the treatment was finished, Horus fished some coins out of his pocket and tossed them over.

The old man went inside to mix a poultice, while Horus sat in the courtyard waiting, his mind racing.

Just now, standing outside Apophis’s door, he had heard everything.

In the corner of the courtyard lay a stack of old paper used for wrapping poultices, printed with pharmaceutical advertisements in Franc.

Horus reached over and tore off a sheet. Using his fingernail, he forcibly etched out words onto the advertisement page:

”Winter solstice, Gotthard. Don’t let your people near the mountain pass.”

Once finished, he folded the paper to the size of a fingernail and clenched it in his palm. Outside the green door, a Greek man walked by carrying canvas.

The man smuggled canvas between the Port of Alexandria and Cairo, selling it to the quartermasters at the Mena Camp outside the city for tents. Half the old city knew him.

He greeted people as he walked, his voice louder than the striking hammers.

Horus waved him over.

The Greek man walked into the courtyard, clicking his tongue when he saw Horus’s face slathered in poultices.

”Brother, did a roof beam drop on your face?”

”Deliver something for me.”

Horus handed over the folded paper along with two coins.

”Send it to Marseille. Give it to the family that sells lavender in Grasse. The usual place.”

The Greek weighed the piece of paper in his hand. ”A love letter?”

”A bill.”

”Then it needs to be fast.” The Greek man stuffed the paper into his canvas roll.

”If a love letter is half a month late, the girl will cry at most.

”If a bill is half a month late, it’ll cost someone their life.”

He shouldered the canvas and walked off. Upon reaching the door, he turned back.

”That face of yours—do you owe someone money too?”

Horus ignored him.

The delivery of this note went extremely smoothly. Apophis was even acting as an escort along the way.

Apophis had even subtly leaked it to the others at his table, subsequently coaxing them into spreading the information as well.

Horus’s note ultimately landed in Hecate’s hands. The paper smelled of copper shavings and musty hay, alongside a hint of bird feather ash.

It could be the truth, or it could be bait.

Luring her people to the mountain pass, or tricking her people into staying away from it.

She strung a thread on her loom for each of these two possibilities, watching to see which way they would pull. Neither side stirred. Having no other choice, Hecate could only let the other six people at her table decide for themselves.

That night, six messengers departed from the house by the sea, heading in six different directions.

On the other side, Catherine sat on the second floor of a tavern, all ten of her fingers wrapped in cloth.

The night before last, she had followed a Serbian priest to a village upstream along the Vardar River.

That snowstorm had frozen an entire squad of men retreating from the north to death. After freezing to death by the roadside, these men just wouldn’t lie down when dawn broke. They stood shoulder to shoulder, staring northward.

An old Greek woman in the village called these evil creatures ”The Uncorrupted.” As a result, Catherine had cracked her Whip all night long.

Only when the tip of the Whip lashed out did those standing men collapse, their faces finally taking on the look of proper corpses.

When she returned at dawn, her fingers were purple from the cold, and her palms kept feeling a bizarre sensation.

Her hands were empty, yet it felt as if she were gripping something.

She couldn’t help but use her forearm to measure the table, the doorframe, and the book MacFie always carried with him.

In the end, all this measuring caused the white-haired giant to frown. If he hadn’t considered she was a girl, he would have smacked her across the head long ago.

MacFie had just returned from Mount Athos today. The twenty monasteries on the peninsula had forbidden women from coming ashore for a thousand years; even keeping hens was prohibited.

When they arrived at the docks, the monks had politely stopped Catherine, keeping her on the boat.

She had filled several entire pages with written protests on the boat. MacFie read them page by page, folded them up, and handed them back to her.

”Female cats seem to be allowed,” the white-haired giant had said at the time.

Catherine wrote in her notebook: ”Then I’ll dress up as a cat.”

In the end, her disguise didn’t succeed. The professor could only stay on the mountain alone for half a month, copying and returning with a large box of Byzantine manuscripts, along with a body full of fleas.

At this moment, MacFie was sitting on the other side of the room, combing his beard with a small iron comb.

With every stroke, he would glance at the comb’s teeth, his expression utterly serious.

Just then, a grey moth landed on Catherine’s notebook.

She reached out with her cloth-wrapped fingers. The moment the moth folded its wings, it transformed into a piece of paper.

On the paper was Hecate’s handwriting: ”Winter solstice, Gotthard. Don’t let your people near the mountain pass.”

A line of notes was attached at the end: ”The source of this intelligence is unknown.” Catherine flipped open her notebook and hurried over to MacFie, frantically scribbling a line: ”Richard is in the Apennine!”

After writing it, she couldn’t help but underline ”the Apennine” for emphasis.

MacFie put down the iron comb.

”I know. I heard that kid and Old Mo went from Milan to Genoa.”

”With Old Mo watching him, he won’t starve or freeze to death.”

”But you—take a look at your own fingers first.”

Catherine lowered her head and looked at her ten cloth-wrapped fingers.

She flipped to a new page and wrote: ”It’s nothing.”

MacFie looked at the line. ”Then write him a letter.”

Catherine gripped her pencil again. Halfway through writing, she suddenly stopped.

MacFie’s head had leaned over at some unknown point.

”Can I see?” The red-haired girl threw her entire upper body forward, covering the letter completely.

”...Fine, fine.”

The white-haired giant raised both hands in surrender and retreated to his chair.

”I’m old. I don’t read young people’s letters.”

He sat back down and continued dragging the comb through his beard.

”When I was young and wrote letters to people, I also blocked them with my arm.”

Catherine looked up and wrote in her notebook: ”To whom?”

”A girl who married and went to Orkney.”

MacFie toyed with the iron comb in his hand.

”She wrote back then, saying my handwriting looked like a muddy field trampled by a flock of sheep.”

Catherine looked at him.

”Later, she married a fisherman.” MacFie combed his beard again.

”I saw that fisherman’s handwriting. It was even worse than the sheep’s.”

Catherine chuckled, burying her face as she continued to write her letter.

Once finished, she folded the letter, pushed it to the center of the table, and asked her Mentor: ”How do we send it?”

”The post office probably won’t do.” MacFie put the comb down.

To send a letter from Salonika to Genoa, it must first pass through Franc military postal censorship, then the Greek censorship, and it has to detour through Marseille.

”By the time the letter reaches your good friend, the winter solstice will have already passed.”

The white-haired giant was full of teasing when he said the words ”good friend.”

He admired his student’s blushing face for a moment, then stood up and pushed the window open.

Wind instantly flooded into the room, sending the papers on the table fluttering noisily.

MacFie then grabbed a handful of oats, placed them on the windowsill, and muttered a phrase in Gaelic.

The clouds above the sea split apart, and moonlight leaked through, paving a path of light. A wild rabbit fell along the light, kicked off with its legs, and hopped onto the windowsill.

It was completely snow-white, save for the very tips of its ears, which were black.

Catherine’s green eyes went wide the moment she saw this adorable little messenger.

She stood up and reached out with her cloth-wrapped hand.

The wild rabbit raised a hind leg and stomped heavily on the windowsill.

”Don’t touch it!” MacFie hastily stopped her from reaching out.

”It even bites me. It bit me twice last year and ripped out a tuft of my beard.”

Catherine’s hand froze in midair.

She thought for a moment, scooped the oats into her palm, and offered her open hand forward.

The wild rabbit’s nose twitched. It leaned in, sniffed her cloth-wrapped fingers, and then lowered its head to eat from her palm.

Catherine scratched it between its ears with her fingertips, and the rabbit closed its eyes.

MacFie stood by the window, his expression thoroughly unpleasant. ”...I’ve been feeding it oats for years, and I’ve never seen it so affectionate with anyone.”

Catherine freed one hand and wrote in her notebook: ”It likes cold hands.”

”What you have is frostbite.”

MacFie rolled the letter into a tiny scroll, tied it to the rabbit’s hind leg, and then patted its rump.

The wild rabbit bounded from the window, landed back onto that shining path, and darted west.

Finally, it vanished into the darkness beyond the sea, out of sight.

Catherine remained standing by the window.

MacFie let out a yawn and headed to the next room to sleep.

”Close the window. The wind is getting in.”

...

Hecate’s letter arrived in Genoa first. The grey moth landed on the teak boards of the Mahabharata.

After reading it, Richard considered that the winter solstice was December 22nd. On Yule Eve, the lord of the hunt was going to descend into the Deep Realm, and the entrance was at Gotthard.

The Chief had told them not to go near the mountain pass, but he had already promised he would go to that very pass.

What would be at the mountain pass? The letter hadn’t mentioned a single word about it.

He figured that if he went and asked the lord of the hunt now, the lord of the hunt would likely just reply: ”Stick close to the procession when the time comes.”

All he could do was prepare himself as much as possible.

Mercury was still waiting for a telegram from the supplier in the New Continent; there was still no definite word regarding the bark paper.

Mortimer never went to the docks to check on the status of his ritual materials; he left all such chores for his student to handle.

Ever since the old professor got his hands on that tin of Darjeeling, he had planted himself in the small parlor downstairs at the tavern.

The landlady insisted on putting lemon in his tea, while he insisted on milk.

The two couldn’t speak each other’s language and relied entirely on gestures.

During these days of waiting, Richard’s [Speculation] slowly crept up to 97%.

At night, he borrowed a magnifying glass from the landlady. Her husband used to be a pilot at the Port Authority, and this magnifying glass was what he used to read tide charts.

”Return it when you’re done,” the landlady said.

Richard took the magnifying glass upstairs, opened the teak boards, and turned directly to the passage describing the night before the heroes set out for war.

Along the edges of the palm leaves were minuscule annotations that could only be read with a magnifying glass. Richard’s [Learning: General Knowledge] began to take effect, analyzing the context.

It took him over half an hour to mostly decipher a single line of the annotations.

The annotations were written in Javanese. The person who wrote them was a shadow puppet artist. The Javanese called shadow puppet artists ”dalang.”

A shadow puppet play ran from dusk till dawn. Hundreds of puppets were manipulated entirely by the dalang alone, and all the singing and spoken lines were performed by the dalang alone as well.

Everything the dalang had written on the edges of the leaves were hands-on insights on manipulating the puppets. They were disjointed and rambling, much like the casual mutterings of a master teaching a disciple:

Before the play starts, plant the Gunungan right in the center of the screen.

The Gunungan is a puppet shaped like a tree, and also like a mountain. Birds hide in its leaves, and guardian beasts crouch beneath its roots.

Once the Gunungan is planted in the center, the play begins.

Throughout the long night, kings come, gods arrive, and brothers fight each other—and all of them must detour around the Gunungan. Before dawn breaks, remember to plant the Gunungan back in the center. Only when the Gunungan is replaced is the play truly over.

”If you forget to put it back, the shadows on the screen will keep acting endlessly. The play won’t end even when the lamp oil burns dry.”

Squeezed onto the very edge of the leaf was another line, so small it was barely legible:

”The entire play is lit by only a single lamp. The lamp hangs above the dalang’s head. The king’s shadow, the god’s shadow, the demon’s shadow—they are all cast by the exact same lamp.”

Richard put down the magnifying glass and rubbed his eyes. He thought of his own shadow, then turned back a few more leaves:

The audience sits on two sides. Those sitting in front of the screen see the shadows. Those sitting on the dalang’s side see the puppets themselves.

”The old folks say that those sitting on the side of the shadows are gods, and those sitting on the side of the puppets are humans.”

According to the dalang, the side casting the shadow was actually the front of the screen.

The gods sat before the screen, watching with relish as one shadow cut down another. They would never go around to the back of the screen to look at the slaughtered leather puppet.

In Richard’s previous understanding, the main body remained on the puppet side, and the shadow was merely an avatar cast onto the other side of the screen.

[Speculation lv.4, 97%→98%.]

Behind the leaf with the bizarre annotations was a third marginal note, written in Latin. After reading it, Richard tossed and turned all night. He got up at the crack of dawn and rushed to the library at the University of Genoa to conduct research, harboring a premonition that the advancement conditions for [Speculation] would unlock in the coming days.

Mortimer mentioned he also happened to be looking for a book, so he tagged along with Richard.

The University of Genoa library had been a college for the Society of Jesus two centuries ago.

Richard and Mortimer stopped in front of the circulation desk. Sitting behind it was an average-sized librarian in his forties.

The librarian was looking down, logging entries, a pencil tucked behind his ear.

Richard and Mortimer exchanged a glance, doubt in both their eyes. Neither of them could be sure if the librarian in front of them was a Master.

The librarian looked up, pulled the pencil from behind his ear, and scratched his scalp with it a couple of times. He then asked in a gruff voice, speaking in the local Genoese dialect:

”What books are you two gents looking to borrow?”

The moment he opened his mouth, a reek of garlic puffed out.

’A Master couldn’t possibly be this sloppy, could he?’ Richard thought.

Mortimer shifted his cane to his other hand, exhaled softly, and replied politely:

”Excuse me, we would like to borrow Kircher’s Illustrated Eastern Continent.” Illustrated Eastern Continent was printed in Amsterdam in 1667. It was thick enough to crush a man to death. The book detailed the writing systems, religions, and customs of the East, and included a set of copper plates depicting the Sanskrit alphabet.

Richard found the copper plates printed with Sanskrit letters in the massive Illustrated Eastern Continent and forcibly memorized the letters one by one.

After closing the book and returning to the tavern, he opened the teak boards once more and read Roth’s marginal notes against the Sanskrit letters.

The Latin marginal note was written next to the story of Ashwatthama. The handwriting was neat and tidy; one could tell at a glance that it was the penmanship of someone who had practiced in a monastery:

When a Brahmin imparts the mantras of celestial weapons, according to ancient custom, the incantations for both summoning and withdrawing must be taught together. Neither can be omitted.

”When Drona taught the mantra for Brahma’s Head to his son Ashwatthama, he only taught the summoning. He knew Ashwatthama’s temper all too well, so he deliberately taught him the summoning alone.”

Below the marginal note was a passage about the story of Karna.

Karna was a child adopted by a charioteer. He lied, claiming to be a Brahmin, and became a disciple under Parashurama to learn martial arts.

One day, Parashurama fell asleep resting his head on Karna’s lap. A bug burrowed into Karna’s thigh, biting him until blood spilled all over the ground.

Karna, terrified of waking his teacher, clenched his teeth and remained motionless.

When Parashurama awoke and saw the ground covered in blood, he immediately realized Karna’s true identity. A Brahmin could not endure the agony of a bug burrowing into their thigh; only a warrior could bear it.

Parashurama cursed Karna, declaring that the mantras Karna had learned would abandon him precisely when he needed them most. Karna ultimately died on the battlefield. Right before his death, his chariot wheels sank into the mud. When Karna jumped down to push the wheel out, his mortal enemy Arjuna had already nocked an arrow.

Karna remembered every single word of the mantra, but he could not remember how to use it at all.

The annotation started a new line below Karna’s story:

The mantra for summoning can be copied, it can be eavesdropped, or it can be swindled, just like Karna did.

The mantra for withdrawing is never written on paper. Only when a master fully trusts a disciple will they speak it face to face. If the master refuses to speak it, the transmission of the withdrawing mantra is severed.

”Therefore, in the lore of celestial weapon mantras, the half that is always lost first is the withdrawing.”

Richard remembered the origins of the Broken Branch technique: he had learned the strike of the Broken Branch from Catherine’s notebook, and Catherine had learned it from MacFie.

The angle of the descending blade, the direction the edge sliced across the ridgeline, the precise timing to erase the strokes—[Erudition] remembered it all without a single error.

When MacFie himself used the Broken Branch, he always only cut and never withdrew.

[Speculation lv.4, 98%→99%.]

Richard realized he could follow the methods of the two immortals. If he wanted to retract the strike of the Broken Branch after launching it, he simply needed to find a landing point for the broken branch.