Chapter 626: Calling the Name

The candlelight was bright, and the silence in the study lasted for several seconds.

Asda looked at Thales expressionlessly.

"Is this question so important that you are this eager to know?"

Thales smiled.

"Not necessarily. It depends on how much you want to see my 'trick.'"

Asda lowered his head and looked at the wrinkled sky-blue invitation on the floor.

"This is not a transaction," his tone cooled, "let alone one using your mystic energy as a bargaining chip."

"Then this is not a transaction." Thales' smile did not change, and his reaction was extremely quick as he adapted smoothly. "It is mutual aid between teacher and student. Teaching and learning benefit each other."

As soon as the words fell, Thales immediately felt something was wrong. The air around him slowly stagnated.

"And this is not a joke either."

The Mystic's face was expressionless, his speaking speed extremely slow.

"Your mystic energy is strange and unpredictable. The consequences are unknown. One careless step may endanger your life--"

Thales gently raised his left hand.

Asda's words came to an abrupt stop.

The sky-blue invitation on the floor had already disappeared.

At this moment, it was clipped between Thales' fingers.

"Not bad." Blue light flashed repeatedly in Asda's eyes. "Impressive."

"Several months ago, when I was forced to knock and thus learned this trick," Thales lowered the invitation in his hand, and his smile gradually vanished, "I was in a dungeon, being chased and hacked at by an unreasonably powerful lunatic with a blade. We played hide-and-seek for an entire night."

The Mystic said nothing. Thales continued softly:

"All because he stubbornly believed I was the product of a conspiracy created by your old Three Calamities Alliance, even though I was born five years after the Bloody Year."

Asda's eyes moved.

He slowly spoke, his tone chilling.

"He discovered your secret?"

My secret.

Thales looked at Asda faintly.

That damned secret.

"Do not worry. He died." Thales flung away the lonely, weathered silhouette in his mind and spoke as if he did not care.

He died a long time ago.

The youth's tone changed.

"But before that, he did not 'possibly' endanger my life. He truly, actually endangered my life."

"The only reason I can still sit here and listen to you lecture me from high above instead of turning into prince-branded sliced cake..."

Thales lifted the hair on one side of his forehead, revealing a bald scar on his scalp.

"Is because I lowered my head fast enough."

Asda silently looked at him, silent as always, and no one knew what he was thinking.

"So this really is not a transaction, not a bargaining chip." Thales snorted coldly and raised the invitation, shaking it. "It is proof that I was dragged down by your 'glorious past,' implicated by the sin you once made, driven all the way into desperate straits by old grudges I knew nothing about, and almost lost my life!"

Thales seemed to alarm the residents above the ceiling. Scattered noises of mice scurrying came from overhead, but neither of them paid attention.

"This unlucky mess made me realize something: mystic energy is not only about itself. It is even more about Mystics."

Asda did not speak, but the lines of his face grew sharper and more solemn.

Thales took a deep breath.

"Compared with mystic energy that is supposedly 'strange and unpredictable, with unknown consequences,' perhaps the things you have hidden from me pose an even greater threat to me?"

"Therefore, for the sake of my little life, I need to know. I must know. I demand to know."

Thales lifted the invitation high and sent it flying to the other end of the room with a graceful motion.

"Now, who is Frelan?"

When his words fell, the study quieted. The two faced each other silently.

The duke stood before the window, letting moonlight cover his shoulders while leaving his face in shadow.

The Mystic stood in the room. The candlelight was bright, yet it could not cover the deep blue in his eyes.

Only the scattered sounds from the ceiling proved that this place was not entirely dead.

Several minutes later, Asda moved slightly and spoke.

"You truly are different."

Thales snorted lightly.

"No matter how many times you repeat it, you are still the twentieth." The duke shook his head. "No prize."

Rustle, rustle.

The increasingly tense atmosphere was somewhat suffocating, and the movement above the ceiling grew more restless.

"What if I refuse?"

The Mystic spoke flatly, his voice still elegant and pleasant.

Thales put on an expression of "as expected" and shrugged helplessly.

"Then there is nothing I can do."

"After all, you are the incomparably powerful Mystic. I cannot force you."

In the next second, the Duke of Star Lake withdrew his smile, his eyes focusing.

"But for the sake of my life, to avoid being harmed by your old debts, I can only think of ways to save myself, using all kinds of methods and channels to probe that period of history."

Asda said nothing. Only the increasingly anxious noises overhead answered the duke.

Thales lifted the corner of his mouth.

"And do you know? The Sunset Temple in the capital has an ancient library. The Royal Guards in Renaissance Palace left behind all kinds of records. Of course, do not forget the Secret--"

Before Thales could finish, the Air Mystic's eyes moved, and blue light burst out.

"Ah! Damn it!"

The dazzling light forced Thales to turn his head and avoid it. He cursed while raising his hand to block.

Fortunately, the strong light in Asda's eyes lasted only an instant before weakening.

Thales awkwardly lifted his head and blinked repeatedly, waiting for the afterimage in his vision to disappear.

"What exactly are you--"

Thales froze as soon as the words left his mouth.

Asda stood in place as always, elegant and calm, looking at him faintly.

But...

Thales realized something and slowly raised his head.

Quiet.

No. Dead silence.

At some unknown time, there were no extra noises left in the study. Only a chilling dead silence remained.

Thales stared blankly at the ceiling.

"Cleared," Asda said as his eyes slowly returned to normal, his tone drifting. "Including those in the nest and those passing through. Fourteen mice in total."

"No need to thank me."

Cleared?

Thales needed several seconds to understand this sentence, and could not help swallowing.

Damn it.

How was he supposed to explain this to everyone?

A wildcat had newly arrived in Star Lake Castle? The kind that catches mice?

"If you want a more thorough result, then around the castle, including the nests in the fields, I can..." the understanding Asda continued.

"Whoa, uh, thank you, thank you." Thales hurriedly stopped him. "There is no need to be that thorough. We have to leave my subordinates something to do..."

Asda nodded gladly.

"Please forgive me. I was distracted by that matter. What were you saying just now?"

Thales clapped his hands.

"Oh, that thing just now. In short, what I mean is, respected Mr. Sakern." The high-ranking and powerful duke smiled warmly, his attitude amiable. "We are teacher and student, guide and apprentice. On the long road of mystic energy, we accompany each other. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen communication and mutual trust..."

Thales looked at the guide he respected and admired from the bottom of his heart, his eyes full of expectation.

"What do you think?"

The room once again fell into dead silence.

Until several minutes later, the Mystic spoke softly:

"Respected Your Highness, are you saying that just now, you intended to use yourself to threaten me, in exchange for my compromise and concession?"

Thales coughed and withdrew his smile.

"Sorry. I only recently discovered this."

Thales exhaled and tried to sound sincere.

"Using myself as a bargaining chip is rather effective."

Thales weighed the Covenant in his pocket and thought sarcastically.

After all, everyone loves Thales.

Asda's gaze moved, and he stared tightly at Thales.

But several seconds later, he suddenly smiled.

"You really should look in a mirror and see yourself right now."

The Mystic's smile, which felt like an arc carved into the mouth of a puppet, made Thales' skin crawl.

"The mirror in the bedroom is broken. No idea when it will be replaced." Thales smiled with difficulty, cooperating with the Mystic's smile.

Depending on Scholar Julio's accounts.

"Wait. Aside from exterminating mice, you do not happen to know how to fix mirrors too, do you?"

In the next second, before Thales' smile had faded, blue light flashed again in Asda's eyes.

Thales felt a great force surge toward him. Caught off guard, he was lifted into the air, then dropped heavily.

Fuck!

Watching the ground approach at extreme speed, Thales angrily reached out to protect his head and face.

I knew this bastard was petty--

Thud.

With a muffled sound, Thales opened his eyes and came back to himself.

His feet landed on the ground. His back was suspended in midair. His entire body was awkwardly "sitting" in the void.

Asda had long since "sat" down beside him and was leisurely admiring the night scenery outside the window.

"Then, let us talk," the Mystic said calmly.

"Old rule. No notes."

Talk?

Thales reacted and frowned as he touched the "air chair" under his backside.

He soothed his thumping little heart and looked in disbelief at Asda, who had suddenly become easier to talk to.

All right. It seemed he was not that, mm, petty?

"Good."

Thinking this, the youth crooked the corner of his mouth.

"But before inviting me to sit, perhaps you should first ask--"

Plop!

Thales fell hard to the floor. Holding his backside, he grimaced in pain.

Ahhh--pain, pain, pain--shit!

"Then, may I ask," Asda looked at him calmly as blue light appeared to his left, outlining the shape of a chair, "respected Your Highness, would you like to sit?"

Thales clutched his backside and climbed up through gritted teeth.

Sit your fucking--

But just as the word "no" reached his mouth, the corner of his vision caught sight of the duke's old crooked chair behind the desk, mottled and faded.

In the end, the noble and dignified Duke of Star Lake could only smack his lips unhappily and sit down angrily on the "chair" Asda had prepared for him.

Shit.

Petty.

"Frelan Sanchet."

In the room, Asda looked at the small piece of night sky locked by the window, his gaze distant.

"That is her name. At least the part I know."

Frelan Sanchet.

Thales silently repeated the name in his heart.

"She was born in an extremely early age. It is said she witnessed the empire at its height. I guess that even among Mystics, very few surpass her in seniority."

Asda's words tightened.

"Before becoming a Mystic, she was an apprentice mage of the Alchemy Tower. After becoming a Mystic, her threshold name was Perception."

"The Alchemy Tower. I know." Thales excitedly raised his hand. "'Toward Omniscience,' right?"

But Asda did not give him a positive answer.

"You said what?"

"The Alchemy Tower. Their motto." Thales repeated from memory. "'Toward Omniscience.' It is right under that weird eye symbol."

Asda narrowed his eyes and looked at him strangely.

"This." Seeing this, Thales had no choice but to stretch out his hand and draw a line of ancient Imperial in the air. "Toward. Omniscience?"

The Mystic was silent for a long time.

"They do teach you Imperial, do they not?"

"Of course. Why?"

"Then you did not pass?"

Thales' little face darkened.

Try taking classes eight days a week.

What? You ask where the extra day came from?

Obviously, it was squeezed out of sleep time.

Thales asked in confusion:

"Where is it wrong? Or should 'omniscience' be translated as 'omnipotence'?"

"The languages of this world do not correspond one-to-one," Asda said coldly. "If that were the case, why would we learn anything other than individual nouns? When using them, one would only need to say, 'You, study, grammar, class, idiot.'"

Thales shrank back into the chair and crossed his arms woodenly.

You really do not need to be this harsh.

"And if you could be slightly more generous and magnanimous, noble, studious, knowledgeable, and progressive Your Highness."

Asda spoke faintly:

"If you could release just a tiny bit of the touching concern you show while diligently handling government affairs, worrying about the family, country, world, and people's well-being; if you could squeeze out a fragment of the time you spend standing by the window sighing over the kingdom's magnificent mountains and rivers; or if you could slightly divide some of the heroic courage with which you negotiate with me while full of grand ambition and ready to face death, then mercifully and magnanimously donate it to certain boring grammar classes that seem unimportant in your eyes, then perhaps you could luckily, coincidentally, unexpectedly, movingly, and as if by a miracle fallen from heaven, notice one insignificant point in an inconspicuous corner: in this sentence, what you call 'toward' in ancient Imperial is an abbreviated combination of noun plus verb."

Thales listened until his head spun, and only after great difficulty did he digest this long passage. Only then did the corner of his mouth twitch.

"Uh, you. You only needed to say the last sentence."

Asda ignored him.

So the ancient Imperial motto of the Alchemy Tower was not literally "toward omniscience."

For the dignity of his studies, Thales had no choice but to gather his energy and begin drawing in the air again.

"Then if 'toward' is a noun, it is not 'toward,' but 'path,' or simply 'road.'"

"Add the verb, and it becomes 'the road leads to omniscience'?"

Thales looked expectantly at his guide.

Asda did not even look at him, only spoke indifferently:

"Look at the case of 'omniscience.'"

Thales scratched his head and continued drawing.

"All right, let me see. Oh!"

Thales reacted.

"So 'toward omniscience' separately modifies 'road.' Mm, 'the road toward omniscience'?"

Asda snorted coldly.

"Now look at the case of 'road.'"

Thales frowned.

"Look again? But it only has these few--oh."

The youth's face changed again.

"I understand. 'Road' is a passive object. It has a corresponding subject and predicate!"

But Thales immediately became confused.

"But there is nothing in this sentence that can serve as subject and predicate..."

Asda snorted lightly again.

This time, Thales did not need a reminder before inspiration flashed.

"I remember. In ancient Imperial poems and aphorisms, according to context and logic, some components are omitted. For example, 'I' or 'I am.'"

Thales slapped his thigh excitedly.

"So what the Alchemy Tower says is, 'I am on the road, and the road leads to omniscience'?"

Asda was expressionless.

"Do you usually speak like that?"

Thales coughed and adjusted the language.

"'I am on the road toward omniscience,' rather than the simple 'toward omniscience.' Correct?"

This time, Asda did not speak again.

Toward omniscience.

I am on the road toward omniscience.

Thales silently repeated these two sentences and thought of the strange eye symbol of the Alchemy Tower. Something stirred in his heart.

"They are different."

"Very different," Asda suddenly said.

Thales silently thought for a moment and nodded.

"I understand."

"'Toward omniscience' is like the nameplate on a door."

"You only need to open it, and behind the door is omniscience."

Asda neither confirmed nor denied.

"But 'I am on the road toward omniscience' is more like a road sign halfway along a long journey." Thales' eyes brightened. "You pass it. You know you have not arrived yet, but you know the direction is right. Then, then you continue forward."

The former was a satisfied master guarding the door.

The latter was a burdened traveler on a long road.

They were not the same.

Thales was somewhat lost in thought.

"The muscleheads may be rigid and stubborn," Asda said as he looked at the moonlight outside, his voice faint, "but they are mages all the same."

Thales came back to himself.

"Muscleheads?"

The Mystic tilted his head.

"A derogatory name the Soul Tower uses to mock them."

"Understood. Then what do they call you?"

"Thinkers."

"Thinkers?" Thales raised an eyebrow. "Why not bookworms?"

"Because it is irony."

Thales narrowed his eyes.

Asda snorted coldly.

"We use the most direct and shallow insult, one they would never confuse or misunderstand."

"And what they use to insult us is irony that requires linking context, history, and reality, with an extra layer of meaning before it can be understood."

Thales' interest rose.

"Interesting. Even in their insulting names for each other, the Soul Tower and Alchemy Tower use completely different logic, right, Thinker?"

As soon as the words fell, Asda looked at him expressionlessly.

The air around them grew heavy.

Thales reacted and had no choice but to cough hard.

"Cough, cough. Back to the topic." The duke straightened his expression. "So, Mr. Sakern, Frelan is a deeply senior Mystic. Perception?"

"Do not."

"Do not what?"

The Mystic's tone instantly turned cold.

"Do not call her that."

"Either call her by her mortal name, or use the complete title, Perception Mystic. You may even casually mention 'perception' in a sentence."

The blue light in Asda's eyes was incomparably sharp.

"But only this. Only do not, while knowingly referring to whom you are calling, use such a pure, simple, crude method to directly call a Mystic's threshold name alone."

Do not directly call a threshold name?

Thales was puzzled.

"Why?"

The Air Mystic was silent for a while, seemingly weighing something.

But in the end, he still spoke.

"Because we do not know Frelan's current state. Whether she is sealed, whether she is complete, what her condition is, whether she still walks free and exists in the world, all are unknown."

"If, while knowing precisely whom your words point to, you call a Mystic's threshold name with single-minded intent, then if the other party is normal, they will feel it."

Thales' expression chilled.

To call a threshold name seriously, alone, and intentionally, and the other party would feel it?

Then that meant...

"Once or twice may not matter. But if it happens too often... Believe me, no matter how quietly, no one likes having their window knocked on for no reason." Asda ended this sentence with a warning tone.

Inspiration struck Thales.

"That amazing? Then I will try yours. Ai--"

In that instant, the surrounding air compressed toward him like mountains and seas overturning.

"No, no, no--" Thales flushed as breathing became difficult and waved his hands wildly. "Ha--ha--"

In the next second, Asda lowered his finger. Only then did Thales recover his breathing and gasp painfully in great gulps.

Shit!

He definitely did that on purpose.

"First, this action is not friendly."

Asda snorted coldly.

"Second, remember this. The Magic Empresses stand at the peak and summit of the mystic path. I deeply suspect they can, through some unimaginable method, sense and monitor known threshold names. Once a Mystic is called too much and reacts, those bitches can discover the abnormality."

The Magic Empresses.

Monitoring threshold names?

Thales pulled open his collar and said unhappily:

"That sinister?"

The Mystic did not answer, only looked at him coldly.

Thales could only continue asking:

"So a threshold name is like a website--I mean, an address? Once you call it, it is like throwing stones at that person's window?"

"And the Twin Empresses live in the highest mansion, holding sniper rifles--holding crossbows from a high vantage point as hunters. When someone's window sounds, they pull the trigger and take them out with one shot?"

Hearing this, Asda let out a deep, long sigh, seeming dissatisfied.

"Metaphor, analogy, inference. Always like this."

But he paused only for a few seconds before blue light rose in his eyes.

"No."

"In a certain sense, a threshold name is more like a great gate with a sign, using a mark to distinguish our territory and boundaries, warning others," the Air Mystic's eyes shone dazzlingly, and no one knew where he was looking, "to prevent us from colliding, oppressing, and killing one another."

Distinguish territory and boundaries.

Gate.

Thales frowned and pressed on:

"But if calling the threshold name directly lets the other party sense it, then it seems more like a gate deliberately erected to invite people to knock?"

Asda turned his head.

"Is that not precisely the meaning by which a 'gate' is stronger than a 'wall'?"

"It warns and separates, strictly guarding against invasion," the Mystic's voice seemed to come from ten thousand li away, faint and unclear, "while also leaving a gap, awaiting visitors."

Thales blinked painfully.

"A bit complicated?"

"You will understand."

The blue light in Asda's eyes slowly disappeared.

"When you understand."

Thales nodded and forced out a fake smile.

Thank you for that useless answer.

But he suddenly discovered that after he had demonstrated that mystic energy trick and firmly expressed his opinion that "I do not want to be implicated by your old debts," Asda seemed willing to teach him more, deeper things this time, even if they were harder to understand.

Inside the candlelit study, one large person and one small person hovered side by side in midair, one quiet and contemplative, the other gritting his teeth with arms crossed. It looked extremely strange.

"Then the Cleansing Plan from seven hundred years ago, the one meant to erase the records and history of magic, is it related to this?" Thales thought of something and immediately asked.

The Mystic turned his head.

"When fewer and fewer people remember you, and the people calling you become increasingly limited," the youth slowly sorted through the logic, gradually feeling it made sense, "then when your threshold name sounds, it becomes extremely conspicuous, making it convenient for the Twin Empresses to search for and hunt you?"

Asda was silent for a short while.

"Perhaps," the Mystic said faintly. "But it is more than that."

Thales was about to ask when Asda had already opened his mouth.

"Whether it is demons bewitching hearts and demanding victims loudly call their names, or religions spreading faith by making believers repeatedly pray and recite the teachings of gods, or even emperors ruling the four directions by making millions upon millions of subjects shout 'long live the empire' again and again..."

The Mystic seemed to sink into his own world again.

"Calling a symbol is always the most direct method for strengthening connection, establishing habit, and building authority."

"Mystic energy is the same. Even more so."

Thales listened through fog.

"I actually, mm, do not quite understand."

Asda lifted his head, incomparably certain.

"You will understand."

"Sooner or later."

Thales could only hug his arms tighter and laugh.

Thank you.

Another useless answer.

"And that is why, Mr. Sakern, you have always refused to tell me the threshold names of the Twin Empresses, including Mystics who have not yet been sealed?"

"That is one reason."

Asda said seriously:

"And you must be careful, especially now that you have initially contacted mystic energy, and even knocked. A mortal calling a threshold name and a Mystic sounding a threshold name are entirely different levels."

Thales snorted lightly and turned over on the air chair to face his guide.

"You know, you could have told me earlier. Just tell me what can and cannot be done, and that would be enough." The prince curled his lip. "This has nothing to do with mystic energy itself."

The Mystic was silent for a while.

"Believe me, Thales."

Asda spoke faintly, though it made Thales somewhat nervous.

"Everything that happens in this world, everything, everything..."

"Is connected to mystic energy."

Strange. Today, he had been speaking mysteriously the whole time.

Thales frowned and decided to turn back around and look at the ceiling. No. As soon as he thought of the fourteen dead mice above, Thales had no choice but to turn to the other side and face the door.

"So even Mystics themselves usually do not directly call each other's threshold names?"

"One."

Thales frowned.

"What?"

The Mystic's distant voice sounded again. This time, his tone was mechanical and indifferent.

"As far as I know, since mystic energy appeared, there has been only one, the only one, Mystic who from beginning to end, without the slightest scruple, habitually and even with unwavering conviction, directly called his peers' threshold names."

"As if those were our only names."

"As if that were the creed of his existence."

For some reason, hearing this made Thales shiver all over.

He turned instinctively to look at Asda.

"And each time one felt their threshold name called by him..."

The Air Mystic lay seated in the void, and his eyes, flashing unsteadily with blue light, stared fixedly at the ceiling.

Yet it did not seem like he was staring at the ceiling.

Rather, he was staring at something above it, beyond it.

Something else.

Thales rarely saw Asda like this.

"Who was he?" the youth could not help asking.

Asda made no movement.

But in the next moment, blue light flashed, and the Air Mystic's gaze, filled with blue light, locked onto him.

This startled Thales.

It was like a flipbook turning on the page, changing to the next frame in the blink of an eye.

"Fortunately, he and his brother have been confirmed sealed."

Blue light spilled from the Mystic's eyes and crawled like cracks over his face.

"Before they destroyed the world."

Those two streams of blue light made Thales extremely uncomfortable, and he subconsciously turned his head away.

In the next moment, the Air Mystic suddenly turned toward the sky and, with cold and wooden indifference, called out one word:

"Existence."

Existence.

Existence...

Existence, existence, existence...

This word seemed to possess a certain power. Under Asda's call, it spread with a faint echo that seemed both present and absent.

In the next instant, Thales had an illusion: all sounds and colors in the world disappeared together.

Even his thoughts stopped.

Everything ended.

After an unknown amount of time, he felt something move somewhere.

Soon, the ceiling, floor, walls, door... everything before his eyes and beside his ears gradually, slowly returned.

In the next second, the youth drew a deep breath and flipped upright.

Only then did Thales come back to himself and discover he was covered in cold sweat.

Asda sat beside him, just as he always had, calm, elegant, and indifferent as he looked at him.

Thales gasped urgently and blinked hard.

Everything was normal.

Normal?

The only thing extra, or rather, left behind...

Was a deep, omnipresent palpitation from inside to outside.