I Loaded the Occult Panel

The air around the table turned cold, chilling even the silhouette of the torch above Hecate’s head.

The crimson flame above Prometheus’s head flickered once, then again.

Richard watched in silence.

He had seen Hecate restrain her presence before, but she usually kept it loose and relaxed.

Tonight, she drew it to a sharp edge.

”I crafted the masks, and I gave them to you.”

Hecate spoke in her crone’s voice.

”When one is tampered with, of course I know.”

Everyone around the table carefully restrained their breathing.

”When he dismantled the mask,” Hecate continued.”Did he trigger something?”

”...When my master reached the seventh layer,”

Prometheus’s voice leaked from beneath his red-gold mask.

”a ’foresight’ vision sealed inside the mask was released.”

”What kind of foresight?”

”He saw a sea of fire.”

”Fire behind the veil.”

”The ether field of the entire workshop was thrown into chaos.”

”It took my master three days to calm it down. Several half-finished pieces he was forging were completely ruined.”

Hecate’s Golden Mask faced him, its overlapping eyes perfectly still.

Richard quietly weighed the situation.

Richard could produce fragments of foresight through his own divination.

But a vision severe enough to throw a Major Adept artisan into a panic... that was a deliberately planted bomb.

Whoever stripped the mask down to the seventh layer would take the blast head-on.

Hecate had probably rigged every mask with the exact same failsafe.

”Prometheus,” Hecate said, her maiden’s voice icy.

”I made the masks. I tuned every single layer to the person wearing it.”

”Letting someone else dismantle yours is like letting them take a scalpel to your heart.”

”No matter how steady their hands are... they might bump something they shouldn’t.”

Hecate left it at that.

She simply watched Prometheus, waiting for him to speak.

”...Chief, it was thoughtless of me.”

”I will have my master compensate you with an item of equal value.”

Hecate shook her head.

”Equivalent value is unnecessary.”

Her voice softened to its usual warmth.

”I only need him to do one thing for me.”

”What is it?”

Hecate produced a small box from her sleeve and set it on the table.

”Pass this box to him.”

She pushed the box toward the center of the table.

”Have him craft the item according to the blueprints inside, free of charge.”

Prometheus glanced at the box.

”...Alright.”

He reached out and tucked the box into his coat.

Hecate looked away. The matter was settled.

She had raised the axe high, only to let it fall gently.

Hecate didn’t say what was inside the box, and Prometheus didn’t ask.

But anyone at the table with a shred of insight could see just how shrewdly she had calculated this.

She had rigged the masks with a bomb as a failsafe, waiting for someone to take the bait.

Once the hook was set, she reeled in the line to force a new transaction:

making this fire-stealer’s master—a Major Adept artisan—craft something for her free of charge.

Demeter recalled her private discussion with Hecate about the masks after the last gathering.

Looking at it now, the old hen’s scheming was far sharper than the little chicks had imagined.

The rest of the trading session commenced as usual. Demeter spoke first.

”I’ve planted the box of Divine Throne Frost Pods that Hermes gave me last time,” she said.

”Have they sprouted?” Richard asked.

”Not yet.” Demeter shook her head.

”They are incredibly finicky. Seeds from the snow line wilt the moment they reach lower altitudes.

I had to carve out a separate cold zone in my fields just to coddle them. They’re more exhausting to care for than the most troublesome tree on my entire acreage.”

”How long will it take?”

”Optimistically, the end of the year. Pessimistically, mid-next year.”

Richard nodded. He was only taking a gamble anyway; if they grew, it was pure profit. If they didn’t, he lost nothing.

”No rush,” he said, leaving it at that.

Dionysus lifted his Double-Handled Kantharos.

”I have something new on my end.”

Reaching behind him, he produced a small clay jar. He popped the lid, and an incredibly faint, sweet aroma wafted out.

”What is that?” Prometheus asked first.

”I call it ’Twilight’.”

Dionysus tipped the mouth of the jar toward the center of the table, letting the sweet scent drift over to the others.

”One of the bonuses my mask gives me is Boundary Dissolution,” Dionysus explained at a leisurely pace.

”I’ve experimented with it for a few months and discovered that it doesn’t just dissolve the boundary between people. The line between waking and sleeping counts too.”

He brought the jar to his nose and took a sniff.

”Inside this jar is a wisp I gathered from an all-night banquet. It’s the most relaxed breath of ether expelled by someone hovering halfway between drunkenness and sleep.”

The flame above Prometheus’s head leaned forward. ”...Half-drunk and half-asleep?”

Dionysus tilted the jar back.

”If you pour it over a supernatural item, its seal will loosen.”

”Loosen in what way?” Richard was highly intrigued.

”It means you don’t break the seal itself.”

Dionysus explained.

”You just make the seal ’yawn.’ And in that split second while it yawns, a Scholar can steal a glance inside.”

”You only get a glimpse, but it’s completely safe.

You aren’t tampering with it; you’re just taking a peek while its guard is down.”

Richard nodded. This was incredibly valuable to him.

Whenever he appraised items of unknown origin in the past, he had to rely on Professor Mortimer’s method of brute-force dismantling.

Peeling them back layer by layer from the outside in. He could only see what lay beneath after stripping away the layer above it.

If he had this jar of Twilight, he could simply dab a bit on the seal’s outermost shell.

In the instant the seal relaxed, he could peek inside to see exactly what he was dealing with, allowing him to decide whether to dismantle it, and how to go about doing so.

It was the equivalent of taking a CT scan before placing a patient on the operating table.

”It’s still in the experimental phase,” Dionysus said, resealing the jar.

”The effects are a bit unstable. Sometimes the seal loosens, and sometimes you just end up getting drunk yourself.”

”So it’s not for sale just yet.”

Several people around the table chuckled.

Nemesis finally made her move around this time.

Her lips remained tightly shut, but a line of text materialized above the left pan of the scales floating over her head. It faced the center of the table, visible to everyone present.

”Due to special circumstances, I will be communicating with everyone in this manner.”

Dionysus spoke up first.

”That’s an interesting trick, Nemesis. Did you seal the mask’s radiation inside?”

Nemesis projected a second line of text.

”Yes. I used a Sealing Spell Formula.”

”What kind of seal?” Dionysus was intrigued now, even setting down his Double-Handled Kantharos.

”You managed to seal off that compulsion to ’even the scales’?”

A third line surfaced above Nemesis’s scales.

”It is a deflection.”

”The compulsion is still there, but it has been guided in a direction of my own choosing.”

A fourth line immediately followed.

”The compulsion to even the scales hasn’t weakened. Before, it would lash out wildly in all directions, demanding a reckoning from anyone I bumped into.”

”Now, it has been bundled into a single stream, driving only in the direction I point it.”

Richard quietly analyzed the situation.

During Debate Week, Catherine had nearly lost control; whenever she encountered anyone’s bias, she felt an overwhelming need to even the scales.

Now, that force had been braided into a single rope, one she could deliberately yank toward inscriptions and rubbings.

She had essentially taken a blade that hacked wildly at everyone and ground it down into a knife meant solely for filleting fish.

But what caught Richard’s attention even more was the other implication.

To craft a deflecting Sealing Spell Formula... she absolutely had to have a Major Adept backing her.

Following that line of logic, it was highly likely to be Professor McPhee.

During the few days Catherine went missing after Debate Week, the professor had probably crafted this Spell Formula for her, or at least guided her through the framework of the ritual.

Richard felt a quiet surge of happiness for her.

Catherine finally had a true backer, much like his own situation.

Another line of text surfaced above Nemesis’s scale pan.

”This Sealing Spell Formula is for sale.”

”Its applications extend beyond just the mask’s toll. Any directional radiation can be deflected using it.”

”However, a seal merely seals. Once the buildup reaches a certain threshold, it will still need to be released.”

”Asking price: Three hundred pounds in cash or equivalent value, plus one high-grade supernatural item.”

A hush fell over the table. Three hundred pounds was no small sum, to say nothing of a high-grade supernatural item, which was exceedingly rare.

Prometheus didn’t move, waiting for someone else to speak first.

Dionysus shook his head.

Demeter remained motionless as well.

The yield from her fields consisted mostly of raw materials and seeds. Scrounging up three hundred pounds wouldn’t be difficult for her, but she didn’t have a single high-grade supernatural item to her name.

Richard was even further out of the running. The meager savings in his pockets combined with his scholarship wouldn’t even come close to that figure.

Hecate, however, looked interested.

It was the first time since Richard had joined the table that he had seen Hecate make an active bid during the trading phase.

”Nemesis,” three overlapping voices echoed from beneath the Golden Mask.

”I’ll take the Spell Formula.”

The scales above Nemesis swayed slightly.

”Make your offer, Chief.”

Hecate slipped a small Cloth Bag from her sleeve and placed it on the table.

Inside was a bead the size of a thumb. It was pitch-black—so dark that it swallowed the light without a single gleam.

”This is from my own private collection,” Hecate said, offering no further explanation.

”Is this enough?”

Nemesis stared at the bead for a long moment.

”It is.”

The deal was struck. The two of them began conversing silently, their exchange completely encrypted.

Richard observed, deep in thought.

Why would Hecate buy a Sealing Spell Formula like this?

Did her own mask... also require its toll to be deflected?

Nemesis took the opportunity to post a new notice.

”I can now accept commissions for the following work.”

A long list followed.

Richard skimmed the text. It was filled with specialized Scholar tasks—dating inscriptions, verifying seal structures, cross-referencing rubbings... Every single item fell perfectly into Professor McPhee’s areas of expertise.

He grew even more certain of his earlier deduction.

”First we had Hermes’s appraisal shop, and now we have Nemesis’s proofreading stall.”

Dionysus’s voice drifted from beneath his mask, trailing a sour note.

He took a sip from his cup and muttered, ”I’m starting to think I chose the wrong career path.

All you Scholars ever do at this table is sell your services at zero cost, and yet they fetch a far higher price than any physical goods.”

A short snort echoed from beneath Demeter’s terracotta mask; she was likely laughing.