I Loaded the Occult Panel

It rained through the first half of the morning, clearing up by ten.

On his way back to the dorms, Richard took a detour along the small path behind the main building.

Another recruitment slip had been pasted on the noticeboard, covering half of the military enlistment poster.

At the entrance to the dining hall, Fischer was slapping a piece of paper against a table.

”Someone changed the lyrics to my composition!”

”Changed them to what?”

”An insult to the dining hall.” Looking completely aggrieved, he read it aloud to Richard.

”Call once, no answer; call twice, no answer. Call a third time, and the cook swaps the meat for radishes.”

Catherine wrote a single word in her notebook: ’Rhymes.’

”You’re actually praising them!” Fischer nearly jumped.After lunch, Richard went to the professor’s office. Mortimer was cutting out newspaper clippings.

”Professor, I have a question unrelated to coursework.”

”When have you ever asked me anything related to coursework?” The old professor didn’t look up.

Richard sat down in the chair by the window.

”I want to ask if there is a way to guide that procession.”

The scissors paused. Mortimer pushed his reading glasses up the bridge of his nose and began.

”Before the procession departs, they stop where the wind rises. The hounds go first. Whichever way the hounds point, the rest follows.”

Richard’s finger twitched against his knee.

”So the ones who need convincing are the hound-keepers. What do they want?”

”Plentiful game, fat targets, an easy chase, and clear scents.”

”What they hate most is prey they can’t run down, and scents they can’t distinguish.”

”What about reasoning with them?”

”Try to reason, and you’ve already lost.” The old professor let out a joyless chuckle.

”They were taken in one by one over the years, and they have long since forgotten their own names. Reasoning with them is about as useful as reading a verdict to a brick wall.”

Outside the window, a pigeon landed on the gutter, paced two steps, and flew off again.

Mortimer suddenly looked up, the muddy haziness in his eyes completely gone.

”Where do you intend to lead them?”

Richard didn’t answer.

Mortimer stared at him for three or four seconds before picking up his scissors again.

”Never mind. It has nothing to do with a dying old man like me anyway.”

When Richard returned the next evening, Gerard handed him a map.

”I can’t get my hands on a military one right now.”

”This is a merchant route map used for running goods before the war. The bridges and ferry crossings are drawn in far more detail than on a military map.”

On the map, the canals traversing the lowlands were woven together like a fishing net.

Gerard planted his finger on a specific spot.

”Baldwin is here. Four li north of the city east of the canal—the one with the Cloth Guild Hall.”

”And Vincent?”

”Further south. He was relocated last month, but the family doesn’t know exactly where.”

Although he had heard from Senior Clara that the Imperial Capital had long prepared against enemy poison gas attacks, a vague anxiety still lingered in Richard’s mind.

He planned to see if he could find a way to redirect the procession toward the Flanders region when the time came.

Many members of the Ashford family were still on the front lines, and Coleman was there as well.

Whether the enemy actually succeeded in launching a gas attack or not, the arrival of the Wild Hunt would undoubtedly plunge the situation into even greater chaos.

And the greater the chaos, the better the chance to fish in troubled waters.

...

Over at the forage shops in the eastern part of the city, white requisition slips were nailed to the doors.

By the time Richard reached the third shop, the sun was slanting beneath the roof ridges across the street.

A shophand was using a short pitchfork to rake the last bits of chopped hay into a wheelbarrow.

”Looking for hay?” The shophand didn’t even look up. ”The Quartermaster Department requisitioned this year’s entire supply last month.”

”Just one bundle is fine.”

”I don’t even have one bundle.”

Richard sighed inwardly and slapped a banknote onto the weighing pan.

Only then did the shophand straighten up, looking first at the money, then at the man.

”Sir, are you keeping horses?”

”No.”

”Then what are you buying it for?”

”To feed a guest’s horses.”

The shophand grinned. Leaning his pitchfork against the wall, he dragged an extremely tight bundle of hay out from the back.

In the creases beneath the binding rope, the sun-baked hues of last autumn still lingered.

”This guest of yours, his horses must have quite an appetite.”

”They do.”

”How many?”

Richard thought of the vast, endless expanse pressing against the underbelly of the clouds.

”Too many to count.”

The shophand pulled the binding rope another notch tighter and hoisted the bundle onto Richard’s shoulder.

”Then this one bundle won’t be enough.”

”It’s enough,” Richard said, steadying the load. ”They’ll only take one bite.”

On the carriage ride back, pieces of hay slipped down his collar, prickling the back of his neck with a burning itch.

The coachman glanced back twice but asked nothing.

When the gates to 13 Chelsea Road opened, the butler’s face poked out from the gap.

His eyes landed first on the bundle of hay, then on the young master’s shoulder.

”Young Master... our stables are already fully stocked with hay.”

”I know.”

”Then this...”

”Leave it for now.”

Gerard sat in the rattan chair under the porch, an unread evening paper spread across his knees.

”What are you carrying?”

”Hay.”

”I can see it’s hay,” the old man said, his voice stiff. ”I’m asking what you plan to do with it.”

Richard stood the bundle of hay upright beneath the left stone pillar of the gate. Once it was steady, he stepped back half a pace to inspect it.

Gerard’s gaze paused on that exact spot. The tooth mark from back in March still lingered there.

”Families that leave hay out will have good luck in the coming year.” Gerard folded up the newspaper. ”Are you hoping for good luck?”

”I want that being to hear me out.”

The old man asked no more.

Tucking the newspaper under his arm, he tilted his chin at the butler. ”Turn the lamps down. Don’t let the patrols see.”

Past eleven o’clock that night, the gas lamp on the porch was reduced to a mere sliver of pale flame.

The butler tried to approach with a lamp in hand, but Gerard chased him back into the foyer with a single look.

His grandfather retreated behind a porch pillar, hands clasped behind his back, standing perfectly straight.

Richard ran through the phrasing in his mind.

”Horned Bearer, I seek an audience.”

”I owe no debts, nor do I pay debts on another’s behalf.”

”I ask for a seat for one night. I will earn my own merit, and I will seize my own luck.”

Finishing his request, he pushed a sliver of ether into the antler.

The ether field along the entirety of Chelsea Road sank toward the ground, pressing down completely flat.

In the distance, a watchdog let out half a bark before swallowing the rest of it back down.

What arrived first was the smell.

Frozen earth and horse sweat, mixed with the scent of green grass trampled to a pulp by tens of thousands of hooves.

A corner of the hay bundle collapsed on its own.

Frost crept from the tip of the antler onto the reins, stopping at the knot and forming a new shape.

Richard had seen that shape in the pile of rubbings in Corbin’s office. It read: ’Granted.’

Only then came the voice.

”You aren’t coming yourself?”

”I have an emissary.”

”An emissary?”

The wind strengthened a few degrees, swirling a half-circle around the gate pillar.

”Interesting.”

The sweat on the back of Richard’s neck trickled down his spine.

He was being weighed, just like the three syllables on the scale that night—not a fraction more, not a fraction less.

The lord of the hunt spoke. ”For tonight’s journey, I only concern myself with riding.”

”Those at the very front of the procession who do not blow horns will read the wind. Whichever way the wind drifts, the hunt will follow.”

”Since you wish to speak, I will give you a seat from which to speak.”

”If you can convince them, the procession will head where you say. If you cannot, you will simply run with us for the night.”

Far in the distance, Richard heard hooves pawing the earth—tens of thousands of them, rapid and dense.

”I wait to see where you will lead my hunt.”

The frost melted, flowing down the reins and dripping onto the scattered hay beneath the pillar.

Richard put everything away.

Gerard stepped out from behind the porch pillar and pinched a piece of the hay stalk between his fingers.

”What did it give you?”

”A seat to speak from.”

The old man crumbled the bit of hay between his fingers, dusted off his hands, and stood up.

”That is the most expensive thing of all.”

Richard looked up.

”And the most worthless.” Gerard shoved his hands into his coat pockets. ”If no one listens to what you say, that seat is just empty space.”

...

On the afternoon of April 26th, only a single pen scratched across paper in the staff room.

Clara pushed over the stack she had just finished grading and stared at him.

”You have hay on your sleeve.”

Richard looked down. Two pieces of hay stalk were caught in the seam of his cuff. Despite brushing it off several times the day before, he hadn’t gotten it completely clean.

”I carried a bundle of hay.”

”You pushed back all your makeup classes these past few days.”

”Something came up.”

Clara didn’t press the matter.

”After you get back,” Clara said, standing up and taking her coat from the back of her chair, ”remember to come to class.”

That night, the iron door of the training room was bolted from the inside.

Standing in the dead center of the room, Richard summoned his shadow and had it don the mask.

Only then did he realize something he hadn’t considered from the very beginning.

The shadow couldn’t speak. But if it couldn’t open its mouth, the ”seat to speak from” would be nothing more than an empty chair bestowed upon him by the lord of the hunt.

He transmitted the most ordinary sentence over through that thread of spirit.

”Tonight, the wind comes from the northwest.”

That sentence emerged from beneath the Mask of Hermes.

It produced no echo. The moment it entered the ear, it pressed a fully formed meaning directly into the mind.

Once impressed upon you, you felt an instinctual conviction that this was a voice you were meant to obey.

Richard stood frozen in place for two seconds, a thin layer of sweat breaking out on the back of his neck.

An emissary delivering messages for a god never needed vocal cords.

He tried three more times; all three times yielded the same result.

Then, he attempted to activate the [Mask of the Inverse Emissary], making the patterns of the twin golden snakes flip over within his Spirit Vision.

The snake heads turned inward, biting their own tails, completely sealing the mask from the inside.

The original form of the mask vanished, and the staff dissipated along with it.

He opened his mouth, but the words transmitted through that thread of spirit were trapped behind the sealed mask. Not a single syllable made it out.

Richard had long known the two forms were mutually exclusive, but when he actually tested it, he still cursed inwardly.

When the door of communication was closed, no one could define him. Yet, closing that door also meant he couldn’t speak a single word, nor did he hold the staff that forbade others from striking him.

By the time he returned to Chelsea Road, the butler was pushing open the woodshed door, clutching the remaining half-bundle of hay in his arms.

”Young Master, this... has long since dried out, and the woodshed is damp. I was thinking it’d be better to...”

”Keep it.”

”What use is there in keeping it?”

Richard thought for a moment.

”For the holidays.”

The butler opened his mouth but ultimately asked nothing, shuffling back into the woodshed with the half-bundle of hay.

Upon reaching the doorway, he glanced back, his eyes clearly saying: ’This family is getting harder to serve with every passing year.’

In the backyard, Gerard was squatting down, loosening the soil around the row of hollies.

”Got everything you need?”

”Everything.”

The trowel plunged into the dirt.

Gerard propped his hands on his knees and stood up, dusting the dirt from his hands.

”Make sure you’re back before dawn.”

”I know.”

As the last sliver of twilight fell upon the top of the backyard wall, the wind shifted.

...

At a quarter to five, the larks stopped singing.

That was the first thing Coleman noticed.

The cacophony of birdsong that usually grated on the nerves peeled away layer by layer until it vanished completely.

He straightened up and looked north. At first, he thought it was smoke.

Smoke always rose after the artillery finished firing—white, gray, and black. It would billow upward, scatter, and fade away.

But this didn’t float upward. It emerged from the front of the enemy trenches, pouring out column by column, hugging the ground as it rolled forward.

It advanced at roughly the height of a man’s belt buckle, forming a perfectly even line.

Across an eight-thousand-meter front, it stretched so far from west to east that the end was out of sight.

Its color was yellowish-green.

Baldwin vaulted down from a broken wall.

”Poison?”

”I don’t know.”

Flocks of draft horses from the forward artillery positions snapped their reins and bolted south in droves.

Coleman threw himself against the ruined wall and raised his binoculars.

He saw that the men in the Garrison Division’s trenches were all scrambling upward.

Once out, they ran blindly toward the rear, only to collapse halfway. Some fell to their knees and clawed at their collars, leaving their necks covered in bloody scratches; others propped themselves up on both hands, heads hanging low as they vomited white foam; still others writhed on the ground, rolling into furrows and never rising again.

The wind was carrying that substance straight toward them.