Chapter 166 - Runes and Sequences

"I actually haven't made contact with the third rune since the incident at Steamscript relay station," he answered truthfully.

"Ohh? Any specific reasons?" she countered.

Vern already had a line in his mind that he wouldn’t cross, and this one fell before it. So, he explained, "Well, the realm linked to Third Rune isn't exactly…amiable. Me shading my perception in there seems to have angered a higher entity that's omnipresent in there, and I barely escaped last time. I'm not sure I'll be lucky enough to repeat that and live to tell the tale."

After this note, there was a slight lull before she responded, "That sounds…horrifying. Could it be the Architect of Unseen himself?"

Architect of Unseen? Does she mean Cryptic Constructor? She most probably did. Such beings always had many monikers they went by, and he remembered that she wasn't very comfortable using their proper name last time.

After a bit of deliberation, he replied, "It's possible." If that giant eye in the sky was really Cryptic Constructor, then he was screwed.

"Ughh…that's not good. Not good at all. You might have witnessed a true Elden One. I was hoping to...coerce you into sharing what happened in there using my essence strands, but now, something tells me it won't be good for my sanity at all."

"Wow, were you always so evil and selfish?"

"Hey, you can't blame me for wanting to know the secret behind how new visions are formed. Did I tell you that someone like you shouldn't exist? You shouldn't be sane."

"How can you be so sure I'm sane?" he retorted.

"Very funny. Then, Mr. not-so-sane, what are your plans? Give up on Third Rune forever? I assume you've already reaped great permanent benefits from in there, and it wouldn't exactly be a shame to stop while you're ahead."

Lady-above, I want to know, too, he lamented silently.

But he realized this might be a good chance to consult her about this issue, and wrote, "Hmm, I don't think I am ready to fully give up yet. After all, I don't have a shade sequence to follow. I am more than a little lost on how and what to shade my perception with the next time."

"Ahhh…" she suddenly gasped before adding, "I…didn't think about that."

Vern asked, hopeful, "Any ideas?"

She remained silent for a full minute before finally saying, "Typically, one must follow their shade sequence religiously to avoid encountering things better left alone. However..."

Vern turned in his seat, eager to hear more. He had some ideas of his own but wanted an unbiased opinion from her.

"...there have been many instances where an Observer can't progress. The observation record of the next shade might be locked down by those in power, lost to time, or simply can't get their hands on a suitable resonant catalyst. In such cases, many a Observer's desperation has driven them to attempt shading their perception with visions from sequences not their own."

"And how did that go?"

"Not pretty. Not pretty at all. I don't know if you know, but it's almost just as bad even for sequences that can share visions with each other."

"I've indeed heard of that." He remembered Irene mentioning that Ambrose had imprinted another vision on his perception from a sequence that had synergy with his.

"Right. Even for closely related shade sequences, I've only heard of one or two successful transitions. I wonder if you could look to do something of the sort. Though, your situation is likely worse since you don't even know which sequences might synergize with yours."

I actually do, he added silently in his mind. For starters, if he just wanted to take the safe route, he could work to find what sequence included Instability Inducement as its first shade's vision and follow that record. However, he had no plans of limiting himself to just structure fundamental and wanted to follow what Lady Sylphina suggested.

Not just that, he also knew the underlying reasoning for synergies between different shade sequences. It was the fundamentals—they linked everything together. It was honestly surprising that even Esther didn't know about that. He had a hunch that Rupert knew about this connection, but it seemed even the Lightvein family wasn't privy to this nature of reality.

Hmm, but she does have a good point. What if I look for shade sequences that synergize with structure fundamental as well as one of the four other choices I had in mind?

The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. So, essentially, he would use that sequence's affinity with structures to make it easy for himself to adapt to it but then shade his perception with another vision from the sequence that primarily focused on another fundamental.

There was still an issue of whether he could retrofit them to his perspective of Balance, but his experience in the land of dark sun wasn't in vain. He knew exactly how to create a vision. It is about having a bunch of experience observing the cause and effect of my imaginary vision to make sure it can condense into a consistent internal logic, he reminded himself.

Molding an existing vision should be easier than that.

The issue was that outside the Third rune, one's perception didn't have any basis to start forming this consistent logic and instead reached into the unknown. One wrong move was enough for them to lose their mind for good—forget multiple tries.

On top of this, one's personal viewpoint limited what they could and couldn't do. So, if someone whose viewpoint was only good for creation fundamental tried to imprint a vision of dissolution fundamental, they were essentially doomed to failure even if they went inside the Third Rune.

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

When all these hidden factors were compounded and came with the repercussion of losing one's mind, it wasn't surprising that most didn't dare to step outside their sequence, and those that did, failed miserably.

If one didn't account for all these factors, it would indeed be a miracle for them to survive a transition from one sequence to another.

Which made him wonder, If I can give my perception a safe enough experience of other visions, is it possible I won't even need to enter the Third Rune? Lady Sylphina made it more than clear that his viewpoint had an affinity for all eight fundamentals, so that base was already covered.

He just needed a safe way to expose his perception to the cause and effect of another vision when simulated using his perspective of Balance. That way, he wouldn't have to create it from scratch but instead have it molded to fit himself.

Now, the real question is whether a sequence with multiple synergies would be enough for me to safely adapt to it, or I'm just deluding myself.

Suddenly, his hand moved, "Hey. What happened?"

Ahh, he jolted upright as his eyes focused, and he rushed to write, "Ahh, my bad. Got a little lost thinking about which shade sequences might be worth looking into." But then, he had an idea, "Actually, I wonder if it would be possible for you to find observation records for some sequences that I can use to study and see what can and can't work for me?"

"Hmm, that's not going to be simple at all. Other than the publicly available observation records, it's nearly impossible to get your hands on one. It's not even about money. What's left of governments ruthlessly prohibit the trade of Observational materials as they more than often just lead to innocents getting roped into scary business."

"And worse, no one really wants the world to have more observers of the same sequence as themselves. Again, you may not know, but Observers who share their shade sequence have an easier time disrupting each other's vision. So, even if someone has the observation record and its catalysts just lying around, they would never give it away to strangers unless they belonged to a different sequence."

Ah, right. There was that, too. In totality, this seemed to make the trade of observation records a bad business. He narrowed his eyes, "Hmm, then would it be possible to get something like a compilation of names of known shade sequences with a bit of explanation about each one?" After all, he didn't really need the full record unless he was sure it encompassed structure as well as one of the four fundamentals of his choosing.

"Mhm, not sure how that's going to help, but I can give it a shot."

"Thank you! Also…"

"Also, what?"

"You know a lot about the Institute, right? Could you share some things with me? Maybe knowledge about the third rune itself?"

"Well, I don't remember everything, but I can tell you a few things. What do you want to know? Just remember that I have to run soon, so I can't exactly dole out a history lesson here."

Yes! He cheered and asked, "How many axioms are there?"

"I…don't know. I don't think anyone knows. The thing is, many fakes float around the market, claiming to be the Axioms of Observation, but only the first two are guaranteed to be true. The rest haven't really been verified by someone of authenticity. So, any number I give you will just be a guess without any source to back it up."

Ah, damn. He was hoping to see the rest of Axioms in the Vigil's library, but if even Esther wasn't confident about them, he had doubts that Vena's archive could do better. "I see." he replied, not too attached to that question, and asked something else, "Then, would you happen to know the origin of this rune in my head? Or anything about it that you haven't shared already?"

"Hmm, so from what I've read, the Institute researched the Elden Ones and everything in the bounds of the cosmos during its peak, and these runes are believed to be the mimicry of patterns that capture the essence of each Elden One's singularity in a form that even our tiny minds can comprehend."

"Heh…" she penned, and he could almost feel the mirth oozing out of her words as she continued, "Unsurprisingly, even after such massive oversimplifications, thousands of observers have lost their minds, and many more will continue to do so. All in a bid to feel that hint of divine in their beings. To feel the connection. To emulate their singularities."

Vern absorbed this information silently and asked after a bit, "Makes sense. Do we know exactly how many of these runes are there? What do they do differently from mine? Generally, how does one get their hands on them? Also, do we know anything about the origin of the institute itself? How long ago was it established? What happened to them?"

"…"

.

.

.

"Gods, you really are a smelly fundamentalist. Almost had me fooled there for a second. Slow down a little, yes?"

Vern didn't know what to say to that. He was indeed excited about possibly learning answers to all these questions.

Soon, she added, "How about I dig up the records I have access to and write them down so you can figure out whatever answers you want yourselves? That way, we can avoid subjective interpretation of your questions on my part and spare me the headache of thinking?"

"The council of smelly typewriter approves," he nodded with great vigor.

"Anything else? I need to run. Mornings aren't great for chats, you know?"

Well, you actually started the conversation during my morning, he added internally before writing, "A lot, actually. Like, how's the weather, how's your life, and probably, maybe, essentially, what would it take for your mom to let me see the blueprints of those wings you have? But I guess that can wait?"

He'd never really forgotten about them and still wished to know just what kind of sorcery would allow one to fly in the air. Yes, it was apparently a mix of perceptual artifact forgery and fundamentalist mechanical engineering, but he would be satisfied just gazing his eyes at the latter part.

"Wow, were you always so evil and selfish?" she repeated his previous remark word to word, a funny tilt to her handwriting.

Yet, before she could go, he asked something that had him very curious, "By the way, are you really sure you don't want to…you know, learn how visions are formed?"

"Hahhh," she seemed to sigh. "I was joking, Vern. You think I don't know how precious that knowledge is? In good or bad faith, I have nothing to offer you that can come close to being an equivalent exchange. It would be a different situation if my family was involved in this matter, but gods above, I would kill myself before I share this with the likes of them."

Vern hadn't expected her to be so upfront. He thought she would deflect this matter like others. And what's that animosity towards her own family? A little ruffled, he replied, "I appreciate that."

"Okay, now I've got to go. I'll get back to you whenever I have both the things you wanted."

"Not the blueprint for the wings?" he asked, trying to lift the mood and not end this on an awkward note.

"Not the wings. They're mine and mine alone. I would like to hoard the title of the angel all to myself; thank you very much."

"Goodbye, fake-angel Esther. Take care."

"Farewell, smelly typewriter."

Vern closed the notepad with a hint of a smile on his face when the notion in his mind finally stopped for good. Peering outside the window, he watched as the scenery receded by until the carriage finally stopped.

He grabbed his cane and exited gingerly, thanking the driver as he did so. Luckily, he didn't have to pay the fare as this was a publicly funded carriage service. Given the prices Selena charged him for little things, he was really better off saving money where he could for future purchases.

To his surprise, Timekeeper Lane was quite deserted. Well, maybe people are not a big fan of Tuesdays? he chuckled and made his way over to the hotel.

He still preferred coming back here in comparison to sleeping at Vigil for some reason. Maybe it was his subconscious's idea of preferring normal humans over Observers? He didn't know.

Shaking his head, he grabbed the heavy knocker and rapped it. One of the butlers opened the door promptly, and Vern entered with a polite nod.

.

.

.

Suddenly, his steps halted, and he looked around with a frown. What…?

Something felt off.