Chapter 24 - Canvas of Thought

Instead of a world that should have been tinted black and white, Vern was greeted with a pitch-black vista as if there was nothing to be perceived.

Something to rejoice about was that neither those alluring inhuman voices beckoned him nor did that symbol of Cryptic Constructor raze his mind. But this was in line with his conjectures.

This black perception confirmed his hypothesis.

So the issue back then wasn't that he had envisioned the changes to reality inaccurately. The problem was that the 'base state' of his perception was completely black. That is to say, it didn't perceive anything at all.

So, that ethereal form was helping me perceive the shades of gray for any concept of my choice.

But now that the form was gone, he had lost all those advantages and was left with nothing.

Vern closed off his perception, got off the bed, and went back to his chair. This was a great start! If there wasn't a risk in just observing, then he could continue his experiments with an assurance that he wouldn't unknowingly surrender his mind to some unnatural voices.

Penning the new events into the notebook, he reorganized his thoughts. The current situation entailed that he had a completely blank perception. But this time, he had an inkling of how to proceed.

Miss Cera had really given him a big hint with just a few words. He believed it was about comprehension. So the better he comprehended the concept he observed, the more detailed his perception would be.

But this argument had a few flaws of its own. Like, why was everything completely black? He definitely knew about light enough to not have an entirely empty perception of it. Maybe just knowing wasn't enough, and he had to actively think about it?

Not hesitating this time, he opened his perception once again to that black canvas. Ensuring that no voices were seeping into his thoughts, he attempted to figure out the lightness of the environment around him.

To start off, he gazed at the lamp that stuck to a column by the wall with his natural sight and directed his thoughts to discern its lightness. He considered how the lamp emitted light and illuminated everything around it and how the light generated from within was reflected by its metal frame. How—

Then suddenly, it changed. He was caught off-guard as something appeared in his perception. A bright sheen in the endless black overlaid on top of that lamp. I knew it—

However, before he could rejoice, it was gone. The spark that had appeared in the deep darkness of his perception out of nowhere in the blink of an eye disappeared just as swiftly.

Obviously. Nothing can be this straightforward.

Shaking his head, he focused again and directed his thoughts to dissect how exactly that lamp interacted with its surroundings. Its radiance, its effect of light in his room, the shadows it helped create, its reflection off the walls, and many other factors. Before he could go too far, a small wick of white appeared in his perception yet again.

This time, however, he didn't let the change disturb his concentration, and he kept going and mapped more and more effects of the light on the surroundings. The dark canvas with a sole blaze began to populate itself with a few more outlines of different gradations of white.

Minutes passed by, and sweat trickled down his face as he persisted in recreating the surroundings within his perception. He guided his thoughts to assess how exactly light reacted and what caused one spot to be brighter than the other.

Vern even contrasted different sources of light with each other comparing their nature and how their position made an obvious difference in their illumination radius.

It was a taxing task. His mind was already starting to feel the pinch. But he didn't want to let up.

However, something wasn't right. A lot of his speculations and deliberations on the nature of light didn't do anything. Just now, he had even gone for over half a minute without inducing any change in the perception at all.

I am doing something wrong.

However, he persevered, and another couple of minutes passed by in silence as nothing changed in the canvas of black that was speckled with odd grays. He was starting to feel lightheaded, and the process was draining his mental capacity.

Damn.

So he stopped analyzing the light and its ramifications. There was no need to rush it. He would have continued if the situation called for it, but a balanced approach was always better during experimentation.

He relaxed his mind and looked at his ethereal perception, which had a few wicks of flame, odd shades for the cage of the lamps, and a couple specular highlights where objects should be.

Vern scrutinized it with fascination when he realized something. It was changing. No. It was fading. Crack my fucking cogs!

It was fading away like before. All the progress he had made was being erased like it never existed. He had an impulsive thought to start inspecting light again and somehow stop the grays in his perception from dissipating. But he sighed and let it be.

It wouldn't really be sustainable for him to use observation like this. He wouldn't have five minutes in real life to first sit down and analyze the world and then anxiously maintain his perception—always fearful of losing the grays.

So he instead tried to determine the underlying logic of this phenomenon. A few things struck him as odd. The first was the fact that a lot of his thoughts didn't incite any shift in the grays of the perception. Second was this whole business of his perception just fading away.

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There was no way Hensen was repeatedly doing all this while envisioning those mind-boggling changes to the environment. So he must be missing something.

He waited until his perception became pitch black for a third time before inscribing the peculiarities on the notepad. Wiping away the sweat, he rested his forehead on the edge of the desk. That was more draining than he'd have thought. His empty stomach didn't help, either.

Time moved on like this as he relaxed his mind. Then hearing the subtle chime of the thirty-minute mark from the clock tower, he sat up straight once again.

He had to change his strategy. He was doing something wrong. What other information did he have that could give him some clarity on Observation? The burden of Cryptic Constructor sounded like one such avenue, but he wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole if he had a choice.

He was on the right track since he was able to shade his perception to an extent, but the problem was that it was temporary and too inefficient.

Hmm.

He tried to remember the words from the 'Observation Record of Subjectivity.' Its primary idea was to view the world through a unique perspective. But he was already doing that, right?

Actually. He might not have been doing that. Just now, he had tried to rationalize the lighting of the room like he would Fundamentals. Logically following the effect and cause to comprehend it further. But was it really done subjectively?

That might be it! He had neglected to think about the matter more subjectively. That would mean he should have used his insights of balance to analyze the concept.

Well, that sounded like a solid plan. So he tried to think what 'balance' would even mean in such a situation.

In a short minute, he already had an idea. Steering his thoughts to consider the lightness and darkness, he looked at the darkest corner of the room and chose it to be one end of the spectrum. Then he shifted his gaze to the lamp and elected it to be the other end of the spectrum.

A white wick appeared in his perception once again, but this wasn't all he had thought up. Looking at the notepad in front of him, he mentally compared its brightness to the lamp and the dark corner and assigned it a shade of gray based on where it sat in terms of brightness on the spectrum.

To his surprise and delight, a gray rectangular outline appeared in his perception. One that was much more well-defined than his last try. Not letting this little victory get to his head, he kept going. Primed to repeat the success, he looked at the bright part of the couch and mentally assigned it a cloudy color based on how it fared relative to that lamp and the corner. As if on cue, a soft cloudy patch appeared in his perception.

He repeated this process for other items one by one, and new shades started populating the black canvas every few seconds. Every time he assigned a shade to another object, he had to make sure that the gray that he chose was actually logical and precise—because his perception wasn't correcting any of his mistakes.

He had erroneously assigned a darker balance to the bright clock in his fatigue, and his perception represented it as it was. That is to say, it was really akin to a canvas that he could paint however he liked. But he was sure that incorrectly perceiving the world around him wouldn't do him any favors. It might actually be detrimental instead since what he perceived wouldn't be consistent with reality, and this would devolve into the same situation as in the library.

Shaking his head, he focused back on the exhausting task of assigning a balance to the hearth.

A few more shapes took color in his perception, and it kept becoming more detailed. His head was feeling heavier and heavier by the second, and this continuous cycle of comparing luminescence was becoming tough to keep up. And now assigning balance to even one more object seemed impossible.

Ughh!

But this wasn't enough to get him to give up. He hadn't reached his tipping point just yet.

His perception was much more comprehensive compared to the last time. Though it wasn't even close to what he had back during Enlightenment. It was like a black painting with some blotches of grays painted by some amateur, but he felt like it was a masterpiece that just needed more work.

So he looked at the top of that vase and asserted that it should be a slate gray since it was far from the lamp and was mainly lit by the moonlight from the window.

But nothing happened.

Huh?

Why didn't that work? He was sure that he had done exactly what he'd been doing so far. Even if it was taxing, he had done it correctly. So he concentrated on the vase once again and assigned it a similar balance.

Not a single thing changed.

What the hell is this now?

Not ready to give up just yet, he shifted his gaze to another lamp in the room and tried assigning it a balance close to the bright extreme of the spectrum.

Nope. Nothing's working!

This was the same situation as his previous attempt, where he wasn't thinking about it subjectively. He kept trying, but no new balances materialized. Any and all grays he tried to perceive didn't manifest, and his perception became completely static.

No. It wasn't static. The grays were actually losing their brightness by the second.

Not again! He involuntarily crumpled the page of the notepad as his perception began to lose all its details rapidly.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

A sudden knocking echoed in his ears, and Vern jerked back as he inadvertently let go of the pen, which fell on the desk with a clang. The dark space with gray speckles which overlaid his natural sight was gone without a trace as he lost any and all concentration.

"Hotel service here with your dinner, sir."

Fuck. That blew all the steam out of me!

"Yes, give me one second."

Smoothing out the crumpled page, he closed the notepad and got up. Making his way to the door, he opened it and was greeted by the sight of Beaumont once again, who was standing next to a lavish multi-level food cart that didn't have as many dishes on it to justify the use. This wasn't the person that usually delivered his meals.

Vern didn't say anything, but as if understanding his questioning gaze, Beaumont admitted with a bitter tone, "We're indeed quite short-staffed right now. Three of us are cooking, and two are fixing the leaks while the rest are in the basement, pumping the furnace. Can't have the guests sleep in the cold, can we?"

He seemed to not expect any response as he pushed the cart into the room without a pause.

Vern comforted the old man, "I wouldn't really know where to go if not for the hotel. So know that your services are very much appreciated in these trying times."

The butler tersely nodded and stopped the cart next to the dining table in the room. Two silver cloche lids rested on the top shelf of the magnificent bronze cart, hiding something sumptuous within. A subdued smile appeared on Beaumont's face as he lifted both the lids just a tad and swirled them around the dish beneath before uncovering them wholly in a swift motion.

Vern forgot all about his problems as the aroma filled the room, and his stomach reminded him of its existence, delivering intense pangs of hunger, which he had been disregarding for quite a while. The plate on the left had potato and a bowl of leek soup while an elegantly prepared roasted guinea fowl rested on the right one, all in judicious portions.

He didn't wait for Beaumont to explain as he walked towards the food, only to be interrupted abruptly.

"FUCK! Stop knockin! What in the name of four hells is wrong with ye fuckers? I said I don't need nothin!" a muffled shout seeped in from the room next door.

Beaumont, who was transferring the plates over to the table, halted midway and stood up straight holding the dish palm-up, looking to where the sound originated from. Vern was just as taken aback as he turned around and focused on the sound.

"I tell ye. If ye don't fuckin stop right now, I'll shoot ye right in the head. Yer hotel be damned!"

Vern glanced back at Beaumont, and their gazes met as both of them looked at each other with confusion. What knocking is this guy yelling about? No one was knocking. He would've heard it quite a while ago if it was as annoying as he insinuated.

Beaumont elegantly placed the platter on the table and walked towards the door, and Vern followed right behind him.

"Alright! I see. Ye won't see the coffin until ye're nailed. Then let me clip yer head with some iron."

However, before Vern could even reach the door, a multitude of sounds resounded in his ears.

"AAAAAHHHH!"

BANG