It took Richard three full days, including Friday, to decipher the remaining two pages of coded language in Appendix C.
Friday night went the smoothest, as the vocabulary covered by the conversion table was still sufficient.
He just had to apply the substitution rules and then make minor adjustments to the word order based on context, and most of the sentences would emerge.
By Saturday afternoon, after he returned from the antique shop, it started to get difficult.
The further he got into Appendix C, the deeper the layers of encryption became.
Some words had been substituted twice: first, ancient Latin words replaced common terms, and then religious terminology replaced the ancient Latin words.
The conversion table from Mr. Hutton only cracked the first layer; for the second, Richard had to look up etymologies in religious texts himself.
Fortunately, with the aid of his Scholarship skill, he could break down word roots much faster than an ordinary person.
He spread *A Handbook of Church Latin Etymology*, borrowed from the library, on his desk. With his left hand holding down Appendix C and his right hand flipping through the handbook, he juggled several lines of inquiry in his mind at once.
Sunday was even more difficult. The encryption method for the last half-page had changed.
The encryptor had broken complete sentences into fragments and scattered them throughout other sentences according to a specific pattern.
It took him nearly two hours to figure out the pattern: extract every seventh word, and string them together to form the original sentence.
Seven. In many contexts of Mysticism, it is a key number.
Perhaps the person who wrote this code was trying to hint at something to the reader.
As he transcribed the last line onto a clean sheet of paper, Richard set his pen down, his fingers slightly numb.
He arranged his draft pages in order and read the fully deciphered text from beginning to end.
The contents of Appendix C were divided into three parts.
The first part, in an exceedingly restrained and academic tone, stated a fact.
Beyond the known material world exists a world behind the Curtain.
If the visible world is a house, then the world behind the Curtain is the plumbing and wiring within its walls.
The people in the house walk on its floors and live in its rooms.
They might occasionally hear sounds from the pipes, but the vast majority never investigate the source of these noises.
All phenomena that people call "supernatural" are, in essence, the Curtain seeping through.
The voices a Spirit Medium senses, the moving pointer on a Divination Disc, the unclean things expelled during an exorcism—they all point to the same thing:
Something has either leaked through from the other side of the Curtain, or someone from this side has reached across.
The passage was worded with particular care at the end of this section:
"The realm behind the Curtain is not uniform. The closer one is to the surface, the gentler the power that seeps through, and the more easily it can be understood and utilized by humans."
"But the world behind the Curtain also has depth. The deeper one goes, the more its rules deviate from common sense."
"In the existing literature, records left by Cultivators who have explored its depths are exceedingly rare, and their wording is often vague, contradictory, and filled with fear."
"The only consensus is this: something is waiting in the depths."
"Perhaps they have been waiting all along."
The title of the second part was: *On the Three Categories of Breathing*.
The text first clarified the concept: of all known starting points for extraordinary cultivation, Breathing is the most ancient and most fundamental.
The reason was not complex.
Breathing is a natural channel connecting the physical body to the world behind the Curtain.
Each time air enters the lungs, a minuscule amount of Ether flows in as well.
Pneuma, Ether, or what some texts translate as "spirit-breath."
The text described it as a substance from the other side of the Curtain that permeates the air.
It is colorless, odorless, and undetectable by any instrument.
The phrase Mr. Hutton had said in class—"instruments don’t lie"—took on another layer of meaning in this context.
Just because instruments couldn’t detect it didn’t mean it didn’t exist.
Ordinary people go their entire lives without ever perceiving it. It enters the body with each breath and leaves just as silently, without a trace.
However, a trained individual can, in the process of breathing, capture, guide, and accumulate Ether within their body.
This is the essence of an Extraordinary Breathing Technique.
The text listed three known major categories of Breathing Techniques, providing a classification framework and basic information, but no specific training methods.
The first category: the Golden Path.
This category of Breathing Technique seeks order and balance.
The origins of the Golden Path can be traced back to the Asclepius Temple.
That was the ancient Medical God Temple, which also served as the earliest medical school.
Due to its origins in the medical arts, the Golden Path is characterized by its safety and stability.
Most legitimate supernatural organizations consider the Golden Path the primary choice for new initiates.
The second category: the Path of Burning Blood.
Long before the Empire was founded, a group known as "Demon Hunters" was active in the northern forests and swamps of the Western Continent.
According to the text, Demon Hunter training began at the age of twelve.
Apprentices had to repeatedly alternate between holding their breath and performing Explosive Breathing in icy winter water until their bodies learned to automatically force Ether into their bloodstream on the verge of suffocation.
Many apprentices did not survive their first winter.
By the Imperial era, the old Demon Hunter traditions had been incorporated into a formal system, but their core essence remained unchanged.
The text’s evaluation was as follows: "Cultivators of the Path of Burning Blood often burn brightest in their prime, but few live to a peaceful old age."
For the third category, the Abyss Path, the text’s wording became extremely cautious.
The first two types of Breathing Techniques, whether gentle or brutal, essentially operated on "this side" of the Curtain.
It was like standing on a riverbank and reaching into the water to draw from it—the only difference being how much one took.
The Abyss Path, however, required the Cultivator to actively immerse themselves behind the Curtain, to dive completely underwater and try to breathe.
The text used a grim analogy:
A person who lights a lamp in the darkness can see everything it illuminates.
But at the same time, all the eyes in the darkness can also see that lamp.
The deeper you go, the brighter the lamp, and the more eyes there are to see it.
When Richard reached this point in the text, he realized he hadn’t turned the page in a long time.
His heart was beating much faster, and a vein in his temple was throbbing.
The information on Breathing Techniques was far more valuable to him than the high-level overview of the Curtain in the first part.
The advancement condition for Breathing on his status panel—"Learn one Extraordinary Breathing Technique"—was no longer just an abstract concept.
Now it had concrete categories, a traceable historical lineage, and a clear training rationale.
The Golden Path, the Path of Burning Blood, the Abyss Path—three roads lay before him, each with its own advantages and disadvantages.
Although Appendix C didn’t teach any specific training methods, it proved one thing at least: Extraordinary Breathing Techniques were documented and traceable.
As long as he followed this lead, he would eventually find a specific Breathing Technique.
He turned to the final page.
The third part had no title, only a single passage of text. The tone had also become somewhat personal:
"If you have read this far and decided to continue down this path, then please remember one thing."
"On this path, your most dangerous enemy is not the Evil Beings behind the Curtain, but your own desires."
"Everyone who steps behind the Curtain will face the same temptation: to go deeper, further, for more.
Ether is more addictive than cannabis, and the knowledge behind the Curtain is intoxicating."
"The growth of your power will create the illusion that you can go on forever, that there’s no harm in taking just one more step into the depths."
"Those who can stop in the face of temptation will ultimately survive."
"Those who cannot will become new, wandering souls."

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