Richard took the cup.
Isabella waited until he had taken three sips before getting the conversation back on track.
"Take out all the Marvels you brought."
While he was drinking his tea, she had already placed an isolation barrier around the entire suite.
Richard sat on the low couch and opened his school bag.
He had already arranged the Marvels in his bag in a specific order before leaving.
The Sphinx Lamp, in the very back, was wrapped up tightly.
The Copper Pendant, Sophie Incense Burner, and Sun Emblem were on top of it. He hadn’t brought the military medal or the silver ring for now.
Four items, stacked neatly.
Isabella glanced at the miscellaneous objects and raised an eyebrow.
"Which one do you want to see first?" Richard began to rummage through his bag.
"Let’s start with the most important one, your signed Marvel."
Richard opened the bag.
The lamp was wrapped in three layers of old flannel and placed at the very back. He unwrapped it layer by layer, and the body of the lamp emerged from beneath the cloth.
The moment the lamp was revealed, the Ether Field in the entire suite wavered slightly.
Isabella’s right hand hovered an inch above the lamp.
She didn’t touch it immediately, first scanning it with her inspiration.
Richard took the opportunity to observe her microcirculation with his Spiritual Vision.
His aunt’s microcirculation was completely different from his Mother’s crippled circuit.
The rhythm was steady, the direction consistent. The entire main channel extended to her fingertips, finally converging into an extremely fine point of light.
It was a level of precision even Mr. Hutton couldn’t achieve.
As a Practitioner, when Mr. Hutton handled work of similar precision, he had to rely on external media like Rubbing Copies, paper, and pencils.
His aunt didn’t need them.
Her palm remained above the lamp for about twenty seconds.
Isabella withdrew her hand.
"Richard, the compatibility between you and this Sphinx Lamp has already surpassed the level of conventional ’resonance.’"
"Mr. Hutton mentioned the three conditions for resonance to you last time, didn’t he?
Prolonged close contact, sufficiently high Ether compatibility, and a sufficiently deep causal connection."
"He did," Richard nodded.
"Between you and this lamp, you meet all three."
"...All three?"
Isabella didn’t press the matter.
"Judging by the lamp’s craftsmanship," she returned to the main topic, "its original purpose was likely to guard the Gate of Two Realms in some Temple."
"Which Temple specifically?"
"There’s no way to verify that anymore." She shook her head. "And there’s no need to investigate it too thoroughly."
Isabella gently pushed the Sphinx Lamp back toward Richard. "It recognizes you now. That’s enough."
Richard re-wrapped the lamp in the flannel and placed it on a corner of the desk.
"Next... I need to tell you about what happens after signing."
She reached out and drew a circle in the air above the table.
"Mr. Hutton should have told you that a Tier Transition requires a signing."
"Yes."
"But he probably only told you about the process: carving the brand, letting the Curtain know of your existence."
"Yes."
"The process is correct, but he didn’t explain the layer behind it in detail."
Her gaze fell upon the lamp on the table.
"After signing, the Marvel will begin to change."
She took out a sheet of white paper from the desk drawer, spread it in the center of the table, and then picked up a sharply pointed pencil.
Isabella drew a circle in the middle of the paper.
"After signing, the Marvel will ’align’ itself with its owner’s Practitioner direction."
To the left of the circle, she wrote the word "Secret."
"The Secret Direction is the most complex. Their signed Marvels become containers or Casting Mediums."
"For a Spirit Medium, it’s a container to house a Spirit;
For an alchemist, it’s a vessel to seal intermediate products of a reaction;
For a Sealing Master, it’s a conductor that facilitates the flow of Inscriptions;
It depends on which specific path the person walks within the Secret Direction."
Her pencil tip landed to the right of the circle, where she wrote "Hunter."
"The Hunter’s Direction is the most direct.
A signed Marvel becomes a combat aid: amplifying weapon damage, manifesting extra armor, extending the duration of an Ether burst, and so on."
Finally, she wrote "Scholar" directly below the circle.
"The Scholar Direction is the most singular."
"Our signed Marvels can only be for recording and Analysis."
"Regardless of its original form—whether it’s a book, a Mirror, a bone flute, or a stone tablet... after signing, its function is always the same."
Richard looked at the paper.
He pictured the Sphinx Lamp and the concept of "recording and Analysis" in his mind, imagining what the lamp would become after being signed.
’Would a genie pop out and give me a lecture?’
’No, no, that’s a Middle-earth myth. It has nothing to do with the Black Earth River Basin.’
’Or maybe the Sphinx on the lamp would come to life and make me play a riddle game with it?’
’That’s a little scary. If you can’t answer a Sphinx’s riddle, you get eaten...’
While his imagination was running wild, Isabella raised her hand.
With a light swipe over the tabletop, a Sheepskin Scroll materialized out of thin air.
"Here."
She levitated the Sheepskin Scroll between them. "This is my signed Marvel."
"According to the rules, a signed Marvel is one’s lifeline and isn’t shown to outsiders."
"But you’re my nephew, not an outsider. It’s good for you to see it ahead of time."
She turned her head to look at Richard.
"Want to give it a try?"
"Try what?"
"You can try to cast Stone Armor in front of me."
Richard glanced at her.
"...Here?"
"Yes, right here."
Richard took a deep breath.
During the exhalation phase of the third cycle of Quadruple Breathing, a large amount of Ether surged from his Throne of the Sun to his palms.
He chose his left forearm as the target for the Covering Armor, and the Ether extended along the main channel to the outside of his wrist...
Halfway through its formation, it broke.
He could clearly feel that just before the Covering Armor was about to form, the Ether he had pushed out was quietly "read" from the outside.
After being read, the Ether dissipated, like a dismantled set of building blocks.
He looked up at his aunt.
Isabella’s hand was resting on the floating Sheepskin Scroll.
Richard frowned and tried again.
The second time, the Ether solidified a bit further back, dissipating at his elbow joint.
"..."
Isabella took her hand off the Sheepskin Scroll.
She nodded at Richard.
Richard tried a third time, and it went much more smoothly.
The Covering Armor solidified on the outside of his forearm, spreading from his fingertips all the way to his elbow with a light "DING."
After a full three seconds, he withdrew the Technique.
"What just happened?"
"That is the Scholar’s ’Analysis.’"
Isabella waved her hand, and the Sheepskin Scroll dissolved into the air, returning to some unseen place beneath her collar.
"As long as my manuscript has a record of the corresponding Technique, I can use it against anyone who uses a similar one."
"Your manuscript has an Analysis of Stone Armor?"
"Not necessarily the exact same Stone Armor."
"I studied Gargoyles in the past, but not too deeply."
"But I have methods for deconstructing several types of ’Universal Protection Class’ Techniques. A Scholar’s Analysis of a Technique looks at its ’Underlying Logic.’"
"Once I understand the ’Walking Technique,’ I can deconstruct that entire class of Techniques."
Richard’s fingers paused on the edge of the table.
He needed to properly digest what she had said.
’So this is how a signed Marvel from the Scholar Direction works.’
’Mr. Hutton’s Forged Blade and Judgment on the night of the Whitcomb Seal ceremony must have been another application of the same type of analytical ability.’
’Calling out the parts of that "Mother" that she couldn’t name herself, one by one.’
’Once they were named, she couldn’t hold her ground.’
’Isabella just used this analytical ability to completely block his Technique, which was more direct and better suited for head-on combat.’
"Aunt Isabella," Richard began, pondering, "what if the opponent uses a Technique that you have no record of in your manuscript, not even a similar type?"
"Then I can’t deconstruct it," Isabella answered bluntly.
"What if it’s only similar, not a perfect match?"
"I can use it to weaken them, but I can’t block them completely."
"What if the opponent’s Technique... is one that has never appeared in the academic world before?"
Isabella glanced at him.
"The Techniques used by ordinary Practitioners, those at Minor Mastery, and even Grand Mastery all have traceable origins.
No matter how much they innovate, they can’t break free from the framework of their respective traditions."
"Only Experts are different."
"An Expert’s Technique is created by the Expert themself. There is no second record of it in the entire academic world."
Above the circle on the white paper, her pencil landed again, and she wrote the word "Expert."
"In the literature you have access to, the descriptions of the Expert Tier are extremely brief."
"This is one of the reasons why."
She set the pencil down.
"Experts are all highly individual."
"The core ability of every Expert belongs to them and them alone."
"Its name, its method of activation, its area of effect... all of these things only take shape the moment they become an Expert."
"We have a specific word in our field to describe it."
She wrote a noun at the very top of the paper.
"Mysterium—the sublimation of a Technique."
"An Expert’s Mysterium is the culmination of every step they’ve taken in their life—from signing to becoming a Practitioner, from Minor Mastery to Grand Mastery...
It is the condensation of their personal tradition, and it is the final product of decades, even centuries, of repeated entanglement between their signed Marvel and themself, on both sides of the Curtain."
Isabella looked up.
"Sound familiar?"
Richard nodded.
"A bloodline Technique?"
"Correct. Those ’family tradition’ Techniques passed down from generation to generation... their earliest source is almost always the Mysterium of an Expert."
"Alright, all of this is quite distant from your current Tier. A general understanding is enough for now."

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