Krafft's Anomaly Notes

Chapter 352 Tower of Babel

"You're welcome. You can read any of the books here. Just be careful with them, as some of them are no younger than me."

The gray-haired old priest opened the window for the two visitors, and the long-lost light from outside entered the only locked room in this chapel, illuminating the outline covered by cloth.

The wooden floor creaked underfoot, with bits of stale bran grains scattered in the cracks.

"Sorry, it's a bit dusty and I haven't opened it for a long time." The priest coughed a series of times and uncovered half of the cloth, revealing several layers of bookshelves filled with volumes and small bags of crushed lime.

"After that, it became difficult for young monks to stay here permanently. When there are not enough people, these things will become a big problem. After all, there are many people who don't understand the value of knowledge, but few people who don't know the price of books."

He used a corner of the cloth to wipe the dust off the surface of the book. The books were obviously aged, but in good condition. The dry and cracked leather covers had hand-painted icons and holy emblems. Most of them were stitched rather than glued, and some were also covered with decorative panels, making them suitable for long-term preservation.

For a small village church that is only maintained by an old priest, the collection is indeed too large and even maintenance is a problem.

"Look, I'm going to go pick some peas in the backyard and let you taste my cooking for dinner."

"Thank you for your generosity."

Dominic thanked this respectable senior, covered his nose and slowly lifted the remaining half of the cloth, revealing the entire bookshelf.

Things went more smoothly than expected. The two of them simply picked a village church that was nearby and had convenient transportation, and they didn't expect to come across such a rich collection.

Even though the village was near the monastery's transportation line to the outside world, it doesn't seem like there would be so many paper products left in the prosperous period. For small country churches, there are many that only have one holy book.

If they were not particularly lucky, then it was the local parish's custom and preference for this that led them to spend a lot of money and energy on book collection, which was an investment with limited effect on missionary work.

Of course, due to funding constraints, most of these were not purchased, and the majority were handwritten, so the format looks quite uniform.

Without Dominic's invitation, Field actively jumped into the pile of old papers and started searching.

The two men skimmed over the monotonous scriptures and liturgical books and focused on the textual content written by the monks in their spare time.

Surprisingly, there were quite a few of these. Heavenly Father was helping them find supporting materials for the report, and after just searching the first shelf, they found several books that might meet their requirements.

Except for two books on logic, philosophy and literature, the rest are more or less related to the monks' life experiences in the local area.

Some of them cannot even be considered books, but are simply personal notes, containing some experiences and memos on missionary work and personal life.

There are limited records about astronomical phenomena, and most of them are related to agricultural activities. There are not many records specifically about thunderstorms.

But upon closer inspection, I did find some other content that resonated with me, for example, they were not the only ones who noticed the unique local basket weaving technique.

In books written in various handwritings, there appear more or less one or two sentences recording the existence of these unique creatures and their widespread existence.

Nor was Field alone in receiving gifts in return for his assistance, sometimes a woven hat, sometimes a basket filled with wild fruit. There has also been speculation about the specific origins of the woven spiral pattern in local custom.

"So Priya is not the only one who has this kind of thing?"

"Indeed, and they are quite uniform." Field habitually wanted to lick his fingertips to make it easier to turn the pages. Considering the age of the document in his hand, he suppressed his conditioned reflex and used his fingernails to carefully pick up the next page.

The original owner of this booklet moved from another church far away and found that there were quite similar and complex woven handicrafts in two semi-enclosed settlements that had no connection. As a curious person with free time, he paid attention to this matter when he passed by nearby villages and towns several times.

The result was that most of the settlements in the parish, despite their widely varying accents and customs, produced similar types of weaving.

The materials and uses are different, but the finished product appearance and craftsmanship details are extremely unified, or even exactly the same.

He described it as a "Tower of Babel".

Just like after the tower that reached the sky collapsed, each fragmented settlement was given a brick or a tile. After a long period of separation, they gradually forgot its origin and meaning. However, that extremely gorgeous brick and stone was still firmly embedded in the foundation of the new building and could not be removed.

Thereafter, no record of the incident was made, because in a place where the illiteracy rate is close to 100%, there is no information that can be traced back more than three generations.

Some families can't even trace their origins back three generations and they are immigrants who moved here with their lords. No one knows where they learned it, but they just think it is really beautiful, so they preserve it as a craft and a symbol of protection.

Personal ability limited his curiosity, and the narrator soon gave up halfway, leaving the two monks who did not see the follow-up scratching their heads.

Unfortunately, this is already the most complete record. Like the local residents, most monks have been trapped by the mountains for most of their lives and have spent all their energy on the localization of the doctrine.

Looking further up the bookshelf, I found that the books were much fewer and the materials were simple and cheap. They were obviously from an earlier era when the church was still in its infancy and there was not much free time.

"I think this is very interesting and can be used as a backup report content. After all, rare astronomical phenomena are rare, and local folk customs are everywhere, so it is much easier to write something new."

Field stood on tiptoe to reach the top shelf of the bookshelf. Dominic helped hold the ladder with one hand and read the notes of his curious predecessor with the other.

The cold, shadowy light rises and falls with the blowing pages of the book. The simple-stroke pattern is quite lifelike, capturing the essence of the vortex-shaped dynamics.

Your attention will inevitably be attracted by it, and you will put yourself in the writer's shoes and imagine what kind of situation the writer is in and how he or she is thinking.

"Why use 'Tower of Babel'?" Fragments of inspiration fell upon him, and he subconsciously looked up, only to see the dust raised by his companions moving books, which was blown by the slight air current connecting indoor and outdoor areas, and was swirling and floating.

“It’s really quite vivid.”

“I mean, does it seem like a metaphor? The shapes of these hats and baskets and things like that are very unlikely to be coincidental and can only come from a larger, more unified whole.”

His words stopped abruptly, his thoughts paused, he couldn't come up with anything to describe the concept in his mind, it was some kind of large-scale unity of time and space, visibly and invisibly covering the mountains.

Just imagining it can give rise to an instinctive reverence for grandeur in the midst of inexplicable panic.

That feeling came again, floating across the tall bookshelves, leaving behind hallucinatory ripples.

"Don't just stand there, help me take it." Field bent down and handed a book that was about to fall apart to him.

Recommended book: "The Kingdom of Nations"

Suddenly I found out that Jiuyu has published a new book, and it is set in the background of the Crusades. I have to read it.

()

Speaking of which, "The Saint" is one of my favorite Western fantasy novels. Even the inspiration for the fusion of two consciousnesses in this book is partly derived from the two souls bound together in "The Saint".