I loaded the Mysticism panel.

Chapter 164 Boundary Stone Tablet

After leaving the small lounge, Richard returned to his room.

He opened his notebook and wrote down every detail he had observed during the ceremony the previous night.

He wrote six whole pages, and when he got to the seventh page, someone knocked on the door.

Richard.

It's Maggie's voice.

He closed his notebook and went to open the door.

The freckled girl stood in the corridor, clutching a small cloth bag in her hand.

"Let's go to the third basement level."

"Border Stone Circle?"

"Yes, Mrs. McNeil has given permission. She said the curtains are already drawn today, and there's no danger in just taking a look."

"it is good."

Richard took a notebook and pencil from the table and followed Maggie downstairs.

The entrance to the mill's cellar was still that low door.

After the ceremony last night, Mrs. McNeil re-attached a silver strip to the door frame.

The two bent down and crawled inside; the first level of the cellar was the main hall of last night's ceremony.

The stone coffin was still in the center, completely covered by iron chains and silver foil, with the wax residue from seven candles clinging to the ground.

"Go down." Maggie pointed to the narrower stone steps behind the sarcophagus.

The stone steps are very steep, and the height of each step is different, some are half a foot high, and some are a foot high.

Richard walked down the wall, his left hand supporting him. The limestone on the wall was pitted and uneven from hundreds of years of dampness.

The second floor is much lower than the one above, with the ceiling almost touching your head.

There were several soot marks on the wall, and a few pieces of gravel were scattered on the ground.

"Go further down."

The entrance to the third level is hidden under a movable stone slab in the northwest corner of the second level.

Maggie crouched down, gripped the edge of the stone slab with both hands, and forcefully lifted it upwards.

The stone slab was heavy, and Richard helped her lift it.

Below the stone slab is a vertical stone staircase, embedded in the wall, with each step only half a foot wide.

The two climbed down the stone steps for about three meters.

When his feet touched flat ground, Richard looked up and looked around.

This is a circular stone chamber.

It is about five steps in diameter, and the dome is a complete hemisphere. There are no decorations on the stone walls.

In the very center of the stone chamber is a circular altar stone.

The surface of the altar stone was polished to an extremely smooth finish, completely different from the two rough limestone layers above it.

Richard approached the altar stone and squatted down to examine it.

The surface of the altar stone is engraved with twelve circular grooves, each about the size of a fist in diameter.

The grooves are arranged in an irregular ring, with varying spacing between the rings.

Each groove has an inscription engraved at the bottom.

"This is the overall map of the Boundary Stone Array," Maggie explained from the side. "The positions of all twelve boundary stones are marked on this altar stone."

"And what about the boundary stone itself?"

"Underground," Maggie pointed to the ground. "Each one is buried in its corresponding position, invisible from the surface."

"This altar stone is the central control point."

Richard placed his palm flat on the surface of the altar stone.

The stone surface was cold, but he could feel a very faint etheric pulse coming up from beneath it.

"The inscription is in pre-Roman Celtic script," Maggie said, squatting down next to him. "I recognize some of it, but not all of it."

How much can you read?

"About 30%." She pointed to the nearest groove: "There are a few word roots in this section that I've seen before, but the way they're combined is different from what I've learned."

Richard activated his spiritual vision.

The inscriptions in the grooves became much clearer under the spiritual vision.

Each stroke carries a very faint grayish-blue light, the intensity and flashing frequency of which correspond to the current "health status" of this boundary stone.

The light in some of the grooves was noticeably dimmer than in others.

"Those darker ones, are they the ones with the most severe degradation?"

"It should be." Maggie nodded. "Last night's ceremony repaired the top two layers; this layer was left untouched."

"Mrs. McNeill said that repairing the Border Stones requires a completely different set of rituals, which are not included in this mission."

Richard maintained his spiritual vision and began to fix the inscriptions in each groove one by one.

You need to stare at the target for a long enough time to clearly see the direction, turning point, and connection of each stroke.

Maggie took out a stack of thin paper and a charcoal pencil from her backpack.

"You hold firm, I'll expand."

"it is good."

Richard locked his vision onto the first groove.

The inscription consists of seven lines, with three to five symbols in each line.

The strokes of the symbol are mainly curved, with occasional angular turns.

Curves are guides, and angular turns are constraints; these are the basic grammar he learned from the bookshelves on the third floor.

"In the first line, from left to right, the first symbol is a double arc followed by a vertical line..."

As he described it, Maggie copied it onto thin paper with a charcoal pencil.

The two worked together very well.

Richard was responsible for using his spiritual vision to "illuminate" the strokes that were no longer visible to the naked eye, while Maggie was responsible for converting what she saw into lines on the paper.

The first groove took about twenty minutes.

The inscription in the second groove was longer than the first, and it took almost half an hour to complete.

By the fourth one, Richard's vision began to slip slightly.

He stopped and took two full quadruple breathing cycles before the leaves of the balsam tree could stabilize again.

"Are you alright?" Maggie asked with some concern.

"Not bad." Richard stretched his neck. "Continue."

The fifth, sixth, seventh... the stone chambers had no windows and no light source.

The two relied on a thick candle that Maggie had brought down and Richard's spiritual vision.

The candle flame remained motionless in the stone chamber, without even a breath of air.

By the time he reached the tenth groove, Richard's temples began to throb slightly.

This is a normal reaction to prolonged, high-intensity spiritual vision.

He used his breathing healing technique to press down on the pain, and it subsided by more than half.

"The last two." Maggie has already used up three charcoal pencils.

The inscription in the eleventh groove is the shortest, with only four lines.

The inscription in the twelfth groove is the longest, with nine lines, and the strokes are more complex than all the previous ones.

Richard pushed his vision to its limit, reading each stroke meticulously.

The last symbol in the last line was a structure he had never seen before.

The three arcs originate from the same center and extend in three different directions, with a small dot at the end of each arc.

"This symbol..." he frowned.

"I've never seen it either." Maggie drew it as it was: "Go back and ask Mr. Hutton."

Three hours later, all twelve groove inscriptions were copied.

Maggie folded all the tissues in order and tied them together with a thin string.

Richard stood up, his knees cracking twice.

He squatted in the stone chamber for three hours, and his legs were numb.

The two climbed back up the stone steps to the second floor, then walked back down to the first floor, and finally crawled out through the low door.

The bright sunlight outside made him squint.

The sun was already setting in the west, and the entire wilderness was tinged with a dark gold.

Back at the hostel, they went to Mr. Hutton's room.

The old gentleman was organizing his documents while making tea by the fireplace.

Maggie handed over the stack of rubbings.

Mr. Hutton took it and looked through it one by one.

When he turned to the third page, his hand paused for a moment;

He turned to the seventh page and put down his teacup.

He flipped to the twelfth page, to the symbol with three arcs and three dots, and held the rubbing up to his eyes, looking at it for a long time.

"Sir, is there a problem?" Richard asked from the side.

Mr. Hutton put the rubbing back on the table.

"Do you know where these twelve sets of inscriptions stand within the entire system of sealing techniques?"

The two newcomers shook their heads.

Mr. Hutton picked up his teacup, took a sip, and put the cup back on the saucer.

"The Whitcomb Boundary Stones were built more than a thousand years before the most recent layer of the seal."

When the Celtic engravers of the former Roman Empire erected these twelve boundary stones, the Roman legions were still crossing the Alps.

He folded the rubbings neatly and placed them back in the center of the table.

"From that era to today, it has been nearly two thousand five hundred years."

"It passed through at least four different civilizations, each of which made repairs, overwrites, and re-annotations on it."

"The twelve sets of inscriptions that were ultimately preserved are no longer just Celtic ancient script."

Their foundation is Celtic, with traces of Romanization interspersed throughout, and their surfaces are covered with Latin annotations from the medieval church.

He looked up at the two young men.

"In other words, these inscriptions were layered on top of each other."

Some strokes belong to the earliest inscription masters, some to Roman-era reworkers, and some to medieval monks who performed sealing ceremonies.

Maggie understood.

"That's why it doesn't fit into any single system I've studied."

"Yes." Mr. Hutton nodded.

"The Gaelic script you've learned can cover the bottom layer, but the middle and top layers require a foundation in Romanized inscriptions and medieval ritual Latin, respectively."

Richard touched his chin.

"Does the gentleman mean that all twelve sets of inscriptions need to be disassembled and restored to their original state?"

"Disassemble, restore, retranslate, annotate," Mr. Hutton listed the four steps.

"If it can be accomplished..."

He flipped the top one over and pointed to the first symbol of one of the inscriptions.

"This will allow you to complete the empirical task of advancing your professional status."