I loaded the Mysticism panel.

The medium spread the tarot cards out in a crescent shape on a corner of the worktable.

"First look at him as a person, then look at the people behind him."

Her index finger hovered over the card array, picking out the first card from the crescent moon pattern.

When the cards were turned over, old Biggs' shoulders hunched almost imperceptibly.

The Hanged Man (Upright)

A young man is hanging upside down on a T-shaped wooden frame with one leg bent into the shape of the number "4" and his hands tied behind his back.

The expression on the face of the upside-down man should be serene; it is a face that has been painted repeatedly for hundreds of years.

But at this moment, the eyes of the upside-down man hanging above the tarpaulin are closed.

It's tightly closed; this card doesn't want anyone to see what it's looking at.

"He didn't resist being hollowed out," Mrs. McNeil began.

"He cooperated when he was being drained, to the point that... even he himself felt 'this is how it should be'."

Richard recalled the "Harmony" who had been captured alive in the cave last night.

"That's how it should be done."

That's the same thing.

The medium moved his finger to the position of the second card.

[The Moon - Reversed]

An upside-down moon hangs between the two towers.

Dogs and wolves barked and looked up under the moon, but when the cards were turned upside down, the path became a slope leading from the ground to the moon.

"He's been deceived, and more than once," the medium said.

"There are at least three layers of people who are deceiving him."

The outermost layer tells him to "get rid of the suffering before him".

"The middle layer tells him, 'You are the chosen one.'"

"The innermost layer... tell him, 'What you did will be remembered.'"

Richard recalled the peaceful smile on the face of the dying leader yesterday.

That smile wasn't a sign of "I won" at all.

That smile meant, "I will be remembered."

Be remembered by that thing at the bottom of the pit, and have it call out your name, even if only once.

The medium moved her finger to the third image.

[The Pope Reversed]

The pope, upside down, sat between two pillars, his triple crown slipping off his head, while the two little figures he had blessed turned their heads away.

"This is the one who gave him directions."

"In the Echo Society, they have a 'mentor'."

"That 'mentor' himself may not be the person most involved in this matter; he is more like a... intermediary."

She drew the fourth card.

The Tower (upright position).

Lightning struck the top of the tower, and two people fell from the top.

The tower was torn apart from the top by a vertical bolt of lightning, and the top of the tower was blown away by the shockwave.

Richard frowned instinctively when he saw the card.

The Tower is one of the most dangerous cards in the Tarot, signifying an impending and inevitable collapse.

The medium's hand lingered on the tower for a few seconds.

Old Big hissed softly beside Richard.

The medium raised his hand and made a "don't speak yet" gesture.

She pulled out the fifth card, but instead of turning it over, she placed it face down on top of the fourth card.

She then drew a sixth card and placed it face down on top of the fifth card.

The last one, the seventh one, is placed on top of the sixth one.

On the right side of the entire crescent moon, she stacked three unflipped cards, like a three-story tower.

"Senior sister," Old Big's voice was low, "Are you trying to pull something out?"

"Um."

"...Should we just forget about it?"

"I'll try it once."

The medium held his right hand over the stack of three face-down cards.

Her fingers no longer maintained their original relaxed curve; the tips of her five fingers were now somewhat tightly closed.

She was using the entire deck to tap the deeper line behind the answer.

The medium recited something.

The top card on the table, which had been facing down, had a corner of it flipped open.

Mrs. McNeil's eyes widened instantly.

Old Big's face turned completely pale at that moment.

"Senior sister, let's retreat!"

Richard stood outside the silver line and saw that the original face of the card had been replaced with a blank one.

An eye is visible on the blank card.

The eye stood on the blank card, slowly opening towards Mrs. McNeil's side.

It has no pupils, not even eyeballs, only the feeling of being looked at.

If we remove the parts of seeing that require the use of organs, what remains is the purest form of being seen.

An inspiration exploded in Richard's chest.

This is clearly a deliberately set trap.

The person behind the Response Leader had placed a reverse hook on him from the day he was taken in as a "tool".

Any medium who tries to uncover the true name of the respondent and the identity of the person behind the scenes will follow that path and deliver their inspiration to the other party.

Mrs. McNeil stood there, her left hand hovering over the cards, her right hand instinctively pressing on the bone bracelet on her wrist.

Richard realized that she was being stared at by that eye and couldn't move.

Every action will be interpreted by the other party as a "response".

Once she "responds," her entire deck of cards and her entire ethereal microcycle will be pulled along this line by that eye.

Richard instinctively wanted to do something; if something really happened, he wouldn't be able to escape from this small room.

But as soon as he had that thought, the silver ring on his chest felt icy cold.

Mrs. Mary was reminding herself that she would take action.

On the other side, the wisp of spirit in the bone bracelet awakened.

She extended a finger from the bone bracelet toward the blank card.

"Smack."

The card was pressed back down by a finger.

Mrs. Mary closed the door that had been pushed open a crack for her student.

The eye was hidden behind the door, and the temperature in the autopsy room slowly rose.

Mrs. McNeil staggered backward, but was caught by old Biggs.

She was panting heavily, and it took her a while to be able to speak.

"...The person behind him cannot be found using tarot."

A thin layer of sweat appeared on her forehead.

"I almost..."

Old Big helped her to a chair by the wall and sat her down.

He took a breath and glanced at the bone bracelet.

Mrs. McNeil sat in the chair for quite a while.

Old Big glanced at Richard and made a gesture that said, "Don't go away yet."

The entire autopsy room was quiet for about five minutes.

When the medium stood up again, her complexion was still not good, but she was able to steady herself.

She waved at the stack of cards on the table.

The three cards that were face down closed up on their own.

She put the entire deck of cards back into the box, and the "click" as the lid closed was particularly crisp.

Next, Mrs. McNeil stopped touching that "behind" layer.

She changed direction and only read the first part of the response, "things done".

She walked back to the front of the table and took out a palm-sized ebony box from the bottom of the suitcase.

The lid of the box is inlaid with several tiny, polished copper nails.

"Bigro, open your chest cavity a little wider."

Old Big responded and made two more incisions on either side of the already gaping wound in the chest cavity with his scalpel.

The membrane-like structure that was originally pressed against the inner wall of the ribs has been thrown into the refining furnace and burned.

The chest cavity was now empty, with only the ribs remaining.

The medium opened the ebony box.

Inside the box was a roll of net woven from dark silver threads.

Richard used his spiritual vision to look at the net and could see that there was a faint flow of ether within the threads, in a very chaotic direction, showing traces of being repeatedly folded and straightened.

"A network of tracks," Mrs. McNeil explained.

She unfolded the net, allowing its surface to spread out, and covered the chest of the person who had answered her.

The entire net slowly sank down and adhered to the inner wall of the responder's chest cavity.

Mrs. McNeil held her right hand half an inch above the net.

She began to read, a barely audible murmur escaping her throat.

Old Big gave Richard a wink, signaling him to take a step back.

Richard complied.

He stood two steps away, and could hear his own heartbeat amplified by the echoes from the autopsy room.

The medium's murmuring lasted for about three minutes.

The dark silver threads above the ruts began to change.

The first few threads emerged from the net, suspended in mid-air, and automatically coiled into a minimalist geometric shape.

Then the second, the third.

By the time he got to the tenth or so, Richard realized what it was.

The trajectory of each technique was drawn out inch by inch from the respondent's chest cavity by the silk threads.

Each trajectory corresponds to a surgical procedure performed before the patient's birth.

Those trajectories intersected in mid-air, forming an extremely complex web within a web.

"...Found it," Mrs. McNeil said softly.

She extended one index finger and picked out a thread in the net that was darker in color than the others.

The shape of that silk thread was very peculiar, resembling an inward-curling spiral.

"Silence spell," she confirmed.

Old Big came over.

"The one the lieutenant colonel was shot in the cave?"

"Yes." The medium nodded. "He used it twice in the mine, and I've traced all the evidence."

She carefully removed the silk thread from the net within a net and placed it on a piece of parchment that had been prepared beforehand.

The silk thread stuck to the parchment as soon as it touched it, turning into streaks of ink.

After engraving the spell, she picked up the small bag of talismans used for reading the stones and poured them into a copper dish.

This time, Mrs. McNeil learned her lesson and used the stone reading method for divination, which resulted in a more ambiguous reading and was harder to pinpoint.

The dish jingled as several rune stones rolled to the center.

The medium glanced at it, then grabbed a handful and threw it in.

After going back and forth three times, she looked up.

"The divination has been performed; the technique itself has no inherent good or bad."

"It's just a tool."

"How a tool is used depends on the person wielding it."

"Anything that relies on spells and breathing rhythms will be thrown off balance if it sweeps over it."

Richard moved closer.

What emerged on the parchment was a complete diagram of the surgical procedure.

In the center is a tiny mark, the shape of which corresponds to the two steel pipes on the workbench.

Two corresponding grass symbols are drawn around the steel pipe, representing multi-eyed black moss and silent fern.

The entire procedure relies on the practitioner pushing the ether along the steel pipe to activate the two herbs inside.

When the fodder is stimulated, it releases a "vacuum" at the etheric level.

When that vacuum covers the target, all of the target's original spells and breathing rhythms will be disrupted.

Of course, like gargoyles, the steel pipe is just a medium for casting spells; once you're skilled at it, you can discard it.

"Did you see it clearly?" Mrs. McNeil asked.

"I see it clearly." Richard nodded.

She pushed the parchment toward Richard.

"If you're interested, you can learn."

"You'll have to figure out the two herbs for the spellcasting medium yourself."

The multi-eyed black moss is alright; it can be collected in the nearshore transition zone.

The Silent Fern is much deeper, having already reached the edge of the deep realm; its essence generally doesn't flow out through the main channels.