I loaded the Mysticism panel.

Gerrard continued:

"Hundreds of thousands of people stopped killing on the same night, sang the same song, and thought the same thing—go home."

Richard has already learned from experience in this kind of thing.

The Angel of Mons, the prayers of tens of thousands, coalesced into a form that blocked the pursuers.

Hundreds of people sang the same song, "Tiperelli," and the echoes of the song formed a net in the spirit world.

Mons is fear twisted into a single thread, and Sharon is habit strung together into a net.

On Christmas Eve, hundreds of thousands of people laid down their guns, their hearts filled only with longing to go home.

The weight of this desire to go home, as it fell behind the curtain, was many times heavier than the fear itself.

"Wanting to go home is also a collective will."

Richard said those words aloud.

Gerald looked at his grandson: "You're right."

"The problem isn't suppressing it, but what to do after it's suppressed."

Hundreds of thousands of living people want to go home, and even the dead lying under the earth can hear it.

The curtain was pressed down by Anning for a brief moment.

The moment the body was flattened, the overwhelming fear and pain within the deceased were temporarily relieved.

Someone patted them on the shoulder and told them they were alright.

So they also wanted to go home.

Tens of thousands of souls rose from the earth and looked toward their homeland.

"Christmas Eve is over," Gerald said in a low voice.

"The gunfire has resumed."

According to Logan's battlefield account, when the first artillery shell rang out at dawn on the 26th, not all the survivors in the no man's land had had time to crawl back into the trenches.

Several people, clutching buttons they had exchanged with the other side, were knocked over by stray bullets halfway through their run.

Re-enter after death.

A sleeping dead person is quiet, but you wake him up and stir up his desire to go home.

Now they've started fighting again, what's the point of this?

"The soul that is forced back into the fold harbors more resentment than a soul that has never awakened."

Gerrard folded the battle report and stuffed it back into the metal cabinet.

"Your great-grandfather once told me something when he was young."

"What did you say?"

"The most difficult anger to quell comes from a hand that is just one step away from reaching out."

………………

From Christmas to New Year's Day, the streets of Beijing took on a different look.

There are too many black veils.

On his way from Ashford House to the College District by carriage, Richard passed three hat shops.

Every shop window displayed black mourning hats, placed in the most conspicuous position, with fresh ink still on the price tags.

The owner of the stationery store next door had set up a small blackboard at the entrance, with the following words written in chalk:

Funeral envelopes and condolence postcards are available in stock.

Below the chalk writing was an even smaller line of text: "Bulk orders are negotiable."

The shop owners in the capital city have very keen senses of smell.

The booming business of black gauze indicates that a certain demand is turning into an industry.

Imperial University has a large library, which makes it convenient for him to look up information. His aunt is also in the office, so he simply returned to school before the end of the holiday.

Back in his dorm, he didn't touch the rune data he'd brought back from his aunt.

The two items Hercules asked him to appraise at the last gathering are still being held back.

A cornflower copper clasp and a small lead-sealed tube.

Richard first took out the copper buckle.

He placed the Sheng'er copper paperweight and the bronze balance scale side by side, letting Sheng'er "look" at the copper clasp first.

As the long beak turned towards the button face, Richard's inspiration struck.

A wisp of ether settled inside the copper clasp, so shallow it was almost undetectable.

As he refined his inspiration, a scent seeped from the lightest layer of ether.

The owner of the brass buckle was a pipe smoker.

He had a pipe dangling from his lips while he was carving this flower.

After he finished carving, he pressed his thumb on the stamen.

It's a habitual action, like playing with prayer beads; touching it brings peace of mind.

Richard knew what cornflowers symbolized in Germania.

That was Wilhelm II's favorite flower.

The Germans sewed it onto their military caps and embroidered it on their handkerchiefs, which they then carried to the front lines.

The owner of this bronze buckle was a German soldier.

He died, in the ruins of the bunker that Hercules had mentioned, which had been blown over by cannonballs.

Richard ordered the scales to be used for weighing.

As the left scale pan fell, the entire contents of that wisp of ether were extracted:

A young man in his early twenties died clutching a cornflower copper clasp before being directly hit by a shell.

Richard wrote the data down in his notebook, the pencil tip lingering on the paper for a moment.

This bronze buckle is not of much value.

The ether content is too low, so the quality is not good either.

Richard wrapped the brass buckle in oiled paper and then took out the small lead-sealed tube.

He used his spiritual vision to stick it on, but he couldn't see anything on the first layer.

Lead is one of the most ether-conductive common metals.

Richard brought his nose to the mouth of the tube and sniffed.

This thing has been sealed; a layer of cast lead has been poured between the opening and the cap, and it has become one with the cylinder wall.

He pushed his inspiration even deeper, to the limit that lead walls could penetrate.

He vaguely felt something inside the cylinder.

It is very small, about the size of a chess piece.

Ether concentration… Richard abruptly pulled his hand back.

The concentration of the substance in the tube was so high that it bounced off the moment his inspiration struck it.

Richard put the lead cylinder back on the table; this thing couldn't be forcibly disassembled for the time being.

He doesn't even know what's inside, and if he rashly cuts it open, what if it triggers something...?

"Get a CT scan first."

The technique for opening seals came in handy.

He let his shadow rise from behind the curtain and hover about two feet above the lead cylinder, while he himself retreated far away and piled on top of the stone armor.

The shadow's palm was facing down, and the ether began to press down.

Pressure accumulates on the surface of the lead cylinder, forming a very small high-pressure zone.

The lead wall expanded slightly under pressure, and its interior was broken open.

Richard held his breath, and inspiration struck the outer wall of the lead cylinder.

It only lasted half a second. After half a second, the elasticity of the lead wall restored and closed the gap, so nothing could be read anymore.

That half-second was enough. Richard pulled the shadow back behind the curtain and began writing rapidly in his notebook.

Item inside the tube: possibly a badge or token.

Ether attribute: It does not match any known sealing system on the front lines.

Richard wrote two words in his notebook: "Germanic variant?"

He decided not to disassemble the lead tube for the time being.

He sealed the lead tube with coarse salt and put it into the frost branch box.

After doing all that, he finally touched the rune data sent by the department.

Runes consist only of straight lines, each stroke representing a single cut.

A vertical cut represents the main stem, while a diagonal cut with a short blade represents the side branches.

The number, angle, and length of the main stem and side branches determine what this rune represents.

It is brutal, simple, and like its creator.

The Vikings carved words into oak rafters with short knives on their rocking ships; no other writing system was more meticulous about "not making a mistake with a single stroke."

Richard spent three days reading through all twelve pages of the manuscript related to the Whitby Seal.

[Bowen] copied the depth, angle, and spacing of every knife mark into his mind.

On New Year's Day, it snowed again in the capital.

The January 1st edition of the Beijing Morning Post was thicker than usual.

The thicker pages were all lists of the dead.

Richard bought a copy at the newsstand.

The newspapers reported that the number of expeditionary force casualties in the week from Christmas to New Year's was more than the total number of casualties in the first half of December.

The military explained: "After the Christmas truce ended, the enemy launched an organized counter-offensive on multiple fronts."

Li realized that a counterattack might be real.

From a military perspective, if fighting resumes after a brief ceasefire, the death toll will naturally be higher due to the lack of preparedness.

But from a mystical perspective, could those spirits that are called out from under the earth also have an impact on the living at the etheric level?

Richard stuffed the newspaper into his bag and passed a bookstore.

He hadn't planned to stop, but the cover of the book in the center of the shop window made him freeze in his tracks.

How to Talk to the Dead: A Practical Guide for Those Who Have Lost Loved Ones.

A handwritten "GG" was pasted on the corner of the shop window, the ink writing crooked and messy:

"A complete set of spirit communication tools starts at five shillings, plus a free instruction manual."

Five shillings—this price is precisely positioned at the point where middle-class wives are prone to impulsive purchases.

It's not extravagant, but it's enough to make you feel like you're doing something serious, not just being silly.

Two shillings for books, five shillings for equipment.

With the curtains and candles already in the living room, the entire cost of a family séance is covered.

Richard stood in front of the shop window for a long time.

The bookstore owner peeked out from inside, assuming he wanted to buy something.

"Sir, that book is selling particularly well lately."

Last week we received fifty copies, and today we only have seven left.

"I'm not buying." Richard waved his hand and continued walking.

………………

Mrs. McNeil gave him some information during their meeting.

The coffee shop is the same one as last time, and it's still the same alley where you have to turn at a wrong turn to get in.

"The spiritual medium shops on the outer street of Flower Moon Street have had long queues since Christmas."

Mrs. McNeill held a cup of black coffee, her expression not very pleasant.

"In Mayfair, Chelsea, and Bloomsbury, every night there are ladies having psychic séances in private salons."

"In what form?"

"Everything you can think of."

Mrs. McNeil put the cup back on the saucer.

"Play a song from the wax cylinder of a phonograph, and when the song ends, let the wax cylinder spin idle, and try to identify the voice of the deceased in the hissing sound."

Place your hands on the table and ask questions. Tap the table once for "yes" and twice for "no".

Some people even held a pencil, closed their eyes, and let their hands move on their own, trying to write down what the deceased wanted to say...

She tapped her index finger lightly on the table.

"There are also those who actually hire mediums to come to their homes, using tarot cards, crystal balls, and psychic mirrors, sometimes booking out the entire venue for the whole night."

Richard summarized the information; these people were almost all mothers, wives, and sisters.

Their sons, husbands, and brothers died on the other side of the sea.

The unusually long list of casualties at Christmas shattered their last remaining hopes that "maybe he was just injured" or "maybe the next letter will arrive."

They just wanted to hear that person's voice one more time, even if it was just a simple "hmm".

"The teacher has already posted a notice to suspend all orders."

Mrs. McNeil took an envelope out of her pocket.

"A notice was posted at the entrance of Viktoria's Psychic Center on Flower Moon Street, which read, 'Internal inventory, temporarily closed.'"

All disciples were also instructed not to accept any such requests.

Richard took the envelope, which contained the cash from the small change he had received from the secretary's previous sale.

The fragment of the Gaelic spell sold for one pound and seven shillings, and the serial number index is still awaiting verification by the buyer.

He put the money away, but something else was on his mind.

Why did Lady Mary pause?

Mrs. McNeil glanced at him.

"If she hadn't stopped, the threshold of No. 17 Huayue Street would have been trampled to pieces long ago."

The teacher's exact words were: "If you go fishing in a pond where malaria has broken out, you won't catch any fish; you'll catch the malaria first."

"Those ladies come to you with money in their hands, their eyes red with greed. Do you accept it or not?"

"If the connection actually works, what's being connected to on the other end?"

She pushed the coffee cup aside.

"You already know what happened on Christmas Day. The resentment of those souls who woke up on the front lines but were forced back down is several times stronger than before."

"If you open the door on this side of the curtain at this moment, peek your head out and say, 'Come on,' guess who will come?"

It was already dark when I came out of the coffee shop.

Richard followed the correct path and went out.

Gaslights were on in the main street, carriages were parked by the roadside, and the coachman was dozing in his cloak.

He flagged down a car and headed towards Chelsea, back to Ashford's mansion.

As the carriage passed an intersection, he glanced out the window.

There was a door half-open at the corner of the intersection, and the shop window was lit up.

In the lamplight, a woman wearing a purple headscarf was wrapping wax tubes for a customer behind the counter.

Richard guessed that this person must be the so-called wild medium.

The guest was a young woman in a black dress, clutching a handkerchief in her hand, her eyes red-rimmed.

The medium, wrapped in a wax tube, was muttering something rapidly, seemingly explaining how to use the instrument.