I loaded the Mysticism panel.

Starting Monday, Richard officially received a deluxe meal on his plate.

Warren was very generous; he could order whatever he wanted from the cafeteria, as long as he could eat it.

Every bite of protein and fat Richard ingested was filling his thin, translucent body.

The terms of the exchange were also fulfilled very readily.

Twenty minutes after lunch, Richard would sit in a corner of the restaurant and explain the key points of his Latin lesson to Warren.

He explained it simply, breaking down the word roots, stringing together the conjugation logic in the simplest framework, and then having Warren repeat it.

He himself also benefited from the teaching process.

Every time he wants to explain something clearly, he needs to go through it all from beginning to end himself.

The process of teaching others, in turn, reinforced his own understanding.

The numbers on the panel provide the most honest feedback.

Every effective teaching action propels one's knowledge and experience forward.

Not much, but about 20 percent faster than reading on your own.

Teaching and learning go hand in hand; the ancients were right.

Of course, before teaching Warren, he actually spent ten minutes teaching Hugh the first conjugation of verbs.

After he finished explaining, he asked Hugh, "Do you understand?"

Hugh nodded seriously: "Understood, amo, amas, amat."

"Next, the second conjugation, moneo, mones..."

"Wait a minute," Hugh raised his hand to interrupt him, "What's the difference between 'amas' after 'amo' and 'amat' again?"

"...I've been talking about this difference for ten minutes straight."

"Really?" Hugh tilted his head, his face showing only confusion.

Richard patted him on the shoulder:

"Hugh, you're doing pretty well as you are now."

"It sounds like they're giving up on me."

"I really have to give you up."

"..."

Hugh gave up, but the benefits of teaching have already been proven.

He only needs to find a student with a decent foundation who can keep up with the pace.

Warren just happened to run into him.

During lunchtime tutoring, Grey listened attentively the whole time.

She listened quietly, without interrupting or asking questions.

But Richard noticed that after he finished speaking, she would look down and write a few lines in her notebook.

The next day, Grey turned to a new page in her notebook, looked up, and asked her first question:

"Williams, you said that the suffix changes of the third conjugation's i-form variant in the subjunctive mood overlap with the fourth conjugation in two places... Could you repeat which two places?"

Richard glanced at her.

A person who can ask questions with this level of precision must be quite intelligent.

"Okay, come a little closer, I'll draw a table."

Grey brought over a chair.

From that day on, the lunch tutoring team went from two to three people, and they would bring him breakfast every morning.

Whether it's a hot pie or a sandwich, the fillings are always plentiful.

Warren called it "Williams' after-school tutoring";

Mason called this "a poor man teaching a rich man to read, a sight to behold."

Richard ignored all of that, but after Warren recounted what had happened that night to him, his mind started racing.

The fact that Warren's family was willing to go to such lengths to make this matter demonstrates the significant importance of this "other world" within upper-class society.

But then again, there aren't many families in Bristol's business class who can afford to have a medium come to their home for a checkup.

Warren occasionally mentions things about his family:

My father's business, my mother's tea parties, and the family's "traditions" around the day of the exorcism.

When he mentioned "tradition," he glossed over it in a vague tone.

But Richard developed a different kind of interest in the term "medium."

Thursday afternoon, the last period was Mr. Hutton's class.

It discusses a comparative analysis of several controversial archaeological reports from the New World colonial period.

The content was quite dense, and several boys in the back row had already started dozing off, covering their faces with their textbooks.

After the school bell rang, the sound of chairs being moved could be heard in the classroom as students began packing their schoolbags.

Mr. Hutton stood on the podium, neatly stacking the scattered lesson plan sheets one by one, his movements unhurried and deliberate.

"Williams, wait a moment."

The sound wasn't loud; it was mixed in with the noise of people packing their bags, and only people in the nearby rows heard it.

Warren walked past, bag in hand, and raised an eyebrow at Richard: "Why were you kept behind again?"

Richard shook his head, indicating that he was fine.

Once the classroom was empty and the footsteps in the corridor had gradually faded away, Mr. Hutton stood up from his chair.

"I heard from Holland that you're going to participate in the Cicero Cup?"

"Yes, sir."

"Not bad." The old man's glasses reflected the light.

"You've changed a lot lately; Holland has mentioned it to me several times."

Richard did not respond.

Mr. Hutton looked at him and suddenly said something completely unrelated to the previous topic:

"Williams, do you like libraries?"

"It's alright, I've been going there quite often lately."

The old man put his hands in his pockets and looked back out the window.

On the east side of the third floor, there is an inconspicuous bookshelf.

It's sandwiched between the geography and agriculture categories, without any classification labels.

"The fourth row, the seventh compartment, might contain something that interests you."

Richard looked up, waiting for what would happen next.

Mr. Hutton took a small object out of his inner jacket pocket and placed it on the edge of the lectern.

It was a thin piece of paper folded into four sections, yellowish in color, with rounded edges.

"Keep this for now." He tapped the piece of paper lightly with his finger.

"Once you get there, you'll know what it's for."

Richard walked over and held the piece of paper in his hand.

Even through my fingertips, I could feel that the paper was unusually thick, unlike ordinary book pages.

"Sir, this is..."

"It's just a piece of paper," Mr. Hutton said casually.

"It might not be anything at all; it depends on whether you can use it when you see it there."

He sat back down in his chair, picked up a pen, and began writing his lesson plan at a leisurely pace.

"Go on, don't be late getting home."

Richard frowned, picked up his schoolbag, said "Goodbye, sir," and left the classroom.

………………

The next day, after lunch and the tutoring session ended, Richard didn't go to the classroom for a nap; instead, he went straight to the library.

Greenwood’s library is a standalone three-story red brick building, separated from the teaching buildings by a covered walkway.

The first and second floors are well-lit, with large south-facing windows, and the tables and chairs are neatly arranged, each with a table lamp.

During breaks and lunch breaks, students often gather together to do their homework.

The third floor is clearly another world.

When you reach the top of the stairs, the light dims.

There were only two windows, most of which were blocked by the side wall of the opposite teaching building, and the air was filled with the sour smell of old paper.

There was no one on the entire floor, so Richard walked in following the bookshelf numbers.

The large local atlases in the geography category occupied two entire bookshelves, with faded coastlines and contour lines printed on the covers.

Next to it were bound volumes of agricultural journals, rows of thick-covered booklets with the year stamped on the spine.

In the fourth row, seventh compartment, Richard reached in and found his target.

The book is not thick, about two hundred pages.

Most of the gold lettering has faded, and it can only be barely discerned when you get close.

The title is: "On the Organizational Forms of Early Agricultural Communities in the Western Continent and Their Relationship with Natural Cycles"

—A Comparative Study Based on Seven Field Cases

The author's name has only one abbreviation: EVM

The publication information is printed at the bottom of the title page in very small font: Royal Anthropological Society Press, 1832.

It's a book from about seventy years ago.