White feathers?
Klein stared at the empty tomb, suddenly thinking of a word:
"Angel!"
In the texts of the Seven Churches, legends of angels and saints are ubiquitous, and one of the traits of the former is having one, two, three, or even six pairs of white, pure wings on their backs.
In the blink of an eye, however, Klein recalled a past event:
Mr. Azik had once described his dreams to him, dreams that felt like a succession of lives one after another.
In one scene, he was in a dark mausoleum beside many open, ancient coffins, and inside the coffins lay corpses with white feathers growing on their backs!
Was this a special manifestation of the "Death" pathway, or an eerie phenomenon created by the Church of Spirits? Without speaking, Klein restrained his emotions and calmly looked at the white feathers stained with pale yellow grease at the bottom of the tomb.
He preliminarily judged that the old gentleman couldn't be an angel, as a terrifying Beyonder of Sequence 2 or even Sequence 1 would definitely exert a strong influence on their surroundings after death. For instance, the "Saint's Ashes" behind the Chanis Gate in Tingen extended nearly invisible, black, cold, thin lines to seal everything around them.
Of course, it was also possible that he hadn't truly died... Just like Mr. Azik? Klein bent down and picked up three white feathers with his black-gloved right hand.
—— He planned to go home and perform a divination above the Gray Fog.
At this moment, Copst came to. He scrambled over to Klein, looking at the tomb with hidden fear. "Where's the corpse?"
Klein glanced sideways at him and said in a low voice, "Maybe it left on its own."
"Left on its own..." Copst repeated in terror, completely realizing how terrifying it was for the dead to awaken.
His legs trembled, and he muttered to himself, "But... but I didn't perform a resurrection ritual on him, on him."
Klein turned around, looked at him for a few seconds, and said, "Death is not the end."
"Death is not the end... Death is not the end..." Copst was utterly frightened by the belief he himself held, and blurted out, "Will... will he come back?"
Hmm, the messenger summoned by that copper whistle most likely corresponds to that old gentleman. In other words, giving a note to the messenger is the same as writing a letter to that old gentleman, writing a letter to a man who has been dead for almost half a year... Heh, I wonder where he is now and in what state... In response to Copst's question, Klein lightly warned him, "Don't blow that copper whistle anymore."
"You mean the whistle will attract him back?" Copst asked in fear.
Before Klein could answer, he himself requested, "C-Can you help me throw this copper whistle into the Tussock River?"
"If you can't, then... I'll do it myself."
Weren't you just very interested in death and its corresponding philosophy? Klein thought with an internal snort, but he reached out and took the copper whistle from Copst.
He planned, under suitable conditions, to try sending a letter to a dead man to see what would happen.
Of course, this was all premised on him determining there was no great danger.
After instructing Copst to refill the tomb, Klein exchanged knowledge about the "Spirit Dance" and related occult knowledge with him for a while, enriching his own experience, and clarified that when Copst buried that old gentleman, he had followed the old man's will and placed the body face down.
In some special circumstances, using the "Spirit Dance" to replace the tedious setup of ritual magic is more effective and simpler... Seeing that his objective was achieved, Klein warned Copst once more not to mess around with the so-called resurrection ritual anymore.
Next, he left the street through the garden, made a wide detour, and took a carriage to the East Borough.
After changing back into his former clothes, he returned to Minsk Street, entered the bedroom, and through a series of operations, brought the three white feathers and Copst's copper whistle up to the Gray Fog.
Sitting in the high-back chair belonging to The Fool, Klein materialized paper and a pen and wrote down the divination statement he had thought of long ago:
"Its origin."
Then, he held the three white feathers and leaned back in the chair.
Amidst his silent recitations, Klein entered a dream state. The surroundings were hazy, filled with thick grayish-white.
In this world, there was an expanse of dense, lightless darkness. Suddenly, the darkness was stained with a crimson hue, and a pale, bony hand broke through the yellowish-brown soil.
A human figure slowly crawled up. It didn't lift the stone slab or stir the soil, but just penetrated right through them.
Under the crimson moonlight, the clothes on the back of the figure were tattered, and white feathers were sprouting one by one.
This figure with graying hair slightly turned its head, revealing the distinct red patches on its face, and wooden, vacant, emotionless eyes.
It took a step, laboriously penetrated the railing, and walked into the depths of the darkness, getting farther and farther until it vanished.
The dream shattered, and Klein awoke.
White feathers really did grow out of the corpse's back... Its state was very similar to Miss Sharon, yet there were obvious differences. It felt heavy and substantial, not illusory... It seemed able to transform between a human body and a spiritual body in a semi-natural, incomplete way? A messenger connecting the real world and the spirit world/underworld? Klein lightly tapped the edge of the long table, deep in thought for a long time.
Following this, he divined whether there was any danger in using Copst's copper whistle to send a letter right now. He got an affirmative answer, and the pendulum swung with great amplitude and speed.
"What a pity. I can't use the copper whistle directly on the Gray Fog. The messenger simply can't get in. Otherwise, there would be no danger at all..." After muttering this to himself, Klein sank into the gray fog and returned to the real world.
................
In the early morning, in the relatively fresh woods of Queen's Borough.
The round-faced, thirty-something Apothecary appeared in a secluded corner, packing the secretly grown medicinal herbs into a leather pouch he always carried.
After completing today's tasks, he straightened his back, stretched his body, and silently muttered to himself with satisfaction:
"As expected, my physical fitness has improved. It's not like before, where I only had strong resistance to toxins."
"But... why is my Sequence 8 'Beast Tamer'? What does that have to do with 'Apothecary'?"