261 Holy (2/2)

”I don’t know. I just struck a pose. I guess it likes to see me pretend to be cool,” Ye Qingxuan praised himself shamelessly, however, his eyes twitched. Seeing something inside the brim, he reached in and felt a line of slightly protruding words. Too much time had passed so the silver thread had turned black, making it difficult to make out.

Relying on the touch, Ye Qingxuan subconsciously sounded out the words, ”There is a limit to man’s power and he must obey the boundaries.”

This was one of the vows for a musician set by the first three kings. Every musician must abide by them. But why were they carved here? Unless…

He froze and his smile stiffened. ”Unless this was the spell to activate the hat.”

Putting weird and mysterious alchemy equipment on his head was one thing. Being close to uttering its activation chant…This could definitely be in the top ten of ”One Hundred Dumb Ways to Die for a Musician.”

He subconsciously tried to take his hat off but it was too late. The world went black. All he could hear was a crisp sound. And then the sky fell down!

The experience at that moment was painfully pleasing. It was indescribable. It felt as if someone hacked a giant hole into his head with a hammer. Then, something like mercury was forcefully poured in. An immense amount of runes and images flashed past his eyes, drowning him. Inheritance of a heart mark?

This should definitely be the inheritance of a heart mark but why was this so weird. Did they want to kill him? He fell unconscious before he could react.

After who knows how long, he opened his eyes and found himself on a metal bed. He saw the pale white light of a shadow-less light.

”How long was I out?”

”One full hour.” Lola grasped a cup with two hands and looked down on him. ”You wasted another of my recovery medicines.”

”Sorry.” Ye Qingxuan rubbed his swollen forehead and got up with difficulty. ”My brain is a little messed up.”

”Seems like it really is the heart mark inheritance.” Lola looked at him gleefully. ”The bad thing about old-fashioned alchemy equipment is that the load is too heavy. What school is it?”

”Ancient…School of the Stone Heart…it combined Abstinence and Modifications,” he said with pauses in between as he searched through all the new information in his brain. ”We weren’t wrong. The hat is its inheritance ceremony. Its previous owner is…the first concertmaster of the Royal Musician Division, Andrea Casiraghi. Unfortunately, there isn’t more information related to the user. There aren’t any more records on Avalon’s Shadow. The music score carved in this comes from…the Requiem?” Taken aback, he carefully distinguished the aether music score in his memories and let out a long breath. ”It’s the Requiem!”

”Which Requiem?”

”What else can it be? Of course it’s the Requiem composed by Mozart, King of Yellow, which the Royal Academy of Music uses for its enchantment!”

Ye Qingxuan waved his fists in excitement. This reward alone made all his dangerous life-or-death experiences worth it! Worth it? No, he had hit jackpot!

”Don’t get happy so soon,” Lola dampened his excitement. ”Which movement does the score come from? It’ll be fun if it’s Dies irae. It’s a supersized forbidden score that requires more than three orchestras in coherence to play. We’re not enough even if you sap us dry.”

”It’s ‘Holy’.” Ye Qingxuan felt the aether waves in the hat with his eyes closed. ”This piece is called ‘Holy’. It seems that its effect is protection abandonment.”

After a short silence, Lola nodded slowly. ”This is one of the most famous core elements of the School of Abstinence. It really does have the School of Stone Heart’s style. You’ve really gotten lucky. It’s the prototype of the School of Abstinence’s scepter. It can create a completely pure territory and reject any outer music theory. As a defensive music score, it is definitely one of the best. Furthermore, it can completely protect you against one fatal blow. It’s a savior for musicians.”

Ye Qingxuan instantly grew overjoyed. ”So I’ll be able to do whatever I want now?”

”If you can bear its burden.” Lola glanced at him with pitiful eyes. ”You probably can’t wear it past…thirty seconds at your current level.”

”…”

”Don’t just stand there. What else is there? What else did the heart mark inheritance say?” Lola asked. ”The School of Stone Heart went extinct after appearing during King Arthur’s reign. Maybe the reason is in the inheritance.”

”What else? There’s also…” Ye Qingxuan searched through his memories and recited seriously, ”:?xt=urn:btih:WCJX3P5C5HZT26SKSHMWTD7WJW4LPM3Y…huh? Is this a password?”

”This should be the result after transforming music notes into binary numbers and modified with music theory. Its purpose is to ensure that others won’t know about its secret core technique.”

”It must be something good! Let me do it! I’ll finish decoding in three hours!” Ye Qingxuan’s eyes brightened and he excitedly climbed out of bed, not caring that a medicine bag was still hanging to him. ”These century-old tricks are outdated. Do you have pen and paper?”

Lola shook her head helplessly and gave him the pen and paper. She also placed a translation dictionary of the lingua franca from one hundred years ago on the table before he could ask. And so the room fell silent once again.

Ye Qingxuan began focusing on the decoding and moved quickly. It was from years ago but the changes in sentence structure and music theory were headache-inducing. There was a multitude of problems. However, the further he went, the more excited he became. His eyes practically shone. He was so focused he had forgotten everything else.

Beside him, Lola gazed at his expression. She sighed after a long while. ”You’re growing more obsessed with decoding. If you continue…do you really want to be a scholar?”

”To be honest, I haven’t considered it.”

”Huh?” Lola was taken aback. ”Never?”

Ye Qingxuan looked up and, after thinking, asked, ”Lola, did you ever think about what you wanted to become when you were a kid?”

After a pause, Lola nodded. ”Yes.”

”Same with me. When I was little, I wanted to be a toy buyer. When I matured, I wanted to inherit the family business. After the catastrophe, I wanted to become a filial son. Then later, I wanted to become a priest. I wanted to pray for those who had died and live in a rural church until my death.

”Those are all pretty good, aren’t they? Now that you mention it, I think being a scholar is pretty good too. But these are just for thinking. Anyway, for me, a lot of things are like that.” He paused and chuckled. ”Just think about it and that’s it. It’ll never happen so you don’t need to think too much.”

Lola fell silent. Seeing the youth’s self-deprecating expression, she wanted to speak but stopped herself and looked away as if avoiding something. For some reason, she suddenly felt sad.

The only sound in the silence was the pencil scratching against paper. After some time, Ye Qingxuan set down his pencil. He stretched and moaned happily.

”Done! Lola, come look.”

Lola snapped out of her thoughts and accepted the stack of notes Ye Qingxuan offered. Her expression grew stunned. ”The Sub-Originator Theory? You’ve really taken back something impressive.”