Tower of Erudition

Biodata

Architecture & Facilities

The Tower of Erudition was a white-marble academic complex centered on a towering Main Tower before its eventual collapse. Its outer walls were covered in decorative and functional runes, while aerial corridors connected the individual towers. During Lu Yuan's first visit, it is described as a seven-tower complex; during its later lockdown, it is described as a Main Tower surrounded by four subsidiary towers. 140 223

Exterior

• The Main Tower was the tallest structure, with a pointed spire and a dome-like upper structure. 140 270
• White marble walls shimmered in daylight; at night, their alchemical patterns gave off a faint ghostly-blue glow. 140 223
• Aerial corridors linked the towers in a web-like formation. 140 223
• The Main Tower's entrance was a bronze gate over ten meters high, covered in flowing inscription patterns. 224
• During the lockdown, the gate's inscriptions weakened significantly; later, the entire gate was sealed and humming with active power. 224 255
• During the Fourth Fishing crisis, the Tower's dormant inscriptions activated across its body and barely sealed a rupture in the Sea of Knowledge tributary. 359
• The Tower was capable of projecting a Light Beam that extracted K from the Guardian's domain before the Guardian could destroy him. 338
• The Tower's body contained extensive sealing and suppression inscriptions, whose light was visibly weaker after prolonged deterioration. 223 224

Interior

• Broad corridors contain blue-tinted glass windows, scholar portraits, rune-carved floors, and alchemical patterns. 140
• The Main Tower contains a central Spiral Staircase ascending through staggered floors and massive stained-glass windows. 145
• The Main Tower serves as the institution's administrative center and the Principal's workplace. 224
• Its third floor includes a large circular chamber equipped with alchemical patterns, blueprints, instruments, and the Special Inspector's workspace. 255
• The peak contains a vaulted chamber covered in inscriptions and accessed through a sealed copper door. 348
• The peak also housed a Dark Red Array that enshrined the massive skull containing the Person on the Wall's will. 386
• The Main Control Room was used to oversee the harvesting program and its shutdown procedures. 374
• After the Guardian embedded himself in the Tower's inscription network, dark living tissue spread through its masonry and floors. 379 386

Underground Fishing Hall

• A concealed underground hall beneath the Tower was built around a tributary of the Sea of Knowledge. 271
• The hall was excavated from a single mass of rock and had a high domed ceiling with an opening through which the Sea of Knowledge tributary could be seen. 271
• Its floor was divided into three concentric operational zones:
  • Outer zone — The Church's blessing-inscription ring. 271
  • Middle zone — The Night Watch's stations and Mental or Rational Barrier array. 271 272
  • Inner zone — The Tower's restricted Fishing Core Area, containing the student vessels and harvesting equipment. 271

Present Condition

• The Tower had already been heavily damaged by the collision between the flesh tide, the Sea of Knowledge, and multiple Taboo-level forces. 456 477
• During the crisis, the Main Tower was sealed and everyone within it lost consciousness. 354
• Worms of Knowledge and gray-white mist temporarily formed a barrier around the Main Tower, slowing the Dark Red flesh spreading toward it. 477
• The structure finally collapsed when the aura released during Leike's advancement erupted outward from the Tower. 485
• All nobles who had taken shelter within the Tower were killed when it collapsed. 502
• Bronze City subsequently entered a period of large-scale reconstruction, though the surviving records do not establish that the Tower itself was rebuilt. 502 503

Departments

Administration & Institutional Ties

• Empire Headquarters — Authorized the Tower's Sea of Knowledge experiments and assigned Special Inspector Arthur Heinz to supervise them. Empire Headquarters later sent personnel directly to the Tower without consulting the Night Watch and brought members of the Ascension Society with them. 169 255 272
• The Church — Performs routine purification and maintenance at designated nodes, though sealed areas above the Third Tower are no longer accessible through its routes. 223 224
• Night Watch — Investigated disappearances, temporarily requisitioned personnel to patrol the Tower's dormitories, and later supplied personnel to maintain the Rational Barrier during the harvesting operation. 139 142 159 271 272
• Ascension Society — Arrived in Bronze City with the Empire Headquarters delegation and became involved in the political and supernatural crisis surrounding the Tower. 169 255
• Dwarves — Were hired to participate in sealing work at the Tower; Green later confirmed his personal involvement in the sealing project. 285 459
• Kame — Vice Dean who admitted that the Tower's experiment had succeeded and escorted the Night Watch to Arthur Heinz. 255
• Calvin Morton — Department Supervisor who represented the Tower during official meetings and directed Night Watch personnel during the harvesting operation. 255 271 314
• Arthur Heinz — Empire Headquarters' Special Inspector; supervised the experiments, later activated the array connecting the Tower to the Sea of Knowledge, and attempted to shut down the harvesting program. 255 374 456
• Laurina Castor — Department of Alchemy student and prominent alchemy talent; her laboratory on the Third Tower's top floor contained research that attracted attention from the Main Tower's hidden entity. 156 224 226
• Earl's Council — The Tower was expected to send a Special Envoy to political meetings concerning the Sea of Knowledge crisis; Calvin Morton represented it when the envoy was absent. 314
• Empire-wide Tower network — Institutions called Towers of Erudition operate elsewhere in the Empire, including Distant City, where a high-ranking master teaches Ancient Music Theory. 406

Sea of Knowledge Operations

Harvesting Program

The Tower conducted Empire-authorized experiments intended to retrieve lost knowledge from the Sea of Knowledge. 159 272

• A concealed underground hall beneath the Tower is built around a tributary of the Sea of Knowledge. 271
• The Guardian identified the Tower's experiment as using a Forbidden Artifact to open a Forbidden Land. 257
• The hall has three operational zones:
  • Outer zone — The Church's blessing-inscription ring. 271
  • Middle zone — The Night Watch's stations, which draw on Sanity to form a Mental or Rational Barrier. 271 272
  • Inner zone — The Tower's restricted experimental area. 271
• Night Watch personnel are instructed to maintain the barrier, avoid entering the tributary, and not look into the inner zone once harvesting begins. 271
• Sanity Rings were issued to allow the participating Night Watch members to share their Sanity and prolong the barrier's operation. 270
• Arthur later activated the Tower's array directly, opening a rift that poured words and knowledge fragments over Bronze City. 456
• Arthur's consciousness entered the Sea of Knowledge while he endured within the opened connection to widen the rift. 456
• Lu Yuan subsequently used his authority over the Sea of Knowledge at the Tower summit, widening the rift in an attempt to draw the opposing Taboo existences into it. 478 484
• During the catastrophe, the Sea of Knowledge attacked the surrounding flesh and opened a route for the Sky-Seeking Fortress to evacuate survivors from the Tower. 467
• Lu Yuan later summoned the Sea of Knowledge into reality, unleashing a deluge of words that affected the Person on the Wall and the newborn Taboo. 492

Student Vessels

Twenty-three Tower students were transformed into living vessels for Worms of Knowledge. Their bodies were overtaken by insects while their brains were preserved as the true containers. 271 272

• The students' consciousnesses were stripped away while their brains remained alive. 271
• Their bodies were replaced internally by thousands of insects, leaving only their brains as genuinely human tissue. 271
• Upon entering the Sea of Knowledge, they temporarily regained human forms and memories. 272
• The operation was authorized by the Empire despite its human cost. 272

Containment Failure

• The Tower's defenses began weakening before the harvesting operation: wall runes flickered or went dark, bronze-gate inscriptions dimmed, and damaged floor runes were left unrepaired. 223 224
• Church purification could cleanse knowledge pollution at designated nodes, but only temporarily improved the inscriptions. 224
• Liquid continued to flow through copper pipes after nightfall, indicating that experiments persisted despite the Tower's deterioration. 226
• The Tower's lockdown centralized experimental data in the Archive Room and removed research materials from public display areas. 224
• During the Fourth Fishing, the Tower's inscriptions temporarily reacted on their own to close cracks in the Sea of Knowledge's light river, though the Tower continued to tremble under the strain. 359
• The Guardian's domain later blocked the breach above the Tower while Arthur attempted a controlled shutdown from the Main Control Room. 374
• Arthur's subsequent activation of the array tore open the sealed passage at the Tower's summit and caused the remaining underground sealing inscriptions to fail. 456
• The resulting clash between the word tide and flesh tide placed the Tower under catastrophic pressure and contributed to its ultimate collapse. 456 485

The Presence in the Main Tower

A dangerous existence is sealed at the Main Tower's spire: a massive head containing the will of the Person on the Wall, described as the fragmented remains of a Taboo existence recovered from the North Sea. 381

• The Tower's inscriptions suppress the entity's will and emanations. 381
• It repeatedly directed an oppressive gaze at Lu Yuan, triggering Sanity Checks that he resisted. 226 271
• Its skull was held within a Dark Red Array at the top of the Main Tower. 348 386
• Its aura had permeated the Tower over six months, turning the structure into a physical extension of itself within Bronze City. 386
• When the Guardian forced himself into the Tower's inscription network, the Guardian and the sealed entity became bound to the same structure “like one body with two souls.” 386
• The Main Tower later became sealed during the conflict, leaving everyone within it unconscious. 354
• A separate Seed or Taboo-related entity was believed to have sprouted somewhere within the Tower's grounds. 347
• The Person on the Wall later stabilized the Tower during the tremors caused by the newly born incomplete Taboo. 479
• As the newborn Taboo pressed its attack, the Person on the Wall began to fight back directly, using its gray mist to contest the expanding Taboo domain. 484
• The Person on the Wall was among the major existences affected when Lu Yuan summoned the Sea of Knowledge into reality. 492
• Klaus assessed that Selina, or the Tower as a whole, had likely made a deal with the Person on the Wall in connection with the Sea of Knowledge harvesting program. 438

Story Role & Major Arcs