Legend of Inverness County

After a "slow travel" journey that took nearly an entire day, the steam train finally pulled slowly into Inverness, the capital of the Scottish Highlands, accompanied by a long, drawn-out hiss of pressure release as evening fell.

This ancient town is situated at the mouth where the River Ness flows into the Moray Firth; compared to the suffocating industrial clamor of London, it appeared both tranquil and rugged.

Lin Jie and William did not rush to their final destination, Loch Ness. Instead, they chose to first settle into a lodging house in town held by the I.A.R.C., which bore the sign "Highland Exploration and Surveying Company."

This provided a perfect cover identity for their investigative operation.

William was already accustomed to this routine.

As soon as he reached the room, he began checking his weapons and equipment, preparing for any combat that might occur at a moment's notice.

Lin Jie, meanwhile, took out his newly purchased map of Scotland and, under the light of a kerosene lamp, clearly marked out the first phase of the action plan he had already mapped out.

"Sergeant William, our operation tomorrow morning will be divided into two steps. I need you to go to the local fishermen's association and a few of the liveliest pubs; I need every rumor regarding the water monster. Do not judge their truthfulness; no matter how absurd the claims, record them for me."

"And I," Lin Jie's finger tapped the center of the map, "will go to this place—the Inverness County Library and Archives, as well as the back-issue archives of the Inverness Courier. What I need is the oldest and most detailed history regarding this legend."

The next morning, the two split up according to their plan.

Sergeant William, relying on his weathered, highly approachable veteran's face and a few glasses of mellow Scotch whisky, quickly hit it off with the hearty and talkative local fishermen.

Lin Jie, carrying a letter of recommendation from the University of Oxford as a "folklore researcher" issued by the Association, smoothly entered the history-steeped county library.

The librarian was an elderly gentleman wearing reading glasses, filled with a sense of pride for local history.

When he learned that this young scholar from the East had such a keen interest in the ancient legends of the Scottish Highlands, he showed great enthusiasm and personally led Lin Jie into a special collection room that was usually closed to outsiders.

Lin Jie understood that what he wanted to find were not the tourist legends one could see in ordinary travel brochures.

He needed the most primitive, raw, and first-hand materials that were closest to the truth.

He requested that the librarian allow him to consult all ancient county records, church documents, and mythological epics regarding the "Loch Ness area" that had been recorded by scholars after being orally transmitted by Celtic bards.

This was an extremely tedious and vast task.

Most of those ancient documents were written in Gaelic or Old English, which were no longer in common use; the handwriting was blurred, and they were filled with grammatical errors and subjective assumptions.

But Lin Jie was like the most patient gold panner, using his powerful logical analysis and information synthesis capabilities to sift through piles of seemingly worthless gravel for the "gold dust" that might be related to the UMA.

He thoroughly organized all descriptions of the "Loch Ness Monster" in the documents chronologically.

He discovered that the earliest clear record of the Loch Ness Monster could actually be traced back to the sixth century.

An Irish missionary named Saint Columba mentioned in his biography that he had once used the power of a cross by the banks of the River Ness to drive away a "water beast" that had attempted to attack local residents.

In the church's description, this "water beast" was a Demonic Beast from hell.

However, in those much older, primitive Celtic myths, the image of this creature was completely different. Those bards used awe-filled strokes to call it "Loch Nis nan Deur an t-Solais," which translates to "Guardian of the Lake of Tears and Light."

In these legends, it was not an evil Demonic Beast, but a "spirit of nature" responsible for guarding the peace of this sacred lake.

It would bring good luck when kind people prayed by the lake, and only when greedy invaders attempted to defile the lake water would it stir up waves to swallow them.

Two diametrically opposed records pointed to the same existence.

A clear "historical evolution model" immediately emerged in Lin Jie's mind: an ancient UMA, originally worshipped by the local indigenous people as a "guardian" and possessing no malice, had been deliberately vilified and demonized by the church after the introduction of Christianity to promote the power of the new faith, turning it into a devil that needed to be expelled by a saint.

This discovery gave him a deeper understanding of the target of his mission.

Perhaps what they were looking for was not a ferocious "water monster" at all, but a "hermit of the lake" whose peace had been disturbed.

Following this, Lin Jie went to the office of the Inverness Courier.

He spent an entire afternoon flipping through all the old newspapers in the basement of the newspaper office, dating from the early nineteenth century to the present.

In this ocean composed of yellowing paper and lead ink, he once again discovered a startling pattern.

Before the nineteenth century, the number of sighting reports regarding the "water monster" was extremely small, with vague records appearing only once every few decades on average.

But entering the nineteenth century, especially after the fifties, as the tentacles of the Industrial Revolution extended into the Scottish Highlands, as steam cruise ships began to navigate Loch Ness, and as the forests by the lake were heavily logged for railway construction, sighting reports of the "water monster" began to show an... explosive growth!

Every large-scale sighting event had a startling coincidence in timing with the launch of some "modernization" project in the lake area!

Especially this most recent one—the sighting report that had caught the Association's attention as mentioned in the commission—occurred one month after a mining company from Manchester began experimental "underwater mineral exploration" near Urquhart Bay!

The truth was already clear.

That ancient creature, which had slept for many years, was being forced to surface from its lake-bottom dwelling time and time again due to the unceasing intrusion of human industrial civilization.

When Lin Jie returned to the inn, dragging his exhausted body with his notebook filled with dense notes, William had also finished his day of "pub investigation."

William had collected countless bizarre rumors from the mouths of those fishermen and drunks: some said the monster's neck was like a giant python, some said its back was like an overturned boat, and others swore that on a full moon night, they had seen its eyes like two giant headlights.

Although these descriptions contradicted each other, they all pointed to a common point—the thing was enormous in size.

When Lin Jie laid out the results of his day of "document research" in front of William.

The veteran simply poured a glass of mellow whisky for Lin Jie.

"No wonder Barton said your value is sometimes more important than an entire field team. You guy... have already dug up its 'personal file' of fifteen hundred years clearly and thoroughly."

Lin Jie raised his glass and clinked it gently with William's; the mellow liquor slid down his throat, bringing with it a warm flame.