Inner Layer

The second week of December.

Artoria began deciphering the inner layer of the Ancient Celtic Sealing System.

She nailed a huge whiteboard—borrowed from Filius Flitwick—to the office wall, enlarged the rubbings of the inner-layer runes threefold, and pinned them up. Then she moved a chair in front of the board and began identifying the symbols one by one.

The process was slow.

The Ancient Celtic Sealing System was completely different from modern magic—there was no standardized grammar, no unified symbol chart. Every seal master had their own variations and abbreviations. Merlin's system was especially complex—he liked to layer three or four meanings into a single symbol.

Artoria sat before the whiteboard for hours at a time.

On the first day, Zhang Wen had tried to help.

"This symbol looks like—"

"No. This is Merlin's personal variation. Its standard meaning is 'door,' but in his system, it means 'entrance to consciousness.' The difference is in the hook at the upper right—the standard form curves outward, while Merlin's curves inward."

Zhang Wen looked at that hook.

The difference was roughly half a millimeter.

He decided that his way of helping should be making tea and keeping quiet.

Wednesday.

Artoria sat in front of the whiteboard for six hours.

During those six hours, Zhang Wen made four cups of tea—two and a half spoonfuls of sugar each—graded two sets of homework, replied to three letters, handled a prank incident involving Fred and George—they had thrown a homemade colored smoke bomb at Peeves, who exploded into rainbow colors and screamed in the corridor for twenty minutes—and gave Neville Longbottom a private advanced Iron Armor Charm lesson.

Every time he returned to the office, Artoria was sitting in the same spot. Her posture had barely changed. Only the pen in her hand moved—as she wrote down the translations in her notebook.

He made the fourth cup of tea at five in the afternoon.

Zhang Wen set the tea on the small table beside her hand.

"How many times have you stood up today?"

"Twice. To use the bathroom."

"You didn't eat lunch."

"I forgot."

Zhang Wen looked at her.

Artoria Pendragon. Someone who considered eating the second most important thing in life—after fighting—had forgotten to eat lunch.

That meant those runes had consumed all her attention.

"Get up," Zhang Wen said.

"Let me look a little longer—"

"Now. Get up. Eat."

Artoria's pen stopped. She looked up at him.

"Are you ordering me around?"

"I'm concerned about you. In a way you can understand. It worked last time."

Artoria looked at him for three seconds.

Then she put down her pen.

"You've learned how to deal with me."

"It took me three months. Worth it."

When Artoria stood up, her legs swayed slightly—she had been sitting too long, and her circulation was poor.

Zhang Wen reached out and steadied her elbow.

"See? Even your legs go numb if you sit too long."

"Temporarily. I'll recover in three seconds."

Sure enough, three seconds later, her gait was completely normal.

Zhang Wen was already used to the speed of her physical recovery.

Kitchen.

Zhang Wen took Artoria to the kitchen to make up for her missed lunch.

When the house-elves saw that "Miss Pendragon" had arrived, they were nearly as excited as Gryffindor winning the Quidditch Cup. Within three minutes, the table was laden with roasted chicken legs, shepherd's pie, cream soup, bread, butter, and an entire apple pie.

"This is too much—" Zhang Wen said.

Artoria had already sat down.

Fifteen minutes later, every plate was empty.

Zhang Wen looked at the empty plates and silently revised his estimate—Artoria who had "forgotten lunch" probably consumed forty percent more food than Artoria who ate a "normal lunch."

When hungry, the King of Knights was a biological weapon with double the eating efficiency.

"All right." Artoria wiped the corner of her mouth with a napkin. "We can go back to work."

"No. You can't sit back down and stare at runes right after eating. Take at least twenty minutes to walk and aid digestion."

"My digestive system—"

"Your digestive system is legendary, I know. But your eyes aren't. You've been staring at dense runes for six hours. Your eyes need to look at distant things to relax. Come on. Walk."

Artoria opened her mouth, probably intending to argue.

Then she closed it.

"All right."

The two of them walked along the shore of the Black Lake.

The Black Lake had completely frozen over by December. A thin layer of snow covered the ice. In the distance, they could occasionally see the vague shadow of the giant squid passing beneath it.

The sky was dark—at half past five on a winter day in Scotland, the sun had long since set. Only the castle lights and faint moonlight reflected off the lake remained.

"How's the inner-layer deciphering going?" Zhang Wen asked as they walked.

"About forty percent complete," Artoria said. "The sealing structure of the inner layer is more complicated than I expected. Merlin didn't just seal Mordred's soul fragment—he also embedded a complete 'protocol' within the seal."

"A protocol?"

"Something like—a contract. It set rules of conduct for the soul fragment within the seal. If the soul fragment tried to break through the seal, the protocol would automatically activate a punishment mechanism and suppress its conscious activity. If the soul fragment remained quiet, the protocol would grant it a certain degree of conscious freedom."

"A reward-and-punishment system."

"Merlin's style. He didn't like simple violent suppression. He preferred designing intricate systems to manage problems—rather than eliminate them."

"That sounds a little like Dumbledore."

"They were indeed alike in many ways." There was a trace of tenderness in Artoria's voice that she might not have noticed herself when she mentioned Merlin.

"You respect Merlin a great deal."

"He was the smartest person I ever met. And the most headache-inducing person. Every time he solved one problem, he created three more. But in the end, every problem would be absorbed into the framework he designed."

"The privilege of genius."

"The flaw of genius."

The two of them walked along the lakeshore for about ten minutes.

A cold wind blew over the lake. Zhang Wen's scarf—the dark blue one—fluttered around his neck.

Artoria wore an old gray scarf.

Two scarves. Two people. An understanding that had carried on from November into December.

"What else is in the protocol?" Zhang Wen asked.

"There's one clause I haven't fully deciphered yet. But judging from the parts I've already translated—Merlin left a 'release condition' in the protocol."

Zhang Wen stopped walking.

"A release condition?"

"If certain specific conditions are met—the seal will automatically dissolve. The soul fragment will be released."

"What conditions?"

"That's the part I'm still deciphering. Those runes are extremely dense—Merlin wrote the conditions in extraordinary detail. I need to translate them word by word."

"Merlin left an exit for release." Zhang Wen frowned. "He sealed Mordred—but also designed conditions to release her. That means—he didn't intend to seal her permanently."

"Merlin never intended to seal Mordred permanently." Artoria's voice lowered slightly. "He was waiting for an opportunity. A suitable opportunity to release her."

"What opportunity?"

"I don't know. Once I finish deciphering the release condition, I'll know."

Zhang Wen looked at her.

Moonlight fell over her profile. The wind lifted the loose strands of hair by her ears. Her gray scarf was wrapped twice around her neck.

Her gaze was fixed on the distance—the mountains beyond the Black Lake. In the darkness, those mountains were nothing more than a blurred outline.

But Zhang Wen felt that she was not looking at the mountains.

She was looking at something from fifteen hundred years ago.

"You're thinking about Camelot," Zhang Wen said.

"I'm thinking about Merlin," Artoria said. "When he sealed Mordred—what was he thinking then? He knew the relationship between Mordred and me. When he designed this seal—he must have considered that one day, I might stand before this cabinet."

"You think Merlin's release condition has something to do with you?"

Artoria fell silent for three seconds.

"That's possible."

Zhang Wen thought for a moment.

If Merlin's release condition had something to do with Artoria—if this seal would only be undone when the King of Knights appeared—

Then this fifteen-hundred-year imprisonment had possessed an ending from the very beginning.

That ending was Artoria.

"If the release condition is you—" Zhang Wen said, "then this cabinet has been waiting for you from the moment it was made."

"It waited fifteen hundred years."

"What do you think?"

Artoria's gaze withdrew from the distance. She turned to look at Zhang Wen.

"I think Merlin still likes giving people difficult problems, just like before."

Zhang Wen couldn't help laughing.

A puzzle fifteen hundred years old. Merlin's handiwork. Mordred's soul. The King of Knights' regret.

"Come on. We're heading back. Your twenty minutes of walking are up."

"You were timing it?"

"You told me to walk for twenty minutes. Twenty minutes are up. I need to go back and continue deciphering the runes."

"Can't you walk a little longer?"

"The runes won't translate themselves."

"The runes can wait."

Artoria looked at him.

"You want me to walk a little longer."

"The air by the lake is good for your eyes."

"You're using my health as an excuse."

"You often use 'basic duty' as an excuse too. We're even."

The corner of Artoria's mouth moved.

"Another ten minutes," she said.

"All right."

The two of them continued along the lakeshore.

This time, Artoria's pace was a little slower than before. Not because she was tired—she would never become tired from walking.

She was matching Zhang Wen's pace.

And Zhang Wen was deliberately walking slower than usual.

Both of them were deliberately dragging out the time.

But neither said it aloud.

When they reached the east side of the castle, they ran into Hagrid.

The huge groundskeeper was returning from the direction of the Forbidden Forest, his leather coat covered in snow and bits of branches. Fang walked at his feet, his tail wagging like a propeller.

"Hey! Professor Zhang! Miss Pendragon!" Hagrid waved enthusiastically. "Out for a walk this late?"

"Relaxing a little," Zhang Wen said.

"Good, good. You two have been busy as anything lately—the whole school is talking about it." Hagrid lowered his voice—for him, "lowering his voice" was probably equivalent to an ordinary person's normal volume. "Fred told me you were researching some secret project."

"Fred Weasley's information is about as reliable as The Quibbler."

"That's true enough." Hagrid laughed, then looked at Zhang Wen, then at Artoria, his expression turning slightly strange.

"You two—are really close, aren't you?"

"Part—"

Zhang Wen swallowed the word "partners." Because Artoria was looking at him beside him.

"Colleagues," Zhang Wen corrected himself.

"Colleagues," Artoria repeated. Her tone was perfectly flat.

Hagrid looked at Zhang Wen's expression. Then he looked at Artoria's expression.

Then he gave them a knowing smile—the kind of smile that said, I may not be good at socializing, but I can tell.

"Right, right, 'colleagues.'" Hagrid made exaggerated quotation-mark gestures with his hands. "Then you 'colleagues' carry on with your walk. It's cold out. Don't catch a chill."

He led Fang away. Before leaving, he looked back once, that smile still on his face.

Zhang Wen closed his eyes for a moment.

The whole school.

The whole school was talking.

Including Hagrid.

Probably the only ones who didn't know were themselves—though they actually did know.

"He made air quotes," Artoria said.

"I saw it."

"He doesn't believe we're 'colleagues.'"

"The whole school doesn't believe it."

"Then what are we?"

Zhang Wen looked at her.

The December night sky. Moonlight. Snow. A cold wind. The distant lights of the castle.

"We are..." He thought for three seconds. "Two people who haven't defined themselves yet."

Artoria considered it.

"That definition is acceptable. For now."

"For now," Zhang Wen repeated.

"For now means... one day, there will be an official definition."

Zhang Wen's heart skipped a beat.

"What are you implying?"

"I'm stating a matter of logic. The meaning of 'for now' carries the presupposition that it will change in the future. You chose to say 'for now'—which means you expect this state to change."

"You've started using semantic analysis to interpret my words?"

"You use data analysis to interpret my actions. I use semantic analysis to interpret your language. Fair."

Zhang Wen smiled.

Then he held out his hand.

Not to support her waist, not to wipe her face, not to massage her, not to put an arm around her shoulders.

He simply held out his hand. Palm up. Between them.

Artoria lowered her gaze to look at that hand.

Three seconds.

She placed her hand in his.

Their hands came together, their fingers naturally intertwining.

The same way they had in the office yesterday. But this time, they were by the lake, beneath the moonlight, where the whole world could see them.

"Let's go," Zhang Wen said. "Five minutes left."

"You're timing it again."

"Because you said thirty minutes. Thirty minutes means thirty minutes."

"You said twenty minutes just now."

"Then we added another ten. Five minutes remain now. Mathematics."

"Your mathematics has a lot of subjective variables."

"All the best mathematics has subjective variables."

The two of them held hands as they walked along the lake for the final five minutes.

Then they returned to the castle.

They let go as they entered—there might be students in the entrance hall.

But in the instant they released each other, both their fingers tightened slightly.

They didn't want to let go.

Then they did.

Back in the office.

Artoria sat down before the whiteboard again.

But this time, she did not immediately pick up her pen.

She stared blankly at the runes on the whiteboard—Merlin's handwriting—for about ten seconds.

Then she turned her head to glance at Zhang Wen, seated behind his desk.

Zhang Wen was pretending to grade assignments.

"Zhang Wen."

"Hmm?"

"During that walk just now—you walked very slowly. Twenty percent slower than your normal pace."

"The path by the lake was slippery. A safety consideration."

"You were wearing non-slip boots."

"...A walk doesn't need to be too fast."

"You deliberately walked slowly. To make the walk last longer."

Zhang Wen put down his pen.

"You walked slowly too. Fifteen percent slower than your normal pace."

Artoria's lips pressed together slightly.

"The path really was a little slippery."

"You were wearing non-slip boots. And you wouldn't slip even if you ran on ice."

They looked at each other for three seconds.

Then they smiled at the same time.

Neither smile was large. The corners of Zhang Wen's mouth rose by about three millimeters, while Artoria's rose by about two.

But in this quiet office—the firelight from the hearth, the snow outside the window, two steaming cups of tea—those two tiny smiles were enough.

"Back to work." Artoria turned back to the whiteboard.

"Okay."

She picked up her pen.

Zhang Wen picked up his quill.

The two of them worked quietly in their respective places.

Occasionally, Artoria would read out a rune's translation for Zhang Wen to record. Occasionally, Zhang Wen would stand up to refill her tea.

The snow was still falling outside.

There were roughly three to four weeks left before the seal completely failed.

As for figuring out Merlin's conditions for release—perhaps only a few days were needed.

But at this moment, Zhang Wen was not in a hurry.

Because no matter what the answer to the riddle was—they would face it together.

That much, he was certain of.

More certain than any data analysis.