"I'm sorry, the power of ti has dissipated so severely that even I can't see what happened in the past."
Audrey answered, a note of apology in her voice.
She was telling the truth. The Church had already identified which Bestowal had been damaged and knew the odds of a successful divination were slim. Still, they had to try.
"You can't see anything at all?"
They spoke as they walked into the shop.
"Not a single thing," she answered with certainty.
Of all the Enchanters in the shop, the two elegant won were by far the youngest. Nolan's local churches had, by unspoken agreent, all dispatched their own researchers. Even with everything that had happened over the last six months, a damaged Bestowal was still a matter of considerable weight.
"Only Mysterious Objects and gods can damage a Bestowal."
An old man with the Sage's emblem embroidered on his chest whispered, and Audrey recognized him at once as a Keeper of Secrets from the Church of Knowledge and Books.
"So, the incident this morning..."
"It's related to a god. Given that it involves a ti-series Bestowal, only a select few Mysterious Objects could have had an effect—and none of them would have appeared here at this ti."
Another man nodded in agreent.
"A god's power cannot manifest without leaving other signs. We've felt no trace of any great being here."
"Unless..."
"Unless it was a follower of that new god, the one who is so skilled at concealnt!"
Despite the complete lack of clues, the matter still, miraculously, pointed to the correct person.
At that very mont, the ground gave a sudden lurch.
"An earthquake?"
That was everyone's first thought. Although Nolan City was not prone to earthquakes, tremors did occur from ti to ti.
The tremor struck only once and was not followed by another. The group inside the clock shop moved outdoors. Snow was still drifting down, and the sky showed no unusual signs.
They gazed toward the southern sky, in the direction of the junction between Nolan City's largest slum and a bustling comrcial street.
A few seconds later, a thin beam of light suddenly shot up from the ground, piercing the thick layer of clouds and tearing a hole in the sky. But beyond the opening was not the familiar blue expanse, but a dense tapestry of characters and bizarre patterns of dots and lines.
A sound like a tolling bell echoed from the depths of the heavens as a seven-hued light descended, mingling with the patterns. Gradually, those on the ground could begin to make out what they were seeing.
Bizarre equations, complex geotric shapes, chaotic stick-figure drawings;
Mind-numbing data tables, vast blocks of densely packed text, arrows pointing toward inscrutable anings;
Smoothly rotating spheres, complex fractal divisions of space, and nauseating graphs of cyclical decay;
...
Colorful patterns, shifting gradients, white symbols, black text. Ordinary people saw none of it, but across half the continent, Enchanters looked up as one and beheld the spectacle.
Audrey swallowed hard. This was clearly her friend's ability, but... what in the world were she and Jenkins doing?
The celestial display lasted a full ten minutes before fading away. Fortunately, ordinary people remained completely unaware. This fact only underscored how peculiar and unnatural the vision was. Perhaps only a god could know what it truly represented.
Near Miss Miller's apartnt, an entire half-block of people had fallen unconscious. As for Jean and Mamie, who had been facing Jenkins directly, they lay collapsed on the floor, bleeding from their eyes, ears, noses, and mouths. They were no longer breathing.
"What are you waiting for? Let's go!"
Miss Miller grabbed Jenkins's hand, a huge suitcase already in her other, and pulled him right out the window.
She had long been prepared for a hasty escape via a Mysterious Object carriage, so packing had taken no ti at all.
As the contract expired, a vast amount of spirit and an indescribable sensation drained from his body. The vision in the sky faded to nothing, and Jenkins returned to his senses.
The images in the sky had simply been the patterns manifesting behind Jenkins when he used [Mathematical Principles]. Neither of them had any idea why they had suddenly been projected across the heavens.
At the ti, he had only felt a faint connection to the world itself, a strange pulse that allowed the ability to be more fully realized. When it ended, the spirit within him had inexplicably surged, which he presud was related to the incident.
"What just happened?"
Jenkins asked as they ran down an alley. Chocolate poked his head out from Jenkins's collar, though for what purpose, it was impossible to say.
"I'd like to know that myself. When the ability loan ended, I gained a new [White Basic] ability called [Mathematical Foundation]. What exactly did you do?"
"How should I know? All I did was activate your ability, and then I inexplicably started to glow!" he said, the picture of innocence.
"Then it's settled! You're just like , a true enthusiast of mathematics, an Enchanter who believes that all things are number!"
"I'm not..."
They spun around abruptly, trying to even out their breathing as they pretended to be casual passersby heading back the way they ca.
Thankfully, a policeman passed the mouth of the alley without paying any mind to the suspicious pair within, continuing on his way.
"If Audrey was called in to help, where am I supposed to be right now?" he asked, still trying to figure out how to distance himself from the whole affair.
"Audrey sent you ho. She doesn't think you should get involved in sothing potentially dangerous."
"That's perfect."
Miss Miller seed to have planned long ago for the day she might need to flee her apartnt. She knew the surrounding area intimately—which low walls could be scaled, and which ones concealed a fruit vendor's stall on the other side.
In any case, despite yet another unexpected incident, Jenkins's own plans had, surprisingly, not been derailed.
The only change was that they were supposed to be discussing their plans in a warm room, not standing atop a four-story, half-finished building to deliberate their next move.
Yes, this was the very spot where Jenkins had encountered the magic eye collector.
There was no higher vantage point nearby. The expansive view allowed them to see people converging on the apartnt from all directions.
A pang of guilt struck Jenkins as he thought of it.
"I'm sorry. I don't think you'll be able to go back to that apartnt. Oh, but my family has a large house..."
"Jenkins, don't apologize. To have witnessed the power of [Mathematical Principles] in your hands makes it all worthwhile. Just as I suspected, the true nature of this ability is..."
An ambitious expression spread across the shorter woman's face. She was well aware of what the celestial vision had signified.
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