Inside the tent, looking at the sudden appearance of words on the blank space at the end of the comic book, Kapak's brow furrowed slightly. Although he didn't know the meaning of the word, he felt it shouldn't be there.
All the other words in this comic book were in black font, appearing very neat and standardized, as if printed. This word, however, was blue and not as regular as the other letters, so it must have been written in.
'Should this be a vocabulary word written separately on the blank page? Does it have some special meaning? What does this mean?'
Looking at the word on the paper before him, Kapak thought this. Then he rummaged through his wooden box for a while and pulled out a small notebook. When he opened it, it was filled with writing.
In this small notebook, there was a collection of words, with other characters resembling seals beside them, allowing for cross-referencing.
Kapak had once been a slave in a city established by invaders from across the sea. There, to make him understand what tasks to do, the factory owner hired someone specifically to teach these foreign slaves simple vocabulary. Although this was for the purpose of better exploiting Kapak, he still diligently studied these foreign languages, even taking careful notes. The small notebook he now held was one he had brought back with him.
On one side of the notebook were alphabetic characters, which, according to the invaders, were called Prit Language. On the other side were seal-like characters called Spirit Seal Language, a common written language among many tribes on this continent.
On the vast land where Kapak lived, there were many tribes. The languages and customs among these tribes varied greatly, but their written language was the same. According to the tribal priests, long, long ago, all the tribes on this land were united, ruled by a great King. At that time, warriors united under the King were even able to campaign in worlds across the sea under the King's god-like power.
However, when the King fell in war, countless disasters descended, splitting the tribes. After countless years, the King's great legacy gradually vanished. Now, only this writing remained, but it was only mastered by a small number of people within the tribes, mainly centered around the priests. Kapak had been an assistant to the tribal priest when he was young, so he also mastered this writing.
The small notebook in Kapak's hand at this time was a simple vocabulary reference book, cross-referencing Spirit Seal Language and Prit Language. Kapak flipped through the small reference book, trying to find the meaning of the word written on the blank page, but couldn't find it after searching for a long time.
Kapak's reference book had a very limited vocabulary, mostly words he needed to know while working as a slave, such as "work," "eat," "keep working," "move things," "shovel coal," "no rest," "work all night," "work all day," etc.
Finally, after searching for a long time, Kapak found a word in his small notebook that was very similar to the word on the blank page, just with a few more letters. According to the Spirit Seal Language cross-reference next to it, Kapak understood the specific meaning of this word.
This meant "ignorant," "idiot," or "fool." It was usually used by factory owners to curse people. Because Kapak had been cursed like this so often, he found a way to figure out how to write and pronounce the word. When he killed the factory owner, he loudly cursed the corpse with this word ten times in front of a crowd of workers, causing many workers to curse along with him.
'Oh... so it means 'ignorant.' It just had a few letters missing. Other than the missing letters, it was quite similar. Hmm... it must be that the owner of this picture book made a mistake and left out a few letters.'
Having found the result in the dictionary, Kapak was very satisfied and concluded that the word in the comic book meant 'ignorant' or 'fool,' and the person who wrote it had simply accidentally missed a few letters.
'Hmm, this is a good opportunity to correct it, deepen my impression of the word, and I won't have to flip through the notebook next time I encounter it.'
Kapak thought this, and being a diligent student, he decided to slightly correct the incorrectly written word. He rummaged through his collection box again for a while and found a bottle of ink and a fountain pen. After filling the pen with ink, he placed the comic book on the ground and began to write on the blank page. He had practiced using a fountain pen when he was in the city.
Below the original word, Kapak first wrote what he believed to be the correct word, and then below this "correct" word, he wrote the corresponding Spirit Seal Language. After glancing at it, he nodded with satisfaction.
However, soon after, something surprising happened. The characters he had written, whether the Prit word or the Spirit Seal Language, all seeped into the white paper together and disappeared without a trace.
And Kapak stared with wide eyes, astonished at the scene before him.
...
East coast of the main island of the Preet Kingdom, Tivian, Royal Saint Crown University, King's Campus.
In the library's washroom, Dorothy was momentarily stunned by the characters that appeared on the """wen hai hang zhi""" in her hand. She truly couldn't understand the strange, seal-like writing, but she did recognize those few Prit words.
'Ignorant? Fool? Why is someone cursing here? I wrote 'knowledge,' and you replied with 'ignorant'? What does that mean?!'
Looking at the book before her, Dorothy thought with a bit of annoyance. In fact, the Prit Language word for "knowledge" and "wisdom" were the same word. Adding a few more letters to this word could turn it into its negative form, "ignorant," becoming an insult.
'The person linked by this """wen hai hang zhi""", I don't know why they replied with some unreadable characters and a Prit word for 'ignorant.' What does this mean?'
Looking at the words on the book-sea navigation record, Dorothy pondered, then thought of a possibility and began to question the system.
'System, check if there is any new language knowledge.'
'Reply: Detected a new Spirit Seal Language vocabulary word, 'ignorant.''
The system replied to Dorothy. After hearing it, Dorothy nodded knowingly.
'As expected, this strange blob-like character is a new script, corresponding to the Prit word 'ignorant.' This time, the """wen hai hang zhi""" might be linked to a scholar who has mastered a language called Spirit Seal Language.'
'This scholar might be using the book linked by the book-sea navigation record to draft something, which is why I saw it. This is great.'
Thinking that the person on the other side of the book-sea navigation record had mastered a new language, Dorothy's eyes lit up. Then, she took out a pen from the magic box and wrote on the book-sea navigation record in Prit Language.
"Pray."
Dorothy finished writing the word, then watched as the characters slowly seeped into the paper.
Using the """wen hai hang zhi""" as a medium, Dorothy's system could expand the range of anonymous prayers it could detect. As long as Dorothy and the other party were in a communication state using the book-sea navigation record, Dorothy could sense any unspecified prayer the other party made, relying on the system.
Of course, whether the other party would subconsciously pray upon seeing just the word "pray" depended on luck. If not, Dorothy would slowly communicate with the other party and then induce them to pray.
...
Inside the tent, looking at the words that had vanished from the text before him, he was momentarily startled and panicked. He immediately stood up and grabbed the short axe weapon beside him.
'What is going on?! Why did the words I wrote disappear? What exactly happened? Evil spirits? Witchcraft? Or something else entirely?'
Kapak looked nervously at the book pages on the ground, thinking. Just as he was wondering whether to show this strange thing to the priest, characters suddenly appeared out of nowhere on it. This time, it was directly a new vocabulary word.
'This... the words just disappeared out of nowhere... and now they've appeared out of nowhere again, and it's that kind of alphabetic writing again... What does it mean this time?'
Looking at the new word that appeared on the book, Kapak leaned closer with some curiosity. After not quite understanding it, he picked up his translation reference book again and, after flipping through several pages, he found the corresponding vocabulary word.
One was "pray." Those white people, whether workers or factory owners, paid attention to this. Whenever they had time, they would go to their Church and pray to their god. Because this was a common phenomenon, Kapak had noted it down.
"Pray... Who is this telling me to pray to? To this book? This book can respond to me. Could it be... that there are powerful spirits residing within?"
Kapak muttered the word in his own language. Having been a priest's Apprentice, when he read this word, he also thought of the various rituals for praying to the Wilderness Spirit. Having witnessed items that housed guardian spirits, Kapak's heart couldn't help but become devout. For a moment, he wondered if there was some powerful spirit inside this book, as only items housing souls could possess wisdom.
Whether they were Evil spirits or guardian spirits, they were all things the tribal people had to worship.
And at this very moment, Dorothy's system on the distant end finally reacted. She immediately consumed the Spirituality of the """enlightenment""" and established an information channel with Kapak.