Following the guidance of the faint glimmer, Byrne walked toward the secret door. Although the light itself was weak, the restrictions of the Rules made it appear exceptionally prominent in his eyes. In the darkness, that sliver of light was like a solitary lighthouse, guiding him step by step toward the door.
The closer he got, the more clearly he perceived that the light wasn't coming from an object on the stone shelf itself, but was seeping through a gap between the shelf and the wall. Reaching it, Byrne tried to nudge the shelf outward. Initially, he thought it would be an arduous task, but to his surprise, the shelf wasn't as heavy as the pedestal. With a slight surge of strength, he pushed it aside.
The moment the shelf moved, the glimmer brightened significantly. With the obstruction gone, Byrne could finally see the source. The light was leaking from a crack in the wall. However, the crack wasn't between the blue-black rocks; it came from a square stone slab embedded in the surface of one of the boulders.
The slab blended almost perfectly with the surrounding rock wall in both color and texture. Had it not been for the guiding light and his deliberate moving of the shelf, he might not have discovered this hidden slab even if he had felt along the wall earlier.
Byrne pressed both hands against the slab and pushed hard, but it didn't budge. He switched directions, hooking his fingers around the edge to pull it outward, but the slab remained immovable.
Can't push it, can't pull it. What's the deal?
Since conventional methods didn't work, did it require a specific way to open? The moment this thought arose, he thought of the teardrop-shaped Elemental Stone. He immediately pulled it out and pressed it against the square slab. However, after waiting for a while, the slab remained still, showing no change.
Heh, as expected, it's not that simple.
If it's not the stone, then what else could it be?
Byrne muttered to himself, his gaze returning to the faint light seeping from the edges. The light remained steady, neither strengthening nor weakening, as if it would never run out. As he watched, he suddenly realized something. Perhaps from the moment the glimmer appeared, he had been looking in the wrong direction.
The light wasn't meant to guide him to a method for opening the slab; it was meant for him to "see" the nature of the light itself. Byrne took two steps back and re-examined the glimmer. In the darkness, the light wasn't piercing or flickering; instead, it possessed an almost stagnant sense of stability. It was just like his vision when he was first pulled into the dark space—bound by the Rules.
["The darkness is not natural; it is the Darkness of Vision."]
Byrne recalled this line from the supplementary rules. Initially, he thought "Darkness of Vision" simply meant the deprivation of sight. But looking at it now, the statement seemed to have another meaning. Perhaps the darkness of this mysterious space didn't just obscure his sight; it distorted the act of "seeing" itself.
The Rules stated that the darkness was of vision. To Byrne, this now meant it wasn't just a predicament of being unable to see, but a prompt to break conventional visual perception. In this dark space, some things were not meant to be seen, but to be perceived.
With this thought, Byrne slowly closed his eyes, completely abandoning his limited sight. At first, because his eyes were closed, he saw nothing. But gradually, he sensed something. It wasn't "seeing" in the traditional sense; it was more like images being projected directly into his mind.
There were no colors or gradients of light and shadow—only clear outlines, like lines drawn with ink. In his consciousness, he saw the stone shelf inside the secret door, the chisel marks on the walls, and the square stone slab. Compared to before, the patterns he saw on the slab's surface were no longer identical to the surrounding rock. Instead, fine, web-like hidden markings emerged. These markings formed a teardrop shape identical to the Elemental Stone.
I see. The so-called Darkness of Vision actually requires abandoning normal sight and observing with the "Mind's Eye."
Byrne opened his eyes and pressed the Elemental Stone against the slab once more. This time, however, he didn't push. Instead, following the hidden markings he had seen in his mind, he slowly rotated the stone.
Click!
The moment the stone aligned perfectly with the markings, the once immovable square slab slid half an inch into the wall. Then, it slid to the left, revealing an opening about the size of the slab itself. With the obstruction removed, a light far brighter than the previous glimmer entered Byrne's eyes.
Byrne leaned in and saw another piece of animal hide inside the hole. However, when he opened it with expectation, it was just like the one he had seen on the stone shelf—it was completely blank.
Blank again?
Byrne's brow furrowed. He rubbed the surface of the hide repeatedly with his fingertips. The texture was dry, with no bumps or hidden imprints. He checked both sides thoroughly, finding them clean. Even the natural pores and texture of the skin were visible, but there wasn't a single man-made clue.
It doesn't make sense. It wouldn't be hidden this deeply if there were nothing on it.
Wait. Could it be that the information on this hide also requires the Mind's Eye to be seen?
Byrne closed his eyes again and "looked" down at the hide in his hands. Following the method he used to perceive the slab's markings, he concentrated his consciousness on the hide in his palm. Initially, there was only the rough outline of the hide, like a silhouette drawn in ink.
But as he calmed his mind, fine specks of light began to appear around the edges of the silhouette, flowing slowly like stars. The light spread extremely slowly, like water droplets seeping into sand, gradually soaking through the outline of the hide. Finally, these outlines formed a map.
No, more accurately, it was half a map. The lines traced by the light weren't exactly neat; they looked more like they had been hastily carved with a sharp stone. Yet, they accurately formed a three-dimensional spatial diagram on the silhouette of the hide.
Byrne concentrated, and the image in his mind grew clearer. The left side of the map marked a downward stone staircase—the very path he had taken into the stone chamber. The end of the staircase corresponded exactly to the northwest corner of the magic circle in the center of the room. The core area showed four pedestals, matching the layout he had seen perfectly.
Beside the southwest pedestal, a teardrop symbol was drawn, clearly corresponding to the blue-green Elemental Stone in his hand. However, the lines on the right side were blurry, and the edges looked as if they had been violently torn away by a sharp tool. Clearly, this was just a fragment; a part was missing.
As for the remaining portion, Byrne turned his head toward the stone shelf nearby.
Heh. What a coincidence.