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墨書 Inktalez
Arthur's fingers traced a winding path along the dusty spines of books, as the afternoon sun filtered through the stained glass windows, casting a mottled violet halo on the back of his hand.
The Victorian Library loomed like a slumbering giant, its oak shelves forming rib-like structures that held a century's worth of time, with even the air thickening into a pale golden honey.
"Grain Rotation Method Examination... Medieval Agricultural Tools Atlas..."
He murmured the titles embossed in gold, when suddenly, a damp, musty odor invaded his nostrils. In the farthest corner lay a leather-bound volume, its spine cracked to reveal yellowed paper pages. As he lifted it with his fingertips, three dried Cornflower specimens tumbled to the ground.
The moment the diary was spread open on the Oak Table, clouds outside abruptly obscured the sun. Arthur saw his reflection distorted on the brass lamp shade, the faded ink stains resembling rain-soaked wounds, intermittently whispering: "...the chime of bells on a full moon night... figures in antler masks circling around a bonfire... a silver plate on the altar holding... the following words devoured by brown stains."
"That’s Madam Margaret’s diary."
A clear female voice startled Arthur, causing him to knock over an ink bottle. The deep blue ink spread across the parchment, forming shapes reminiscent of ghostly islands. As he turned, his knee collided with a movable ladder, and the metallic clatter echoed beneath the dome like a long sigh.
The girl speaking was on tiptoe, dusting off the higher shelves; her linen skirt stirred tiny whirlwinds of dust as it brushed against the rungs.
"How do you know?"
Arthur pressed his palm against his racing temple. The girl's light golden hair was dusted with cobwebs; when she looked down at him, her lashes cast shadows like raven feathers on her pale face. The librarian's bronze badge glimmered at her collar, engraved with "Lily White."
"Because every librarian discovers this book in the same spot on their first day."
Lily's fingertips grazed the diary's tattered footer.
"Just like migratory birds always return to their old nests, even if they have long since become ruins."
Arthur noticed a faint pink scar shaped like a crescent moon on her inner wrist. As Lily reached up to adjust a tortoiseshell comb in her hair, ancient bloodstains suddenly surfaced from the diary's smudges, glinting with an eerie pearlescent sheen in the sunlight.
He snapped the diary shut but heard a soft clinking sound from within its pages as if coins were rolling.
"This is not natural decay."
Lily suddenly grasped his wrist, her palm cold as if it had been dipped in snow. "Can you smell it? The rusty scent of decaying memories. Those people wearing antler masks... they harvest every harvest festival with scythes..."
Before she could finish her sentence, the entire row of bookshelves began to shake violently. Arthur instinctively shielded Lily, watching as the heavy volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica tumbled down like an avalanche.
In the dust that rose, countless tiny specks appeared, resembling a swarm of fireflies disturbed on a summer night. Lily's breath brushed against his ear. "Follow me, there's a place they haven't managed to erase yet."
As dusk fell, they stood before the abandoned manor on the outskirts of town. The rusty iron gate let out a mournful creak when Lily touched it, and the shadows of climbing ivy crawled up her trembling fingertips. "This is where I grew up."
She pushed open the creaking oak door, and the faded mistletoe wreath above the doorframe suddenly crumbled to dust. Beneath the seventh loose plank of the attic floor lay an iron box.
As Lily retrieved the letter, the full moon rose perfectly to the top of the clock tower outside, casting a blood-red glow on the parchment where the Sealing Wax seal lay. Arthur squinted at the scrawled handwriting: "...the ritual requires not a sacrifice, but a vessel... when the twelfth bell tolls, the antlers will..."
The sudden hoot of a night owl shattered the silence. Lily spun around sharply, a comb falling from her hair and bouncing across the pine floor toward a dark corner. As Arthur bent down to pick it up, he noticed several strands of silvery hair caught in its teeth—distinctly different from Lily's golden locks that hung over her shoulders at that moment.
"They're coming." Lily suddenly covered her right ear, blood seeping through her fingers and dripping onto the letter, transforming into writhing symbols. "Quick, close the windows! The bells are about to toll!"
In the distance, he could faintly hear the tremors of copper instruments; Arthur's pocket watch throbbed wildly. As he lunged toward the intricately carved window frame, he caught sight of several pairs of antlers swaying gently in the overgrown grass under the moonlight, stirred by the night breeze.
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