svetikya Chapter 49 Anchor Point
Chapter 49 Anchor Point
Arthur found Merry at dusk the next day.
At the edge of the forest outside Camelot, silvery-white magic lingered in the air, like someone walking and scattering breadcrumbs.
This was deliberately left by Merry, and Arthur followed the faint resonance of the river channel at the anchor point all the way there.
I saw her through the darkening shadows of the trees, on the trunk of a fallen ancient oak.
That tree had been fallen for countless years, its trunk covered in thick moss, like a velvet carpet.
She was barefoot, her white magician's robe pulled up above her knees, her calves dangling from the edge of the tree trunk.
Her long, silvery-white hair was not tied up, but lay loose behind her, with the ends falling onto the moss. The setting sun shone through the gaps in the leaves, shattering into countless tiny spots of light on her hair.
She held a wildflower in her hand, yellow, whose name she didn't know, and was casually turning its stem.
"You're too late." She didn't look up. "The sun is almost setting."
"It's because the road signs you left were too convoluted. From the city wall to the edge of the forest, it took three whole turns."
"Of course we have to go around in circles. How would we know if you really want to find me if we don't?" Mary finally raised her head, her amethyst eyes reflecting the golden light of the setting sun.
"If you turn back halfway, it means you haven't learned the concept of anchor points yet, so teaching you would be a waste of time."
Arthur walked to the tree trunk and sat down beside her. The coolness of the moss seeped through his clothes, mingling with the faint scent of Lake Avalon emanating from her.
"...How should I get back?"
Mary planted the yellow wildflower in the moss, its stem standing straight, then she reached out and placed her index finger on Arthur's chest, where the Dragon's Hearth was.
"When you were looking at those worldline fragments yesterday, which one made your core vibrate the most?"
Arthur recalled that there were too many fragments and too many different pieces, each of which had caused his furnace core to vibrate to varying degrees.
“There is one,” he said. “A city I’ve never seen before, with a river in the city and a red bridge spanning it.”
The night sky was clear, without flames or smoke, but beneath the city flowed a magical river, and seven people stood in its depths.
He paused for a moment.
"One of them had short brown hair and pure black eyes..."
Meryl pressed her finger against his chest and then withdrew it.
"That's the one where the core of the furnace vibrates the most, which means that there is the strongest 'connection' between that world line and you. It's the one 'calling' you."
"What contact?"
"It could be someone you've met, something you've used, or a memory you've never experienced but that the hearth recognizes."
Meryl drew a tiny circle on the moss with her finger. "The scenes that the Trail of Stars shows you are those worlds calling to you; they need your response."
Arthur thought for a moment, "After responding, how do we fix that line and prevent it from shattering again in the Trails of Stars?"
Mary extended her right hand, palm up, "Hand."
Arthur placed his hand on her wrist, her fingers closing around his, and just like yesterday on the city wall, her fingertips were slightly cool.
But this time, she didn't just hold it; a wisp of extremely fine, silvery-white magic seeped from her fingertips, clung to his skin, and flowed slowly along the course of the Dragon Power River.
"Use your Dragon Force River to 'remember' the frequency of that world line." Meryl's voice became very soft, with a focus rarely seen when teaching.
"Use the furnace core to memorize, let your furnace core beat with that frequency."
If you jump to the right spot, that world line will transform from a 'fragment' into a 'complete line' in Trails of the Stars, allowing you to follow it.
Arthur closed his eyes, and the Dragon Force Rivers unfolded, with more than forty rivers extending outward from the heart of the furnace, passing through bones, flesh, and skin.
He could sense the silvery-white magic that Meryl was guiding him; it flowed slowly in a stream closest to the hearth, like a tiny lamp.
He let his consciousness follow the lamp, and as the light flowed, the four beats of the furnace pulsed accordingly.
It's like two rivers flowing into the same channel. At first, their flow rates are different, but as they flow, they become synchronized.
"The third step," Meryl's voice came from very close by.
"Leave new resonances there. Every time you go to a new world, you will meet people, experience events, and create a new 'throbbing moment'."
Your furnace core channel will automatically record those moments; each additional record adds one more 'stone'.
"With enough stones, you can step on them to get back."
She pressed her fingers against his wrist, as if checking his pulse.
"That's how you use the Star Trail: it's not about jumping into a river and swimming around aimlessly, but about leaving a stone in every river you cross."
Arthur opened his eyes. The setting sun had dimmed a degree from before, turning from golden yellow to orange-red.
Meryl's hand was still holding his wrist, her fingertips a little warmer than before. She didn't know if it was his body heat that had transferred to her, or if the flow of her magic had brought warmth.
"That anchor point you assigned me," he said, "contains five hundred years of your blessing?"
"right."
"Every time I travel to a new world line, I leave a new resonance there. The core remembers, and the anchor points increase. Will the road back widen?"
"right."
"Then the anchor point you've created will have to sense more things."
Meryl's fingers on his wrist stiffened slightly.
"You know that, right?" Her voice softened slightly.
"When you said the anchor point was vibrating yesterday, I was thinking, you can sense that I touched the trajectory of the star, you can sense how deep my consciousness is."
I establish new resonances in different timelines, and each resonance will be transmitted back to you through an anchor point. The more you perceive, the faster that anchor point is consumed.
Arthur looked at her.
"It will shorten by five hundred years."
The setting sun in the forest was turning from orange-red to deep red, casting a warm hue on Mary's profile, while her fingers grew cold again.
"Yes," she said. "Maybe four hundred years, maybe three hundred, depending on how far you run."
"Then why did you still let me go?"
Meryl raised her eyes, and in her amethyst-like pupils, fragments of light shimmered in the sunset, like the ripples on the surface of Lake Avalon when the wind blew.
Her fingers loosened from his wrist, then gripped it again, as if confirming something.
"Because you saw it, and then you chose to 'change'." Her voice was very soft.
Her fingers tightened slightly.
"Once you made that choice, you haven't stopped."
Arthur did not speak.
"Whether it's Vortigern, those stones, or the forty-seven men of the Northern Lord, you haven't stopped at any of them."
You will go to other worlds, and you will see more things that need to be changed. You will wade into different rivers again and again, leaving behind stone after stone.
Meryl's voice was as soft as if it were floating on moss, "I gave you five hundred years, not so you could 'use it sparingly,' but so you wouldn't have to be afraid of not being able to come back."
Arthur looked at her, and the setting sun shattered into countless tiny dots in her amethyst-like eyes.
The tips of her ears were tinged with red amidst her silver hair, and there was a hint of red on the tip of her nose as well.
He flipped his wrist and took her hand in his palm, the same action as yesterday, but this time, he didn't just hold it.
He pulled her hand to his chest, the four beats of the Dragon's Furnace traveling through her clothes to her palm.
Mary's breath caught in her throat for a moment.
"Four beats, the rhythm of the dragon. When I'm in battle, it accelerates; when I'm injured, it becomes disordered."
The anchor point you pointed out, flowing in the river, isn't magic; it's my heartbeat.
Where I am, there it is. You will perceive more things, but each additional thing proves that I am still alive in some world.
His voice was flat.
"This is not a burden; it's someone remembering for you that you are still alive."
In Mary's amethyst-like eyes, fragments of light began to shimmer violently, like raindrops disturbing the surface of a lake. She did not cry.
The tears of the nightmare were too precious to fall easily, but the hand she placed on Arthur's chest slowly curled up, gripping his collar.
"I've lived for over a thousand years," she said in a muffled voice. "No one has ever remembered that I've lived."
Arthur reached out, his movements as gentle as if he had brushed her hair aside yesterday.
His fingers ran through her long, silvery-white hair and landed on the back of her head, in the exact same spot where she had pressed the back of his head yesterday.
"Now we have it."
Meryl's forehead pressed against his chest, her knuckles white as she gripped his clothes.
She didn't speak. The evening light in the forest changed from deep red to twilight purple, and then from twilight purple to grayish blue.
She kept pressing against him like that, and Arthur's hand remained on the back of her head.
"That world is calling me," Arthur said, his hearth still vibrating.
Meryl loosened her hand from his collar, her palm resting flat against his chest. The four beats of the Dragon's Heart resonated in her palm and returned like an echo.
"Then let's go."
"..."
"These 500 years are a gift from me. How I spend them is my business." Meryl raised her head, her amethyst eyes still shimmering with light.
But her voice regained about 70-80% of its normal tone, "And you said you would find a way to keep me here longer, I'm waiting."
Arthur looked at her; her eyes were still red, her nose was red, but the corners of her mouth were curved up.
It's that kind of "I believe you" smile.
"Okay," he said.
Mary withdrew her hand from his chest, her fingertips lightly tracing a mark on his lapel as she left.
She stood up, her bare feet on the tree trunk, her long, silvery-white hair gleaming in the last rays of light in the twilight.
"When the moon rises tonight, the resonance at the anchor point will be strongest. If you follow the fragments of that world line, the core will automatically lock onto the frequency."
She turned around and walked into the depths of the forest, her long silver-white hair blowing in the evening breeze, her figure gradually disappearing into the shadows of the trees.
Only that one yellow wildflower remained on the moss, standing straight in the twilight.
Arthur sat on the tree trunk, looking in the direction she had disappeared. In the Dragon Power River, the anchor point of the river was glowing.
It is silvery white, extremely fine, like a thread that will never break.
At the other end of the silk thread was tied her five hundred years of protection, the temperature of his heartbeat that she felt every day, and the fingers that had just been clutching his clothes tightly.
He reached out and plucked the yellow wildflower. The lower part of the stem was covered in damp moss. He wiped it clean with the inside of his cloak and put it in the pocket of his breast pocket.
The moon was rising from the edge of the forest, its silvery light spreading across the ancient oak trunks and the path he had come from.
Deep within the Dragon Power River, fragments of that world line began to glow. A clean city, a red bridge, and a blond-haired, blue-eyed person stood in the center of a summoning circle.
Arthur sank his consciousness into the deepest part of the Dragon Power River. He followed the light deeper and deeper, and the light of that world line drew ever closer.
He reached out, and the moment his fingertips touched the light...
Camelot's forest, the moonlight, the dampness on the moss—all vanished.
Instead, the night sky over Tokyo, a coastal city, was spotless, without a single speck of smoke.
Below me was the rooftop of an abandoned warehouse, and in the distance was a river with a red bridge spanning it.
Further away, an iron tower stands quietly in the night, its lights flickering on and off like an ancient rhythm.
Arthur Pendragon fell into the Tokyo night sky.