"Mr. Medan, what is this ancient book on the top of the shelf?"

Zhulan raised her head and stared at the particularly conspicuous damaged book on the shelf, her attention already firmly attracted by the object in front of her.

As long as you have a little understanding of ancient books, you will definitely be able to see the extraordinary features of this material-

It was a small booklet bound with bare ridges, and the two pieces of hardwood plywood on the cover were damaged, but there were obvious signs of waxing; The silk thread on which the book is bound is as old as the cover plate, but it is tenacious and not broken in the slightest, and it seems to have been made of the silk thread of the worm-based Pokémon in some special way; Because it is a bare spine binding, the pages inside can be seen directly from the outside of the bookshelf, and the sides have been oxidized and yellowed to almost blacken, but compared to the ancient books that Zhulan has seen, the paper on each page is abnormally thick, and it is very likely that it has been sandwiched; All of this suggests that the booklet should be very important to those who bind it......

"You mean, the booklet on the shelf with a wooden board as a cover?" Medan's voice interrupted the Sinnoh Champion's musings, "It's an inexplicable book of poems, it seems to have been found in the attic when the Western-style pavilion was being renovated. ”

"Is there an attic in this mansion?" Junsha asked curiously.

"It's the one below the black spire." Ah Ying replied to the police officer in place of Medan.

"The loft space was originally designed for this Mori-no-Yokan, which was originally a bedroom. However, with the current interior decoration idea, it is really difficult to create a comfortable space for such a small area, so when we rebuilt it, we simply converted that area into a storage room, and the passage was changed from a spiral staircase to the only entrance from the back of the roof. ”

"Yes, we usually store the ingredients we need to cook there." Zina added.

"Can I read this book?"

Zhulan turned around, her gaze scanning between Hayden and Medan, not knowing whether to make this request to the owner of the Western-style Pavilion or the funder who bought the Western-style Pavilion.

"Feel free to take a look, the champion of the Sinnoh region."

Mr. Hayden, who was holding his cane, was the first to nod in approval, while Professor Maidan folded his arms indifferently and sneered harshly—

"It was a boring pamphlet, and even in the clichés of religious superstitionists, it was a particularly pale and boring kind. The content is fragmented, lackluster, and not half of the literature to speak of. ”

Zhulan ignored this. Eager to approach the bookshelf, she stood on tiptoe and carefully removed the artifact that had been left in the corner of time.

Flipping open the hard wooden cover, the smell of fiber degradation comes to my nose. Some book lovers refer to it as bookish or vanilla, but Zhulan thinks it's closer to a musty smell with sawdust notes.

The pages were as sandwiched as she had expected—not so much a sandwich as some kind of special mounting to protect the documents inside.

The author of the book first used a layer of hollowed-out paper to extend the original length and width of the broken pages into neat rectangles that could be bound into a book. Then, it is completely covered front and back with a tulle that is visually completely transparent. In this way, not only does it avoid the damage caused by the binding of the book to the paper, but also greatly reduces the oxidation degree of the original document in the interlayer.

Among the yellow pages, pale pink paper of unknown material is inlaid in it, like a piece of amber of knowledge.

The moment she saw the words on the pink paper, Zhulan's gray eyes couldn't help but widen suddenly-

"In ancient times, two statues coexisted,

"When he saw the passage of time,

"The earth is wide and the sky is wide.

"For the future after the future,

"I want to explore the world at the end of the world.

"The two deities go their own way,

"Always with Sinnoh."

This is not something that has never been seen before, on the contrary, this short ballad like a poem has long been widely circulated in the mythological research community in the Sinnoh region.

Although it is not known who the author is, this nameless ballad was widely circulated long before the birth of the Elven Alliance. In the Shuimai City Museum alone, you can see at least dozens of ancient documents similar to this.

From the perspective of Sinnoh mythology, this short essay concisely and eternally expounds the birth and origin of time and space in the eyes of the ancient ancestors, and unabashedly predicts the existence of Dialuca, Palukia, and the legendary Arceus who created the world, which contains extremely important archaeological value for the Sinnoh research community today.

Of course, in the eyes of the owner of the Meydan Pavilion, this strangely written essay is written with well-known religious content, and naturally there is nothing new to speak of.

However, as a professional mythology scholar, Zhulan sees great value in it.

The evidence at the moment is not sufficient, and this ancient book, sealed in the attic of the Mori no Yokan, may be just a forgery carved by a good deed.

And yet, yet, ah......

Judging from the vicissitudes of this ancient book, the broken wooden cover, the interlayers in the pages, the yellowing of the spine, the traces of ink smudging on the pink paper, and the content of the text on the first page, the concise narrative between the lines, Zhulan, as a mythology scholar, has to construct another more terrifying possibility in his mind at this moment-

What if?

The damaged collection of poems in front of me may be the original text of all the same myths and ballads.

The dark gray drop-shaped pendant swayed gently on the chest of the Sinnoh champion, as if to hint at her vacillation and shock.

At this moment, the best support for Zhulan's guess is the text used by the author who wrote this note on the first page of the poetry collection.

The round, full-bodied handwriting font is arranged in blocks with black lines to form a poem of varying lengths. At first glance, those text styles remind people of the superpower Pokémon attached to the cave murals, the unknown totem.

In fact, this is not the symbolic font used by humans when they first created writing, but the words used by humans when they first invented paper and pen about 2,000 years ago. As long as you look closely, you can see that this kind of writing has developed many changes on the basis of the unknown totemic pictograms, and you can see the two trends of pictographic simplification and evolution into words and letters at the same time.

Obviously such an ancient text, can the owner of the Meidan Pavilion recognize the true meaning of these words? No, if you just identify ancient characters, you can get a rough idea of what the article is about by looking at the comparison table in an open paper on archaeology...... In any case, Maidan as an atheist was not as dismissive of metaphysical existence as he appears, and he also delved into the field of mythology.

Just as Zhulan was about to continue to turn the pages of the book, confirming or refuting the conjecture in her mind-

"Okay, it's almost time now, and everyone has been gathering in my cramped hall master's room like something."

It was Professor Meydan, who spoke, shrugging his shoulders exaggeratedly.

"Champion Zhulan, you can take this strange book of poems with you and check it out at will, anyway, I don't think this cultural relic is of great value. Other than that......"

Medan's mocking eyes rolled like cunning tengus, turning to the maid's lady, Xena—

"It's getting late, isn't it time to eat?"