Geneva police lights cast a quiet rotating glow over the pumping station's stone exterior. Within a managed disorder unfolded among paramedics, Europol agents and the subdued puzzled murmurs of fifteen individuals emerging from a dream out of reach. They were covered in foil blankets drinking water, their faces, with lingering eerie calmness. They recalled a sense of relief. Beyond that they remembered nothing.
Flavio Fergal had vanished, transported to a guarded detention center. He showed no opposition, that identical mournful tranquility. His quietness seemed commanding than any declaration.
Devon remained separate resting against an iron piston. The release of adrenaline left him feeling emptied, vacant. He had prevailed. He had halted the ritual. Still Flavio's last murmur stayed with him: So desperate to keep the world wailing.
Pamela Pauline stepped in the sound of her heels striking the stone floor. She took in the sight—the spot once occupied by the ouroboros, the stunned survivors—with a practical scowl. "Status update, on the damage?"
"Ceremony interrupted. Main individual detained. No deaths, no harm." Devon's tone was flat.
"And the… method?"
Prior, to responding Javier Jeffrey hurried over gripping his tablet as though it were a life preserver. His eyes were reddened his composure broken. He pushed the screen in Pamelas direction.
"It's a form of communication. A developed terrifyingly exquisite system of expression."
The tablet displayed an equation, mixed with the well-known geometric shapes. "I've been comparing all the symbols from the four scenes " Javier explained, his speech rapid. "They are more, than decoration. They represent a language. A calculus."
Pamela's scowl grew more intense. "Mathematics, for what purpose?"
"For gauging indifference. For assessing the relinquishment of intent." Javier focused on a symbol resembling a spiraling vortex. "This represents a variable for ' resistance'—the mental expense of ongoing involvement, with a seemingly pointless system. This one " he pointed at a set of sluggish overlapping curves "is an operator. It. Increases nor decreases. It diffuses. It transforms tension into passivity."
He displayed a picture of the ouroboros drawn on the pumping station floor superimposed with his emerging translation. "This whole pattern acted as a working formula. It represented a schematic for a circuit. Those, around the edges were variables contributing their friction coefficients'—their exhaustion, their disenchantment. The core apparatus served as an operator directing that combined force.. The result…" He faltered, gazing at the empty floor.
"The result was the ' pause '" Devon concluded, the chill, in his stomach hardening. "Belphegor. Not a being that takes action. A condition of non-existence that consumes."
"Exactly!" Javier shouted, his tone tinged with hysteria. "They've invented a math, for surrendering. A Sluggish Calculus. It doesn't depict the universe. It models the desire to exist within it.. It's crafted to yield a single graceful answer: zero."
Pamela gazed intently her adherence, to rules clashing with the controversial idea. "Are you telling me they applied math to… repel people?"
"They applied mathematics to signal people out " Devon whispered carefully. "Then kept it open. The formula serves as the rationale. An impeccable reasoned demonstration that the best answer, to the dilemma of existence is to stop struggling."
The meaning hung in the air chillier, than marble. This was no insanity. It was a rational study of the spirit.
"We must control this " Pamela stated, her tone soft. "Every study, all citations. This poses a security risk, like no other…"
"It's late " Javier murmured. He opened a web forum he'd been watching closely. Displayed there in text-only style was a stripped-down form of the calculus. A "First Principle." The entry was named: Axiom One: The Burden of Action. It had already garnered thousands of views with hundreds of comments buzzing with a yet reassuring acknowledgment. "He spread it. Flavio. Fragments of it. Prior, to tonight. This is the ceremony. The pumping station served as a… a demonstration. The evidence of the theorem."
Devon's dedicated phone rang. It was Agustin Arthur, the physician, from Geneva General currently attending to the healed acolytes. The doctor's typical calm demeanor was missing.
"Analyst Duncan? We are conducting all assessments. From a standpoint they're flawless. Beyond flawless. Cortisol concentrations are abnormally reduced. Brain activity indicates a… a calmness I've never observed except, in drug-induced comas.. They remain aware. Responsive. They simply…" he struggled to articulate "they simply lack any desires. It's not catatonia. It's satisfaction. A complete lack of longing. It's medically perplexing.. Psychologically… infectious. My team is noticing a sense of tranquility following their interactions, with them."
The Lethargic Calculus wasn't a formula to be reviewed. It functioned as a program that when run implanted a code, within the human operating system. A serene immobilizing virus.
Pamela started issuing demands regarding isolation about isolating the victims about interrogating Flavio. Yet her directives came off as frantic given the magnitude of their challenge. How can you isolate a concept? How do you interrogate someone convinced they have uncovered a principle of ethical physics?
Devon moved away, from the clamor heading to a spot where one of the victims was seated. It was Nathania Nora, the developer. She glanced up at him. The fear she had shown before had vanished, replaced by a vacant clarity.
"You ended it " she mentioned, not in blame. Merely, as a straightforward remark.
"Yes."
She nodded slowly. "It was, like… ultimately fixing a bug thought unsolvable. The kind that brings down your system. You simply… remove the line of code that's overcomplicating things." She gave a smile. "He revealed the key to us."
Devon dropped to his knees speaking softly. "Nathania, what took place with you inside that circle? What sensations did you experience?"
She glanced beyond him at the motionless pumps. "I perceived the equation settle. Every ounce of my stress, anxiety and desire to improve… it no longer belonged to me. It simply turned into… data. Indifferent. Then it disappeared.. What remained was…" she sought the term "…space. A silent vacant space, within me. It was stunning."
At that moment he realized. They hadn't been scarred. They had been persuaded. They had examined the numbers. It had unraveled them.
His phone buzzed with a encrypted notification. No text, an image file. He tapped to view it.
It was a page from a handwritten journal. Flavio Fergal's journal. The handwriting was neat, precise.
"The Lethargic Calculus is not a weapon. It is an awakening. A key to a lock we were unaware we possessed. The lock, on our fatigue. To perceive it is to understand that the battle is elective. That tranquility is not achieved,. Embraced. The Sleeper's Tithe is not offered to a deity. It is given to our innermost essence. We are not invoking Belphegor. We are recalling that we are Belphegor."
The message was from Benjamin, the anonymous contact. The defector. It was a warning, and a confession.
Devon shifted his gaze from Nathania Nora's yet haunted expression, to Pamela's frantic clinical intensity and then, to Javier's quivering mentally shattered state. The calculation was underway. It was measuring their reactions. Pamela's behavior. Javier's fearful understanding. His own empty tired conviction.
The battle was no longer against a man in a chamber. It was against a logic, a beautiful, seductive, devastating logic that promised an end to all battles. Flavio Fergal was in a cell. But his equation was in the air, and it was solving for zero, one weary mind at a time.