The journey to Scotland felt like a crossing through a threshold. The clouds beneath resembled a grey sea. Devon sensed a lack of grounding burdened by Flavio's journal and Benjamin's tired admission. He wasn't pursuing a fugitive; he was following a metaphysical contagion back, to its origin. Glen Lyon. A "place of earthly calm."
At a Highland airstrip a local coordinator named Felisca Fleur organized via Interpol greeted him. She was a woman, in her fifties her skin weathered by the wind and her eyes matching the slate hills that surrounded them. She quietly drove a Land Rover for an extended period the sole noises being the gravel crunching beneath the tires and the mournful call of a distant bird.
"You've come regarding the silence " she stated at last not posing a question.
Devon looked at her. "What calm?"
"The one that's taken up residence in the glen over the several weeks. Not an ordinary silence. A… parched one. Birds continue to sing. Their song feels… diminished. The stream still flows,. It seems merely mechanical." She gazed forward at the path. "My grandmother named it 'Fàileas Falamh'—the Empty Shade. A realm where the world thins out. Where things might… slip away, from themselves."
Her speech, rich, with myth was a reflection of the Lethargic Calculus. A realm where resistance faded. Where yielding turned simple.
She left him at a bothy, a stone shelter, close to the entrance of the glen. "I'll be further, down the path. If you sense that stillness creeping into you come seek me out. Don't allow it to embed itself within you."
The bothy was chilly carrying the scent of peat and worn wool. Devon kindled a smoky blaze. In its glow he unfolded Flavio's journal to the last operational remarks Benjamin had referred to. Drawings of studies diagrams of ley lines annotations, on "telluric lassitude." Then a mention that stole his breath away:
*"Main amplification location verified: Glen Lyon, coordinates NS 67724 44911. Intersection site of three 'ley lines depicted in the Liber Ignaviae page 12. The passage reads: 'Where the earth's yearning quiets, there the Sleeper's Tithe increases ten-thousand times. The mountain's endurance transforms into a cathedral.' This text is essential, for the concluding, ritual. Extract it from the Brussels archive, division Omega before the conjunction."*
Liber Ignaviae. The Book of Laziness. It wasn't a metaphor. It was a manual.
Devon's protected satellite phone showed a bar. He dialed the individual who could reach that archive at this moment.
"Sari? This is Devon Duncan. I require your assistance to locate something. Section Omega. A manuscript known as the Liber Ignaviae."
He could perceive her breath drawing in over the phone. An extended pause. Then noises of her relocating, a heavy container being adjusted. "It is… not a book as you imagine " her voice returned, quiet. "It is a stone. A slender slab. With engravings."
"Are you able to read this? Could you translate it?"
Another silence, accompanied by the sound of manipulation. "Certain… words. It's not Latin. More ancient. A primordial… script. The title says: De Inclinatio Mundi Ad Quietem." She interpreted carefully. "Concerning the World's Tilt Toward Stillness." Her tone softened to a murmur. "Study… the engravings. They don't lie next, to the writing. They constitute the writing. It is Calculus. In its ancient unadulterated state."
"What is written there Sari?"
He listened as she followed the stone's outline with a fingertip her tone shaking with the reverence and fear of a scholar. "It… it presents Sloth not as a flaw. As a cosmic power. A force of attraction. Not between objects. Between wills. It suggests that a universe, in motion is a mistake, a 'passing fever.' That true harmony—genuine peace—is not a harmony of deeds. Their complete stillness. This force attracts all beings and opposing it means existing in constant conflict." She paused. "There's a diagram. A spiral winding down into a level surface. It's titled… Belphegor's Basin."
"The conjunction " Devon whispered. "He isn't just opening a door. He's creating a… a gravity well. Employing the slate as the center."
"There's a footnote " Sari whispered, her tone almost inaudible. "Written in a script. It says: 'Only a will that understands the battle yet embraces it again can steady itself against the draw. The tired fighter. The devoted fool.'" She paused. Then "He will require the stone."
"He's already in possession of it " Devon understood, a chill of certainty settling in. "He wouldn't have marked its spot if it hadn't already been relocated. The ceremony, in Geneva was a trial. This is the deal." He expressed his gratitude. Hung up.
The flames. Snapped, a small defiance against the vast attentive quiet of the glen, beyond. The tired fighter. The devoted fool. The phrases lingered in the atmosphere. They seemed like a gateway or a judgment.
When sleep finally arrived it brought no peace. His dream involved the spiral, from the slate. It wasn't etched into stone. Instead it was the glen, the road, the river—all winding down into a gray circle of complete emptiness. At its boundary gazing inside stood figures. Kale Kane, Nathania Nora, Mikael Van Dort. They weren't fighting. They were waiting. Anticipating. At the disks core a form started to emerge from the emptiness—not a creature. An ideal inviting chair.
He jolted awake dawn a streak, on the skyline. The quietness felt truly altered. It wasn't a lack of noise; it was a softening, a dampening. Like the atmosphere itself was surrendering its will to transmit vibrations.
He departed the bothy. Trekked upward into the glen. The scenery was raw, breathtaking. It seemed ghostly like an artwork of a recollection. He arrived at the grid reference noted by Flavio. It was a natural amphitheater where the river broadened into a quiet dark peat pool. Three valleys met at this point their inclines bending inward, as if in a meeting.
And there, in the center of the mossy ground, was the evidence.
A ring of stones not old. Arranged with intentional precision. Inside it the ground had been cleared thoroughly. At its core a rectangular mark, in the moss—precisely matching the dimensions of a stone slab. It was vacant.. Encircling this mark etched not with salt or dust but appearing to be scorched into the moss and stone itself was the most intricate and extensive example of the Lethargic Calculus he had encountered so far. At its core it included the spiral, from the Liber Ignaviae—Belphegor's Basin. The lines shimmered with a oily glow even under the dim morning light.
The location had been sanctified beforehand. The slate had been laid down. This was the altar. The union was not imminent; the scene was arranged, awaiting the actors.
A shape appeared from the treeline bordering the amphitheater. It wasn't Flavio. Devon identified him from Europol documents—Rex Ralph, the lieutenant. Dressed in hiking attire and unarmed his expression was composed, though his gaze revealed the intense resolve of a zealot.
"He was aware you would arrive " Rex mentioned, his tone resonating clearly in the silence. "You're attracted to it. Like a pointing, to true north."
"Where is the slate, Rex?"
"Secure. Aligned." Rex advanced a step, not menacingly. Like an instructor nearing a student. "You viewed the archive. You grasp the magnitude now. This is not Flavio's fancy. It's an adjustment. We're merely the midwives."
"You're burying the spirit of determination."
"We're patching a gap " Rex clarified. "A gap of meaningless desire. The Liber Ignaviae… it doesn't sermonize. It conveys. It declares a truth: effort is a condition. Stillness is natural. We're assisting the world in returning to default." He indicated the quiet terrain. "Do you sense it here? The earth consents. It's weary well. Of wearing down of expansion of repetition. It desires to be mass. Calm, lasting mass."
Devon experienced a tug. Not merely a concept,. A tangible feeling—a profound downward longing within his spirit to simply rest on the moss and embrace the silence. The calculus, beneath him appeared to beat in sync with his heart. The weight of tranquility.
"The footnote " Devon murmured, struggling to speak holding onto the phrase. "It mentioned that an anchor was required. A tired soldier."
Rex grinned, a icy smile. "Indeed. One last element. A resolve that completely comprehends the lure that senses the weight. Still… denies it. That denial forms the flawless tension. The final cry, before quietness. It finalizes the formula. Flavio wished it could be you. Your exhaustion is so… eloquent. Your opposition would be energy."
So that was his role. Not a detective. Not a savior. The kindling.
Devon inquired, "When?"
"Shortly " Rex stated. He glanced upward toward the heavens as though interpreting a timer. "When the shade of Ben Lawers falls on this point. Tomorrow, at twilight. The planet's gradual shift, indicating the moment. Poetic don't you think?" He cast Devon a sympathetic glance. "You may stay here if you prefer. Sense the force intensify.. You can flee and experience it dragging you back." In any case you are now a component of the grammar."
Rex. Disappeared quietly among the pines as silent, as a shadow.
Devon remained solitary in the amphitheater, the enduring quiet of the glen weighing heavily upon him. The inscribed calculus appeared to absorb the sunlight. He wasn't merely confronting a cult. He was confronting a debate etched into the earths bones and the saga of anguish.. His own spirit was the battleground.
The exhausted fighter. He gazed at his hands quivering faintly from chill and weariness. Did he still have the resolve to embrace the fight? Not, for a regime he doubted. For… something different? For the chaos the agony, the dreadful battle itself?
He didn't know. But as he turned and walked back down the glen, each step felt heavier, as if the basin's gravity was already testing its hold. The final conjunction would not be a battle. It would be a choice. And he had until the mountain's shadow fell to decide.