Виктор Пахомов – Sherlock Holmes: The Gate of Oblivion. Volume 1 (страница 7)

«The request has been accepted…» the voice in Holmes’s head trembled, and for the first time a semblance of static noise appeared in it. – Start of calculations… Three… dot… one… four… one… five… nine… two…

At that very moment, chaos began throughout the Library.The floating book cubes began to twitch, losing altitude.The magicians, immersed in a trance, sharply opened their eyes, clutching their heads – an endless stream of numbers broadcast by the Crystal burst into their minds, displacing their usual spells.

– What did you do? – Elyan watched in horror as the golden rings under the dome began to rotate at wild speed, striking out sheaves of sparks.

«I infected their ideal system with a virus of absolute precision,» Holmes grabbed Elyan by the shoulder. – The number «Pi» has no end, Elian.For the machine that has to give the answer, it’s an endless loop. While the Library tries to calculate the incomputable, its sensors will go blind.

The inquisitors at the entrance fell to their knees.Their detector masks burned out, unable to withstand the information overload.The air in the hall was filled with the smell of ozone and burnt paper.

– Now follow me! – Holmes commanded. – To the Forbidden Geometry sector.Moriarty left his mark there. They ran through a fog of disintegrating data.The sphere in Holmes’ chest now shone with an even blue light, showing the way among the dying magical lamps.The library died and was reborn every second, trying to digest the mathematical paradox of the Earth.

The Forbidden Geometry Sector was located in the deepest part of the southern wing.There were no floating books here.The walls were lined with heavy obsidian, and the shelves were lined with real, physical volumes, chained in cold iron.

Holmes stopped in front of a small pedestal.There, under a layer of many years of dust, lay an object completely out of place in this world of magical excesses.It was a book bound in simple leather.

The detective took it carefully.There were no runes on the cover. Only embossed letters in Latin: «Elementa».

«Euclid’s Principia,» Holmes whispered, and there was something akin to awe in his voice. – In a world where towers are built with the power of thought, someone brought here the laws of a straight line and a compass.

He opened the book.Between the pages lay a dried flower – a rose, which retained the subtle aroma of an English garden.In the margin of the first chapter, next to the definition of the point, there was a note made in familiar calligraphic handwriting:

«Dear Sherlock, magic is just physics poorly written down. I found a way to fix composer errors. I’m waiting for you in the Third Tower.Sugar is in the cupboard on the left.»«He’s mocking us,» Elian hissed, looking into the book. – Who is this «James»? And why does he write in your language at the very heart of our story?

«He doesn’t just write, Elian. He will colonize this world,» Holmes slammed the book shut and hid it under his cloak. – Moriarty doesn’t want to be a magician. He wants to be an Architect. He translates magic into the language of mathematics to make it predictable and… subject only to him.

At that moment, the floor beneath their feet shook.The Guardian Crystal in the main hall made a final, plaintive sound and burst, scattering into thousands of fragments.The entire Library was plunged into darkness.The logic virus has completed its work, bringing down the security system.

«We need to leave,» Holmes confidently walked towards the wall, which seemed monolithic. – If I remember correctly the architectural plan of the Library, behind this shelving there should be a discharge channel for waste ether.

He pressed on a barely noticeable protrusion in the obsidian. With a dry click, part of the wall moved to the side, revealing the mouth of a narrow shaft leading down into the technical tiers of the city.

– Jump, Elian.The Lower Ring awaits us below.There we are just shadows among shadows.And the Inquisitors will be looking for a long time for the «great magician» who brought down their archive without a single spell. The descent down the mine was long and painful.They slid through the slimy pipes through which liquid mana once flowed, until they fell into a pile of garbage at the very bottom of Aetor.

Holmes was the first to rise, dusting off his badly damaged linen frock coat.Down here the city looked different.The floating towers were hidden behind a thick layer of smog, and instead of graceful bridges, rusty magical cables hung overhead.

«We are in the slums of the Outcasts,» Elian looked around cautiously. – The law of magicians does not apply here. Only the law of force applies here.

«An ideal place for a detective,» Holmes straightened up, feeling the Book of Euclid in his inner pocket. – Moriarty in the Third Tower.This is the eastern sector, the most prestigious area of the city.To get there «Empty», we’ll need a plan.

He looked at the two moons.The Silver Moon began to set, and the Blood Moon bathed the slums in its unhealthy, red light.

«Elian, we have an ally that Moriarty forgot about,» Holmes pointed to the Sphere in his chest, which was now pulsating in time with the Blood Moon. – He thinks that I will come to him as a guest. But I will come as an investigator.And the first thing I investigate is the origin of his «new order.»

They moved deeper into the slums. Ahead, in the crimson fog, could be seen the outline of the Third Tower – an immaculate black obelisk that rose above the chaos of Eldria as a monument to cold reason. The slums of the Lower Rim reminded Holmes of the East End, but afflicted with the leprosy of magical progress. Here the air was so thick with the fumes of spent mana that it seemed tangible – sticky and smelling of rancid fat.The outcasts, wrapped in rags that were once expensive fabrics, watched the travelers with dull glances.

«Look at their faces, Elian,» Holmes walked quickly, his cane rhythmically tapping on the iron slabs of the pavement.«They’re not just poor.They’re drunk.Moriarty uses them as filters. He passes raw ether through living people to obtain a pure concentrate for his towers.

– This is prohibited by the laws of the Council! – Elian screamed, covering his mouth with the edge of his robe.

«The Council is just a group of old men, mesmerized by their own greatness,» Holmes stopped at a gutter where a poisonous green liquid was flowing. – Moriarty is a practitioner. He realized that in this world magic is oil.And he builds his drilling rigs right on the bones of this people.

The detective picked up a piece of perforated metal tape from the ground.Small symbols were stamped on it – binary code woven into runic script.

– Punch cards. He doesn’t just rule them, he programs reality.It seems the Professor has found a way to turn Eldria into one giant Babbage Analytical Engine. They took refuge in the shadows of an abandoned foundry where mana crystals had once been smelted. Holmes laid out the Book of Euclid on the rusty surface of the workbench.The sphere in his chest responded to the proximity of the book, and the pages began to glow faintly, revealing hidden layers of text.

– Do you see these marks, Elian? – Holmes pointed to a diagram of a triangle inscribed in a circle. – This is not just geometry.This is a scheme for suppressing the will.Moriarty has calculated the resonant frequency of your magic. If he tunes his towers to this rhythm, any spell in Eldria will become impossible without his personal permission.

«He wants to steal our freedom?» – Elian’s voice trembled.

«He wants to eliminate human error,» Holmes slammed the book shut.«For him, the world is an equation.«If the result does not suit him, he changes the conditions of the problem.

Holmes took a bottle of salt dust from his pocket and mixed it with the sticky ethereal slag found on the floor.The mixture sizzled, turning into a thick black ointment.

– Apply this to your runes on your clothes.This will create a «negative stain".To its sensors we will become invisible – just pieces of empty space.It’s time for us.The Third Tower doesn’t like latecomers. The path to the Third Tower ran through the border between the chaos of the slums and the surgical order of the Inquisition area. Here the streets were swept to a shine, and patrol automatons moved with the precision of clock pendulums.The air here did not smell of ozone – it smelled of death and sterility.

– Do you hear? – Holmes froze in the shadow of the arch.

Elyan listened. A dry, rhythmic knock made its way through the steady hum of the city."Teak.So.Teak.So.«The sound came from the very depths of the black obelisk of the Third Tower.It was not the sound of the heart, it was the sound of the Metronome – a colossal device that set the pace for all of Aetor.

«He synchronized the city with his pocket watch,» Holmes straightened his cloak. – This is the highest degree of arrogance – to force an entire civilization to breathe in time with your pulse.

They slipped past the last patrol using Holmes’ ointment.The automatons turned their pyramidal heads in their direction, but the red rays passed through them, not finding a target.To the machines they were just shadows, errors in the code that they had not yet learned to recognize.