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benthic_universityThis week, The Academic was on time for their own class. They’d cleared the chalkboards, refilling them with an extensive list of symbols. Though each clearly corresponded to The Correspondence, not one was scarcely more complex than the radicals they’d learned last week.
“While technically correct, you will almost never see any of these symbols on a plaque or temple wall. We’re still one step away from proper symbols." The Academic stepped away from the display, inviting the eyes of the students to begin to roam over the writing." But put your goggles on now, and look! You can see it now, can’t you?”
Not all of the symbols were rendered in plain white chalk. Every tenth symbol or so, there were tinges of something else, something reddish, or violet, or-
The Academic smacked the dust from their claws. “Yes, there is a touch of violant pigment in some of the chalk. I’m making very, very sparse use of it, in order to assist you in memorization of these patterns and connections. Under regular circumstances, it would take a scholar roughly a year of back-breaking expeditions to The Forgotten Quarter, or Bazaar Back-Alley deals to find and collect scraps of symbols from under the watchful eye of the government.” The Academic clasped their hands behind their back. “Don’t try to memorize it. Simply take your time with it, as you might glance at a broadsheet on your way to the green grocer.”
It wasn’t impossible to look away from. These symbols were laced with neither compulsion nor trickery. If anything, it was little more than a word search. There was no need to read from right to left, when the pattern is as interesting upwards, or diagonal.
But the longer you look, the less the symbols seem to be aligned into strict rows and columns. The entire thing feels convex. But that can’t be right, because each one is right above the other. Some on either edge of the entire grid have more in common with one another than the ones that are next to them. But why does the noun for “light” have so much in common with the verb for “to commit violence?” Why is your stomach so tight? How does your gut balance that with the satisfying scratching under the surface of your skull, the itching sated again and again by noting which symbols connect to which ones connect to which ones connect to which-
A snap as wood clatters against wood. You aren’t done when The Academic pulls down a second layer of boards, filled with another grid. But when you glance at the wall, over an hour of the class’ time has fled into the void of the past. That feels wrong both ways. You’d only just looked up. But you’d also been playing for days. Playing? Yes, of course. If it hadn’t been fun, you would’ve looked away. But your mind feels as though you’ve finished solving a fiendishly tricky puzzle. Indeed, as you look back to the new symbols, you’re about to connect new information. You’re not just looking.
You’re reading.
The Academic clapped their hands, startling any new reveries before they began. “You may wish to stretch your legs before diving into the next set. These ones shouldn’t take quite as long, but you’ve already been working very hard.”
Faces stirred around the classroom, the other students managing to blink. Each stirring snap of eyelids knocked tears loose to stream down their faces, landing and pooling in the cups of their goggles.
Oh. There was a tickling sensation on your cheek, and a coldness at the rim of your googles. You too.
Perhaps that break wasn’t such a bad idea.
Once everyone had a good chance to stand up, get a good drink in and a good cry out, The Academic reconvened class.
“This is applied use of The Correspondence. Heavier usage of violant pigment can force a reader to recall certain words, and there are ways to inscribe symbols in a way that conveys, conducts, or enhances meaning.” The Academic gestured back to the board. “This grid system invites the reader to draw connections, and the use of the faintest dash of violant helps the mind to hold onto important information while continuing to read. This effect is only temporary, but the best study happens when you are able to begin employing the symbols on your own terms. Perhaps the effect could be made permanent if I’d written the entire thing with a stronger shade of violant...” The Academic clucked their tongue against their teeth. “But I’m not looking to burn my readings on these symbols into your mind. It’s much better for me to pass on what I know as a foundation, and to get you building your own voices as quickly as possible.” They tapped their boot on the stone floor, and lifted an eyebrow. “If we wanted everyone to simply agree with me, we might as well throw me into a Rubbery vat and attempt to make copies. But your perspectives are valuable. Irreplaceable. Don’t forget that, while you look at the next set of boards."
As before, the end of class came before anyone was quite done. The Academic rolled up each and every board, spiriting the grids out of sight.
“That’s it. Don’t ask for any more time with them. The correspondence can be highly addictive, but looking at these grids won’t teach you anything else you don’t already know. If you’ve still got the itch, look over your study materials this week. Next week you’ll begin writing in earnest.”
The Academic gripped their lectern. “You may be experiencing the dread beginning to overtake you. This is normal. Learning languages opens up new ways of thinking. Learning The Correspondence opens up venues of cognition man was not meant to know.” Claws adjusted their monocle, like fingers worrying at a cuff. “And the speed with which you have all broken new ground this week will be…trying. Your sleep tonight will be unpleasant. That is one side effect of studying The Correspondence. Thus, you have two homework tasks this week. First-“ The Academic added this to an empty chalkboard, “-write down one of your nightmares. Especially if a particular vision proves to be recurring. You don’t need to do anything but be aware of it. If a dream repeats, there is a kernel of truth in it, and it’s better to be aware of what it’s telling you.
Second assignment: get rid of the nightmares.” The Academic underlined this, twice. “If they get worse, you’ll be forced to take a stay in hospital, and that will get in the way of your studies, and effectively waste MY time, too. So. Find something soothing. A good meal, time spent with someone you think you can trust, several bottles of opiates. I don’t care what you use, so long as it works. You don’t need to bring it into class; I’ll be able to look in your eyes next week and tell. Anyone who comes into class with a haggard and haunted look will…” The Academic looked from face to face, then smiled.
“…not receive homework points!” They tossed their chalk back to the lip beneath the chalkboard. “That, of course, is all the punishment which I care to offer. If you choose to ignore my warning, then tonight you will immediately receive a somewhat more natural incentive.” They took up a rag and an atomizer of their own, before promptly beginning to clean the chalkboards.
“Class dismissed!”
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 07:45 am (UTC)He returns to the class a few minutes later, drops of cold water still on his face, his hair re-tied into a more orderly queue, and richer for an emetic revelation. He slinks back into his chair; it is almost as if he hasn't been gone at all.
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 02:18 pm (UTC)"Feeling better?" a question out of genuine interest, as they haven't seen him react, but empiricism suggesting he must have suffered as well, even if a little.
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 06:23 pm (UTC)Nevertheless, he looks up, slightly startled, but offers a radiant smile: "Not at all!"
He pushes the thermos towards the Professor. "It is not exactly the hair of the dog, I believe the saying goes, but perhaps a wig of the fog that bit thee?"
(That almost begets the question if it is coffee at all. But if it tastes like coffee and has a high concentration of caffeine...)
"Thy own person seems to be faring better than mine. I applaud you." Something about the way the Mycologist's lips twist around the words make it sound less like a praise and more like self-depreciation.
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 06:47 pm (UTC)"No more, thank you. It is so strong I feel one more drop would bring me a Neath-sized headache. But thank you for the offering."
"And not so good, really... Yet it isn't too dissimilar to the effect after emerging from a rubbery vat, or experiencing the Sea of Spines... I'm afraid I haven't been the most cautious in where I put my mind..."
The Professor tries to make it sound funny, yet there's a very obvious terrified undertone. Maybe the Correspondence attacked them with those very weapons.
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 07:05 pm (UTC)"Well," he says carefully, "my supplier of amber has to stock at a different place then, I suppose. Then again, I have very little doubt that our Professor-Emissary would tell us something about interpretation of language, perhaps something pertaining to Platonic ideas. Provided we have the guts to ask them."
He mulls his coffee over and finally settles: "Well, how unprepared can the second set catch us?" The tone of his voice suggest that he expects the second set to shoot him point blank.
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 07:14 pm (UTC)"And about that, I actually expect it to be easier. We already had the first contact, we already read what our subconscious perception wanted, or at least that's my take on what just happened. Now it's time for the conscious, actual understanding and outwards knowledge... Or at least, I hope so."
They really thought so, otherwise they may very well lay on the floor and not stand up until next week at last.
"Also... That mention on a Platonic interpretation of the language... What's your take on it? Are you so certain this language is so perfect it evocates the Ideal Forms directly? Is it a pure, high-echelon form of communication that isn't biased by the physical imperfections of our mind?"
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 07:21 pm (UTC)A pause.
"My apologies, that was untoward of my self. I acknowledge thy interest is of academical venue. I merely thought flustering thee momentarily might distract me from my... linguistic failure. It did not."
He scowls in the direction of the blackboards and sighs: "It would certainly be easier if there wasn't so much blank space between the sigils."
"Nothing," he says with uncommon seriousness, "can be perfect. Only death dwells in true perfection. No, I merely meant that when thou readest 'Light'," he makes a vague gesture towards where the particular sigil should be hidden, "thou thinkest of a different light than I do. Yet the word itself embodies all of those interpretations, thine, mine, everyone else's. I have yet to encounter a language for which this isn't true. I also have yet to encounter a language in which the gulf between meanings ina singular word attempts to claw the reader's brain out."
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 07:53 pm (UTC)Which didn't extend to their still exposed ophidian eyes, the slitted pupils of which were too relaxed and wathing the Mycologist in an even more becoming light than the spiced coffee did.
"Anyways... Yes, I understand what you're saying, my apologies. Perhaps I'm too used to people bringing Plato to the conversation just to brag about who or what is closer to the Absolute Truth or the Highest Philosophy..." There the Professor shakes their head quickly. "Not that I assumed you would be like that, it's just... Uhm... I best drop the subject."
"I like your actual take much more. I believe it is because we are shaped by our experiences. So even such a 'straightforward' thing like a word's meaning will be more strongly tied to our subjective feelings and impressions of what could it mean, than to the common concept it stemmed from. And yet that common connection, as loose as it may be, allows us to communicate in a meaningful way despite those differing experiences... More so with something like the Correspondence, pulling from the very strings that hold our mind together to manifest that meaning behind our skulls..."
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 08:29 pm (UTC)It is a well rehearsed line. The Mycologist would give it in writing if asked.
"Please, do assume the worst in me. It is rather refreshing, my dear esteemed colleague," he shoots back a smile. "Although I am not a philosopher. I am many things, but certainly not a philosopher. Hadst thou lay the Ultimate Indisputable Truth in front of me, I'd vivisect it. My knowledge of truth and its perception extends to the practical knowledge of disproving solipsism."
The Mycologist puts the container of coffee back. Not because he is done with it; he's merely ran out of content. He concludes: "Withing the bounds of language, the Correspondence is not special. In that regard it behaves like any other language. Of course," he waves his hand, "about no other language would we naturally think that it exhibits any kind of behavior."
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-27 09:06 pm (UTC)"And that take of yours is both very useful and loyal to science. I admit I find myself lost in the metaphysics more often than in the facts, so a balancing factor is always welcome." A short chuckle. "If some day I find some Ultimate Indisputable Truth I'll be certain to ask you prepare your laboratory and be in the front row of said vivisection."
"And about the Correspondence I believe there's no interpersonal benefit of it, no more than any other language as you said. But it is the first we've known that's capable of communicating those concepts to the surrounding world, and it acting in consequence. And although it opens many metaphysical questions, the more practical ones could propel the scientific method centuries ahead."
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 11:56 am (UTC)He smirks: "We are then going to need a third person in this vivisection to hold the door. The Ultimate Indisputable Truth seems to be the sort to leg for it at the earliest opportunity." Given what would await it, should it ever be found, probably a wise course of action.
"Such is the nature of mankind: We force all into harness to work for us, whether we understand it or not." He taps his pen against his thick notebook and adds: "Do not misunderstand me. I am not complaining. After all, I too benefit. But sometimes I am wondering if we are asking the right questions, regarding the Correspondence. Both metaphysically and physically."
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 12:21 pm (UTC)"And how right you are! Maybe for the best though... Truth deserves its space as well... For now. About the Correspondence? I'm fairly certain that's not the case. And it may take a long while before the right questions are formulated... In the meantime we can grope in the dark and perhaps take the right steps forwards."
OOC(This conversation made me think on the Mycologist and the Professor in the Adulterine Castle, where at least a truth can be vivisected, if you know what I mean)
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 12:29 pm (UTC)((OOC: That is a very convenient thought, because the Discordance is(n't) why Myco here struggles with the grid-based learning so much XD))
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 01:25 pm (UTC)OOC(Oooh, that's why he complained of the blank spaces! Very clever)
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 02:06 pm (UTC)"But I am also not one to turn away from a dancing hall when invited. Thou puttest me into a difficult position, to choose one or the other. Let us say that dancing first, and than thou shalt take me amber-sampling after thou'st seen me work with my hands."
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 02:11 pm (UTC)Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 02:19 pm (UTC)"Dost thou have a time in mind?"
((OOC: Do you want to RP out their night on the town? And if so, where?))
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 02:49 pm (UTC)OOC(Oh, I'd LOVE to. Where would be better? A thread in our journals? Through FL? A Discord channel? I'm oppen to suggestions on what would be more convenient)
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 03:33 pm (UTC)"Then it is settled. I shall meet you there, equipped with something more suitable to dancing. Just between the two of us," he leans in conservatively, "these shoes were not a wise purchase. They were not made for walking, let alone dancing."
((OOC: I am all for a thread in journals, those are best for archiving and re-reading. I can start a new post, beacuse my current "come RP with me" is in the Medusa's Head.))
Re: Break Time
Date: 2025-06-28 03:45 pm (UTC)OOC(Great! We'll make the dance in your journal then. And the shaping part in mine once it's finished? To share the word count or something)