Occlumency and the lessons of the High Priest

Kai turned over one page after the other, ignoring the High Priest's words, his mind already playing scenarios based on the incredible data written about the middle-aged Viscount.

He could not believe how the Temple of Byagoona had figured out this much about a Contestant, given the System would have never told them.

He closed his eyes, his mind running like a killing machine about to sign the death sentence of an unknown person.

One stroke of thought and Viscount Lucas' fate was set.

Kai snapped open his eyes and nodded. "It can be done," he said, smiling a hollow smile. "I want to learn the principles of both Occlumency and Legilimency, and along with it, I want a saber and armor. Items, of course."

Kai already knew that the Temple of Byagoona knew he had two Abilities. One based on movement and the other on a weapon. That's why he only asked for one saber, to throw them off on a false trail.

The High Priest's face gave away nothing. "Life of Viscount Lucas for Occlumency," he told Kai.

Kai almost smiled. "Deal."

"A man can feel that you have somehow locked your emotions," the High Priest said, as Kai put the folder into his MRB. "But that is not true hiding of emotions. This artificial lock doesn't represent Control. Let it go."

Kai stared back into those pale green eyes, contemplating what to do now. If this man were to use Legilimency on him, then he wouldn't even know.

"Don't worry," the High Priest told him. "Even the simplest use of Mana to cast such spells will cause dire consequences for Contestants of the 9th floor who have descended this low in the Primordial Tower.."

This was the only reason Kai was here, to begin with. If it wasn't for Item-M's experience, and knowing how abnormal these restrictions were, then he would have never come here.

Kai took a deep breath, and lifted the lock over his emotions, his face immediately welcoming them with open arms.

"Is your Intelligence over 20?" the High Priest asked.

"No." There was no point in withholding such information when it could easily be guessed. Not to mention, it was he who wanted to learn, and if his instructor had demanded this data beforehand, then it must be relevant.

The High Priest nodded. "Contestants can perceive the surrounding Mana even when their Intelligence is lower than 10," he instructed. "But only after it rises to 20 that one can perceive Mana inside them. Consider it as a threshold. All Active Attributes have the value 20 as their threshold. So, if you have any spare Attribute Points, then raise your Intelligence as much as you can before we begin."

This wasn't according to Kai's plans, but there was no other choice. He assigned the latest gained 2 Attribute Points to his Intelligence, bringing it to 14.

"What do you know about Occlumency?" the High Priest asked.

Kai recalled his sessions with Item-M and said, "It's an art to defend one's thoughts, emotions, and memories against Legilimency by creating a barrier. My slave had told me…"

The High Priest cut him off. "If all that you know about Occlumency is learned from your slave," he said, sharply, "then forget about it. Clean your mind of all the knowledge that has come from the Temple of the Yellow King. When did they become a master of this art for them to teach it to a Candidate of Many-faced God?"

Kai was gobsmacked. It had taken a week for him to learn from Item-M the tiny details of Occlumency and Legilimency. And now this green-eyed man was telling him to forget about it.

The High Priest must have guessed Kai's thoughts, or he must have read his expression, for his next words cleared Kai's hesitation. "Outside the Temple of Many-faced God," he said, explaining himself, "almost all Contestants follow the theories on this magic taken out from the World of Harry Potter. It's simple, easy to learn, and has a standard form for average wizards to cast the spell. But these Contestants can never become as good as the in-world Wizards. The ancient priests of Many-faced God had surpassed even them, using their unique ideas, formulas, and…"

Kai knew what was the last thing. "Multiverse Interdependency?"

For the first time, the High Priest smiled. But Kai couldn't tell if it was genuine or fake.

The High Priest nodded. "As a man can't do magic here," he told Kai, "you will be taught the basic principles and the underlying theory of the Occlumency in the coming week. You will also have access to the section of the Temple's library relevant to this art. Shall we proceed?"

Kai sighed, reluctantly forgetting about all the details Item-M had so fervently told him about this magical art.

"Our way of Occlumency is based on three core fields," the High Priest said, nodding to Kai's changed state of mind. "Neurophysiology, Cognitive Psychology, and Metaphysics. The human brain is one of the largest and most complex organs of the human body. It comprises over 100 billion nerves, also called neurons, that communicate in trillions of connections called synapses. You seem to be familiar with these things."

Kai smiled. "You can say that."

"That would make it all easier, then," the High Priest continued. "These 100 billion neurons communicate with each other by transmitting electrochemical signals in between them, creating a web of one of the most complex pathways known in the universe. Memories are nothing but a set of selective pathways among this web, and what seems to be a single memory is actually a complex composite of different areas of the brain being activated. Think of all this as messages being fired back and forth between neurons as signals. Let a man explain all this using an example."

The High Priest's right hand went inside his loose, left sleeve, and took out a wand.

Kai's eyes burned with passion for the tiniest of instances, but even that got noticed by the man sitting in front of him.

The High Priest looked from Kai to his wand, and after a brief pause, flicked it. Letters of the English Alphabet from A to Z came flowing out of the wand in gold color and hovered between him and Kai.

"Suppose these 26 letters represent the neurons in a brain," the High Priest said, as the letters gathered together to form a group. "Then, a combination of these letters forming many pathways can represent a memory."

The wand swayed, and the letters A, C, E, and Y came flying out of the group of letters. A green line then appeared, connecting A to E, E to C, and then C to Y. "This particular combination of neurons forms three pathways," the High Priest said, pointing at the green line running between the four letters. "This is a memory. In the same way, all memories can be represented by a combination of a different number of neurons and the pathways running in between them. Here comes the concept of Magic."

Kai's entire mind was now focused on the lesson. Once again, he was a student, but instead of his mother, it was a killer who was teaching him.

The zeal, tension, and interest in the topic being discussed, though, were the same.

"When one can perceive Mana inside them, and be able to control it with practice, using Elementary Magical Aptitude," the High Priest said, swirling the wand, "then one can give shapes to these pathways, turning what is one dimensional into multidimensional, and letting the real overlap with imaginary. One can trigger a particular set of pathways, i.e. a memory, and use Mana to assign an object to it."

As he finished these sentences, the wand paused, and the 4 letters and the green line running between them, representing three pathways, disappeared. In their place now hovered a book. Simultaneously, the group of rest of the 22 English letters, hovering between Kai and the High Priest, disappeared too, and in its place appeared a Bookshelf with many books already lined neatly on the many shelves within it.

With another flick of the wand, the single book formed from the memory of the three pathways flew toward the Bookshelf and rested itself on one of its shelves.

Kai watched the entire process with terrifying fascination.

"Now look closely," the High Priest told Kai. "When one's emotions are not in check, meaning Control, not Lock, these emotions trigger a memory in one's mind."

A red thread of light, representing unchecked emotion, came out of the wand and touched one book on the Bookshelf. The book left its row, opened up itself, and a set of letters with a green line running in between them showed itself to them. Kai knew the red thread of unchecked emotion had just triggered a memory.

But it didn't stop here. From the open book, many black threads burst out. Some of the black threads revolved around the opened book, but a few of them got thrown towards the Bookshelf. The moment they touched the books, they too flew out, opening up by themselves.

"These black threads are thoughts," the High Priest said. "When an emotion triggers a memory, more often than not, this memory triggers thoughts related to this memory. If not Controlled, then these threads trigger more memories, which trigger more thoughts. And it would keep going on until it all becomes a convoluted, never-ending cycle. So, have you realized how crucial it is for one to Control one's emotions? By locking them, you are just timing the bombs. It's a tested and rejected theory."

Kai had to nod.

The High Priest flicked the wand again. The Bookshelf returned to its previous appearance with the books lined neatly in it, leaving behind one book that hovered outside the shelves and a single black thread revolving around it. One memory and one thought, Kai reflected. And then, a perceptible but transparent sphere appeared around the Bookshelf, including the stray book and the black thread.

"Occlumency is Controlling your emotions, accessing your memory, and preventing your thoughts from getting accessed by a foreign party, using a barrier," the High Priest concluded. "If your emotions are disarrayed, then it would cause an abundance of thoughts, which would in return weaken the barrier, making it easier for a Legilimens to access them. Once getting a hold of your thoughts, a Legilimens can trace them back to the source and access that memory. So all things must be in tune with each other."

At last, Kai had to agree. He had to accept that the lessons he had received on Occlumency and Legilimency from Item-M were like two children playing around at the sight of a new toy.

"Now, most wizards who have arrived at this conclusion, though following some other theories but with weak foundations, assign books to the memories," the High Priest said, as the Bookshelf and the barrier vanished. "And you can see the reason for it. It's simple, easy to access, and can be expanded as much as one like. With time, with just a thought, one can access any memory, even those from the past, eliminating the need for remembering. They combine it with a barrier of a maze, or other complex forms, structuring their entire defense around these things. But the ancient faceless men had come up with better alternatives, using Multiverse Interdependency."

"How?" Kai asked, not getting the reason for it.

"For example, in place of the Bookshelf, a man has a computer," the High Priest said, flicking a wand. A PC appeared on a desk, its monitor showing a window containing many folders and files. "A man has assigned the memories to various files on this computer, and they can be accessed by a simple search function with pin-point accuracy. For the barrier, a man has used a wall of 56-bit encryption, i.e. there are 2 to the power 56 possible keys to breaking into the system. For a Legilimens to break into the computer, not only must he know about this type of encryption but he must almost need to be quick about it. Or, one can use brute force against it too, a way that would give a man enough time to secure the defenses even more tightly."

'This…' Kai gulped. 'This is ingenious! What a brilliant way to limit stray and unavoidable attacks.'

"It has its flaws too," the High Priest continued. "A wizard with high Mana output could force his way into the System. Here lay the advantage of this structure. A man can just create new files and folders with random encrypted data and use them to hide files containing sensitive memories. You must have heard of Professor Snape. He is a powerful wizard and a master of hiding his true memories under the false ones. It's the same effect, but Snape's process of getting those results is considered too crude among the faceless men. If a man can make it almost impossible for unlearned Legilimens to break into the System using only 56-bit encryption, then you can imagine what the result would be using 128-bit and 256-bit encryption."

Kai licked his lips.

The High Priest then shook his mind. "A man knows it looks good at one glance," he told Kai, "but the best defense is the one which a wizard is the most familiar with. You must create your own structure for it to be unique and unbreachable. For the next six days, you have full access to all the notes, mentioning the hundreds of different unique structures used by ancient faceless men as defenses using their own Multiverse Interdependency. Refer them, and in case of doubt, seek Simon. Simon is the best Occlumens below the 5th floor. He would be the most suitable guide for you. We will meet on the morning of the 7th day."

Saying that the High Priest stood up, and walked away without sparing Kai another glance, his black and white cloak billowing noiselessly over the stone floor. When Kai walked out, lost in his thoughts, he found Simon standing outside the doorless room.

He smiled, making Kai recall how hideous it was. "Follow me," Simon said. "Let me show your chamber for the coming week."

Simon took Kai through a hidden tunnel outside the gates of the 3rd-level basement and stopped in front of a barred door. Kai heard some incomprehensible whispers coming out of Simon's mouth, but before he could make sense of them, the door opened.

The smell of old books and scrolls hit his nostrils instantaneously.

"It's the library," Simon said, entering the chamber. "Simon will be your librarian, and you have free access to the Occlumency section. There are rooms behind the last bookshelf. We will stay there."

The place was dark but clean. Kai was just about to ask for the light when Simon clicked something out of his sight, and hundreds of gas lamps lit up, lined in the little chambers into the walls. Kai even felt the faintest hint of a breeze, telling of a meticulous ventilation system.

It was then Simon beckoned him with the gesture of a hand, and pointed at something.

Kai neared him and saw his fingertip almost touching the wooden board hanging on the side of a bookshelf. It was worn, but even then Kai could read the word Occlumency clearly on it. Kai tilted his neck and saw the Bookshelf running farther into the library on and on like a wooden snake. He saw many books on various fields of psychology, magical theories, and ancient scrolls; probably on Multiverse Interdependency, he later guessed.

A smile crept up on Kai's face.

"Only the books on this Bookshelf will open themselves to you," Simon said. "You are not to linger around the other Bookshelves."

Kai heard, but ignored it. His hand went out for a book titled "Thoughts: An Aristotelianism view", pulled a stool to the table under the light of a lamp, and sat down. "Are you going to stand there for 6 days?" he offhandedly asked, his fingers opening the book.

Simon chuckled, silently. "Of course."

**********"

AN: Check out the auxiliary chapter, if you haven't already