“I can’t make sense of these but they are probably extremely valuable, right?” Zheng asked Gandalf with a smile.

Gandalf inhaled a puff of smoke then muttered back, “I apologize. I don’t even recognize the characters written. I have not seen such characters throughout my life, not the language of the orcs, not of the elves, not of the dwarves. They could be words left behind by long fallen civilizations. Saruman was truly the chief of wizards. His knowledge far exceeded mine. He studied such fallen civilizations while I couldn’t even recognize these characters.”

(I think it’s more likely that God altered the plot and intentionally buried the scriptures under the tower as a reward.) Zheng smiled back. He gathered the scriptures under Gandalf’s loathing gaze then said, “I am going to take these back. They might be related to our team in some way. Don’t worry. I will bring it back to you once we studied them. I know you want the scriptures.”

Gandalf returned an awkward smile, inhaled a few more puffs of smoke then said, “Your power has grown again... but your mentality seems to be weaker than we last met. You might fall into the same state as Saruman if this continues.”

Zheng was surprised. “Become like Saruman? What’s that? What do you mean by my mentality?”

Gandalf nodded and said, “Our senses are much more sensitive than typical humans, especially our senses on a being’s mental state. Just like I was about to sense those being controlled by the One Ring, your mental state is ragged with holes. What happened?”

Zheng replied, “Some things indeed happened... Do you have any way to solve this issue?”

Gandalf sighed, “Issues on the mental state are the most difficult to resolve. Otherwise, the One Ring wouldn’t have caused so much damage. You are the only person who could solve this issue. No one can help you. Overcome your mental obstacles and your mental state will return. The only advice I have is hold onto the things you have been holding on firmly. Never waver and your heart will never waver.”

(Hold onto the things I have been holding on? Like live on? Or protect those important to me?)

Zheng pondered over what Gandalf said as he waited for the day to return. Yet, he didn’t know what to do. Wasn’t he holding onto his beliefs all this time? Or... had his beliefs changed without realizing?

He left the Lord of the Rings world with these questions and refined Qi that was double the amount he accumulated the last time. His refinement rate increased as his strength grew and his unlocked stage deepened. The biggest rewards from this trip were the scriptures. Gandalf was still breaking through the magic restrictions in his world. A surprise might await for when he return again.

“These are the scriptures found under the wizard tower. They don’t look like any language native to the Lord of the Rings, right? Gandalf also said they are not the language of any of the known races. So I think God put these under the tower as a reward.” Zheng brought out the scriptures and said to the team.

The team gathered in his room as usual. The scriptures were passed around then placed on the table. TengYi picked up a piece and carefully studied.

Everyone held their breaths as they stared at TengYi. He was the linguist of the team. Xuan might be more knowledgeable over all and HongLu second, but TengYi was more specialized in this field.

“These characters seem to be older than pictographs. They come from a prehistoric civilization.” TengYi frowned.

“Prehistoric civilization?” The team was curious.

“Yes.” TengYi nodded. He put down the scripture and smiled. “The earlier the writing system, the simpler its sentence structures are. Like pictographs, which have no fluent sentences. You can only deduce the meaning of the sentence. This is to be expected as the early forms of language itself are crude. However, prehistoric writing systems broke away from the norm. Writing systems similar to hieroglyphs and pictographs were found in ruins deep under the sea. When translated, these writings formed very fluent sentences as though they were originally translated from modern language. Thus, archeologists deduced the existence of prehistoric civilizations. Some scientists also believed continents depicted in legends, such as the Atlantis, existed. Those who lived in Atlantis used the prehistoric writing system.”

Xuan nodded, “Correct. I have read information on this regard. However, credibility is lacking... Can you translate these scriptures?”

TengYi shook his head, “Unfortunately, I can only make out the meaning of some combinations. I can’t translate whole scriptures unless I have enough time to study and compare each combination. It might take a year...”

A year? The other members looked to each other. Zheng asked, “Have you made out anything since you were looking at them for quite a while?”

TengYi nodded. He picked up the scripture he just put down. “The year the ice phoenix soared, Saints of the west fell. Our strength grew as we come to understanding with the seekers of truth. Yet, can we be victorious? Our enemies are...

“We won with devastating costs. The path has been closed but it will one day open up again. Saints and the seekers of truth are both annihilated. Who could be the guide for humans? Extinction will fall upon humans when the path opens up again... Record keeper, a dying Saint, Anubis.”