abnabooks Chapter 9 Daisy
Chapter 9 Daisy
Lucius snapped out of his reverie, then asked after a moment's thought:
"But... he won't be taking on undergraduate students, will he?"
"That was true before, but..." Ms. Ruth adjusted her glasses and smiled slightly:
"His current research project is 'The Study of the Evolution of Ancient Languages - From the Second Age's Fa Ke Language to the Third Age's Jie Zong Language.'"
It was originally his independent research, but the Ministry of Education suddenly added a sum of money.
He is required to complete the research in the next two years, and it is stipulated that at least two undergraduate students' names must be included in each published research result.
I heard it's a new decree from the Minister of Education to increase the number of authorships by young scholars in the evaluation process.
If you can join his research group, he, as the dean, can directly link your final grade to your research performance.
There's no need to wait for the disciplinary committee's hearing results regarding Marcus's case.
In other words... there's no need to worry about graduation.
Lucius went over Ruth's words in his mind and quickly grasped the key points.
Professor Anthony needs some translators to help alleviate the pressure of translating documents.
What's even better is that, because the new policy requires him to recruit undergraduates, the entry requirements will be temporarily lowered to a sufficiently low level.
He himself happened to have mastered the ability to read and translate the tracer language.
His eyes lit up; he had to admit, Marcus was a really good person.
Although that guy almost killed him, he did teach him the language of interpretation, and it was genuine ancient language ability, not a watered-down crash course.
This is a scarce resource within the entire academic system.
"Thank you, Ms. Ruth," Lucius said sincerely.
"I'll go to the college building to find Professor Anthony right now."
He walked out of the academic affairs office and back to the history building, where students were in class at that time.
From the nearest classroom came the male professor's booming voice:
"The Tudor royal family and the great nobles once made an alliance with the Unyielding Order, a alliance long enough for them to complete their journey from early conquest to eventual destruction..."
Lucius listened to a bit of it; it was a story about the Fourth Age.
The Tudor dynasty unified the western continent but eventually split into several kingdoms, with Horn inheriting the main body of the kingdom.
As he was thinking about what he had learned before, a dull thud was accompanied by a clear "Ah!" as he passed the corner of the stairs.
Lucius took two steps back, leaned against the wall, and looked down at the ground.
Books and manuscripts were scattered everywhere.
A girl wearing a dark, floor-length dress fell to the ground, her delicate features visible beneath her thick, messy brown hair.
However, the bluish-black color under her glasses made her look particularly tired.
"I'm so sorry! I was walking too fast and didn't see there were people ahead of me..."
The girl hurriedly apologized, squatting down as she spoke, groping around for her fallen glasses.
"It's alright, I was just distracted while walking," Lucius bent down and placed his glasses beside the girl, then helped her pick up her books and manuscript paper.
"Are you alright?... You don't look too good."
"Thank you," the girl said first, then replied after putting her glasses back on.
"Um...it's nothing, I've just been under a lot of pressure lately, and I didn't sleep well at all last night."
After a brief self-introduction in the stairwell, Lucius learned that Daisy Ophelia was a classmate who would soon be pursuing an honors degree.
As she tidied up the scattered books and manuscripts, she kept complaining about how strict and rigid the professors in her research group were:
"Professor Anthony sends me a lot of literature reports every day, some of which are original versions written in ancient languages."
I'm still translating last week's report! I've been working through two nights already, and I've only translated less than a third of it.
Today was the group meeting, and I was late...
She glanced at the clock on the stairwell, her face paling even more. "Twenty-eight minutes late! Twenty-eight minutes! I'm doomed."
Upon hearing this, a glint of inspiration flashed in Lucius's eyes.
He casually picked up a stack of manuscript paper, the edges of which were pressed with the ink signature of "Anthony Thorne".
The first page contains the deciphered trace language, with the title above it prominently proclaiming "A Study on the Evolution of Trace Language into a Dead Language".
Lucius glanced at it and found many errors; he spotted at least two.
"Daisy..." Lucius handed the last stack of manuscript papers back to her, and tentatively began to speak:
"You just said you didn't sleep all night, translating this 'Evolution of Tracing Language into a Dead Language'?"
"Yeah," Daisy replied irritably, tidying up the books and manuscripts in her hands. "What's wrong?"
"Is the original text of this rubbing from the inscription from the second phase of excavations at the Hertz Valley site complex?"
Lucius looked at her; this excerpt of the original text had been taught to him by Marcus a few months earlier as a textbook for advanced tracing languages.
Daisy stopped moving, a hint of confusion flashing in her eyes behind her glasses:
How did you know?
"The inscriptions unearthed in the second phase share a common feature: the verb conjugation system was profoundly influenced by the northern continental branch in the middle of the Third Age, and there are systematic differences from standard tracer language."
Lucius pulled out the sheet of paper from the stack of manuscripts where he had just discovered the error, and pointed to the translation on it:
"For example, here. You translated it as 'the gods offered him sacrifices,' but this word..."
His finger touched a character that looked like three parallel wavy lines intersecting with three vertical lines:
"...is a typical borrowed word from the Northern Continent, derived from the root word 'accept' or 'take in' in the Northern Continent dialect."
In standard tracing, it is a passive marker, but in the second Hull River Oral Inscription, it is an active marker.
Therefore, the correct translation of this sentence should be: "He offered sacrifices to the gods."
Daisy grabbed the manuscript paper and stared at the character for several seconds.
Her lips moved slightly, and then her face turned even paler.
"Oh no," she murmured. "In last month's group meeting report, I translated this sentence backwards at least six times."
Professor Anthony didn't point it out on the spot; he probably wanted to see when I would discover the mistake myself.
She looked up at Lucius, as if she were about to cry:
"In other words, an entire chapter of the analysis in my interim report was based on a flawed translation."
She slapped her forehead hard and said in despair:
"I'm almost forced to rewrite it."
Lucius looked at her frustrated expression as if he were seeing the struggles of those graduate students in his past life.
Why not a doctor? Well, they've already developed a faint sense of impending death.
"Um, Daisy..." he began, making his tone as casual as possible.
"It seems your research group is short-staffed?"