3: Chapter 3 Rules of Play

36 Zoutland Street, Blackthorn Security Company.

From the outside, this three-story gray stone building looked no different from any ordinary commercial firm in Tingen City. The dark green wooden shutters were half-closed year-round, and the brass sign above the lintel was polished to a shine, though the lettering had worn somewhat blurry.

Lu Li looked up at the roof. The shadow flitting across the corner was definitely not left by a pigeon. On the surface, this was a moderately successful small security company, but in reality, it was a Nighthawk stronghold.

The furnishings of the first-floor reception hall confirmed this disguise. A worn leather sofa, a coffee table piled with outdated newspapers, and a half-dead Boston fern in the corner. Hanging on the wall were several yellowed templates of security contracts and a map of Tingen City, with dozens of locations marked by colored pushpins.

The only part that did not quite fit a security company was the deep blue sacred emblem of a hexagram hanging right in the center of the wall behind the reception desk—the symbol of the Church of the Evernight Goddess.

An ordinary security company would not hang a church's sacred emblem on the wall, just as an ordinary bakery would not place a steam difference engine next to the cash register.

"So, what you're saying is—" Rozanne, sitting behind the reception desk, tapped the edge of the register with a ballpoint pen and raised an eyebrow at Lu Li.

"You completed your Sequence 9 advancement all by yourself, without any guidance, in that East Borough apartment of yours that doesn't even have hot water?" Her tone was more curious than interrogative.

Rozanne was a civilian staff member of the Nighthawk squad, a Sequence 9 "Sleepless", responsible for archives management and daily reception. She had messy short brown hair and a pair of eyes that looked like they never got enough sleep, but her typing speed was astonishingly fast.

In the ten or so minutes Lu Li spent answering questions, she had already typed up two full pages of conversation records.

"A stroke of luck," Lu Li said. "A vagrant died in the East Borough and left some things behind. Some black market rumors are valuable in their own right."

"It's not unusual for dead people in the East Borough to leave things behind. What's unusual is that you took those items, brewed a potion directly, and survived." Rozanne set her ballpoint pen down on the notebook, leaned back, and sized up Lu Li.

Her gaze was not hostile, but carried a quiet, discerning judgment that only came from dealing with various Beyonders over a long period.

"Do you know how many wild Beyonders die every year from the very first potion they brew themselves?"

"I was lucky."

"Luck," Rozanne repeated, then smiled and did not press further.

Lu Li noticed that Dunn had not questioned him again after giving her the note to file away. He had probably already confirmed through Beyonder means that Lu Li was not a dangerous person—perhaps using a Sealed Artifact, or perhaps through his own abilities as a "Nightmare."

In the mysterious world, someone who could interrogate others in their dreams did not need much of a confession.

"Captain Dunn said to let you get familiar with the archives under me first." Rozanne fished a key out of a drawer and tossed it to Lu Li. "Locker C-3 in the basement is yours to use. Official Sequence 9 Nighthawks can claim basic supplies, but any excess has to be paid for out of pocket or exchanged with mission points. Keep the locker key safe; if you lose it, replacing it will cost you a week's pay."

"There's a salary?" Lu Li caught the key.

"Two pounds ten shillings a week, with additional subsidies for high-risk missions." Rozanne paused. "Funeral expenses are covered by the Church."

Her tone was very flat as she said the last sentence. The lights in the archives room just happened to flicker gently at that exact moment.

Lu Li weighed the key in his hand. It was an ordinary brass key with well-worn teeth, hanging from a circular number tag engraved with "C-3." There was a shallow scratch on the key handle, left by its previous owner.

Lu Li wondered, was this person still alive?

"C-3," he put the key into his pocket. "I'll remember this number."

"You'd better," Rozanne turned back to resume typing on the keyboard. "The last user of C-3 lost control last year while hunting the 'Blood Above' cult—not dead, but lost control. He'll be locked behind Chanis Gate for at least another thirty years. If you're not afraid of bad luck, this locker is yours."

Lu Li's fingers paused on the key in his pocket. A second later, he gripped the key tightly and changed the subject. "Can I read the materials in the archives room at will?"

"The only things you can read at will are newspapers," Rozanne said without looking back. "Borrowing archives requires the Captain's approval, and some information related to Sealed Artifacts requires bishop-level clearance. But there is an exception for your level—you can directly read the 'acting guidelines' and 'Illustrated Guide to Common Beyonder Creatures' distributed internally to the Nighthawks. Both books are on the newspaper rack in the lounge; hopefully, no one has used them to prop up table legs yet."

The lounge was at the end of the second-floor corridor.

It was a small room, furnished with a few old sofas, a coffee table, and a radiator that hummed constantly. The newspaper rack stood right next to the radiator, its iron frame heated hot to the touch. A few pamphlets and outdated church monthly newspapers were scattered on the rack.

The "acting guidelines" Lu Li was looking for was sandwiched between two old monthly newspapers, only about the thickness of a palm. Printed on the cover was the sacred emblem of the Church of the Evernight Goddess and a line of gold-embossed title. The curled edges of the pages showed it had been flipped through many times, but the gold embossing on the cover remained intact.

Lu Li flipped to the first page.

"A Beyonder's power comes from potions, and the essence of a potion is to accommodate a Beyonder characteristic. A Beyonder characteristic has its own inherent will and inclination, which will gradually erode the consumer's mind and body during the advancement process. The only way to combat this erosion is 'acting.'"

He read on.

"The essence of acting is to align one's own behavior with the 'archetype' contained within the Beyonder characteristic, thereby allowing the characteristic to 'settle' and exist peacefully within the consumer. When acting is achieved, the potion will enter a state of 'digestion,' drastically reducing the risk of losing control, and the application of Beyonder powers will also become smoother."

"Warning: Acting is not pretending. Pretending is deceiving others, while acting is deceiving the potion. There is a fundamental difference between the two. Potions cannot be deceived by lies; they can only be convinced by actions. If your acting is superficial, the potion will not digest; if you immerse yourself too deeply in the acting, you will unknowingly become a slave to the characteristic, rather than its master."

"Rule Number One: Always remember who you are."

Lu Li paused on this page for a good while.

This was the core of the acting method. It seemed to offer Beyonders a lifeline against madness, but in reality, it was a dance on the edge of a knife.

Insufficient acting leads to potion rejection and loss of control; over-acting leads to losing oneself and madness. Where was the balance point? There was no standard answer. Every Beyonder had to grope their way through on their own.

"Always remember who you are," Lu Li muttered to himself. It was easier said than done. When you played another role day after day, gradually bringing your habits closer to some ancient and powerful archetype, how could you be sure you were still yourself?

He closed the book, leaned back on the sofa, and closed his eyes for a moment.

Marauder Pathway. Sequence 9, Marauder. The corresponding "archetype" was "Thief."

Lu Li suddenly realized that this was not a simple identity, but a more abstract concept—stealing fate, stealing time, stealing existence itself. To digest this Sequence 9 potion, he needed to "steal," and he needed to understand and execute the hidden rules behind this act.

But being a Marauder within the Nighthawks was a paradox in itself.

Lu Li thought to himself that he had to steal, but he could not cross the line where the Nighthawks would classify him as an enemy. Finding the exact location of this line might take months or even years of probing.

And he did not have months. Everything that was about to unfold in Tingen City would not wait for anyone.

Lu Li tucked the "acting guidelines" under his arm and was about to walk out of the lounge when he ran straight into someone walking over from the other end of the corridor.

It was a young lady who looked under twenty. Her dark brown curly hair was pinned back with a hair clip, and her brown eyes shone exceptionally bright in the dim corridor. She walked briskly, clutching a thick stack of files in her arms. As she passed by Lu Li, she suddenly halted her steps, turned her head, and cast him a reasonably friendly look.

Daly Simone. Sequence 8, Gravedigger. The future Spirit Medium.

On Lu Li's list of "regrets he most wanted to salvage," her ranking might not have been as high as Old Neil's, but after seeing her in person, he was certain her name belonged on it too.

"Are you the new guy?" She tilted her head slightly, sizing up Lu Li with a tone somewhere between curiosity and caution. "The one Dunn mentioned who advanced through wild means?"

"Lu Li. Sequence 9, Marauder."

"Daly, Sequence 8, Gravedigger." She adjusted her hold on the files, freeing up a hand to point at the "acting guidelines" under Lu Li's arm. "Reading that?"

"Just borrowed it."

"Then you must have seen that warning line." Daly's tone as she recited it was strange, like she was reciting a spell she did not deeply understand. "'When you bend down to steal secrets, the secrets are also bending down to steal your essence.' The Gravedigger Pathway has something similar—when you spend a long time in the same room as the deceased, you will no longer completely belong to the realm of the living."

She paused, as if weighing her words.

"Every Pathway has this kind of boundary. Every Pathway is pushing you away from the definition of a 'human.' Some push fast, some push far, but the direction remains the same."

She fell silent for a beat after speaking, then suddenly shifted the topic. "Tomorrow night, Old Neil is doing an extraction demonstration in the Potion Room. All newcomers are required to attend. Don't be late."

"Old Neil?" Lu Li asked, playing dumb.

"An internal support Beyonder. Sequence 8, Mysticism Magister. He runs the Potion Room. If you have any needs in this area in the future, you'll most likely have to go to him." Having said her piece, she did not wait for Lu Li's reply and set off again toward the archives room.

At the end of the corridor, her shadow was stretched long by the wall lamp, overlapping with the mottled wallpaper on the wall, turning so blurry it was almost unrecognizable.

Lu Li leaned back against the wall, gently pressing the worn "acting guidelines" to his chest, staring blankly up at the light fixture on the ceiling.

Outside the window, the streets of Tingen were enveloped in a thin layer of mist. At this time tomorrow, he would meet Old Neil. All he could do was set up the branching paths on the tracks of fate in advance.

During his first few nights as a Nighthawk, Lu Li repeatedly had the same dream. In the dream, there was something extremely ancient, wrapped in countless chains and eras, silently watching him from above the gray fog, without speaking a word.

Upon waking, he thought to himself that by the time he met Klein, he should already be able to tie the first distorted knot on that intersecting line of fate.