37: Chapter 37 Presbyopia

The storefront of the old bookstore at the end of Water Pump Street was even narrower than Lu Li had expected.

It was sandwiched between two red-brick factory buildings.

The copper sign hanging above the lintel had rusted to a greenish hue, and half the strokes of the characters "Old Eye" engraved on it had been eaten away by the rust, making it look like "Old Sight" from a distance.

The door was unlocked.

Lu Li pushed it open, and the door hinges let out a faint groan.

The interior was dim.

A phosphorescent lamp hung from the ceiling, its cold white halo only bright enough to illuminate a small area in front of the counter.

The four walls were lined with bookshelves that reached from the floor to the ceiling, every shelf packed with old books and manuscripts.

The air was filled with a mixture of scents: old paper, leather binding glue, and aged wood.

There was no one behind the counter.

"Feel free to browse. You don't have to buy anything," a voice came from the depths of the bookshelves, hoarse and slow.

Lu Li followed the voice deeper inside and found the speaker at the end of the third row of bookshelves.

An old man of about sixty sat on a rattan rocking chair, an old book opened halfway on his knees.

He wore a faded gray shirt covered by a brown wool cardigan, and a pair of copper-rimmed reading glasses perched on his nose, the lenses as thick as bottle bottoms.

"It's still early before closing," the old man glanced at him over his lenses, "take your time."

"I'm not here to browse."

Lu Li took the imitation Antigonus Family notebook he had bought at a Tingen second-hand book stall from his inner pocket and placed it on the small table beside the old man's knees.

"This book originated from your shop. A retired church scribe took it to Tingen and kept it on his bookshelf for at least twenty years."

The old man picked up the book, flipped to the title page, and glanced at the line of Hermes script.

He pushed his glasses up his nose, flipped through a few more pages, then closed the book and set it back on the table.

"I forged it. I made it over twenty years ago, just after I retired from the church, before my skills had grown rusty."

"The line on the title page—'The Ring of the Snake, the Key of Blood, when the moon is full, the Gate shall open'—you forged it based on an original. Who has the original?"

The old man took off his glasses and slowly wiped the lenses with the hem of his cardigan.

"You're from the Tingen Nighthawks; you have the holy emblem on your cuff.

But this isn't evidence—it's just an imitation.

You coming here to ask me where the original is means either you want to track down a Sealed Artifact related to the Antigonus Family, or you want to know what the person who forged this notebook saw back then."

He set his glasses back on his nose.

"Which is it?"

"I want to know both."

The old man leaned back into the rocking chair and was silent for about two minutes.

Then, he closed the old book on his knees, set it aside, picked up a pipe from the armrest of the rocking chair, tapped it against the sole of his shoe twice, but did not light it.

"Over twenty years ago, the church asked me to appraise a batch of fourth epoch documents that had just been shipped back from the Southern Continent.

Among them was a fragmentary page of an original Antigonus Family notebook, preserved reasonably well.

After the appraisal, the church sealed the page, but I memorized that line of text and the stroke style of the handwriting."

He tapped his temple with his finger.

"I have an excellent memory; I rarely get things wrong.

After I got home, I made this imitation based on my memory.

The stroke style of the line on the title page—I dipped my finger in graphite powder and traced it over the paper hundreds of times to get it right."

"Is that line of text and the handwriting in the body of the Antigonus Family notebook by the same person?"

The old man took the unlit pipe out of his mouth and used the stem to point at the imitation notebook.

"No.

The body of the notebook is the handiwork of some scribe from the Antigonus Family, but the stroke style of the line on the title page is more ancient—the curve of the hook at the end of the strokes is larger, and the pressure is heavier, like the writing habit formed when carving directly onto stone slabs with a ritual dagger.

Such a habit shouldn't appear on paper—yet it did.

This suggests that the 'entity' who wrote this line was already accustomed to carving on stone slabs in the early fourth epoch, and only later switched to paper."

"It was carved by the Snake of Fate himself."

The old man took the pipe from his mouth.

He didn't nod or shake his head, but simply tapped the cover of the imitation notebook on the table with the pipe stem.

"Alright, I've answered your questions. Keep the imitation; no need to return it."

He put the pipe back in his mouth.

Lu Li did not stand up.

"There is one more thing.

I am looking for Deceiver hyoid bone powder.

The last of the stock at the Underground Commercial Street in Backlund was cleared out all at once four months ago, and the buyer left only a single letter as a signature—A.

People in the underground market say the buyer was a purchasing agent, buying it for a friend."

"A purchasing agent leaving only a single letter as a signature suggests they aren't the buyer themselves.

Purchasing agents in the underground market usually don't leave real names, but the client must use a code to indicate their identity—otherwise, the agent wouldn't know who they were buying for.

A is not a signature; it's a coded marker.

It means the client doesn't want their name appearing on any record, but they must let the agent know it was their job.

This practice of using a single letter as an identity marker is usually only used by buyers and sellers who have a long-term partnership and have agreed on code names."

The old man tapped the pipe ash against his shoe sole and leaned back into the rocking chair.

"Who is that purchasing agent?"

"A middleman in the Underground Commercial Street.

He specializes in procuring rare Beyonder materials for major secret organizations and has channels to obtain some out-of-print formulas and characteristics.

He never leaves a full name when purchasing, only the code A.

Abraham—that is his surname.

He is a distant descendant of the Abraham Family, a Sequence 7 of the Apprentice Pathway."

Lu Li memorized the name.

Abraham.

Apprentice Pathway.

The legacy family of the Door Pathway.

"Why would someone from the Abraham Family want to buy Deceiver hyoid bone powder?

The potion materials of the Marauder Pathway don't overlap with the needs of the Apprentice Pathway at all."

"Perhaps he wasn't buying it for himself."

The old man took the pipe out of his mouth and tapped it against his shoe sole twice.

"Perhaps he was acting as an agent for someone who, like you, needs hyoid bone powder.

But why didn't that client come forward themselves?

Why would they rather pay a high price to hire a middleman than go through official channels?

Either their identity doesn't allow them to appear in public, or they were buying more than one type of material—four bottles of Deceiver hyoid bone powder cleared out, at market price, is worth at least thirty pounds.

No Sequence 7 Beyonder would spend thirty pounds on a potion material they have no use for, unless they have another source of funding."

He put the pipe back in his mouth, struck a match to light it, and took a puff.

The smoke rose slowly under the cold white light of the phosphorescent stone, drawing faint gray streaks between the bookshelves.

"You are a Nighthawk; you should know that Ince Zangwill also procured materials related to the Marauder Pathway before he defected.

His procurement records should be archived in your Tingen team's archives.

If that client is Ince himself—or someone related to Ince—then the existence of this purchasing agent is worth your Tingen team investigating seriously.

If he isn't, then you must ask yourself one question: besides you, who else needs Deceiver hyoid bone powder?"

Lu Li stood up.

"Thank you. This information is enough."

The old man waved his hand and picked up the old book on his knees to open it again.

The phosphorescent lamp flickered slightly above his head.

When Lu Li walked out of the bookstore, the night wind of Water Pump Street blew in his face, carrying the fishy smell of water from the river bay and the faint scent of coal smoke drifting from the distant factory district.

He reorganized Old Eye's words in his mind.

The line on the title page was carved by the Snake of Fate himself.

Roselle Gustav had made a deal with it, trading a finger for permission to walk out.

A distant descendant of the Abraham Family had cleared out the hyoid bone powder stock for someone, identity of the client unknown.

These three clues couldn't be connected yet.

But he would go to the Underground Commercial Street tomorrow to find that purchasing middleman.