The Key Lies in Acting?

Watching Extraordinary materials such as the "Mountain Snowman's brain core" and the "Library Shadow Spirit's crystalline object" go into a small brass pot and form an ice-blue liquid, Luosaier felt an absurd sense that he was crafting a potion in a game. Minutes ago these things had shown no connection at all, yet the instant they touched inside the pot they rapidly fused into one and became a potion free of impurities. No need to heat it or stir...? Luosaier stared at the slowly flowing liquid in the pot and could not help muttering the thought, then realized that what he faced now was a potion, not a mixed solution from a chemistry class. On the other side of the long table, the captain of the Machinery Heart squad picked up a graduated glass and poured the liquid from the small pot into it. He was a middle-aged man of no great height, black hair threaded with a little gray, wearing a dark work jacket with the cuffs rolled up and a brass-rimmed magnifying glass hanging at his chest. Had Luosaier not already known who he was, he might well have taken him for some experienced machinist. "Before you drink, I'll remind you once more," the man said, as if he had not noticed Luosaier's appraising look, and held out the glass. "Don't sample the mouthfeel or the taste. Swallow it straight down." Luosaier took the cup and at once smelled a pungent odor utterly at odds with its appetizing look. He felt the reminder had been very necessary. "Afterward you may grow dizzy, hear ringing in your ears, see chaotic images before your eyes, and have mysterious knowledge surface in your mind. All of that is normal. So long as you converge your spirituality the way I told you earlier, nothing will go wrong. "Whatever you do, do not try to remember or analyze that knowledge." I know. It's just ineffable knowledge... As Luosaier listened to the instructions, his attention had already fallen entirely upon the cup of ice-blue liquid in his hand. A moment later he drew a deep breath, raised the cup to his lips, hesitated for an instant, then tipped his head back and drained it in one swallow. As the icy liquid slid down his throat, Luosaier could not even make out a specific taste. It felt like swallowing a whole mass of compressed cold mist. Then that chill burst open in his stomach and raced along his blood vessels and nerves through his whole body, especially toward his head. The metal table, the brass pot, and the captain's figure before his eyes began to stretch long and then squash flat. A dense thicket of sounds crowded his ears: pages turning, a classroom bell, a keyboard clacking, the low voice of his father, Lai'ang Gusitafu, explaining the etiquette of the Yindisi nobility, and, from before his transmigration, his mother calling from the kitchen for him to come and eat. Then more came flooding up. Illustrations of levers, pulleys, and pressure from his middle-school physics textbook; reaction equations from high-school chemistry that he had long since nearly forgotten; mathematical sticking points he had crammed in university just to get through exams; material he had looked up on a whim while arguing online about the history of the steam engine; papermaking, gunpowder, glass, soap, and improvements to movable-type printing that certain transmigration web novels had mentioned only in passing... Those memories were like boxes dumped out of an old warehouse one after another, sorted through, and then stuffed into his mind, making his scalp prickle. "Breathe deeply." The captain's voice came from very far away. Luosaier wanted to answer, but found he could not speak. He could only follow, by instinct, the meditation method he had just learned, sketching in his mind a shape simple and stable enough. As that image gradually steadied, the noise in his ears at last receded. The knowledge surging through his mind no longer seemed about to drown him. It sank deeper, waiting to be searched out again later. He slowly opened his eyes and found that he was still standing before the metal table, his right hand gripping the empty glass, his left pressed to his forehead. The Machinery Heart captain was watching him tensely. Only after confirming that nothing was amiss did he nod and say: "It looks as though it went fairly smoothly." Luosaier opened his mouth, then said hesitantly: "I feel as if there's a great deal more in my head." "That knowledge was already yours," the other corrected him. "Savant will not turn a dull person into a scholar at once. It only makes it easier for you to understand, remember, summarize, and associate. In addition, things you once learned and then forgot deep in your mind will belong to you again." It sounded like a teacher saying that knowledge you have learned is always your own... Luosaier instinctively recalled his homeroom teacher's scolding in a middle-school classroom, then found that he could actually remember what he had learned in that lesson almost at once. Even the illustrations in the textbook slowly surfaced, growing clearer and clearer. Excitement he could not suppress welled up in him. The bold words he had written in his diary, the inventions he had racked his brains over without finding a way in—at this moment they were suddenly so close! But the next second his thoughts were cut off by another memory that appeared without warning. It was the memory of the day he had transmigrated—not only Huang Tao's, but Luosaier's as well... His breath caught, and his expression changed. Only when the captain looked over in puzzlement did he rein in his thoughts and answer with care: "It's nothing. I just remembered some useful knowledge." The captain stared at him for a few seconds, then reminded him: "Don't drink after you go back. Rest early. Report here tomorrow morning. We'll teach you the most basic knowledge of mysticism and the secrecy regulations." Luosaier nodded and steadied himself against the edge of the table. His body felt utterly exhausted, yet his mind was clearer than it had ever been. ———— By the time Xialuote reached Lawuer's study, the sky had gone completely dark. Compared with the studio almost entirely covered in oil paintings, the baron's study at least better suited a nobleman's bearing. Account papers and quill pens lay on the desk. A bookcase stood against the wall, sparsely set with books that looked as if they had never been opened. A few landscape paintings still hung on the walls, though not in any exaggerated number. Lawuer sat behind the desk with a letter he had just opened in his hand. At the knock he looked up. Seeing that it was Xialuote, confusion came into his eyes first, then a trace of wariness. In his eyes, I suppose, nothing good ever comes of it when I come to him on my own... Xialuote grumbled inwardly, while her face kept the obedient expression she had worked hard these past days to maintain. "Father, there's something I'd like to discuss with you." Lawuer did not answer at once. He only set the letter at the edge of the desk, motioned for her to sit, and said in a low voice: "When you put it that way, you have usually already made up your mind. You are only here to inform me." Xialuote looked a little embarrassed. She realized the "credit" she had built up might not be worth as much as she had imagined. Even so, she sat down across the desk and tried to make her tone sound composed. "I need to take part in an operation of the Church." Lawuer's face darkened at once, but he did not grow angry. He only waited for the rest of the explanation. "The Church of the Eternal Blazing Sun hinted before that, so long as I kept cooperating, provided leads, and accumulated enough contributions, I would have a chance to obtain a potion." She paused here and watched her father's expression. "I think this time is the best opportunity." Of course, Xialuote was already an Arbiter. She said this only to pave the way for one day telling him outright that she was an Extraordinary, and to make up for the lie she had told before. "What operation?" As Xialuote had expected, Lawuer showed little reaction to the word "potion." He only pressed for the details. "The Church searched that ritual site in the Old City again, and also checked a great many leads connected with Aidian and the attack on the printing plant. In the end they locked onto an official at the Municipal Hall and believe he is directly linked to that series of murders." Xialuote explained only the part Weiyefu had permitted her to reveal. "The arrest will be carried out in secret. They hope I will take part, not as a combatant, but so that, in the course of it, I can recall the memories I lost that night, provide more leads, and clear this city's hidden danger clean away." After he had heard her out, he said nothing for a long time. The further explanations Xialuote had prepared felt somewhat feeble in the silence. "Is this necessary?" Lawuer finally spoke. "Must you obtain a potion and become an Extraordinary?" Xialuote looked up and noticed that her father's eyes held none of the anger she had expected. There was more weariness and worry. "You can go on being a daughter of the Suolun family, work on that newspaper or whatever with Luosaier, and study accounts, law, and the management of estates," Lawuer said, his tone not heavy. "Even if you truly want to become an Extraordinary, the Church is not the only path." The words surprised Xialuote. "You mean..." Lawuer leaned back in his chair, as if at last speaking of something he had been unwilling to bring up. "The Suolun family—I mean the part of it that is the royal family—holds a complete potion pathway. Sequence 9 is called Hunter." Hunter? After Assassin, Lawyer, and Warrior, here was another potion name with the profession written plain across its face... If Father had told me this sooner, perhaps I would not have had to go to the Church as a peripheral member... Xialuote felt a little regret, then realized that, given her situation at the time, even knowing of it would not have meant very much. She turned curious instead and asked: "What abilities does Hunter have?" "I don't know much. I've only heard that it can enhance strength and the senses, that one excels at tracking and laying traps, and that one also comes to master a great deal of knowledge related to hunting and survival." A hunter in the literal sense, then... It did sound well suited to tracking evil cultists, and to fighting as well. A pity she was already an Arbiter, and could only go on along this pathway... Xialuote sank into thought. Seeing her thoughtful expression, Lawuer sighed and continued: "In fact, I once had a chance to obtain a potion myself." Xialuote started, then sat up straighter with curiosity. Lawuer's gaze passed beyond her and fell on a painting on the wall that depicted the old Suolun residence. "I was still in Telier then. An elder of the family thought I might try to become an Extraordinary. But at the time I was unwilling to be drawn into those unknown dangers, and I also felt that, with my own status and ability, I did not need to rely on a potion to change anything. "Only later did I learn that I was merely one of those competing for that chance. That elder even said, with regret, that I was in fact well suited to becoming an Extraordinary, and might master the potion quickly." In his youth, Father had actually stood at the door of the Extraordinary world as well. He simply had not stepped through in the end... Xialuote felt a stir of feeling, thinking of herself when she had just transmigrated into this world and faced the choice of fleeing or meeting the threat head-on. Then, as if recalling the elder's expression at the time, Lawuer added in a low voice: "In his words, I was very well suited to acting the part of a Hunter." Acting? The word made Xialuote's eyes light up. Hengli had also once reminded her not to treat a potion merely as something that granted extraordinary abilities, but to make herself more like a true Arbiter. She had been thinking about this all along, yet this word her father had let slip without meaning to gave her a spark of inspiration: Could the real key to mastering a potion lie in "acting"?