Sorry for the slow updates. I ended up breaking three of my fingers and can barely type right now.
On top of that, the medical bills have been pretty overwhelming. If you're able to support me, I'd really appreciate it. My Patreon is $10/month, and you'll get access to 20 chapters ahead.
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The door closed behind Silas and the office went quiet.
Lu Changcheng looked at Ren.
"So," he said. "What do you think?"
Ren was quiet for a moment. He looked at the door, then at Lu Changcheng, and then at the tea on the desk that had been cooling for most of the conversation.
"Brother Lu," he said. "Don't you think it's dangerous?"
"In what sense."
"Almost every high-ranking hunter is a member. Which means Gregory Hood and Malvick Siven are both in that organization."
Lu Changcheng smiled. It was the careful smile. "Yes. They are."
Ren's brow moved.
"You're sending me into a room with the two people who declared me dead," he said. "For what? For a quick death? My doctor identity is anonymous, I'll give you that. But I have the same abilities. The same skill set. The second I demonstrate anything in a room full of Mythical-rank hunters, someone is going to make a connection."
"I know," Lu Changcheng said.
"Then why are you asking?"
"Because I'm asking you." Lu leaned back in his chair. "Not ordering. Asking. The decision is yours. If you go, I'll do what I can: legitimate S-rank alchemist credentials under the Dao Guild's name, a convincing cover identity, full institutional backing. But I can't be inside that room with you. Past that point you're on your own."
Ren looked at him.
"So what I'm hearing," Ren said, "is that you can get me in the door with fake papers and after that it's my problem."
"That is an accurate summary, yes."
Ren sat back in the chair.
"Do you have any means to manage it?" Lu asked.
Ren thought. He thought about Needle, who could make a room full of Legendary-rank hunters forget they had ever met him. He thought about what he could build in two weeks if he started now. He thought about Gregory Hood, who was Legendary rank and politically brilliant, and about Malvick, who had declared him dead quietly and with certainty and had been certain about it.
I think I do, he thought.
"I think I do," he said.
Lu Changcheng nodded once. He did not look relieved or pleased or anything in particular. He looked like a Guildmaster who had passed a difficult thing to the person most capable of handling it and was now waiting to see what happened.
"I'll let you know," Ren said.
. . .
"What a headache," Ren said, leaning back in the reception chair.
The clinic was quiet in the early afternoon. The grafting circle was dark. The side table had a half-finished cup of tea on it that had been there since morning.
"Do you need my help, Father?" a voice said. From the closet.
Ren looked at the closet door.
"Why the fuck are you in there again."
"Being considerate, Father. You know, being bony and all."
"Right. Mr. Bony." Ren looked at the ceiling. "Should I call you Mr. Boner? Are you even capable of having a boner at this point?"
A pause.
"Father," Bone Saw said, from inside the closet, with great dignity, "first, I still have a fully functional lower body. Second, the closet is my safe space."
"Sure. Sure."
"I'm serious about the lower body, Father."
"I believe you."
Another pause. Bone Saw apparently decided to let the topic rest.
"How can I help?" he said.
"Just come with me when the time comes." Ren stood up. "I also need to contact Needle."
He took out his phone.
The message was short. Needle's reply arrived in four minutes, which probably meant he had been waiting with his phone already out: As you require, Father.
Ren pocketed the phone.
From inside the closet: "Father. What are we doing?"
"Walking into a room with the people who want me dead," Ren said, "and making sure they don't know it's me."
A long pause from the closet.
"That sounds dangerous."
"It is."
"Are we doing it anyway?"
"Yes."
"Okay," Bone Saw said. "I'll be here when you need me."
In the closet, Ren thought.
He did not say this out loud.
. . .
Silas Mordane woke up at seven feeling better than he had in months.
He had slept well. He had dreamed about breakthroughs. He had woken up knowing today was going to be a good day, the certainty of someone who is usually right about these things.
He brewed himself coffee, thick and dark, and carried it to the balcony of his guest suite on the guild's residential floor. The city was doing what cities did in the early morning. He lit a cigarette, took a drag, and looked at the skyline.
This is life, he thought. Life is genuinely good.
"Give me one."
He sighed. Not unhappily. "Why don't you buy your own? Why do you always take mine?"
"Cigarettes from someone else taste better," Ren said, already beside him at the railing, hand out.
Silas gave him one and lit it.
"Mr. Bone Saw," Silas said, looking at the third figure on the balcony. "Would you like one?"
"I'll take one, thank you," Bone Saw said.
"No thank you," Needle said quietly, from slightly further back.
Silas lit Bone Saw's cigarette. He watched, with genuine scientific curiosity, as Bone Saw drew on it.
The smoke went in through the space where a mouth should have been on the obsidian skull. There was no tissue, no cheeks, no lips, no lungs in any conventional sense. The smoke went in, paused, and drifted out slowly from the eye sockets.
"Mr. Bone Saw," Silas said. "How do you do that? You have no skin. No soft tissue. Nothing for the smoke to interact with."
"It's a trick," Bone Saw said. "You know. Being bony and all."
"A medical miracle," Ren added.
Silas looked at the skull, the drifting smoke, and the red light in the eye sockets, and thought: this man's patients are genuinely extraordinary. Every single one of them.
He took a long drag of his own cigarette and let the morning settle.
"Have you considered the offer?" he asked.
Ren exhaled. The smoke drifted off the balcony into the city air. He was quiet for a moment, and Silas let him be quiet, because he had learned over sixty-plus years that rushing this kind of silence produced worse answers.
Then Ren turned to look at him.
"Show me your work first," he said.
Silas raised his eyebrows.
"I want to see what you've built," Ren said. "The research. The results. Before I decide, I want to see what you're actually capable of. The successes. Not just the theory."
Silas looked at him.
Then he smiled, wide and genuine, the smile of a man who has finally found someone who asks the right questions.
"Oh, this old man likes you very much, Doctor." He straightened. "Give me two days to prepare. I'll show you everything."
"Just the successes," Ren said.
"Of course." A pause. "This old man may also show you a few of the more interesting failures. For scientific context."
"Just the successes."
"Mostly the successes."
Ren looked at him.
"Mostly," Silas confirmed.
Bone Saw took another drag. The smoke came out of his eye sockets again.
Silas watched it happen a second time with the same expression of pure scientific interest.
"Mr. Bone Saw," he said. "I would very much like to examine you at some point, if you're willing."
"Father decides," Bone Saw said.
"Father decides," Silas repeated thoughtfully. He looked at Ren. "Your people call you Father."
"Yes."
"Interesting." He filed this with the particular satisfaction of a man who has identified a variable he intends to investigate later. "Very interesting."
Ren said nothing.
The city went on below them, indifferent and busy, and the three of them stood on the balcony and smoked, and the morning was good.