"Finished digesting?" Evan hurriedly looked down.
[You reversed the side effect of the incomplete Night Demon Potion.] [Your anemia has been greatly alleviated! 65% → 30%] [Your Regeneration has permanently increased by 2%.]
"So my anemia has been alleviated! No wonder I feel so much better."
He briefly sensed the changes in his body, then drew his attention back to the information on the panel and began thinking.
"Judging from the effects of the Mercury Pill and Phenobarbital, reversing something means turning the values originally reduced by the side effects into bonuses."
"Mercury poisoning causes gum ulcers and loose teeth, so after being reversed, it strengthened my teeth."
"Mercury poisoning can cause ulcers in the digestive tract and damage to the cranial nerves, so after being reversed, those two problems were repaired."
"Following that logic, the side effects of this incomplete Night Demon Potion should be..."
"Further worsening of anemia, as well as a permanent reduction in the body's ability to regenerate."
He paused, still shaken. "One pill sends you straight down the road to diabetes?"
Evan was shocked by the potion's potency, and even more shocked by how inhumane the school was.
They were feeding students something like this. What kind of eyes were hidden behind Pulis's lenses?
"Whatever. I should get familiar with my body first."
As he thought this, he stood up from the edge of the bed, placed his bare feet on the cold floor, and felt every signal sent back by this body.
Just a few hours ago, this shell had been so weak that he could barely walk without swaying. Now, it had regained some of a living person's strength.
His previously stiff and numb limbs had become more flexible. The dizziness and ringing in his ears were still there, but had been greatly alleviated.
His inflamed throat and lungs felt much better, and his breathing no longer carried that irritating, hurried wheeze.
His cold hands and feet finally regained some warmth as well. It was as if his blood had remembered how to flow again.
He took two laps around the room.
His thin legs seemed to have thickened ever so slightly. He could feel a thin layer of muscle around his calves, and his steps were steady and strong.
Evan returned to the table, picked up the Canvas Satchel hanging over the back of the chair, undid the clasp, and stacked the textbooks inside it on the table.
He was currently taking six main subjects: chemistry, biology, physics, English, Mathematics, and German.
Tomorrow—no, today's classes were chemistry, physics, English, and Mathematics. All four classes were crammed into the morning.
Each class lasted an hour, with ten-minute breaks between them.
Laboratory class and a small memorization group began at one in the afternoon and lasted until after four, when he would finally have time to himself.
Professor Mons had assigned a huge pile of work in chemistry class the day before yesterday. There was plenty to write and plenty to memorize.
Unfortunately, Evan had been dazed and muddle-headed these past two days. He had not even had the strength to open his textbook, so he had not touched a single word of his homework.
He pulled out his chemistry Notebook and homework papers and spread them across the table. The chemical formulas and equations looked like a group of neatly arranged little insects.
Evan sighed.
"I've transmigrated, and I still have to study chemistry?"
The next second, four times the concentration slammed down like a floodgate, shutting out every distracting thought.
His pupils contracted slightly, his gaze locked onto the first line of the Notebook, and the entire world fell silent.
"Dalton's atomic theory, Mendeleev Periodic Table..."
His eyes swept across every page of notes, every formula, and every supplementary explanation spoken by the professor with almost mechanical efficiency.
Information poured into his mind like flowing water. It neither swirled nor stagnated, sinking directly into the deepest layers of his memory.
At the same time, his right hand wrote rapidly across the homework paper. The scratching of the Fountain Pen against the paper was even and urgent in the silent early morning, like a well-running sewing machine.
Time slipped away unnoticed.
The oil level in the Kerosene Lamp fell by more than half an inch, and the wick burned into a short black charred tip.
The light between the curtains changed from dim yellow to gray-white, then from gray-white to pale gold.
Three sheets of homework paper on the table were already filled, and the Notebook had been flipped to its final pages.
When the bell tower of some distant Church rang seven times, Evan suddenly came back to himself.
That focused feeling receded as quickly as the tide, and the world became noisy and trivial once more.
The sound of Mary turning over came from the next room. Horseshoes began clattering along the street, and a baby was crying downstairs.
He had become an ordinary person again.
But the homework was finished.
Four subjects required at least ten hours of homework, yet he had completed it all in one uninterrupted four-hour stretch.
"I should go to school."
Evan quickly pulled open the wardrobe, which had lost one of its handles.
There was pitifully little hanging inside: two shirts, one gray, with frayed edges around the collar; and one white, with a stubborn yellow sweat stain beneath the arm.
He chose the gray one, then put on a dark-brown tweed jacket. Its elbows were patched, one button was missing, and a lump of cloth sewn on with a piece of matching thread served as a replacement.
His trousers were a pair of dark pants covered in pilling. The knees bulged slightly, and no amount of ironing could restore their original shape.
He slipped his feet into a pair of faded secondhand Leather Shoes. The soles had worn thin, and the heel of the left shoe was slightly crooked, causing an uneven clicking sound as he walked.
He entered the Washroom next door and splashed some cold water carelessly over his face. The shock made him shudder, but cleared his mind further.
He looked up at the cracked mirror hanging on the wall. Reflected inside was a young, gaunt face with black hair, black eyes, slightly prominent cheekbones, and deeply sunken eye sockets.
The foundation was decent. He was simply far too thin.
He slung the satchel over his back and left.
He went down the crowded stairs. The Stairwell was piled with assorted junk:
Old wooden crates, rolled-up carpets, a child's wagon missing its front wheel, and several empty wine bottles.
Much of the paint had peeled from the corners of the walls, revealing the dusty gray bricks beneath.
The air was filled with a mixture of boiled cabbage, damp wood, and urine. It was the eternal scent of a cheap apartment building.
He pushed open the heavy metal door on the ground floor, and the street rushed toward him.
It was bustling.
Three- and four-story red-brick buildings stood in uniform rows on both sides of Gooding Street. After years of exposure, the brickwork had been blackened by coal smoke, as though coated with a filthy glaze.
All kinds of shops lined the street on the ground floor. Their storefronts were narrow, and their signs hung crookedly.
Old Tom from the Shoemaker's Shop was already sitting on a low stool outside, hard at work. A boot was clamped between his knees, and several shoenails hung from his mouth.
The bakery next door had lit its oven before dawn, filling the air with the sour fragrance of cheap rye bread.
Farther along stood a blacksmith's shop. Its furnace had yet to burn brightly, while the Apprentice worked the bellows with a dull, monotonous rhythm.
A small clinic was squeezed into the corner. A row of faded medicine bottles sat in the glass display case outside, and the window bore the crooked red-painted words: "Tooth Extraction—25 Cents."
The November morning was refreshing, lacking July's humidity and January's bone-chilling winds.
Overnight wastewater had collected between the stones. Mixed with horse manure, vegetable leaves, and scraps of paper, it had been churned by passing feet and wheels into a layer of sticky sludge.
Dockworkers in suspenders passed by in groups of three or five. The Iron Head boots striking the cobblestones made a booming sound as they shouted and traded vulgar jokes, their laughter rough and unconstrained.
A newspaper boy stood beneath a streetlamp at the corner, a stack of Boston Morning News tucked beneath his arm and still carrying the smell of ink. He shouted at the top of his lungs:
"The Steel King buys three more mines! An unidentified corpse found at the East District Harbor! Only one cent! One cent!"
Horse-drawn carts carrying goods traveled back and forth along the narrow street, their wheels producing a deep rumble over the stone.
A chestnut-colored old horse dragged a cart piled high with ice past him. Meltwater dripped from the back of the cart, drawing a dark, wet line across the muddy ground.
The smells of fish, earth, horse manure, and cheap tobacco overlapped and wrapped around one another like an invisible filthy blanket, smothering the entire street.
"Cough, cough, cough!"
Evan, whose pneumonia had not yet fully healed, was choked into a fit of coughing by the mixture of smells. He bent over, coughing until tears came to his eyes.
He covered his mouth with his sleeve, quickened his pace through the sweat-reeking crowd, and reached a fast-food cart by the roadside.
The cart was run by an old Italian man. An iron pot and a tin coffee pot stood on it, while several rows of sliced brown bread warmed in the pot. Thin wisps of white steam rose from the coffee pot's spout.
A piece of brown bread cost three cents, and a cup of black coffee cost two.
Five cents. That was breakfast.
Evan slapped a five-cent Nickel Coin onto the cart's metal counter and accepted the bread and a chipped enamel cup.
The over-fermented sourness of the bread and the burnt bitterness of the black coffee combined in his mouth, and he nearly vomited.
Fortunately, his stomach was more pragmatic than his Willpower. His Adam's apple bobbed twice before he forcibly swallowed it down.
He chewed the last bite of bread as he walked, returned the enamel cup to the cart owner, and turned into a narrow alley south of Gooding Street.
The alley was narrower and dirtier than the street, with the walls of the buildings on both sides nearly within arm's reach.
Laundry lines stretched overhead. Damp sheets and underwear covered most of the sky, and droplets of water fell onto his shoulders with a chill.
Cigarette butts and rotten vegetable stalks floated in the standing water on the ground. A skinny stray cat, little more than skin and bones, crouched atop a pile of garbage and watched him pass coldly with yellow-green eyes.
After passing through two alleys, his view suddenly opened up.
The main road to the north was a completely different world from Gooding Street.
The broad street was more than ten meters wide, paved with smooth stone slabs. Iron rails for the Tram were embedded in the center, their two lines gleaming with a cold gray sheen in the morning light.
Wires crisscrossed overhead like a gigantic spiderweb, connecting the tall concrete buildings on both sides.
Those buildings were five or six stories tall, with neat, bright windows. Ready-made clothes, clocks, and leather goods were displayed in the storefronts on the ground floor, whose glass was polished without a speck of dust.
The Gas Lamps at the corners had already been replaced by Electric Lights. The lamp posts were cast iron painted dark green, and their shades looked superfluous and extravagant in the morning sunlight.
Large numbers of carriages moved in orderly lines along the street, the clopping of their horseshoes against the stone slabs merging into a steady rhythm.
Occasionally, a black Ford Model T drove past with the traffic, its engine emitting a rough, sputtering roar.
A cloud of blue-gray smoke burst from its exhaust pipe, and the brass fittings on its body glittered in the sunlight.
Pedestrians stopped and turned to look. Several newspaper boys chased after the car for a distance, shouting excitedly.
"So real and novel!" Evan exclaimed, invigorated and satisfied as he experienced the scenery loading into his second life.
He squeezed in with a crowd of people waiting for the Tram and stood there for about five minutes.
He pulled a prepared five-cent Coin from his trouser pocket and clenched it in his palm. When the dark-green Tram came jingling to a stop, he squeezed aboard with the crowd.
The carriage was packed tight, filled with people's shoulders, elbows, hat brims, and every imaginable smell.
Evan was wedged between a huge butcher and a Polish woman holding a baby. He gripped a leather strap overhead with one hand, his body swaying from side to side with the Tram's rocking.
Amid the crowded swaying, he noticed something.
His body had clearly grown stronger.
The last time he had ridden the Tram, he had struggled even to hold onto the strap. His arms had trembled from the strain, and the crowd had often pushed him off balance.
But today, his fingers held firmly to the leather loop, and his body maintained a decent balance amid the crowd's shoving.
He lowered his head and glanced at the panel.
His Physique had increased from 0.501 to 0.601.
The Night Demon Potion was still being digested, reshaping this ruined shell bit by bit.