The next few days passed peacefully and smoothly.
There was nothing unusual about Professor Byron, and Evan made no rash attempt to approach him.
A chemist researching potions against vampires was not necessarily a good man.
The Capitalist raised vampires. The chemist researched ways to counter them.
Whether those two threads led to an ambition for immortality or something darker, Evan could not afford to gamble.
At school, his soaring memory sent his studies racing ahead.
After he got home each day, he needed only an hour to absorb every lesson, key point, and exercise from his classes.
One pass through a textbook was enough to remember the important page numbers and where each passage appeared. He could even recall the extra details his teachers mentioned in passing.
What was strange was that Pulis had given him a Transformation Potion recently but had done nothing else. He had not even drawn any blood, merely asked Evan to describe his symptoms.
He seemed to be waiting for something.
That only made Evan more uneasy.
So once he got home, Evan left the two remaining Blood-Burning Potions untouched and drank one diluted Transformation Potion on schedule each day.
Since the Blood-Burning Potion was made specifically to deal with Sanguines, it might prove useful.
As for whether Pulis had come by at night, Evan knew that too.
Hill had visited one last time three days ago.
She said something unclean had latched onto her. Pulis might have been behind it, so she could not visit for a while.
But her senior fellow disciple had arrived and was hiding nearby. Evan could rest easy.
Sure enough, when Evan woke the next morning, he found a note beside his bed that smelled of whiskey.
"He came. I drove him away. Your good senior fellow disciple. Don't be alone with him for the next couple of days."
"A note from your ally: the two dollars you gave Hill smelled like piss."
Evan felt awkward when he read the second line.
Only then did he remember that the hand he had used to take out the money had apparently touched the very wet crotch of his pants.
With someone helping him, Evan relaxed and continued growing stronger.
As his reproductive capacity surged, his body began producing testosterone in large amounts. Evan could see his muscles changing.
His bones were gaining weight and density, and his muscle fibers were growing denser at a healthy but ferocious pace.
Every morning when he woke, he saw small but real changes in the mirror.
His shoulders were half an inch wider, his chest a finger's breadth thicker, and his jawline sharper.
"The first step from scrawny weakling to Astartes!"
Of course, there was a price.
He could really eat now.
A meal that used to fill him up for fifteen cents now cost him thirty.
Two loaves of black bread, a large bowl of bean soup, two sausages, and a glass of milk—and three hours later, he was hungry again.
Food alone cost him nearly a dollar a day.
Even if he hauled sacks at the harbor every day, the pay could not keep up with his new body's appetite.
He could earn eighty cents in a day, but he ate ninety cents' worth of food.
His savings were quietly draining away like sand through an hourglass.
Before long, Friday arrived.
When the final bell rang, Evan slung on his schoolbag and headed for the school gates with Lane, John, and the others.
Students chatted in small groups along the corridor about their weekend plans and the highly anticipated American football game two days away.
"Arkham?"
Evan turned.
Eldin stood two paces behind him.
She wore a deep-purple velvet coat trimmed with snow-white rabbit fur at the collar.
A pearl hair clip held up her long black hair, revealing her slender neck.
Two other well-dressed girls stood behind her, but neither carried herself quite like Eldin.
"What is it?"
Eldin spoke calmly.
"The American football game between our school and Truth University is the day after tomorrow. Some classmates and I have arranged to go together."
"We need a dependable boy to help look after us."
She lifted her chin slightly.
"Would you like to come? I'll arrange the tickets and travel."
Behind Evan, Lane's and John's eyes went wide.
Both looked down at their own scrawny arms, their faces full of regret over the months they had spent taking experimental drugs.
What an opportunity.
What a dream invitation.
Then they heard Evan answer without a hint of urgency.
"Sorry, I have to haul sacks at the harbor this weekend. I don't have time."
He turned to leave.
The corner of Eldin's eye twitched.
This was the second time in one week she had lost to the words "haul sacks."
"You—"
Lane and John lunged from either side and grabbed Evan's wrists,
their faces full of exasperation.
Their fingers clamped around him like crab pincers. They looked ready to force him down in front of Eldin and make him apologize.
Eldin took a deep breath and quickly collected herself.
"Are you short of money?"
Evan nodded earnestly.
"Very. I've been eating a lot lately. I can barely afford food."
Eldin's eyes shifted.
"Then how about this? Saturday, Sunday, and Monday—three days. I'll pay you three dollars a day."
Lane and John nearly popped their eyes out at the figure.
Going to a game with a beautiful woman from the Nobility would already have been an enormous honor to them.
And he would get paid for it?
Three dollars a day.
Nine dollars for three days.
Nine dollars was what they earned in a week of drug trials, or what a dockworker made after more than ten days without spending a cent.
Envy and jealousy were about to burst through the tops of their heads.
They turned to stare at Evan, their eyes saying the same thing: if he dared say "I have to haul sacks" again, they would pin him to the ground and beat him on the spot.
The word "pay" brought an immediate about-face from Evan.
His casual "I'm busy, I don't have time" attitude vanished, replaced by an eager smile.
"Miss Hurst, you certainly know how to judge a man."
He thumped his broad chest.
"Rest assured, miss. I'll defend your safety with my life."
Eldin was momentarily speechless at how quickly he had changed his tune.
She muttered to herself,
I can smell the testosterone pouring off him. He doesn't seem impotent in the slightest...
So why doesn't he react to my looks at all?
She suppressed her puzzlement and regained her usual composure.
"Be at Bolton City South Station before nine tomorrow morning."
"Don't worry about clothes. I'll arrange a uniform for you."
With that, she turned and left.
The hem of her deep-purple coat swept an elegant arc over the corridor's wooden floor.
The moment Eldin disappeared around the corner, the people around Evan erupted.
"Arkham, you lucky bastard!"
"Damn it, I'm dying of jealousy!"
Evan smiled and patted Lane and John on the shoulders.
"Try to take fewer drugs from now on. Good health matters more than anything."
Under everyone's envious stares, he quickened his pace, ran down the steps of the Teaching Building, and hurried out of the school gates—only to see a Streetcar close its doors and pull away.
Evan could only stand by the road in frustration and wait for the next one.
Lane, John, and a few other poor students remained in the open area by the Sports Ground. None of them followed him.
Lane sighed.
"Forget it. Arkham's not one of us anymore."
He paused.
"Remember to volunteer at the Church tomorrow."
John scuffed his shoe against the ground and muttered,
"Why? We're all poor kids from the bottom. Why does he get to take the drugs, stay healthy, and go to a game with Miss Hurst?"
"While we have to volunteer at the Church."
The others instinctively clenched their fists.
People did not resent having little. They resented having less than someone else.
Malice quietly took root in the gaps between jealousy and discontent.
Evan hurried home.
By the time he got off the Streetcar, it was completely dark.
The night wind in mid-November had turned chilly, and the temperature had dropped to around three degrees Celsius.
The familiar alley off Gooding Street was piled with garbage as usual. Moldy vegetable leaves and damp, rotting newspapers littered the cobblestones.
He had barely entered the alley when he slowed down.
The stray cat was gone.
Every morning and evening, that scrawny gray tabby appeared beside the garbage heap on time, crouching there to paw through it for fish bones.
It had not missed a day all week.
But today, the alley was unnaturally quiet.
No cat cries. No rustling rats.
Even the wind's moan through the clotheslines seemed to have been swallowed by something.
Something's wrong.
At that very instant,
violent pain exploded deep in his abdomen.
As though someone had timed it exactly.
It was no longer the dull, bearable burning he had felt before.
This was agony that pierced to the marrow, as if countless red-hot wires had driven through his nerves at once.
Evan's legs gave way. His knees struck the cold, wet cobblestones, and his whole body began to convulse beyond his control.
With trembling fingers, he pulled the bottle of Copper Pills from his jacket pocket, shook one out, and shoved it into his mouth.
It did nothing.
Against pain of this magnitude, the Copper Pill's numbing effect might as well have been crushed by an invisible hand.
He could clearly feel countless unseen hands working through his blood vessels, organs, brain, and eyeballs.
Every fiber was being pulled apart and woven back together.
The Magic Potion is about to be fully digested!
That damned woman! If she hadn't held me up and made me miss that Streetcar, I'd be home by now!
Evan gritted his teeth.
One hundred and sixty-eight hours. That was how long the Demon Hunter Characteristic took to digest.
Now only thirty minutes remained.
That was why he had been in such a hurry to get home today.
He had known this moment was coming. He had not wanted it to happen in front of strangers.