"Eight hours? All right!"
Evan put the panel away and examined himself.
The change was obvious.
The familiar low blood sugar hit him again, though much more mildly than last time.
He took the jar of brown sugar from the kitchen straight to his bedroom. After eating two handfuls, he took stock of his body.
The two potions weren't improving just one part of him.
His entire body, from scalp to toes, was coming alive. Every cell was rebuilding itself at a speed he had never experienced.
Through the Perception granted by the panel, he could clearly identify where that energy came from.
It was the Blood Potion.
It wasn't merely medicine. It was a source of energy.
"How can a medicine contain so much energy?"
"Was it made with some special ingredient?"
As he pondered, a burning restlessness rose from deep in his bones. His heart raced, his muscles tightened, and an almost frenzied urge surged through his limbs.
He had to move.
It wasn't that he wanted to exercise. He had to.
The need was as irresistible as a drowning person's need to breathe.
Evan didn't hesitate.
He rose from the chair, set his feet shoulder-width apart, and began doing squats.
One, two, three.
His body was frail and riddled with illness, yet it showed no sign of trembling.
He bent his knees, lowered his thighs, then pushed himself back up. Every movement was smooth and steady.
He switched to push-ups. With his palms against the cool wooden floor, his arms and legs held his full weight steady.
There was none of the shaking he had expected.
Even as he exercised, he could feel his blood flowing faster, as though a valve had opened.
Oxygen rushed into his lungs with each quick breath, was seized by his hemoglobin, and carried to every working muscle.
Even such strenuous exercise didn't leave him gasping.
Evan rolled over and sat on the floor, looking down at his arms.
Beneath his pale skin, veins rose one after another, like tree roots pushing up through soil.
The veins in his forearms, once shriveled and sunken from selling too much blood, were now full, with a faint blue-green tint.
Then he saw something even more astonishing.
His arms were growing thicker.
It wasn't his imagination.
Before his eyes, the arms that had been so thin he could make out the contours of the bones were filling out at an unnatural speed.
Muscle fibers writhed, multiplied, and layered beneath his skin, as though an invisible hand were filling his arms from within.
He felt as if his strength would never run out.
Evan looked at the new buff on the panel.
[Blood Wine Enhancement: The prepared Blood Wine is nourishing your body. Duration: 12 hours.]
"Blood Wine?"
It was a term he had never heard before.
"Wine brewed from blood? No wonder. The Blood Potion really does contain Beyonder power."
"So it isn't ordinary medicine. Is it blood prepared in some special way? Or wine?"
His mind kept turning, but his body never stopped.
He rolled over and resumed doing push-ups. The floor creaked beneath his hands as his pace quickened.
Just as Pulis had said, digesting the Blood Potion required a great deal of exercise.
His body was a furnace running at full blast. The potion was fuel, and exercise was the bellows. He needed both.
But Evan soon felt something was wrong.
Pain.
Not in any one place. His whole body hurt.
Thanks to the Power of the Nine Dragons, the side effects of the two potions hadn't taken hold.
But it couldn't reverse the physical strain of violent Beyonder energy surging through his frail body.
It felt as though someone had poured molten iron into his veins. Every muscle fiber was being torn apart and rebuilt by force.
His bones felt scraped with sandpaper, and his joints felt packed with broken glass.
Gritting his teeth, Evan checked the status section of the panel.
No negative status had appeared.
That meant the pain wasn't a symptom of illness or a side effect. It was simply the unavoidable cost of rebuilding his body at such speed.
If you demolished a building to rebuild it, the demolition was bound to kick up dust.
With that thought, Evan rolled upright and grabbed the leftover medicine from his test a week ago off the table.
He unscrewed the cap, poured five tablets into his palm, tossed them all into his mouth, and swallowed them with half a glass of cold water.
[You took a large dose of Aspirin. Effect duration: 6 hours.] [Effect: Your pneumonia is improving, 12% → 9%. Your perception of pain has decreased for the duration.] [You reversed the side effects of Aspirin.] [Your digestive function has improved. Physique permanently +0.001.] [Your hearing has improved. Physique permanently +0.001.]
With the two potions at work, the medicine took effect quickly.
Normally, Aspirin took about thirty minutes to work.
But his metabolism was running as though someone had set it to six times the speed. In less than five minutes, the stabbing pain throughout his body began to fade.
It ebbed from the tips of his limbs like a retreating tide, leaving only a warm, bearable ache.
"That feels good."
Evan rolled his shoulders, his joints cracking.
He was about to resume his push-ups when an idea flashed through his mind.
He stopped.
"Wait."
"I've got this overwhelming urge to exercise, and my body's digesting the potions at high speed. I need plenty of movement to help it along."
"So why am I doing push-ups in this dump?"
"I should go make money."
Hauling cargo, carrying sacks, loading and unloading—the warehouses in the dock district were always short of hands.
Wasn't that sort of repetitive, physically exhausting work the perfect exercise?
Holding back the urge to run a hundred laps on the spot, Evan went to his wardrobe and opened it.
At the bottom lay two sets of work clothes his father had left behind.
Denim overalls, worn pale at the knees but made of sturdy cloth.
A rough canvas shirt, frayed at the collar and cuffs, still carrying the faint smell of engine oil.
Evan shook them out and changed into them.
The overalls were a size too large around the waist. He tightened the straps by two notches before they fit well enough.
He hid the medicine bottle under his mattress.
After putting on his Ironhead Shoes for work, he pulled open the door and hurried out.
It was a November evening, and by six o'clock the sky was completely dark.
Kerosene lamps glowed along the street, their dim yellow halos bleeding into the industrial haze like blurred spots of light suspended in midair.
Gooding Street was still lively. Workers off their shifts poured into taverns and cheap restaurants. Vendors at the corners called out offers of roasted chestnuts and hot cider, while steam rose from their pots and quickly turned white in the cold air.
Evan jogged through Gooding Street, heading southeast.
Once he left the familiar neighborhood, the smell in the air began to change.
The scents of coal smoke and food gave way to something stronger and more primal:
The salty tang of seawater, the sharp bite of tar, the mustiness of rotting wood, and fish—an inescapable reek of fish.
Hain Street.
The street ran beside the docks. From the roadside, he could see the rolling black sea across the way and the massive freighters moored in the harbor.
Rust on their hulls gleamed dull red under the dock lights, and the smokestacks still vented wisps of steam.
The steel arms of cranes reached into the night like a giant's fingers. Their cables swayed gently in the wind, creaking as metal rubbed against metal.
The workers had finished dinner and were returning to their shifts.
Figures filled the docks, carrying sacks, pushing handcarts, and shouting orders to the crane crews. Sweat, curses, and steam mingled in the air.
Evan ran along the edge of the docks, scanning the signs on the warehouses until one caught his eye.
Bryce Transport Company.
The warehouse doors stood open, and the brightly lit interior was bustling with workers moving piles of cargo.
Sacks, wooden crates, and iron drums were unloaded from wagons, then carried one by one into the warehouse and stacked.
"Uncle Parker! Are you still hiring?"
Evan jogged over and stopped in front of a sturdy middle-aged man. He bent over to catch his breath, a smile on his face.
Parker, forty-six, was the foreman here.
When Evan's father, Anta, was alive, the two men had worked together and had been on friendly terms.
The foreman had a blackened briar pipe clenched between his teeth. Its embers brightened and dimmed in the night breeze.
Years of sea wind and sun had weathered his face. His nose and neck were burnt red, and his skin was as rough as sandpaper.
A limp flat cap sat on his head, its brim ringed with salt stains from sweat.
He smelled of fish, tobacco, and cheap rye whiskey—a strong, rough mixture.
Parker's first reaction to seeing Evan was surprise.
He took the pipe from his mouth and looked Evan up and down twice, his brows drawing together.
"Evan? How did you get so thin?"
Then he sighed and lowered his voice. "I heard about your parents. Such a shame. Anta was a good man."
Evan murmured an acknowledgment without dwelling on it.
"I'm all right. Studying late for exams did this. I got into Sage University recently, so I'd like to earn some spending money."
Parker's eyes lit up. "You really got in?"
He tapped the stem of his pipe against his palm and grinned, showing teeth yellowed by tobacco.
"Ha! Anta would've been proud. He was always going on about how his son would be a doctor one day."
He knew how much tuition at Sage University cost, so he didn't ask about the money.
"The usual pay is one dollar twenty a day for twelve hours." Parker put the pipe back in his mouth, his tone shifting to that of a foreman.
"If you can't work a full day, you're paid by the hour. Eight cents an hour. Someone watches the crew, and you'll lose pay if you slack off."
He looked Evan up and down again, his gaze lingering on those stick-thin arms.
"Can you manage?"
Evan patted his chest and grinned between breaths. "It'll be good exercise!"
At the end of the day, Parker and Anta had only been drinking buddies who shared a few drinks after work. Evan couldn't expect special treatment.
Parker jerked his chin toward a small shed beside the warehouse.
"Get your work badge over there. Off you go."
Evan jogged to the registration desk.
Inside the shed sat a dozing old man, with a greasy ledger and a box of tin work badges in front of him.
Evan gave his name, signed the ledger, and pinned a numbered badge to the strap of his overalls.
Then he followed the line of workers to the docks, bent down, grabbed a sack on both sides, and heaved it onto his shoulder.
It took some effort.