The fog in the city of Arkanum was not just water vapor, but it looked like a living being, gray and heavy, wrapping itself around the copper lampposts as if trying to stifle the dim light.
Celine stood before a cracked mirror in his rented room, adjusting the collar of his white shirt. In his other hand, he held an old gold coin, but it bore no image of a king or emperor; instead, it was engraved with an open eye from which a tongue of flame emerged.
Celine muttered in a low voice
"O you who feed on silence, O observer of forgotten paths, I call to you."
Suddenly, the coin began to heat between his fingers. His skin didn't burn, but he felt a sudden chill pierce his ribcage. This was the mark of the "path" he had chosen: the path of the listener.
.(The Listener Path)
He looked in the mirror, but did not see his usual reflection. Instead, behind him in the reflection, he saw an entity forming from smoke, whispering words.In an inhuman language, words that make the mind teeter on the brink of madness.
"I need more spirituality," thought Celine, gritting his teeth. "Tonight's ritual at the Rusty Gears Club is my only chance to obtain the formula for the eighth rank: Collector of Secrets."
Grabbing his tall hat and his staff, in whose handle a silver blade engraved with anti-reverent symbols was hidden, he stepped out into the street, where the smell of burning coal mingled with the scent of the sea.
As he walked, he heard a voice familiar in his mind, a sound like the scraping of old paper:
"Celine... don't look back... fate doesn't like those who watch it."
Celine paused for a moment, his grip tightening on his staff. The voice wasn't coming from the street, but from the "background" unseen by ordinary mortals. The gathering had begun... and the threads of the game, from which only the masters of art could survive, had been unraveledSacrifice. The tavern, located in the basement of a dilapidated building in the "Port Quarter," didn't suggest anything unusual—just the smell of cheap tobacco and stale beer. But behind a huge barrel behind the tavern was an iron door that needed a special touch.
Celine placed his hand on the cold handle and, injecting a little of his "spirituality" into the coin he was holding, the door's texture transformed from solid iron to something like warm human skin, and it opened quietly, plunging Celine into a long corridor lit by perpetually burning blue candles.
At the end of the corridor was the main hall of the "Rusty Gears Club."
Here, there were no names, only masks. Six people sat around a round table made of "black cypress" wood that grows in cemeteries. They all wore elaborate brass masks filled
with gears that moved constantly with every breathThey take him.
Celine takes his empty seat, the gears in the mask of the man next to him creaking irritatingly.
"You're late, listener," said the man with the mask bearing the symbol of the broken scales.
Were the whispers tonight this long
?"
Celine doesn't answer. In this world, information is the most valuable currency, and any response might betray his state of mind.
The man at the head of the table, known as "The Mechanic," opens an old velvet box. Inside, a small vial contains a golden liquid that moves against gravity, as if trying to climb out.
"The Collector's Formula for the Eighth Rank," the Mechanic says hollowly. "Materials required: a nerve from the Mist Beast, 10 ml of a suicide's blood, and a mechanical heart that doesn'tStill beating.
Celine felt his pulse quicken. This was the missing piece for his promotion, but the price wasn't gold.
"The catch?" Celine asked, his voice sounding strange even to himself.
The mechanic behind his mask smiled, or so it seemed to Celine, then produced a small wooden doll that looked eerily like Celine.
"We want you to plant this doll in the Church Inspector General's office. Don't ask why, just make sure it stays there for three nights under the moonlight."
Celine froze. Church meant "purifiers," hunters of illegals like himself. If caught, death wouldn't be the worst that could happen to him; his soul would be turned into lighthouse fuel for the city.
As he thought, he suddenly felt a chill curl his neck. Looking under the table, he saw that the shadows beneath the attendees' feet were beginning to stretch outHis like. If captured, death would not be the worst he faced; rather, his soul would be turned into fuel for the city's lighthouses.
As he pondered, he suddenly felt a chill curl his neck. Looking down at the table, he saw that the shadows beneath the attendees' feet were beginning to stretch and intertwine, and the whisper in his ear had become
a shout:
"Take it... the price is risk... or remain prey to madness in Rank 9!"
Information about the Listener's Path: In our story, Rank and Listener: The ability to hear voices from other worlds and anticipate minor danger, but its possessor is prone to hallucinations.
Rank 8 (Collector of Secrets): The hero was able to store whispers and turn them into mental attacks against enemies, and gain a photographic memory of mysterious events