11: Chapter 11 The New Look of the Antique Shop

The day after saying that, Yan Zheng turned himself into a tailor, carpenter, and interior designer.

December 20th, 10:00 AM.

The winter sunlight was thin, as if filtered through three layers of frosted glass, and by the time it shone into the Antique Shop's display window, it had lost all its warmth.

Yan Zheng stood in the center of the shop, arms crossed, tilting his head as he scanned the twenty-square-meter space before him.

The fake antiques on the shelves were covered in a layer of fresh dust, the folding bed behind the checkout counter hadn't been folded yet, and the cardboard boxes piled in the corner emitted a musty, old smell.

Yan Zheng: ( ˊ ꒳ ˋ )

"No, it's too shabby."

He bent down, fished a rag out of a cardboard box, and began wiping the shelves.

When he reached the third row, he picked up a "Ming Dynasty" bronze censer and looked at it for two seconds; turning it over, he saw a seam that hadn't been polished off right next to the "Made in the Xuande Reign of the Great Ming" mark on the bottom.

"Three dollars in cost and they dare to mark it at three hundred and eighty; the original owner certainly had nerves of steel."

He put the bronze censer back and continued wiping.

After wiping the shelves, he wiped the floor; after wiping the floor, he wiped the display window.

In one morning, the Antique Shop had at least upgraded from a "dump" to a state of "slightly dilapidated but passable."

At 2:00 PM, he pushed open the door to the "Old Jack's Tavern" next door.

Old Jack was sitting behind the bar as usual, with crumbs from half a sandwich stuck in his graying beard, holding a cup of coffee with who knows how much milk added, watching a soap opera on a small TV.

"Jack."

"It's you again." Old Jack didn't even look up. "Here to mooch off the heat again?"

"I'm here to buy something." Yan Zheng sat down at the bar, fished two hundred-dollar bills out of his pocket, folded them neatly, and placed them on the counter.

Old Jack's eyes shifted from the TV screen and stared at the two green bills for three seconds.

Old Jack: ( ꐦ ˙ ꈊ ˙ )

"Where did you go to strike it rich? A guy who couldn't even pay his protection money last week is dropping two hundred just like that?"

"I made a small deal and earned some pocket money."

"What kind of small deal? Drug dealing?"

"Jack, I'm in the antique business. Please don't insult my professional ethics."

Yan Zheng's tone was serious, his expression even faker than the fake antiques on his shelves.

"Alright, alright, what do you want to buy?"

"Three things. First, a pair of gold-rimmed glasses, no prescription, plain lenses will do. Second, three well-fitting suits, they don't need to be expensive, just presentable enough to hold one's own. Third, a complete map of the underground powers in Hells Kitchen."

Old Jack's chewing slowed by half a beat.

"What did you say? Say that last one again?"

"A map of the power distribution. Which street belongs to whom, which gang has a grudge against which, the names of the main leaders, and where their strongholds are. The more detailed, the better."

"Two hundred bucks for all that?"

"If it's not enough, I'll add more." Yan Zheng fished another fifty out of his pocket.

Old Jack put down his coffee cup and reached out to press down on the three bills.

"I'll ask Old Tom, the tailor two streets over, about the glasses and suits. He has second-hand goods; the styles are old, but the quality isn't bad. With your build, a size S should fit."

"As for the map…"

Old Jack looked left and right; there was no one else in the tavern besides the two of them.

"I can draw you a rough one, but you have to promise me one thing."

"Go ahead."

"Don't go provoking Kingpin." Old Jack's voice dropped very low, and a rare look of seriousness flashed in his cloudy eyes. "Whatever you're planning, that man is not someone you can touch. I told you last time, he is the underground emperor of all Hells Kitchen. The Irish Gang, the Russian Gang, the Chinese-American gangs—they're all in the palm of his hand. You're just a kid running an Antique Shop, even if you have a few bucks in your pocket now, in his eyes, you're just an ant on the street."

Yan Zheng took a sip from his cup of hot water, his expression unchanged.

"Jack, I just want to understand the surrounding environment; this is called knowing yourself and your enemy. A person doing business has to know what kind of neighborhood their shop is in, right?"

Old Jack: ( ￢ ε ￢ )

"Your mouth is getting slipperier. After getting beaten up, your whole aura has changed. You used to call me uncle when you saw me, but now you talk to me with this tai chi style."

"Uncle Jack."

"Cut that out." Old Jack waved his hand, but the corners of his mouth relaxed a little. "Alright, come pick it up tomorrow. I'll make a trip to Old Tom's for the glasses and clothes, and I'll draw the map tonight from memory. I can't guarantee it's one hundred percent accurate."

"That's enough." Yan Zheng stood up and walked toward the door.

"Wait." Old Jack called out from behind.

Yan Zheng turned back.

Old Jack chewed the last bite of his sandwich and mumbled something.

"Have you heard about what happened at the docks? After the shootout last Saturday, the Police went to clear the scene and found that several bodies were missing."

Yan Zheng: ( ˊ ᗜ ˋ )

"Oh?"

"It wasn't one or two missing, but six or seven." Old Jack swallowed the sandwich and gulped down some coffee. "The guns were still there, the shell casings were still there, the bloodstains were still there, but the people were gone. Clothes were thrown all over the ground, but the people had vanished."

"That sounds pretty scary."

"You're telling me. The Irish Gang is in an uproar, saying the Russian Gang stole their brothers' bodies to destroy them. The Russian Gang is missing people too, and they're accusing the Irish Gang of stealing bodies in return. The two sides almost started fighting again."

Yan Zheng put his hands in his pockets, his expression one of standard "bystander" curiosity.

"People are stealing bodies these days; Hells Kitchen is really getting more chaotic."

"You said it." Old Jack shook his head and picked up his coffee cup again. "The Police haven't found anything either; I guess it'll just end up as another unsolved mystery."

"Well, take care, Uncle Jack, and don't go out much at night."

"What's there to steal from an old man watching a tavern? I've got one life to give and no money. It's you, kid—your dump of a shop doesn't even have a security camera, you should get one installed quickly."

"I will, it's in the plans."

Yan Zheng pushed open the door, and the December cold wind, carrying a few particles of snow, rushed in.

He lifted his foot to step over the threshold, then suddenly stopped.

"Oh, right, Uncle Jack, one more question."

"Hm?"

"How much do you know about the sewer expansion project? The one that stopped construction last month."

Old Jack was taken aback.

Old Jack: ( ˙ ꒳ ˙ ) ?

"Why are you asking about that?"

"Just asking. I saw a mention in the newspaper about some abnormal traces being found, just curious."

Old Jack put down his coffee cup and scratched his graying head.

"I don't know much about this. It's just that at the entrance on 43rd Street in the West District, the construction crew was halfway through digging when they said there were huge claw marks on the underground pipe walls, and they were scared out. Later, the city sent people to take a look and said it was structural deformation of the old pipes, not claw marks, but the project was still halted."

"The city said it was structural deformation?"

"Yeah, that's the official story. But let me tell you." Old Jack beckoned Yan Zheng over, his voice lowering again. "The construction foreman, that Polish guy Old Miller who lives on the next street, he told me the truth when we were drinking. He said those claw marks were as wide as a palm, with five grooves, gouged two inches deep into the concrete pipe wall."

"He also said there was a smell deep in the pipes, not the kind of stench a sewer is supposed to have, but another kind."

"What kind of smell?"

"Like the fishy smell of a snake." Old Jack shivered. "Fishy and rank, it gave people a headache. The foreman has been doing sewer work for twenty years and said he's never smelled anything like that."

Yan Zheng tapped his fingers lightly on the door frame.

Yan Zheng: ( ꉺ ꒳ ꉺ )

"Interesting."

"What's interesting about it? Stay away from places like that." Old Jack waved his hand impatiently. "Get back to your shop. Come pick up your stuff tomorrow afternoon."

"Alright, Uncle Jack, sorry to bother you."

Yan Zheng's figure disappeared outside, a gust of cold wind blew in, and the tavern door slowly closed.

Old Jack stared at the closed door for a long while and muttered.

"This kid's questions have been getting more and more bizarre lately; first asking where many people died, then asking about the smell in the sewers."

"Don't tell me his brain got kicked in or something."

Inside the Antique Shop, Yan Zheng pulled down the blinds and took a look at himself in the mirror behind the checkout counter.

His pale face had regained a fair amount of color, his eye sockets were no longer sunken, and his lips were not purple like they had been a few days ago.

Restoration progress: 82%. In two more days, it will be fully recovered.

"Suits, glasses, Antique Shop."

He straightened his collar in the mirror.

"A decent exterior is more effective than any disguise. In this World, most people's basis for judging danger is not intuition, but appearance."

"If a person in a suit kills you, that's called business competition. If a person in rags kills you, that's called heinous brutality."

"It's the same act of killing, but with different packaging, the treatment is different."

Yan Zheng: ( ˇ ω ˇ )

He turned and walked toward the entrance of the Underground Room, his footsteps making a rhythmic tapping sound on the wooden stairs.

"After I get the map tomorrow, I'll first figure out the activity patterns of the various powers in Hells Kitchen and plan the optimal route for nightly patrols."

"Then, I'll gather enough Mental Power as quickly as possible and go check out the sewer entrance on 43rd Street in the West District."

"Five claw marks, two inches deep, the fishy smell of a snake."

The footsteps stopped on the last step of the Underground Room.

In the darkness, the four wisps of phosphorescent fire from the two Skeleton Soldiers burned quietly in the corner, like four eyes waiting for orders.

Yan Zheng stood there, looking up at the dark damp patch on the ceiling formed by the leaking water pipe, the corners of his mouth curving into the arc of The Collector discovering a rare treasure.

"Regardless of what you are, if your bones don't belong to a human."

"Then you'll be incredibly valuable."