Chapter 80: A New Channel

Richard took the business card and glanced at it.

Thick cardstock, clean layout—similar in style to Aunt Isabella's.

The front read: Albert Clement, Independent Antiquities Appraiser.

Below that was the shop's address and a telephone number.

The back was blank save for a simple sketch of a copper pot in the bottom right corner, identical to the one on the wooden sign by the door.

He flipped the card over. "Mr. Clement, etiquette dictates I should offer you one in return."

"But I don't have one yet."

Clement paused, finding this slightly amusing.

"There's no rush. You can give me one when you're actually qualified to print them."

"You might have to wait a few years for that."

"I can wait," the old man said, folding the oilcloth in two and setting it on the corner of the counter.

"I've sat in this alley for years. I haven't even replaced the wooden sign out front. You can see the paint peeling off."

"I noticed." Richard nodded.

"I meant to mention it the last time I was here. If you don't repaint that sign soon, passersby won't even be able to read it."

"Good if they can't," the old man snorted. "Saves me from clueless folks wandering in to ask if I buy old bed frames."

"Someone brought in a rusty coal shovel the other day. Claimed it was an antique passed down from his ancestors and asked me to appraise it.

"I stared at it for a good while before telling him it was just a coal shovel.

"He refused to believe me. Insisted the pattern on the handle was an ancient inscription."

"Was it an inscription?"

"It was unpolished flash left over from the casting mold." The old man laughed in exasperation.

Richard chuckled as well.

The previously solemn atmosphere instantly relaxed, returning to the casual tone of his first visit to the shop.

The old man and the young man sized each other up across the counter, neither taking the other too seriously.

Richard picked up the oil lamp and tucked the business card into his inner pocket.

"Mr. Clement, the moment I get my own business cards, you'll be the first to get one."

The old man grunted in acknowledgment and went back to his work.

...

Stepping out the front door of the antiquities shop, Richard felt his mood lighten significantly after the banter with the old man.

The oil lamp, wrapped in two layers of oil paper, sat heavy at the bottom of his bag, shifting his center of gravity slightly as he walked.

As he walked, he digested their conversation.

Now that this channel with Clement was open, his efficiency in acquiring supernatural items would increase by several orders of magnitude compared to testing his luck on the streets.

Between the explanations in his grandfather's study, the scattered hints in On Ascension Within the Veil, and Clement's recent implications, he now possessed a basic understanding of supernatural items.

The superficial reasons the Sphinx Oil Lamp failed to sell at auction were its unclear function, the lengthy appraisal period, and the consigner's impatience.

But the underlying reason was that no one dared to recklessly break its seal.

He mentally reclassified the known uses of supernatural items.

Category one: storing ether to assist in cultivation.

Category two: vessels for a Signature. While a Signature was not a ritual itself, it formed the foundation for all subsequent rituals.

Category three: spellcasting materials.

A medium's crystal ball, a diviner's Tarot Cards, an alchemist's crucible and retort... Tools ascended into mediums, and mediums ascended into supernatural items.

After enough time and sufficiently deep ether infiltration, supernatural items could even develop semi-autonomous functions.

This was likely why the Silver Coin Mr. Hutton had given him could be absorbed by the Panel for points.

Category four: sealing implements.

An image suddenly surfaced in Richard's mind.

The Spirit Board.

Looking back on it now, why had the candle gone out?

The scientific explanation he provided at the time had temporarily fooled Warren and the other students, but it hadn't fooled him.

Ether settling deep within the wood fibers was much like a river depositing silt layer by layer on a riverbed—it invariably brought along some unclean things.

The Panel seemed to have converted all of it into usable points without any side effects or residue.

But then again, what if that supernatural item had contained a trigger-based trap?

He needed to be more careful in the future. He couldn't just reach out and touch everything he saw. Improving his Perception attribute had to be put on the agenda.

Lost in thought, he found himself outside the department store branch on Grafton Street.

Richard paused in front of the display window.

The last time he and Evelyn had come here to look at gloves, his younger sister had stared at the window for ages, looking but unable to bring herself to make a purchase.

He remembered how the sleeves of her coat were too short, leaving her exposed wrists raw and red in the biting wind.

And those tight little leather shoes—after their trip to the Imperial Capital, the inner heels had been worn down to white scuff marks.

He pushed the door open, setting off a chime from the brass bell.

The shop was warm, with a coal fire burning in the hearth. The air smelled of a mix of fresh fabric and camphor balls.

A female clerk wearing an apron peeked out from behind the counter. "What are you looking to buy, sir?"

"Shoes and a coat for a teenage girl."

"How old is she, exactly?"

"Fifteen."

"How tall? What's her shoe size?"

Richard mentally measured his sister's stature, then recalled the stretch of his own socks when she borrowed them.

"She comes up to about my ear. Her feet... are one size smaller than mine."

The clerk took several pairs off the rack and set them on the counter.

Briston wasn't the Imperial Capital. The department store branch had a limited selection, but all the basic styles were available.

Richard's gaze swept back and forth across the shoes twice.

Nothing too flashy. Evelyn had to go to school and do chores every day; if the soles were too thin, they would need replacing in three months.

Nothing too plain, either. The girl claimed she didn't care what she wore, but in reality, she stole a few extra glances every time they passed a display window.

Finally, he chose a pair of deep chestnut lace-up ankle boots. The uppers were cowhide, the soles were about two fen thicker than average women's shoes, and the insides were lined with a thin layer of fleece.

"How much for these?"

"Three shillings and sixpence."

It was a bit pricey, but the quality was evident. They would easily last her a few winters.

Richard turned the boots over to inspect the stitching on the soles. The stitches were even, and there was no excess glue around the seams.

"All right, I'll take them."

Picking out a coat took even more time.

Girls' autumn and winter coats were divided into several price tiers. The most expensive fur coats cost several pounds, while the cheapest cotton-padded jackets were just over three shillings.

He flipped through five or six options on the mid-range rack.

"How about this one?" The clerk pulled a short, grayish-blue tweed coat from a hanger and laid it out on the counter.

The coat had a tailored waist, four black horn buttons down the front, and a collar that could be turned up against the wind.

It was lined with cotton velvet, the shoulder seams were neat, and the sleeves had enough allowance that she could still wear it even if she grew taller over the next year.

"This one is five shillings."

"Can you do four?" he began to haggle out of habit.

"Sir, the wholesale price for this is over three shillings... Four shillings and sixpence, to make it a round number with the shoes."

Richard did the math. The shoes and the coat came to a total of eight shillings.

Had this been the past, he would have definitely spent ages haggling with the clerk.

He would have picked out flaws first, compared it to similar items, and finally deployed the ultimate threat of, "I'll go look next door."

But a department store branch's pricing system was different from a street-side shop's.

The price tags were pre-printed and stuck on. The clerk had limited authority, and arguing until he was blue in the face would save him a penny or two at most.

Besides, after everything that had happened this morning, he just wasn't in the mood to bicker back and forth over two coppers.

"Fair enough. Wrap them up for me."