From the Ship of Fools to Earl of Wugang

The bowling alley was much less crowded in the morning than at night, and two lanes were occupied by dockworkers.

Edmund walked to the empty fairway near the wall, reached into his coat pocket, and crushed a tin pony.

Rick had told him when he gave it to him that if he crushed it, he would know someone was coming for him.

The thin tin collapsed between his fingers, and the little bit of spirituality sealed inside the horse's belly dissipated.

While waiting, one must find something to do. Edmund rented a pair of shoes and picked out a black ball of suitable weight from the rack.

As a beginner, it was perfectly reasonable for his first shot to be slightly off-center, knocking down only six pins. When he reached the approach area for his second shot, he relaxed his wrist and used his path instincts.

After the wooden ball leaves your hand, it rolls along the right side, then pulls inward as it nears the end, causing all ten pins to fall down simultaneously.

In the next three rounds, he only kept one corner bottle, and Rick's voice came from behind him.

"You need superhuman abilities to bowl?"

He stood behind the scoreboard looking at the screen, his indigo hoodie standing out starkly against the court, and his expression showed more disdain than surprise.

Edmund retrieved the wooden ball from the ball feeder: "This was brought by my own train. Should I try to turn it off first, just to be fair?"

"Okay, remember to remind me to bet on you next time."

The two quickly went up the stairs to the second floor. Rick put his hat down in the room, and Edmund then noticed that he was wearing headphones.

Rick pulled a silver-gray Walkman with headphones from his pocket; two spools were slowly turning through the small transparent window of the cassette compartment.

He waved his hand haphazardly: "Get to the point. I just got this thing, I haven't finished listening yet."

Edmund raised an eyebrow: "You can buy this kind of new stuff in Dusk Harbor?"

He thought the entire Principality of Prishini was still in the 1950s of his previous life, half a century behind Gulfstream City.

"Red Anchor has an office here, which receives local orders and imports trendy products from outside... Of course, the prices are out of sync with the local price level."

Rick added, "That office, their style is completely out of step with this semi-feudal state. Anti-gravity hairstyles, high-saturation trendy clothes, and flashy sparkly accessories—you'd feel like they're from another world."

Edmund recalled the Red Anchor employees at the banquet and realized that formal suits did indeed conceal a lot.

He took out his hardcover notebook containing transcribed knowledge about the "visitors," flipped to the pages on materials and ritual structure, and described his needs.

Rick became noticeably more serious after listening, and he read the materials from beginning to end.

"It surpasses the first level, but doesn't meet the third level's requirements for 'achievements.' The material level, capacity, and spiritual closed loop all match..."

Rick concluded: "It is indeed a second-order derivative pathway, with the pillar clearly biased towards alcohol."

The original ritual required the ascendant to use three different names and enter three separate, isolated groups in turn, where they would be welcomed with a toast by the leaders of each group. After completing these steps, the ascendant would then, in a state of intoxication, pass through a door that did not originally belong to them.

"After the ritual is successful, the 'visitor's' identity will be temporarily recognized by the world." Rick pointed with a pencil at the line connecting the "name" and the "door." "This recognition will be fixed by the secret medicine and become the foundation of the second-tier ability."

The ritual was not difficult for Edmund. The problem was that the whole ritual was very much like entrusting his soul to Dionysus for processing.

Rick noticed his hesitation and leaned back in his chair.

"Honestly, this path suits me better. Apart from my inability to drink alcohol, it has almost no drawbacks."

Edmund shrugged, and Rick continued, "So you can try another approach: pillar offset."

He pulled the notebook back over and drew a second structure next to the original ceremony.

"The core actions of the original approach should be retained, namely 'being recognized under a pseudonym' and 'passing through a door that does not belong to oneself.' These actions that carry the meaning of 'visitor' should not be changed. Instead, some of the supporting materials and actions should be replaced."

Rick moved his pencil back and forth between the two sets of structures: "Then perform several experimental rituals, changing only one item each time, recording the spiritual responses, and gradually calibrating. See if the strings respond and if the corresponding conciliator is willing to acknowledge the ritual."

Edmund immediately thought of the enormous image he had seen in the Spirit Realm and Dream Realm before—the Spirit Elder had already confirmed his journey.

If the "visitor" retains its name, the door, and the core of entering a strange group, the lunatic might not reject another interpretation.

The conversation then lasted for nearly an hour, during which Rick listed many feasible ideas and explained which signs of the experimental ritual must be immediately stopped.

Edmund closed his notebook: "I will keep an eye out for suitable spiritual qualities for you."

Although it's unclear why Rick would give away so much valuable knowledge out of the blue, it certainly hit Edmund where it was most needed.

Regardless, I've accepted this favor.

"It's okay if you don't have any." Rick casually picked up the headphones. "You're a well-known tycoon in Dusk Harbor now, gold coins will do."

Edmund actually took out the checkbook from his inner pocket, and Rick stopped what he was doing: "It's best to settle with spirit energy; I'm hoping to live a few more years with it."

Edmund put away his checkbook when a quarrel suddenly broke out downstairs. This was followed by the sound of table legs scraping against the floor, as if someone had pushed several tables aside in one go.

Rick glanced down at the floor. "The union guys are in a really bad mood lately. Red Anchor has lost another diver; I've lost count of how many this is."

When the two went down to the first floor, several tables near the bar had been pushed together.

Several union officers wearing badges were arguing over an accident notice, seemingly discussing things like immediately halting work, organizing a march, and sending a petition to the council chamber.

After listening for a while, Edmund roughly figured out what had happened:

The missing certified commercial diver, Matthew Green, is a union member who lost communication two days ago while participating in an underwater facility inspection organized by Red Anchor.

Red Anchor subsequently announced that Green had left the work area without authorization, but refused to release relevant information and accident reports.

Meanwhile, Rick, who was standing nearby, added that this was not the first accident to occur at the Red Anchor project.

Over the past year, several other divers have experienced short-term amnesia, conflicting equipment readings, and unexplained decompression sickness.

At least one temporary worker was removed from the list by the company on the grounds of "voluntary resignation," and his family has not seen him to this day.

Edmund could imagine that previous missing persons had been dealt with one by one by Red Anchor through various means, but Matthew Green had formal union membership, and this time it would be difficult to let things quietly disappear.

He listened from outside the crowd and guessed that Green's disappearance was likely related to the anomalies in Old Port.

Saving lives was already within his bottom line, and this incident also provided an opportunity to undermine Red Anchor's reputation, obtain diving data, and gain the support of dockworkers.

However, it is not appropriate for him to step forward as a suddenly appearing wealthy outsider and directly interfere in the affairs of the trade association.

Edmund looked out the door at the street leading to the mountain road to the north.

He planned to first visit Earl Schenkel, and then, as Ryan Hall, officially recognized by the family, speak with the union leadership about Matthew Green.