Leo was woken by the sound of arguing, a raw, serrated edge against the deep, velvet black of his unconsciousness.
The voices were muffled and distant at first, distorted as if filtered through a thick pane of oily glass. He tried to open his eyes, a simple command from brain to muscle that went unanswered. His eyelids felt as if they were sealed with lead. The first sense to truly break through the suffocating fog was smell. A potent, eye-watering cocktail of industrial chemicals invaded his nostrils—the sharp bite of turpentine, the heavy, cloying scent of engine oil, and the dusty, metallic tang of ancient ink. This wasn't the sterile, antiseptic smell of a hospital, nor the familiar, oppressive odor of his tiny subdivided flat. This was the ghost of a forgotten era, an olfactory assault from a world of iron and sweat.
Then came sound, layering itself over the smells. A constant, monotonous, low-frequency hum vibrated up from the floorboards, the tell-tale thrum of heavy machinery somewhere in the building. Inside the room, the tired, rhythmic whirring of an old exhaust fan overhead provided a weak counterpoint. And then, the two arguing voices sharpened into focus, cutting through the ambient noise.
"…how the hell do I know you're not one of them? You just show up out of nowhere, spray a fire extinguisher, and say you're here to save us? It's too damn convenient!" That was Ah Zhe's voice, strained and hoarse, laced with a raw, desperate hostility that bordered on panic.
"If I were one of them," a cool, dispassionate female voice replied, each word clipped and precise, "you and he would already be dead in Kwun Lung Lau, your bodies tagged and cataloged as a training exercise. I don't have time for your paranoia. My mission is to ensure that he, and what he carries, are secure."
With a monumental effort, Leo finally managed to pry his eyes open, the light a physical pain.
The sight that greeted him was not a familiar white ceiling, but a vast, complex web of rusted, oil-stained steel girders and pipes. He realized he was lying on a rickety, creaking cot, a coarse, scratchy blanket thrown over him. He pushed himself up, his head swimming with vertigo, and scanned his surroundings. He was in a huge, cavernous, warehouse-like space.
Beside him loomed a colossal Heidelberg printing press, a slumbering iron beast from a bygone age. Its massive gears and drive belts were caked in solidified black grease, and it exuded a palpable aura of immense, dormant power. The walls were lined with towering racks of old wooden frames and trays filled with countless pieces of lead type, the tiny metal soldiers of a dead language. The air, thick with motes of dust, was illuminated by columns of jaundiced sunlight piercing through the grimy, wire-meshed windows. This was a letterpress workshop, a forgotten sanctuary of mechanical artistry, a world entirely alien to his own.
Then he saw the two people locked in a standoff across the room.
Chen Xi, the mysterious girl who had saved them, stood with her arms crossed, her posture a study in controlled aggression. Her gaze was cold and analytical as she watched Ah Zhe. And Ah Zhe, like a cornered animal protecting its young, stood between Leo and her, his body tense, his hand gripping a multi-tool so tightly his knuckles were white.
The moment he focused on them, his world, his very perception of reality, fractured and reformed.
A translucent, futuristic blue data frame materialized silently in his field of vision, locking onto Chen Xi with a soft, almost inaudible chime. The font was a clean, sans-serif typeface, glowing with a soft, internal light.
`Target: Chen Xi.`
`Heart Rate: 85bpm (Controlled).`
`Micro-expression Analysis: Left corner of mouth raised for 0.2s. Indicates 'Contempt'. Probability: 78%.`
`Pupil Dilation: Constricted. Indicates 'High Focus / Threat Assessment'.`
`Threat Level: Moderate.`
Before he could process the implications, another data frame flickered into existence, locking onto Ah Zhe.
`Target: Ah Zhe.`
`Heart Rate: 115bpm (Agitated).`
`Vocal Stress Index: High. Laryngeal muscle tension indicates 'Anxiety' or 'Protective Deception'.`
`Threat Level: Low.`
Leo was so shocked he forgot to breathe. He blinked hard, expecting the apparitions to vanish, but they remained, superimposed on his reality like a heads-up display from a hyper-realistic video game. He looked away from them, at the giant printing press. Another box appeared: `Object: Heidelberg Cylinder Press. Material Analysis: Cast Iron (Fe > 95%), traces of lead, chromium. Structural Integrity: 73% (Significant corrosion detected). Power Status: Offline.` He could see, in a way he had never seen before, the underlying data of the world. It was terrifying. It was magnificent.
He shifted his gaze back to the two combatants. Between them, several simulated, translucent red attack vectors appeared, branching and shifting like a frantic game of cat's cradle. A label pulsed softly beside them: `Physical Altercation Probability: 67% and rising.`
Who are you? What have you done to me? he screamed silently, a desperate, soundless cry launched into the abyss of his own mind.
A cold, dispassionate, synthetic voice, devoid of any emotion or inflection, answered directly in his consciousness. It didn't sound like it was coming through his ears; it simply… existed in his thoughts.
`I am the 'Odin' Basic Protocol. Your Guardian.`
My father… was this you? Did he make you? Leo pushed, the question forming from a place of deep, instinctual need.
`Insufficient permissions. Access to relevant memory partition denied. Further initialization required.` The reply from 'Odin' was like an impenetrable data wall, smooth and absolute, deflecting all his questions.
"He's awake," Chen Xi's voice cut through his internal shock like a shard of glass.
Ah Zhe spun around. Seeing Leo's open eyes, the raw hostility on his face instantly melted into a wave of pure relief and concern. "Hey, Go-board boy, you alright? Man, you've been out for a whole day! You had us worried."
Leo struggled to sit up, a sharp, stabbing pain shooting up his right arm. He looked down and saw the wound had been crudely but effectively bandaged with clean gauze and electrical tape. He ignored Ah Zhe's offered hand and swung his legs off the cot, his gaze fixed on the other side of the vast room.
On a cluttered workbench, piled high with tools, oily rags, and machine parts, sat his old Go board. Next to it lay an open, hand-bound notebook with yellowed, deckle-edged pages.
He staggered towards it, waving off Ah Zhe's attempt to support him and ignoring Chen Xi's wary, calculating gaze that followed his every move. He reached the bench and picked up the notebook. The cover was plain, unmarked leather, but the heavy, high-quality paper and the way the spine was bound told him it was decades, if not a century, old.
He opened it to the first page. Written in an elegant, old-fashioned fountain pen script, the ink faded to a soft sepia, was a statement:
`Organization: The Balance `
`Creed: We who forge the tools, forge the age. When the Balance is broken, the hammer of the Artisan is the hammer of judgment.`
"Where is the board?" Chen Xi's voice came from directly behind him, cold and direct. She had moved with a silence that was unnerving. She had ignored Ah Zhe completely; her focus was solely on Leo and the object on the table.
Leo didn't turn around. His eyes had moved from the notebook to a dusty bookshelf next to the workbench. It was filled with old, hardbound tomes on game theory, cryptography, quantum physics, and even a well-worn Chinese copy of Currency Wars. On the bottom shelf, almost hidden in shadow, he saw a familiar volume—a collection of his father's old game records, identical to the one in his flat. The sight sent a fresh pang of loss through him.
"Who are you?" Leo finally spoke, his voice hoarse and rough from his long stupor.
"I was sent by a 'teacher' to retrieve an heirloom that belonged to a 'Mr. Li'," Chen Xi's answer was perfectly rehearsed, her face a blank mask. "My mission is to confirm that you, and what you carry, are secure."
"How can we trust you?" Ah Zhe interjected again, stepping closer to shield Leo.
Chen Xi reached into her pocket and tossed an old-looking USB drive onto the bench. It clattered against a wrench. "This contains information that will prove my identity. However, it is physically encrypted. Let's see if your little friend here can open it."
Ah Zhe snatched the drive and immediately plugged it into his ruggedized tablet. He frowned, his fingers flying across the screen. "The physical encryption on this is bizarre. The controller chip isn't a standard Phison or Silicon Motion. It's custom. And the data layout… it's not FAT32 or NTFS, it's like it's written in a proprietary radial format. It's a trap, or a test. I need time." His statement was both an admission of the challenge and a strategic move to assert his own technical value in this new, dangerous game.
Leo watched the tense standoff. To his old self, it was just an argument between two intimidating people. But now, through the cold, analytical lens of 'Odin', he could see the invisible flow of game theory at play. He saw that Chen Xi's heart rate didn't change by a single beat when she tossed the drive; her micro-expressions displayed absolute confidence, a predator toying with its food. He saw the sweat gland activity on Ah Zhe's forehead increase by 12% as he analyzed the drive, a clear biometric sign of anxiety and uncertainty.
`Analysis: Chen Xi is presenting a test, not a token of trust,` Odin's data stream flashed in his mind, the text glowing a soft cyan. `Objective: to evaluate our technical capabilities while stalling for time. Secondary objective: establish dominance.`
Leo took a deep, shuddering breath. He was no longer the passive clerk who just received information. He was a player. He looked at the open notebook of 'The Balance,' then turned his head to face Chen Xi, his voice unnervingly calm.
"If your 'teacher' is truly a successor to the author of this notebook," he said, his words slow and deliberate, "then you should know that the second commandment of 'The Balance' is not 'secrecy.' It's 'verification'."
For the very first time, a crack appeared in Chen Xi's cool, composed facade. It was a flicker of an eyelid, a momentary tightening of her jaw, but to Leo's new eyes, it was as loud as a scream.
He pressed his advantage, the logic flowing from him with an unnatural ease. "What you've given us is a test, not a gesture of trust. You're not here to verify your identity. You're here to verify our competence."
The statement, delivered with quiet, unshakeable authority, was like a surgical scalpel, instantly dissecting the core of the psychological game. Ah Zhe stared at Leo, his mouth half-open in disbelief, utterly baffled as to how his timid, nerdy friend could articulate such a thing. Chen Xi, however, didn't look angry. She stared at Leo, her eyes narrowed, and in their depths, Leo saw a flicker of profound shock, quickly replaced by a barely perceptible, and far more terrifying, glint of… excitement.
At that exact moment, a loud, teeth-grinding screech of metal against metal shattered the tense silence in the room, making them all jump.
They spun around in unison to witness a sight that made their blood run cold.
The colossal, multi-ton, and completely unplugged Heidelberg printing press had just started moving on its own.
Its massive rollers, untouched by human hands, began to turn, slowly and rhythmically, with a deafening, inexorable clank, clank, clank. The floor vibrated beneath their feet, and the air filled with the smell of ozone, as if from phantom electricity. After a few rotations, a single, freshly printed sheet of A4 paper, still warm and fragrant with new ink, was slowly, deliberately ejected from its output tray, floating gently to the dusty concrete floor.
The room was plunged into a deathly silence, broken only by the hum of the fan.
Trembling, Ah Zhe walked over, his footsteps echoing in the cavernous space, and picked up the paper.
On it was a hyper-detailed sketch, rendered in the classic, slightly imperfect style of a letterpress print.
The image it depicted was the very scene from a few seconds ago: Leo holding the notebook, Chen Xi with her arms crossed, and Ah Zhe standing guard between them. Every expression, every shadow, every speck of dust in the air was captured with impossible, terrifying precision.
In the bottom right corner of the drawing, printed in an icy, elegant, gothic-style serif font, was a single, chilling line of text:
`We are always watching.`