SOP CH21: 1805

Inside the time labyrinth “Stairs of Paradox,” the two walked through darkness as thick as ink, a torrent of time fragments rushing toward them. The segments of time within glittered like shattered stars, dazzling and resplendent.

Swept up in this torrent, Quicksand felt the world spinning. The stairs spiraled upward at times and descended at others, with no end in sight. In the blink of an eye, Diamonds had vanished without a trace.

Quicksand called out for Diamonds repeatedly, but within the vast and distant expanse of the cosmos, his shouts were like drops of water falling into an ocean, utterly futile. So, he simply continued walking forward alone at a slow pace.

Gradually, he saw tens of thousands of figures emerging from the dark: men and women, young and old, dressed in all sorts of attire, all sprinting along the stairs like ascetic monks. Many were gray-haired, frantically scouring through the time fragments to no avail. Within this endless torture, many bodies already lay sprawled across the steps, their lifespans and sanity drained dry.

Quicksand attempted to strike up conversations with the people, but found that a thick barrier seemed to separate them, preventing any sound from carrying through. The moment he drew near, the figures would disperse like miasmic fog.

Thus, he gazed from afar at the myriad forms of life within the labyrinth. He saw a woman in ragged, patched clothes trying to locate the time fragment before her daughter was struck by a stray bullet and force her way in, only for her body to gradually dissolve as time rejected her. He saw an old man with wild, overgrown white hair who had wandered for seventy years without finding a way back, collapsing onto the stairs like a withered leaf swept by the wind, never to wake again. Everyone ran through the labyrinth, yet no one could find an exit.

Quicksand broke out in a cold sweat. Fragments of worlds drifted like scattered stars, leading to countless spacetimes. This was a colossal prison, and he too was lost within it.

Just as he felt completely helpless, a figure caught the corner of his eye. It was a youth dressed in a vest and dress shirt, around fourteen or fifteen years old, with gray hair and gray eyes. His lips were pressed tight, yet a trace of an uncontainable smile lingered at the corners of his mouth.

Quicksand’s heart jolted. That face belonged to his younger self.

“Wait!”

He cried out, quickening his pace to chase down that figure.

The boy ran exceedingly fast. In the boundless blackness, the two dashed along the stairs, time fragments dancing before their eyes like fireflies, leaving Quicksand disoriented. In the blink of an eye, the boy’s figure vanished once more.

Just as Quicksand was dazed with confusion, a familiar voice carried over from beside him:

“Black-hearted employee, stop running. Where we need to go is right here.”

Turning his head, he saw Diamonds standing calmly to the side, reaching out to grasp his wrist.

Like a ship dropping anchor, the boulder in Quicksand’s chest settled, and he firmly gripped Diamonds’s hand in return. Diamonds was surprised: “What, thought you were lost and got scared? You were moving faster than the wind; I could barely keep up and was following right behind you the entire time.”

Quicksand said, “I wasn’t lost. I just wanted to visit a world where I draw a huge salary and become the CEO of the Time Entropy Group.”

“Alright, so did you see a world like that?”

Quicksand had learned to spin tales: “Of course. This Invincible King is wealthy in every single world.”

He then asked Diamonds if he had seen a child who looked remarkably like him, but Diamonds shook his head. Diamonds led him before a time fragment, rusted and weathered like a scrap of iron. Diamonds said:

“Step in. This is the time fragment for the year 1805.”

“How did you find it?”

“Did you think I came completely unprepared? I had a temporal anchor.” Diamonds pulled a handkerchief from his coat. Wrapped in a stasis bubble, one corner was embroidered with a crest of nested spades of different sizes. “This is the handkerchief Madam Spades gave me before. While you were wandering aimlessly just now, I used it as an anchor to track down the 1805 time fragment.”

Quicksand looked suspicious. “This is… proof that Madam Spades existed?”

Taking the handkerchief and turning it over, he found no memory of ever seeing it in his mind, and asked, “Isn’t this very strange? If Madam Spades was assassinated in the past, she shouldn’t have left any traces in the ‘present.’ Why does this handkerchief still exist in your hands?”

Diamonds said, “Because I enveloped it in a stasis bubble, freezing its time at the very moment I took it from Madam Spades.”

“Yet she has vanished in the past, so the event of her giving you the handkerchief shouldn’t exist anymore either.”

Diamonds’s eyes flickered before he brushed it off: “I told you, it’s because I’m the chosen one. Whether memories or evidence preserved in hand, they won’t simply change just because those hyenas from the 1805 Branch made a move.”

Quicksand eyed him askance, feeling this person harbored far too many mysteries: in possession of a time cleaner’s weapon and pocket watch, while remembering segments of time forgotten by all others. Seeing that Diamonds didn’t wish to elaborate, he judged this wasn’t the ideal moment for a confrontation, so he said, “Speaking of which, why can this handkerchief serve as a temporal anchor? Does it exist in 1805 as well? Madam Spades was quite lavish, gifting you an antique handkerchief from over two hundred years ago.”

“A ‘temporal anchor’ isn’t an ultra-precise coordinate or object; its function is akin to a compass. As long as there is something strongly bound to it within that spacetime, it can point the way for you.”

Saying so, Diamonds stepped toward the time fragment, with Quicksand following right behind.

The instant they stepped through the time fragment, the halo before their eyes expanded abruptly, all cosmic sounds seemingly crushed and swallowed into the void. Weightlessness washed over him, his limbs and bones feeling as if they dissolved into countless specks of light, drifting into the distant past.

All sense of time vanished. After an unknown while, Quicksand felt lightheaded, opening his eyes to find himself already in another spacetime. Dense fog swirled about, carrying the pungent sulfur stench of Shell gear oil, a colossal Gothic granite clock tower looming before him. The pavement was damp, feeling as though water would bubble up with a single step.

He looked up at the chilling night sky, a sky unseen from within Spiral City, embedded with a crescent moon. Clanking metallic sounds echoed through the mist. To his astonishment, beneath the gas lamps marched neat ranks of steam-mechanical soldiers riveted all over with walnut-sized steel bolts, their joints groaning, their footsteps tolling like death knells.

Suddenly, an earth-shattering shriek rang out in the sky as a pitch-black shadow blotted out heaven and earth, plunging the world into darkness. Quicksand looked up to see a whale-like airship gliding across the sky, brass steam pipes along its keel hissing vapor, massive billows of clouds drifting over the city.

“This is… 1805?”

Quicksand murmured to himself. This was completely unlike the scenes he had encountered in books and video archives.

“Yes. The Time Entropy Group altered the past, making it trendier according to their tastes. Move along, black-hearted employee.” Diamonds pointed down the street.

The two arrived on Stonegate, a street that had existed in Britain since 1119, renowned for its stone paving, featuring glass workshops and goldsmiths blazing with lights throughout the night. Carriages turned from the corner from time to time. Aristocrats in lavish attire wearing ivory masks and feathered hats stepped down, entering shops flanked by mechanical attendants carrying steam tanks on their backs.

Yet in a corner of the street huddled laborers and vagrants in coarse burlap tunics, their clothes frayed like fishing nets, dark Penrose stairs brands bared across their skin. Sacks wrapped their heads to conceal ulcerated faces, carrying broken planks as they prepared to pitch overnight shanties against the city walls.

Diamonds sighed, “Wherever the Group passes, not a single blade of grass remains, no matter the era.”

“There are so many steam machines here, and the technological development diverges from what I learned in the archives. Is this the Group’s doing as well?”

“Yes. They would hang billboards advertising prosthetics on the streets two centuries in advance, embedding promotional impressions deep into people’s minds.” Diamonds spread his hands. “Most of the Group’s people have short circuits in their brains; such absurd behavior is classic for them.”

Quicksand felt inexplicably annoyed, but considering Diamonds might have been a cleaner for the Group himself, found it somewhat ironic, asking:

“I noticed many people have ulcerated faces. Why is that?”

A plume of smoke drifted past, and Diamonds covered his mouth, coughing raggedly. “Madam Spades chatted briefly with me about it. She said most laborers of this era were assigned by the Group to mine highly radioactive ore veins to supply the energy consumption of time-jump tech, causing their bodies to ulcerate and rot.”

He coughed for a while, his frame swaying again. Quicksand hurriedly supported him, noticing blood staining his cuff.

Quicksand frowned: “Are you alright?” Shaking his head with a pale face, Diamonds said, “It’s nothing. Just motion sickness from passing through the fragment to get here.”

Quicksand said, “What motion sickness brings up isn’t this color. Could it be that time here is rejecting you, causing such a severe reaction?” Diamonds retorted, “Then why are you completely fine?”

Quicksand couldn’t explain it either. The two wandered the streets. Acting stealthily, Diamonds filched a small bottle of linseed oil, black bread, and a few potatoes from the market, glorifying them as combat rations. After bustling about for half the night, they still had no clue how to find Madam Spades’s trail. Quicksand wanted to question shop clerks and aristocrats, but Diamonds pulled him back, warning against alerting the enemy. Thus, they made their way toward the city gate arches, where vagrants frequently pitched shacks of rubble and smelly hides, hoping to dig up useful intelligence.

Leaving the main streets, human voices thinned, mist wrapping heavily around the avenues like dense cotton batting. The surroundings were pitch-black without a soul in sight, sending a bone-chilling cold through Quicksand. Suddenly, metallic clanks echoed in the darkness. By the time they reacted, dozens of mechanical soldiers had surrounded them.

“Wh-Who-Who are you-you?”

The mechanical soldiers spoke. Standing nine feet tall, the relentless grinding of gears resonated from within their chassis. Steam pipes hummed along their backs, venting scorching white mist. The Penrose stairs emblem was stamped upon their torsos; these were soldiers deployed in this era by the Time Entropy Group.

Diamonds and Quicksand exchanged a glance, one drawing his Mauser while the other gripped a scavenged wooden club. Detecting their hostility, the mechanical soldiers flared red from their optics.

In an instant, combat erupted! A mechanical soldier took a heavy step forward, shattering the flagstones beneath its feet, abruptly opening a gaping maw: razor-sharp teeth spun furiously, transforming into a high-speed chainsaw. Simultaneously, immense suction pulled from its jaws, threatening to drag Diamonds and Quicksand off their feet.

Right then, quick of eye and deft of hand, Quicksand snatched the oil bottle from Diamonds’s grasp, hurling the petty loot straight into the mechanical soldier’s maw. Clogged by the oil, the soldier sputtered with a loud mechanical jam. Quicksand swung his club, knocking it down. Veins bulging along his arms, he hoisted the soldier weighing over three hundred kilograms like a shield, blocking incoming strikes before hurling it violently into the remaining enemies.

Diamonds was dumbfounded. In the blink of an eye, the soldiers around Quicksand collapsed one after another. That wooden club seemed like a divine weapon, gutting the mechanical soldiers, their brass chestplates splitting open like yawning clams. Yet in the next instant, even more mechanical soldiers swarmed forward, barring their path.

Standing back-to-back with bodies taut, anticipating a grueling fight, an object slipped from Diamonds’s coat. Seeing the handkerchief, the mechanical soldiers unexpectedly halted, stepping back submissively.

“Hon-Honored gue-guest, wel-welcome to 1805,” a soldier announced, sounding as if its demeanor had completely flipped.

Diamonds and Quicksand exchanged a puzzled glance, only then noticing Madam Spades’s handkerchief lying on the cobblestones, exposing the embroidered family crest in the corner.

The mechanical soldiers bowed courteously like butlers: “Pl-Please follow us. Madam Spades has been expecting you for a l-long time.”

With a squad of mechanical soldiers clearing the way, the two were guided to a tower perched atop a hill. Stained-glass windows depicted tales of alchemists from various realms: Zosimos of Greece, Nicolas Flamel, fabled as the sole creator of the Philosopher’s Stone, and Ge Hong refining golden elixirs, alongside the Ouroboros and the twelve signs of the zodiac. Moonlight filtering through cast drifting patches of light across the floor, resembling an operating magic circle.

The air was fragrant with ambergris, curls of blue smoke rising from bronze incense burners. The hall was draped in brilliant scarlet Lyon gold-thread brocade curtains, resembling a grand stage. Just as the two halted their steps, a mechanical maid lifted her skirts in a curtsy:

“Apologies for the wait, gentlemen. Madam Spades has arrived.”

“Spades” carried the very meaning of the suit. Diamonds could tell every furnishing in the room was exorbitantly expensive; the curtains cost five guineas a yard, roughly half a month’s wage for an ordinary laborer. Quicksand nudged him with an elbow:

“What’s going on? This old acquaintance of yours seems deeply tied to the Group. The Time Entropy Group’s soldiers are actually her servants.”

Diamonds wore a dark scowl: “How would I know? She previously claimed she didn’t come from a prominent family, but she looks wealthy and noble to me. When Poker Bar was first founded, she appeared out of nowhere, investing a massive sum of money to pull us out of dire straits. Much of Clepsydra’s early funding originated from her as well; she is our great benefactor.” He added another line, “If she truly belongs to the Group, don’t think you can wash your hands clean either. Your wages were paid with the Group’s dirty money!”

While the two were murmuring to each other, the curtains suddenly parted. A tall, elderly woman appeared before them, wearing a black veil and a mourning-like black gown: precisely the Madam Spades that Diamonds knew.

Seeing her, Diamonds breathed a sigh of relief. Doffing his top hat, he said, “Madam, meeting for the first time, I am…” Biting his lip, he finally resolved, “…someone who came from the future.”

Seated on mahogany sofas upholstered in top-grain leather inside the parlor, Diamonds recounted the entire sequence of events. Madam Spades listened quietly, sipping punch. In the end, she smiled:

“I understand the details now. In short, you are my future employee. Seeing that I was in peril, you crossed from the future back to the present to save me.”

She then turned toward Quicksand: “And you are my employee’s employee.” Quicksand said grumpily, “If I could jump ship, I wouldn’t stay under him for a single second longer.”

Watching their playful banter, Madam Spades smiled, her gaze gentle and warm, just as it had been at Poker Bar. Knowing her existence was no hallucination of his own, Diamonds breathed a sigh of relief, asking again:

“Speaking of which, Madam, we were guided here by mechanical soldiers, and I saw they bear the Group’s insignia. Is this…”

“This era holds many inconveniences for you people from the future, doesn’t it? The same is true for the Group, so they sourced materials locally, developing mechanical soldiers while making full use of current technological limits. However, their numbers are precious, mostly reserved for guarding the branch and key personnel; mining the ore veins still requires local manpower,” Madam Spades sighed. “Though tonight several units broke down, for reasons unknown.”

Diamonds cast a glance at Quicksand, who was currently playing with two screws scavenged from the mechanical soldiers, holding one in each hand, making buzzing sound effects with his mouth as he simulated them colliding like spaceships. Diamonds gave Quicksand a gentle kick, putting an end to his childish game.

Diamonds suddenly sensed something amiss. Madam Spades spoke of the Group with seamless familiarity, carrying an intangible warmth. He asked tentatively: “Then Madam, may I ask what relation you hold with the Time Entropy Group?”

Madam Spades smiled and nodded. “If you speak of a relation, there certainly is one.” The mechanical maid stepped forward, drawing open the heavy curtains. Their eyes went wide. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the brilliantly illuminated streets of 1805 stretched out, lights flowing like a radiant dragon to form an expansive portrait: a profile of Madam Spades. Three hundred meters up in the sky, a colossal banner hung from an airship, reading: “Glory of Apothecaries, Decipherer of Time: Madam Spades.” Mechanical soldiers guarded the perimeter of the estate like stars clustering around the moon, every single one bearing the Penrose stairs insignia.

Staring dumbfounded, they watched the elderly woman raise her glass, smiling serenely like a swan gracefully stretching its neck:

“Welcome to this era to save my life, strangers from the future. I am Daisy Spades, Director of the Time Entropy Group’s 1805 Branch.”