Rain softened to a mist that made the world look painted. Forks smelled the way Ethan had expected it to — damp cedar, old asphalt, coffee — and under it all a metallic salt of something older: tide, blood, the memory of things that moved faster than breath. The Terrain Awareness Module whispered the town's arteries into his head: river paths, sightlines, the small hollow behind the bakery where gossip turned into plans. He felt it like a second set of eyes, quiet and efficient.
He kept the Panel tucked under his sleeve. Nobody here would see it; nobody could. The ledger on his wrist was a private accounting, and every option it presented was a choice he alone could make.
The diner on Main had a bell that sang like a small ship. He took the counter seat until Isla — who moved as if she'd been born to pour coffee for the whole human grief of the world — set down a steaming mug without asking. Her smile was careful. The barstools creaked with ordinary talk and ordinary aches.
"New face," she said, wiping a saucer. "You look like the kind of man who gets the wrong end of most rumors."
"Passing through," Ethan said. "Looking for the kind of people who keep their secrets well."
She inclined her head toward a corner booth where three locals watched the door with the practiced boredom of people who'd seen more strange nights than their hearts wanted to admit. "This place has slow news," she said. "But it remembers. Sit. Listen."
He did. The Terrain Module painted the room in muted overlays: where someone might watch a back door, which booths had an easy view of the entrance, which staff pretended not to notice a conversation. It was a map that made small things safe. He filed it away as if it were a tool he'd use later.
When he left, rain wrapped the town in a kind of cathedral hush. At the boardwalk's edge a woman stood staring into the river — a silhouette of patience. She turned as he came up the trail, lips moving like someone shaping an argument with the world.
"You're not from here," she said.
"You could say that," Ethan answered. "You?"
"Isla," she said. "I know most of the town by faces and secrets." She studied him like a human who had learned to read weather. "There are stories that come with the tide. Some of them are dangerous. What are you hoping to find?"
"Answers," he said. It was honest in a way that felt good. "And a sense of who's watching."
Isla's mouth quirked. "We all watch each other to survive. But there's something else people whisper about." She nodded at the riverbank. "The Cullens. Quiet people. Pale. Protective. They keep to their house on the hill. And the Quileute — always at the beach. Tensions never fully sleep."
He listened while she named places and people. The Terrain Module ticked off a useful route behind the bakery that would give him a ridge overlooking the meadow where secrets were exchanged. He walked it because people who wanted to be invisible found edges to stand on; the module smoothed his footing and dampened the risk of slipping on wet roots.
The meadow was a bowl of green cut with puddles. A woman and a man were already there — the archetypal pair, she luminous in a way that made light look curious, he composed, like a man who'd learned to hold the weight of being watched. The distance between them and Ethan felt like a set-piece; they were mid-conversation, but not for him.
When the man glanced up and saw Ethan on the ridge, his expression flickered — not hostility, but assessment. He took a few steps forward, voice smooth. "You're far from home," he said. There was a cadence to his speech that gave a person the tilt of something old.
Ethan let his posture relax; the Combat Instinct gave him tiny lines of likely motion so he could meet people without looking like a cursor. "I travel for work," he said. "And sometimes for answers."
The woman beside the man looked at him with the patient curiosity that had saved her many times from being surprised. "Most people don't climb the ridge alone," she said. "Why ask questions that might get you swallowed?"
"Because the panel tells me to," Ethan almost said — then checked the tongue that would have shown his hand. He'd promised the pack secrecy; he could not betray that here, either.
Instead he said, "Because people need a voice sometimes."
The man's eyes softened in a way he did not hide. "Names are useful. I'm Edward. She's —" he winked at the woman, "— Bella."
He'd expected the names. They wore their story lightly; he watched now as a local plays his part and then stepped aside. The terrain humming in his head showed where wolves might run if they came, where a car could block an exit, which hedges would hide a watcher. None of that was visible to the people who filled the meadow with stories. That made his advantage quiet and real.
When a shape rose in the trees — the sound of weight where no human should be — Ethan's panel pinged an alert only he saw.
PANEL ALERT — HOST ONLY:
New Extractables Available in this Node:
— Vampire Physiology Primer (Tier I) — 200 PP
*Temporary: strength ×10, speed ×10, night vision; duration: short mission window.*
— Vampiric Mind-Slip (Echo-lite) — 500 PP
*Limited telepathic read (single target) — narrative cost: emotional backlash if used on consenting targets.*
— Cullen Stealth Protocol — 30 PP
*Short camouflage & movement refinement; ideal for infiltration/avoidance.*
— Werewolf Pack Bond Template — 60 PP
*Ritual script for rapid trust-building in pack/social mechanics; +social cohesion when used discreetly.*
— Full-Shift Emulation (Wolfform Proxy) — 300 PP
*Temporarily emulate shifter physicality (strength/scent/speed); warns locals if used excessively.*
— Alpha Call Echo — 400 PP
*Short-range vocal command that temporarily increases obedience within small groups (high narrative cost).*
All of it was private. Only Ethan saw the costs, the buttons, the neat columns. The Panel's UI never leaked into the world; the extracts did not register as machine prompts to anyone else. They would appear, in-world, as whatever Ethan chose to present them as: sudden training, a gear trick, luck. He had to plan the explanation before he spent the PP.
A low growl made him turn. From the line of pines a pack folded forward: broad forms, taut and human in the wrong light. A man filled the gap, shifting fluidly into something like fur and bone — Jacob-style presence, a human-sized wolf that did not glint in sunlight. The Quileute scouts had arrived.
Eyes met across the field: four sets on one side, a man who had chosen not to be neutral on the other. Tension coiled into the meadow like wire.
Ethan dropped down from the ridge, walking into the middle of lines that wanted to snap. The Combat Instinct module annotated movement like a chess tutor. He saw not aggression, but a chance to shape the script.
He stepped between the parties and pulled a card he'd been carrying for a while: discretion and a small extraction he could afford. He tapped the Panel in the privacy of his sleeve.
EXTRACTION CONFIRM: Cullen Stealth Protocol — Cost 30 PP — Confirm?
He pressed YES.
The effect was intimate and practical: a subtle shift in the way he moved — his shoulders softened, his footfalls muted, his body mimicking the low-profile stillness the Cullens favored. It was not supernatural to the world; it read as someone who'd been trained to be quiet. He had spent affordable PP to buy himself an edge that his allies could accept at face value.
Riley would have called it common sense.
He joined the line, voice calm. "I don't know the old stories in detail," he said aloud. "But I do know crossing paths poorly ends badly. Let's have a talk. Short. Clear."
The Quileute alpha's snarl flattened to suspicion. Edward's voice, quiet and polished, stepped in: "We're not looking for trouble either."
Ethan used the Pack Bond Template he kept in mind — he had not extracted it yet, but the module's phrasing rolled through him like a practiced script. He offered the phrasing as a human man, not as a code-coming machine. "If both sides promise one thing — no pursuit across property lines tonight — we can settle the argument in the morning. Leave a marker at the oak. No camps. No surprises."
The Quileute leader watched every micro-angle and then tilted his head in a small concession. The Cullens relaxed enough to show teeth that were not predatory. The meadow exhaled.
After the talk, the Panel flashed an internal reward tally — a private chirp only Ethan heard.
MISSION NOTE (HOST ONLY): De-escalation successful.
Suggested Extracts (Optional):
— Werewolf Pack Bond Template — 60 PP
— Hunter Awareness Beacon — 40 PP
Ethan closed the menu and breathed out. He had 1,200 PP when he arrived; after using 30 PP for the stealth protocol, he now had 1,170. The extractables sat there like tools on a bench. He could buy the Pack Bond Template for 60 PP and the Hunter Beacon for 40 PP and still have over a thousand left. Both were the kind of purchases that looked like preparation rather than magic.
He tapped the Panel twice, privately.
CONFIRM PURCHASE:
— Pack Bond Template (60 PP)
— Hunter Awareness Beacon (40 PP)
TOTAL: 100 PP
NEW BALANCE: 1,070 PP
A faint warmth moved through his chest as the extractions registered — not a public glow, but a tightening of skill and confidence. The Pack Bond Template felt like a tidy script he could use in a tense parley; the Hunter Awareness Beacon would give him a small, private detection field if something moved while conversations were ongoing.
No one in the meadow knew the blue numbers had shifted; to them, Ethan had simply been a useful man with reasonable ideas. Bella offered him a small, grateful smile. Jacob — or the boy who stood in for him — gave a curt nod that acknowledged strength more than charm. Edward's gaze lingered on Ethan with a curiosity that was less about suspicion and more about measurement.
Before he left the ridge he tapped the Panel one last time to open the private catalog and scrolled for vampire and werewolf extracts — a quiet reference he might need later, the same way a soldier keeps maps.
(Host Only Catalog — Twilight Node)
Vampire Physiology Primer (Tier I) — 200 PP
Short mission window: strength ×10, speed ×10, heightened night perception. Physical effects are dramatic back home when extracted.
Vampiric Mind-Slip (Single Target) — 500 PP
Limited telepathic nudge/read. Use has emotional consequences; NPCs will not sense a machine, but the human aftermath can be disruptive.
Cullen Stealth Protocol — 30 PP
Non-magical-feeling movement camouflage. Works well for infiltration and social stealth.
Sparkling Surface Primer — 120 PP
Cosmetic effect useful for show or misdirection; high social cost if seen in public — draws attention.
Werewolf Pack Bond Template — 60 PP
Ritual phrasing and social cues to quickly bind a small group in mutual trust.
Enhanced Scent (Tier I) — 80 PP
Amplifies olfactory tracking for 30 minutes; excellent for tracking in wilderness. Especially effective in pack-focused scenarios.
Full-Shift Emulation (Proxy) — 300 PP
Emulates many physical aspects of a shifter for a short window (strength, scent, speed) — risky with locals if overused.
Alpha Call Echo — 400 PP
Short-range authoritative command; narrative costs and ethical weight — use sparingly.
Ethan memorized the prices the same way a carpenter remembers the cost of nails and a hammer. He had not bought the big, flashy things — the Vampiric Mind-Slip, the Full-Shift Emulation, the Alpha Call Echo — not yet. He could, but he did not trust miracles to do diplomacy for him.
He walked back into the town as the rain thickened again, the meadow behind him cooling into memory. The Panel sat silently beneath his sleeve like a private ledger that would not leak its light. He had chosen small, human tools tonight: a way to move that looked like practiced stealth, a social script that read like courtesy, a beacon that would warn him quietly if the night turned teeth.
Only he knew the math behind those choices. Only he would carry the multiplication home.
The town lanterns looked warm in the mist. He slid his hands into his pockets and let the sound of rain drown the blue glow in his wrist. The world here was sewn together with thin, fragile threads: vows, grudges, the hunger to be seen and the will to remain hidden. He had money and the means to twist outcomes, but he liked the shape of being useful without showing the stitching.
He walked toward the diner and the low hum of ordinary people, and felt for the first time in a long while that using power quietly — like a knife kept sheathed — might be the best way to carve a future that would not break the people he was trying to help.