Jace meanwhile looked beside him. There sat the blonde young man with a young, naive-looking face and blue eyes. He sat there with a drink in his hand that seemed like whiskey, and he swirled the glass as he stared at it absentmindedly.
"What's your name?" Jace asked casually, as if making small talk with someone.
The blonde man looked at him and then turned back to his drink. "Harold... Harold Gunderson," he answered as he took a sip from his glass.
Jace nodded. He could feel that this Harold guy wanted to ask him his name as a courtesy, but Jace could make it so that Harold would feel that it was of no use to know his name—this was the dream shaping of a Nightmare!
Dream shaping was kind of like the 'dream walking' ability of the sequence 5 Spectator pathway, but it was significantly weaker.
However, Jace could do a lot of things here; he could make this Harold person feel at peace, angry, or sad, and even make it so that life felt like it had no meaning, so he would answer everything truthfully.
"Gin and Tonic, please!" Jace called out to the bartender.
He looked at Harold and asked, "So, how did you become a Beyonder?"
"It was two years ago. I was working as an accountant at a bank, every day was pretty much the same. Wake up, eat, go to work, eat, come home, and sleep. Every day for a year I repeated the same process. I never thought that after college, my life would be so dull," he said, and took a sip of his drink.
He continued, "One day, a man approached me saying that he would show me the real world hidden behind the curtains of normality... In return, he asked me to drink something... I thought about it for a long time, and I decided to do it. And I drank what the man later called a 'potion,' and I became a Beyonder."
"I see," Jace muttered in thought. "I suppose the potion formulas and ingredients for sequence 8 and 7 were also given by him?" Jace asked.
"Yes," Harold replied.
The barkeeper set a glass of the drink before him. Jace took it and looked up at the bartender. "Get another glass of scotch for my friend here," he said.
He then turned and looked at the Astrologer. "Tell me something, are you from the Abraham family? And do you perhaps hear whispers or ravings on the full moon night?"
Harold answered without a thought, "No, I'm not from any Abraham family. And yes, I do hear whispers and sometimes get a headache and feel a bit dizzy on the full moon night, but it's nothing much."
"I see," Jace whispered, as he took a sip of his drink. It tasted quite similar to the last time he had ordered it in the real world.
The only people who were affected by the Ravings and the madness were those Beyonders who had the Abraham family's blood, and then there were those Beyonders who had advanced through 'contaminated' Beyonder characteristics that came from someone who had Abraham family's blood, like Fors Wall, aka Ms. Magician.
The reason Harold wasn't much affected was because he was in no way related to the Abraham family, and he had used raw ingredients rather than a Beyonder characteristic from the Abraham family.
The only reason why he was even affected was because he had a connection with Bethel Abraham through the door pathway.
The Abraham family, meanwhile, had a direct connection through blood, so they had it significantly worse, like losing control even while becoming a sequence 9 Beyonder.
He continued asking questions and Harold answered without any resistance, be it personal or Beyonder-related.
While he was at it, he also got the formulas for sequence 9, 8, and 7, which he already had, but it was always better to have another source. Several minutes later, he had an idea of what kind of guy Harold was.
So he moved on to the most curious thing about Harold's story. "What do you know about the man who gave you the potion?"
"I know that he is of the same pathway as me, likely of a higher sequence than mine. He never told me his name. When I asked, he said to call him a 'Traveler'. He checks up on my progress every few months," Harold answered.
'Traveler, huh? Now that name would be very unoriginal if he is a sequence 5 Traveler,' Jace thought as he asked, "When did you last meet the... Traveler?"
"A few months ago."
"I see. Is that also when he gave you the Nightmare glove?" Jace looked at him and asked.
"Yes."
"What intentions do you believe the 'Traveler' has for you? Why did he make you a Beyonder?"
"I don't know."
"Okay," Jace continued asking the Harold questions about this person, but the result was nothing.
Jace sat calmly in the bar. He took a sip and set the glass on the table. He had gotten everything there was to know from Harold; the interrogation was over.
It was time to wake up.
Just as he had arrived here, his senses turned blurry and dull. When he opened his eyes, he was back before the steel table where the Astrologer lay.
Jace looked at his hands; he was still in the nightmare state.
He turned around and floated to his body, waking up in it. As he did, he took a deep breath and turned to look at the unconscious Astrologer.
He sighed deeply as he set his elbows on the desk and his hands on his face. 'This is going to be tricky' he thought
By now, Jace had figured out that Harold was a clown. He had no special traits other than being a sequence 7; he was foolish, naive and by all means not a good Beyonder.
But... he could not kill Harold, as the so-called 'Traveler' would likely come to check in on him in a few weeks and find out about his death, which would then lead him to Jace.
While Jace was confident in his abilities and artifacts, he was still not sure if he would be able to take on a sequence 5, much less a tricky one from the door pathway.
It was likely that Harold was some sort of experiment to the Traveler. As for what kind, Jace didn't know, nor did he want to.
After thinking about it for a few minutes, a plan formed in his mind.
It was quite simple.
He got up and put on the Polymath Ring. He picked up the Astrologer, slung him over his shoulder, and used teleportation.
Soon, he appeared in the exact same place where he had knocked Harold out.
Letting go of the body, he dropped it on the ground with a soft thud.
He was going to do... nothing.
As far as Harold was concerned, he was attacked by a strange Beyonder and got robbed by him. He would not remember the conversation they had in the dream, as that was the nature of the Nightmare powers.
Be it Harold or the Traveler, they likely would not be able to track him down, as he was wearing a different face, and Jace himself had the means of anti-divination.
Jace teleported back, but into his bedroom rather than the basement, and jumped onto the bed.
For now, he was going to do nothing, but that did not mean he was going to do nothing in the future.
Harold said that he had been an Astrologer for about 8 months. Hopefully, by the time Jace becomes a sequence 5 Marionettist, the Astrologer would be a sequence 6 Scribe.
Then he would make Harold the Scribe his marionette and act as him. And when the Traveler would visit him, he would make it an all-out fight and make him a marionette while abandoning Harold.
Jace chuckled with excitement.
Having a Scribe as a marionette was going to be interesting, but making a 'Traveler' his marionette would be even more interesting and useful.
On the other hand, he thought about the 'Lucky' Stopwatch, not only had it led him to a easy beyonder with peculiar pathway and artifact, it had also led him to a sequence 5 prospect for Marrionett.
He wondered if it was due the 'Lucky' Stopwatch's luck or his own luck and coincidence, because as far as he could tell, 'lucky' stopwatch belonged to the sequence 7, so at most it would affect, mundane people and beyonders of lower sequences and sequence 7 and even 6.
But he doubted it would affect beyonders of sequence 5 level much or none at all...
'i'll have to experiment more...'