The Melancholy of Mei-Ling

Several hours later, we found ourselves seated at a small, ruby table outside a cafe whose sign was written in a script of elegant, unreadable thorns. The glasses from which we drank were a marvel of bizarre design, intricate spirals and impossible angles of dark, tinted crystal. Ashley and I rested tall, slender vessels containing a concoction the colour of a fresh wound—a bloody, viscous fluid that tasted of salt, iron, and a strange, metallic sweetness. Xiao Ru, by contrast, sipped with immense and unconcealed delight from a round, bubbling globe filled with a vibrant, sun-coloured liquid that smelled of exotic fruits and honey. Did the Makai, I wondered, even possess such a thing as bees?

My own drink remained largely untouched. My attention was fixed upon the street, a slow and endless river of the city's strange denizens. My thoughts, however, were not on the crowd, but had drifted back to the peculiar resolution at the angel's boutique. Seraphina, with the magnanimous air of a queen, had invited us to return at any time. The ghosts—Ami, the violinist; Suki, the onryou; and Ali, the warrior with the mace—had apologized with a sincerity that was difficult to reconcile with their earlier menace. Once their strange sentence had been passed, they had become almost... friendly.

The memory of it all, the sheer, layered strangeness of my new reality, drew a long, slow sigh from my lips.

The sound, quiet as it was, was enough to break Xiao Ru's happy concentration. She lowered her bubbling glass, a droplet of golden liquid clinging to her lip.

"That was a very sad sigh, Mei-Ling," she said, her head tilting with genuine concern. "Is something the matter?"

A small, tired smile touched my lips as I turned to her. "I was just wondering, Xiao Ru," I began, my voice quiet. "What passes for a legal system here? What happens to criminals?"

"Criminals?" she repeated, tilting her head in that curious, fox-like manner of hers. "I must confess, it is not a subject I know a great deal about. There... isn't much crime, of the sort you mean." She took another happy sip of her drink before continuing. "From what I have heard, it varies based on severity. For very grave matters, those are dealt with by the Empress's station, in the lower wards. But that is for traitors and war-time prisoners, mostly."

Her words settled in my heart with the solemn finality of iron bells tolling at the hour of judgment. No system, no procedure. Only the whims of the powerful, like the angel. I let out another, heavier sigh, staring into the dregs of my bloody drink. "So there is no place for an investigator, then," I whispered, the words scarcely more than the exhalation of thought, spoken to no ear but my own. "No purpose, no place for one such as I."

The transformation that overtook her was as sudden as it was unsettling. That lighthearted visage—so recently adorned with the innocent hues of mirth—was swept away as though by a storm, revealing in its place a countenance wrought with such vehement and sacred indignation that I found myself recoiling, as though before some demonic, unspoken taboo. Her violet eyes flashed, and her tail began to swish back and forth, a motion of pure, agitated spirit.

"That is not true!" she insisted, her voice full of a fierce, unwavering loyalty. "That is the most untrue thing you have ever said, Mei-Ling! There is always a need for someone like you! For someone who seeks the truth, who is brave and good!" Her tail, its agitated lashing replaced by an energetic, earnest wagging, was a testament to her absolute conviction. She believed it, even if I no longer could.

Her fierce loyalty was a balm to my weary heart. A true, small smile touched my lips, and I closed my eyes, exhaling slowly. "But faith does not provide a purpose, Xiao Ru," I said, opening them again. "What, then, is a creature like me to do in this world?"

"But... we had a purpose, did we not?" she asked, her voice soft with confusion. "To seek an audience with the Empress? To ask her to... remove the woman you are?"

I hesitated. Her words, once the sole focus of my existence here, now felt... distant—now rang hollow, like cathedral bells tolling in a vacuum. A memory, pointedly intoxicating, flashed in my mind: my body slicing through moonlight like calligraphy penned by a god in fury, each step a thunderclap of grace and annihilation. It was a vision both carnivorous and divine—horrifying, yes… but laced with a rapture I could only find exhilarating.

"Hmhmhm," a low, triumphant giggle came from Ashley's side of the table. She took a slow, deliberate sip of her bloody drink, her scarlet eyes glittering with amusement over the rim of her strange glass. "It would seem," she purred, "that even those with the most... rotten, rancid blood are not immune to the simple thrills of being a vampire."

I scoffed, turning away from her smug expression.

Xiao Ru simply blinked, watching us both with her wide, almond, innocent eyes. "Well then," she said with a simple wisdom that cut through the tension. "There is no rush to decide such things. The Empress will still be there tomorrow, and the rotation after." She took another happy sip of her fruity drink. "So, what will you do in the meantime?"

Ashley rested her cheek upon her gloved palm. "Well then," she said, her voice a low, disinterested drawl. "If you are so determined to play the part of the dogged investigator, why not simply do so? Open an office. Put a sign upon your door."

The suggestion, so simple and yet so absurd, hung in the air. I leaned back in my chair, the strange ruby creaking under my weight. I pictured it for a moment: a small, dark office, a desk, a client chair... a stack of unpaid bills. The familiar anxieties of my old life rose like ghosts.

"An office requires rent," I said aloud, the words tasting mundane and foolish on my tongue. "Equipment. A source of income. How does one afford the bills, if there are no clients to be had?"

It was Xiao Ru who answered, and she did so with a soft, patient sigh. She reached across the table and placed her hand gently upon mine. "Mei-Ling," she said, her eyes full of a gentle earnestness, "you must try to stop thinking in the terms of your old life if you wish to truly understand the new one here."

Her words were a kind but firm rebuke, as I had forgotten the concept of money did not exist. "This world does not operate on such principles. It is a realm of will, and of essence. If an investigator is what you truly desire to be—if that is the role your soul seeks to fill—then the Empress will recognize it. You need only... apply. Make your desire known, and if it is deemed a necessary and fitting role for the city, a place for you will be granted."

I stared at her, speechless. Granted? Not earned through capital and labour, but simply... granted by a distant, unseen Empress based on the desires of one's soul. The concept was so… impossibly strange, it could only be violently askew—so contrary to every principle of the world I had known, that I could do nothing but blink in stunned silence… mute, motionless, as if language itself had abandoned me in quiet revolt.

I could only offer a single, whispered word.

"How?"

Xiao Ru simply, lightly, smiled. "It is better to show you," she said, and rose from her chair. Ashley drained her glass with a final, greedy gulp and followed suit. We left the strange cafe and walked for a time, delving deeper into the heart of the city, the crowds growing thicker and more varied with every step.