Chương 174: Chapter 173 - Pure Gambling

The ink was still wet on the forms when Lucid realized the man beside him was not who he claimed to be. They had spent the afternoon wading through papers and numbers, Fenwick guiding them through the warren of clerks and registrars with a familiarity that spoke of practice. The building smelled of old paper and dust. Not just dust but the accumulated decay of decades, of transactions half-finished and fortunes half-lost. Lucid's legs ached from standing.

His chest burned where the sword had entered, even though the skin had sealed. The resurrection had left something behind, some residue of wrongness that made each breath a negotiation. He kept moving anyway. Kept watching. The plan unfolded with unsettling smoothness. Fenwick filed intent to purchase the abandoned Maren property. Filed intent to sell it to a shell company that existed only on a piece of paper they had filled out in the hallway. Filed intent to buy it back.

The clerks barely glanced at the documents. They stamped and signed and slid forms across counters worn smooth by generations of desperate hands.

'This should not work,' Lucid thought.

'This is too easy.' But the gold appeared anyway. Not physical gold but recorded value. Transaction after transaction, each one building on the last, creating a ladder of debt and credit that climbed toward something the Domain would recognize as wealth. By the time the sun began its descent, the paperwork claimed they had moved property worth thousands of gold coins. The records showed activity, velocity, the frantic dance of commerce that the Domain accepted as proof of economic existence. Fenwick was beaming.

His earlier desperation had burned away, replaced by something that looked almost like competence. He counted the imaginary sums with obvious satisfaction, his fingers tracing lines of ink that represented futures they did not own.

"Tomorrow we walk in as equals," he said.

"They will see the records, the transactions. The Domain will accept us as legitimate participants." Lucid said nothing. He was watching Fenwick's hands. The way they moved. The certainty in each gesture. This was not the shaking grasp of a man drowning in debt. This was the practiced motion of someone who had done this before, many times, in places where the stakes were higher and the margins narrower. They left the registrar's office as the light turned amber.

The street outside was narrow, the buildings leaning toward each other like conspirators. Lucid's shadow stretched long behind him, thin and insubstantial. He felt insubstantial too, hollowed out by the day's efforts.

'When was the last time I had a bath....' Fenwick stopped at a corner. Turned. For a moment his expression was open, unguarded. His eyes caught the dying light and something moved behind them, something quick and sharp and entirely unlike the desperate nobleman who had grabbed Lucid's shirt that morning. Then he blinked. The mask returned. The eager, grateful, slightly pathetic young man was back.

'There,' Lucid thought.

'There it is.'

"We should celebrate," Fenwick said, his voice bright.

"One drink. To our partnership."

"I do not drink."

"Then watch me drink. Come. There is a place nearby." Lucid followed. Not because he wanted to but because the slip in Fenwick's expression had lodged itself in his mind. He needed to understand what he was dealing with. The mission was already compromised by the auction, by the Domain, by the relic that kept slipping further from reach. Adding an unknown variable to the equation was reckless. But walking away without knowing would be worse.

The tavern Fenwick chose was small, but right next to the harbor and beach he frequented. The interior was nice quiet a couple patrons were there but not too many and there was a nice holographic screen at the wall, the one he saw in the void rail incident. This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it. Fenwick ordered wine. Expensive wine, by the look of the bottle, by the way the proprietor hesitated before pouring.

He paid with coins that materialized from somewhere inside his coat.

'Weird... could have sworn he uses a pouch' Lucid sat across from him. Watched him drink. The wine was red, dark, staining Fenwick's lips like blood.

"You move fast," Lucid said.

"What do you mean?"

"This morning you were getting thrown out of some noble gathering. Now you are buying wine like you own the place."

"You knew?" Fenwick's laugh was too loud. It echoed off the low ceiling, drew glances from the other patrons.

"The transactions we filed. They have weight. Even before the Domain recognizes them, people with the right information can see what we have done. Credit flows to those who appear credit-worthy. It is the oldest rule of commerce."

'He is lying,' Lucid thought.

'Or at least not telling the whole truth.' The wine loosened Fenwick's tongue. His voice grew louder, his gestures broader. He talked about the auction, about the relic, about what he would do with the money. His words painted a picture of a man who had already spent the fortune, who saw the future as a certainty rather than a gamble. The desperation that had been so convincing that morning was gone. In its place was a boisterous confidence, a swagger that seemed to grow with each glass.

'This is not the same person,' Lucid realized.

'Or it is the same person finally showing what was underneath.' Fenwick finished his third glass. Wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. The gesture was crude, almost aggressive.

"Tomorrow we take what is ours. You want the relic. I want the wealth it represents. We get both. Simple."

"Simple," Lucid repeated. The word tasted wrong in his mouth. But things never appeared as simple as they were. He was the one who knew that the best after all.

"Meet me tomorrow... The same usual place. One hour before midnight. I will have everything prepared. The papers, the proofs, the appearance of wealth. You just need to show up and not die before the Domain opens."

"And... that knigh.. you were joking right?"

"No? No matter..." Fenwick stood. The wine had not made him unsteady. If anything, he moved more precisely than before, his balance perfect, his eyes clear despite the alcohol. He clapped Lucid on the shoulder, a gesture that was almost mocking in its familiarity.

"Do not disappoint me, fogged shit. You are more useful alive than dead." The words hung in the air. Fenwick walked out without looking back. The door swung shut behind him, and the tavern settled back into its usual silence. Lucid sat alone. The wine bottle sat between them, half empty, a dark red pool at the bottom that caught the candlelight and held it. He turned Fenwick's last words over in his mind. Fogged shit. The same insult from that town, the academy, but the tone was different. He reevaluated him now.

'He is not what he appears. But what is he? A fraud? An agent of someone else? Another player in a game I do not yet understand?' Lucid stood. His body protested. The illness or the resurrection or the simple exhaustion of the day pulled at him, demanded rest he could not afford to give. He walked to the door, pushed it open, stepped into the cooling evening air. The street was empty. Fenwick was gone. But something made Lucid turn, made him look back down the way they had come.

Fenwick stood at the far end of the street. Fifty paces away. He was not walking. He was watching. The dying light caught his face, and for a moment, before he turned away, before he melted into the shadows between buildings, Lucid saw something that made his chest tighten. It was not the desperate nobleman. It was not the boisterous fraud. It was something else entirely. Something that looked back at him with eyes that held no desperation, no gratitude, no fear. Something that had been watching him all along.

The moment passed. Fenwick was gone. The street was empty.

'I should go back to the tavern. Tell Arthur. Tell Ayame. Walk away from this whole scheme and find another way into the Domain.' He took a step toward the tavern. Then another. Then he stopped. Fenwick was hiding something. But he also had a way into the Domain, a method that worked, a path that led to the relic. And Lucid had nothing else. No wealth, no status, no legitimate entry. Just a body that was slowly failing and a mission that would not wait. He turned back toward the eastern pier. Not to follow Fenwick.

Not to confront him. Just to look. To see if there was anything he had missed, anything that would tell him whether the man was an ally, an enemy, or something in between. The city was darkening around him. The street was empty. But somewhere ahead, Fenwick walked, and somewhere beyond that, the Domain waited, and somewhere beyond that, a boy with yellow hair was counting futures that did not belong to him. Lucid walked toward the pier. Not sure what he was looking for. Not sure what he would do when he found it.

Just sure that he could not go back to the tavern yet, could not sit with Arthur and Ayame and explain that their only path forward depended on a man whose face changed like water. The cobblestones were uneven. The buildings were tall. The night was coming. Lucid kept walking. He would find out tomorrow. Or tonight. Or whenever Fenwick decided to show his real face. Either way, the auction was coming. The Domain was waiting. And he was too far in to turn back now.