Free Web NovelChapter 238: Putting My Money Where My Mouth Is
There were only two reasons to let Lia see all of this.
Acquisition and hope.
If you’re going to embrace a cause, do it right. Being too selective doesn’t make anyone more humanitarian. It just dresses cowardice up a little better. I knew I couldn’t embrace the whole world right now. Not the entire Red Squid Slums. Not every Drowned trapped between mud, rotting ducts, and nobles who confused misery with property.
But Lia was here.
In front of me.
And for now, that was something I could touch.
I press two fingers to the makeshift rune on the duct’s metal and channel OXI.
The runic activation answers with a dry yank at my nerves. Heavier than at Richard’s tavern, but still ridiculous given what it could hand back to me.
[OXI: 2,241 / 2,500]
The rune’s light spreads through the anchor points like water running along invisible cracks. Lia takes half a step back, covering her mouth with her sleeve, eyes locked on the design she probably still calls a "cleaning rune."
It isn’t one.
Silver Flow patented it in my past life, but I ran it countless times in far less elegant situations. Gutters, basements, tunnels, dead ducts, makeshift shelters. Always in desperation. Always with the same simple math: pay OXI to the system to recycle contaminated OXI, and pray the profit outweighs the pain.
Most of the time, it did.
There was only one problem with breaking one of the system’s runic patents.
Pain.
Not poetic pain. Not manageable discomfort. Real pain, severe, electric, like every nerve in the body being dragged through the spine at once. A punishment too long for anyone to call an operating cost. The last resort of people who had already run out of resorts.
And that’s exactly why I need to register this patent before the meeting with the Silver Fang.
The rune glows for thirty seconds.
The duct shudders.
The dark crust coating the metal begins to sweat. First in fat drops, then in dense threads, like tar forced out of a wound. The smell worsens for an instant, strong enough to make Lia gag. Then the rune pulls everything into the alchemical circle, and the filth loses its shape.
The light dies.
A notification opens on my HUD.
[You have recycled all present OXI.]
[Condensation Rune executed for the second time in the same zone.]
[As a pioneer, you may register a runic patent. Proceed?]
There it is.
The real reason I came to the Red Squid Slums before the meeting.
The system only counts you as a pioneer the first time a lost rune is successfully executed. But the second execution has to happen in the same zone as the first. It’s as if the world demands proof of intent. Once can be luck. Twice, in the same territory, with the same structure, becomes a discovery.
I select Yes.
[Congratulations.]
[Runic patent successfully registered.]
I let the air out slowly.
Not every rune can be patented. Only those the system considers primordial or labor-class. Runes that actively interfere with the functional physics of Thirstfall. Gravitation. Flotation. Condensation. Industrial purification. The things that change cities, wars, economies.
The discoverer can choose to give the technology to the world.
Beautiful, and useless to me. Useless to humanity in the long run, too.
The world would get cleaner for a few months. The economy might breathe easier for a while. Then a large guild, "a Deepwarden," or some Thomas with a bigger budget and a smaller conscience would monopolize the application anyway. The difference is that I’d have no contract, no patent, no political leverage, and no money to stop it.
I wasn’t doing charity.
I was buying the future.
The telltale sound comes next, breaking my line of thought.
The condensation hardens at the center of the rune. Small pieces begin to form, one after another, crystallizing out of the recycled OXI. Shards. Clean, compact, glowing with that inner blue every Diver learns to love too fast. Military grade. freewёbn૦νeɭ.com
The OXI sludge is pulled out of the duct by some kind of magic only this world understands. When the process ends, the duct is almost unrecognizable. Not perfect. It would still need a final manual cleaning, filter adjustments, a few old parts replaced. But the difference between before and now is the difference between an annoying rasp and a breath that’s actually possible.
[You received 45 Shards.]
A far bigger prize than the tavern’s.
"Oh—!"
Lia lets the sound slip and covers her mouth at once, as if even surprise could be punished. Her eyes are wide. Not on me. On the Shards. Like someone cracked open a rotten duct and found a hidden lottery inside.
I gather the pieces and set five aside.
[Scales: 30,765 → 34,765]
I hand them to her.
Lia stays frozen, hands suspended in the air.
"Take them."
Her fingers tremble when they touch the Shards. It isn’t greed. Greed has heat. This is pure disbelief, almost a fear that the pieces will vanish if she breathes too hard or says the wrong word.
"We’re going to do this a few more times," I say. "Every success, you get five Shards."
She lifts her eyes to me.
This is the acquisition part. Lia knows the city, the names, the alleys, the abandoned buildings, and the people who’ve been handed too many promises. But it’s also the hope part. With a few rounds, she’ll buy her own freedom, and for long years she won’t have to work for people like Thomas.
A Drowned’s life is far cheaper than a Diver’s. Not in the moral sense. In the practical one. No system, no Rank to feed, no OXI burned by skills. Food, a roof, clothes, clean water, some comfort. One Plate can keep a careful Drowned for years.
"Planning to make a fortune and become a Grinder?" I ask.
Lia shakes her head fast, still unable to speak.
Grinders are Drowneds rich enough to pay Divers as private security. They have no system, but Ocean’s Law is bigger than an interface. It’s the physics of this place. Contracts still work for any living creature that signs and registers at an Oathmark.
"Your job is to make sure we look like the good guys," I say, "doing the dirty work Thomas stopped doing. And I don’t need to tell you this stays between us, right?"
She nods.
This time her eyes fill with water. Not from fear.
Gratitude is dangerous when it comes from someone who expects nothing. It makes you want to deserve it.
We leave the technical room.
Marden waits for us outside with a satisfied grin, the kind that says "I knew you two were stubborn" before he even asks a thing.
"Well?"
"We’re done," I say. "Your problem’s solved. Contact Richard at Central Tavern if you need cleaning work again."
Marden keeps staring at me. Too long.
The information hits his face, falls to the floor, gets up again, and only then makes it into his head. He nearly runs past us and throws open the door to the technical room.
Lia and I are already leaving the workshop when the shout comes from inside, straight through the walls.
"WHAAAT?!"
Lia holds back a smile, like she knows exactly what Marden’s going through right now.
"On to the next one," I say, returning a small smile of my own. "You lead."
