It had been two weeks since the attack on the academy. The casualties had been severe, and the headmaster now lay gravely injured somewhere in the medical ward. In the end, every student who had survived was granted a free graduation — no ceremony, no fanfare. Just a quiet acknowledgment that they had made it out alive.
"What are you going to do now that we've finished school?" I asked, glancing over at Kael, who was sprawled across his dorm bed like he'd been dropped from a great height and simply hadn't bothered to get up.
"I have no place in particular to go...." He trailed off, then something seemed to cross his mind. "Oh, that's right. Tomorrow you're heading back to the Azure Palace."
His face shifted — just slightly. Not sadness exactly, but something adjacent to it.
"You want to come with me?"
Kael frowned. "That's not a good idea. Don't they treat you badly there?"
"I'd just tell them you're one of my knights."
"Knight?" He sat up, actually looking at me now.
"I'm not trying to make you serve me," I said quickly. "It's just the language they would probably understand. The real reason I need you is because I have no one on my side in that place. Not a single person." I held his gaze and let the honesty show on my face for once. "I need people who are on my side. Please help me, man."
Silence filled the room.
I started counting the seconds in my head. My thoughts drifted from I hope he doesn't reject me to say something, please, anything.
"Alright."
Just that. One word, dropped into the quiet like a stone into still water.
"For real?" I felt the tension leave my shoulders all at once. "Thanks, man. I genuinely mean it."
"Shut up," Kael said, already lying back down. "When are we leaving?"
"Normally, when the knight and maid my 'father' prepared have finished the proper arrangements, it would be about a week."
He gave me a flat look. "And actually?"
"Tomorrow."
"That is so early."
"You know," I said, studying him, "when I first met you I thought you were this sharp, disciplined type. How are you this lazy and yet somehow still terrifying in a fight?"
"Yeah, yeah." He waved me off. "Do you have anything to pack?"
"No. I'm heading out now — I need to make some arrangements."
"Sure." He was already staring at the ceiling again. "I'll be right here."
I left the dorm and walked directly to the House of Gilded Chance, which sat deep within the Dark Circle. I pulled on the blue mask and draped the white cape over my shoulders, letting it fall to cover everything beneath. As I passed through the streets, I noticed — not for the first time — how different things looked now. The roads that had once felt oppressive and dim were cleaner, better lit. It seemed my funding had quietly improved more than I'd expected.
When I stepped through the entrance of the House of Gilded Chance, a familiar voice reached me almost immediately.
"It's been a while." A nobleman wearing a lion-shaped mask appeared at my side, his tone warm with something that bordered on genuine fondness.
I had started coming here every day after I escaped the cave. He had latched onto me almost immediately — always nearby, always trying to close the distance. It had been exhausting at first. But somewhere along the way I'd started responding to his greetings, and apparently that was enough for him to consider us friends.
"Yes, it has," I replied.
Short. Measured. But it made him visibly pleased.
"Well then, old friend — I'll find you later." He drifted away into the crowd.
I made my way to the counter. I was about to speak when I heard the voice just behind me, calm and practiced.
"Welcome to the House of Gilded Chance."
My attendant. Right on schedule.
"I need to speak with your manager," I said. It wasn't meant to sound cold. It came out that way regardless. I had been trying to carry myself a certain way whenever I wore the mask — composed, unreadable, the kind of person who made other people nervous without raising his voice. My days of reading mafia novels had apparently done more for me than I'd ever expected.
Less than twenty minutes passed before I was escorted to a private room. A man sat across from me, his voice heavy when he spoke.
"I heard you wanted to see me."
"Yes," I said. Then I paused.
Something was off. I turned it over in my mind quickly — every story I'd read, every scene I could remember. Mafia bosses didn't show themselves unless the situation demanded it. They worked behind curtains, through intermediaries. A direct meeting this fast, this easily?
"Is this a test?" I murmured, almost to myself.
Laughter came from behind the door.
It swung open.
A girl walked in — roughly my age, dressed in a black gown patterned with flowers, a wide hat sitting low on her head with dark netting that fell across her face. Behind her came two figures whose presence alone made the air in the room feel heavier. I couldn't see their weapons yet, but I could sense the weight they carried.
"He passed," she said simply, gesturing for the man to leave.
He stood without a word and walked out.
She settled into the chair across from me with the ease of someone who had never once questioned whether a room belonged to her.
"How did you know he wasn't the boss?"
"Let's get down to business, shall we?" I said, holding her gaze and letting the question go unanswered.
According to chapter forty-two: the boss respects those who treat their identity as irrelevant. Indifference is power.
"Did you not hear the boss?" One of her bodyguards moved — fast — and the edge of an unsheathed blade pressed flat against my neck.
Internally, my heart made an extremely undignified noise.
Outwardly, I didn't move.
"Yikes," I said, in exactly the tone of someone who had not just nearly lost composure entirely. "That startled me."
I reached up slowly and caught the sword between two fingers. Then, with just enough force — controlled, precise — I snapped the tip clean off.
The bodyguard took a step back. The surprise on her face was visible even from where I sat.
"Who gave you permission to speak?" My voice came out quieter than I intended. Somehow that made it worse.
"Enough." The young woman — the real boss — raised one hand. Her bodyguard fell silent immediately. "I apologise for my subordinate's behaviour. Now." She folded her hands on the table. "Let's discuss what you came here for."
"I want to buy one of your subordinates," I said. "My attendant, specifically."
She was quiet for a moment.
It wasn't the first time someone had tried to purchase an attendant from her. That happened occasionally. But a request for him in particular — that was new. She had noticed it herself, now that she thought about it. He had been attending to this one client repeatedly, exclusively, in a house full of clients he never gave a second glance. The more she considered it, the more a quiet, curious interest stirred somewhere behind her composure.
She leaned back in her chair, fingers laced together, eyes sharp as cut glass.
"Why do you want him?"
A beat of silence. I held her gaze — don't blink first, the book said never blink first — and let the corner of my mouth lift just slightly.
"Because he's good at his job."
"Everyone here is good at their job." Her tone was flat. Another test — obvious, but I let it land anyway.
I reached for the glass that had been placed on the table before I arrived. My movements were slow, deliberate — the way men in those stories always moved, like they had never once been in a hurry in their lives.
"Not like him. He finds me every time I walk through that door. Doesn't matter how crowded the floor is. Doesn't matter if I'm at the casino floor, the pool tables, or the back corner." I set the glass down without drinking from it. "A man who notices things like that — quietly, without being told — that isn't a mere attendant. That's an asset."
Something shifted behind her eyes. Barely. But it was there.
"You read people," she said. It wasn't a compliment. It was a measurement.
No, I thought privately. I read a book.
"It's a useful habit," I said.
She studied me — long enough that I had to remind myself not to tap the table.
"Most people who sit across from me," she said slowly, "want information, protection, or funding." A pause. "You want an attendant."
"I want the right person." I met her eyes. "There's a difference."
The silence that followed felt different from the one before it. Heavier. More deliberate.
She hadn't said no. In every story I'd read, that meant I was still in the game.
"Fine," she said at last. "You can have him. We'll deduct eight percent from your savings held with us."
Eight percent?
I kept my expression perfectly still while internally doing a double take. I had braced myself for something unreasonable — a demand I'd need to negotiate down from, something that would take three exchanges to resolve. Eight percent was nothing. I agreed without hesitation, signed what needed to be signed, and left the room first.
Behind the closed door, the atmosphere shifted.
"Boss." One of her attendants leaned in, voice low. "Don't you think you undercharged him? We usually take at least thirty-five percent."
She was quiet for a moment, her gaze still fixed on the door he had walked through.
"Think of it as an investment," she said simply.
Outside, my newly acquired attendant was waiting. He was smiling — not the practiced, professional smile he wore on the floor, but something more genuine and slightly unnerving.
"Sir, shall I begin following you now?"
"No," I said. "Tomorrow." I paused. "Meet me outside the academy gates in the morning." I watched his expression flicker — just briefly, with something he quickly smoothed back into composure. "And tonight, I need you to acquire four things: one maid's uniform, one knight's uniform, one noble's outfit, and one butler's uniform. Bring them to the road at the edge of the Dark Circle."
I didn't wait for a response. I walked.
The Poison District was quieter than I expected.
The streets here carried a different texture than the Fortune Section — less bustle, more stillness. The kind of place where the silence itself felt like it was listening. I moved through it carefully and found the contact I was looking for without much difficulty. The negotiation for their subordinate was brief; the Poison District's people were practical by nature. They named their price. I met it. We were done.
By the time I reached the road at the edge of the Dark Circle, my attendant was already there, standing at the corner with four neatly folded sets of clothing stacked in his arms. He looked simultaneously dignified and faintly absurd.
I took the stack from him and sorted through it efficiently. The maid uniform went to the girl I had acquired from the Poison District. The butler uniform I handed back to my attendant. The knight and noble outfits I folded and tucked under my own arm.
"Bring her with you tomorrow morning," I told him. "Academy gates."
He nodded, still smiling.
I left them there and made my way back to the dorm.
Kael was exactly where I had left him — horizontal, staring at the ceiling with the peaceful expression of a man who had committed entirely to doing nothing. I set the knight's uniform on the edge of his bed. He didn't look at it. I didn't explain it.
I changed, lay down, and was asleep within minutes.
Tomorrow, we were leaving for the Azure Palace.
I was as ready as I was ever going to be.
{SHORT STORY — non-canon comedic aside}
Narrator: Honestly? Nullen completely fooled the Fortune Section Master of the House of Gilded Chance purely by reading a novel. At this point he should just go into acting.
Kael: … I mean, he was doing it for both of us, so.
Nullen: Exactly. Thank you—
Kael: That wasn't a compliment.
Nullen: Oh.
Also — Kael: Why does your attendant act like he's gay also now that i think about it yeah being an actor would totally suite you.
Narrator: I know right
Nullen: Bro I'm straight, that's not—wait. How do you even know the word 'acting'? That doesn't exist in this world.
Narrator/Kael: And on that note—
Nullen: WAIT. Answer the question—
See you next chapter.