The lower district of the capital was a separate country.
Elena walked past alleys that narrowed to the point of buildings pressing together like drunkards, blocking out the sky.
The smell of sewage, smoke, and the sour tang of too many bodies grew thick in her throat.
Kael moved faster and more efficiently than most men would have in these circumstances; a predator clears a path better with a sword than with words, even in the heart of the Empire.
Even here, in the guts of civilization, creatures of the night knew a bigger predator wandered their domain.
Lucien wanted to come.
Elena refused.
The prince was too recognizable.
Coming to the lower districts would be a form of investment, but one with terrible depreciation.
The Temple of Mercy was a half-collapsed ruin, previously a hospital, now a shelter for the broken soldiers the Empire forgot.
On the temple steps, where pious people passing by might see them, the city’s beggars gathered.
Elena spotted him at once.
Sylas Vane lounged against the temple wall, his legs splayed, his back curved like a bow.
He was man-shaped, with the wiry, sinewy build of an athlete, but the face of a much older man.
Sun-bleached gold hair hung in matted and grizzled clumps—the color of a hero’s hair in legend, if such things still had meaning—but the filth of the poor clung stubbornly to the roots.
His sword arm, the right one, hung at his side, a wasted and wizened thing, the fingers curled inward in a permanent claw.
A wineskin dangled from his belt.
Empty.
The hero’s last hope, tilted hopefully back against his shoulder.
In the game, Sylas Vane was the heroic player character’s optional love interest, if the main character had selected Route 3 and survived.
The Crippled Knight, rescued from death by the power of holy light, became the shining example of the Empire’s virtue.
But that was all in the game; the vast majority of players would never find Sylas Vane in the second-to-last chapter.
Everyone knew the Vane family was extinct long before the war had officially begun.
Even the most cynical among players expected Sylas Vane to perish, one way or another, in the thirty-first level of the game.
The Crippled Knight died in the lower districts—of pneumonia, despair, or the venomous poison in his veins, the game’s designers claimed.
Elena approached him, slowing to a halt in front of the man.
Sylas Vane did not even bother to turn around.
He rarely did.
“A copper from a charitable lady?” he asked, his voice as rough as sandpaper.
“Or a kick to the bollocks?
The last noble who passed by thought the second option would be good for my character.” “I prefer the currency of investments to the currency of kicks,” Elena replied.
“And I prefer cheap investments to depreciating assets.” Sylas Vane’s laughter was wet and sour.
“Invest in me?
You’re wasting your time, my lady.
I’m not even a full asset.
My sword arm has gone to rot, and my name is mud.
My own mother would refuse to spit on my grave.” “My lady, your mother is dead.
She died of fever when you were eight years old.
You joined the guard to pay for your sister’s medicine, and in four years, you became a captain.
You defended our border against the horde of orcs, and you saved three hundred civilians.
You were the best shot in the Royal Guard for ten years, until a venom wyrm broke your arm.
And then the Empire threw you out, because that’s what they do.” Elena crouched to look into Sylas Vane’s eyes.
“They toss away their broken toys when they stop being useful.” Sylas Vane’s head snapped up.
Heterochromatic eyes—one blue, one milky white—studied her with an expression of mingled fury and bewilderment.
“What are you?” “Your last investor,” Elena said, and extended her hand.
The Golden Touch pulsed at the base of her palm, but this time, it was different.
Not Kael’s demonic energy, not Lucien’s manipulative ambition or calculating skill—but something else, something deeper, stronger.
Something that resisted, furiously.
[ASSET DETECTED] [NAME: SYLAS VANE] [STATUS: FORMER ROYAL GUARD CAPTAIN — DISCHARGED] [CONDITION: CRITICAL — VENOM-INDUCED NERVE DEATH, CIRRHOSIS, SEVERE DEPRESSION] [HIDDEN POTENTIAL: SWORD SAINT] [CURRENT STATE: 0.00% ACTIVE — SEALED BY TRAUMA] [ESTIMATED RETURN: 7,200x] [WARNING: INVESTMENT REQUIRES RESTORATION PROTOCOL] [WARNING: ASSET RESISTS GROWTH] Golden light flared from Elena’s touch, but it hit a stone wall of Sylas Vane’s defenses.
Old poison and old pain, calcified together with the rot in his soul—the wound was fresh enough to hurt, though.
Elena pushed harder, feeling the strain in her mana.
A deep, abiding hurt, not quite pain, not quite pleasure, welled up in her gut—some vestigial part of her soul remembered how Lucien’s touch felt.
“Stop,” Sylas Vane rasped, his voice cracking.
“That hurts.” “Growing things always hurt,” Elena said, and pushed harder.
“You think you’ve lost this arm?
You think it cannot heal?
You are depreciating, yes, but I can restore that value, if you let me.” Light exploded from Sylas’s arm in an angry burst.
Elena staggered back, feeling a deep, twisting discomfort in her own bones.
He was hurting so much, and that was impeding the transfer, but still— [RESTORATION PROTOCOL INITIATED] [ASSET #3 GROWTH: 0.00% → 0.02%] [ESTIMATED TIME TO FUNCTIONAL RESTORATION: 45 DAYS] [LOYALTY: 0 → 8] Sylas Vane screamed, clawing at the air.
Elena’s heart clenched painfully; there was a sound of rending silk in the narrow alley.
His back arched, his withered sword hand convulsing.
And a miracle of miracles—a miracle of capital investment—happened right there in the middle of the street: the withered and knotted muscle of his crippled arm swelled, ever so slightly, and the veins that ran up his arm—the black ones—lightened to the color of copper.
Kael caught her before she hit the pavement.
“That was expensive,” he said, his grip firm on Elena’s waist.
“That was worth more than Lucien.” Elena swayed, leaning against him.
It was a shame, really, that Lucien’s investment had been entirely in politics.
She would have taken his hand and kissed it right there in the street, if her hands were not trembling.
Elena turned to look at the former captain.
“How do you feel?” Sylas Vane blinked slowly, his heterochromatic eyes studying Elena’s upturned—no, tilted sideways—face.
“Like I want to vomit,” he said.
“It hurts.
It hurts, it really hurts.
It feels like it burns, actually.
Wait, why can I feel that?
I thought I was dead.” “Oh, you were,” Elena said.
“Depreciating assets tend to die, eventually.
But see, I like cheap investments.
Cheap people,” she added after a pause.
“Cheap people are the best value for your money.” She extended her other hand, the one that was not glowing.
“I have a room, if you want it.
I have food, if you want it.
I have a training ground, and in forty-five days, you’ll be holding a sword again.” Sylas Vane looked at her hand, then at his own, flexing the fingers in wonder.
Tiny rivulets of blood trickled from the creases in his palm.
He looked up at Kael, whose golden eyes were fixed thoughtfully on the former captain.
Then Sylas Vane looked back at Elena’s outstretched hand.
“I do not believe in miracles,” he said.
“I don’t deal in miracles,” Elena answered.
“Neither do I—I believe in compound interest.” Elena took him by the hand and hauled him upright.
Somewhere behind them, in the temple alley, someone watched.
Elena felt the weight of a foreign gaze and glanced over her shoulder—but it was empty.