Johann shifted his weight from one foot to the other as he choked on the Ghosthound’s words. Jane eyed the young man next to her with something like pity. But the initiative displayed by when he addressed the Ghosthound ran out. So the two could only stand there awkwardly while the Ghosthound leaned back on the cheap couch and studied them for several seconds.

Besides. Can we even deny that the Ghosthound has made this room the most interesting in the office… simply by waiting in here for a little less than two minutes…? Jane’s mouth felt very dry.

Looking at him, she was reminded of a conversation she once had with Dmitri Rainor, Johann’s father, only a few months ago. In retrospect, she suspected that it had been this interaction that led to her current post. They had been sitting in his sunroom, with Dmitri slathering butter onto a roll as part of his morning ritual. Jane had brought a prospective business plan to Dmitri’s attention, a pet project that she had been secretly researching for almost six months.

The wait was agonizing. Inwardly, she had been mentally sprinting through the plan over and over again as he examined it.

The Rainor Family was rich but just rich enough to provide for their descendants. Not politically dominant rich, like some of the other factions on Expira. This plan, Jane sincerely believed, would change that.

Dmitri read through the plan with his characteristic attention to detail. His habit of pausing and rereading an entire paragraph he didn’t quite get was agonizing. Occasionally, he took a sip of his coffee. The roll had been left forgotten on the side. Sunlight filtered through the wide windows as he read.

Eventually, he set down the packet and looked up at Jane. “This is a very good idea. Well done, Jane.”

Jane had nodded eagerly as relief swept through her to earn his approval. “Alright, I’ll get the documents drawn up in the morning. If we move fast-”

“Wait. We won’t be implementing this idea ourselves.” Dmitri had straightened and carefully adjusted the starched collar of his shirt. He picked up his roll and returned to buttering it, as though he had never stopped. “I have some contacts I can pass the plan along to. Very original. Perfectly timed. Impeccable work as always, Jane. Your holiday bonus will surely reflect the initiative that you’ve displayed here.”

“I- what?” Emotions had warred in Jane’s heart. She felt flush with the confidence she had feared would be proved false for so long, vindicated in the months of extra hours at the office, trying to piece together data from shipping yields and sales numbers. She felt slightly dizzy as she looked at Dmitri. “We… will pass this on? But why? I calculated the loan we could expect to get. If it’s a matter of capital, we can handle-”

“Jane.” Dmitri’s voice had been gentle. But more than that, his tone hid a deep and sorrowful fear as he looked at her. She had worked for him for almost three years, following him as he picked the Rainor Family up from the scraps and made it a business power in modern Expira. He was the most competent man she knew. And because of that, she was just a little bit in love with him.

But right now, he was afraid.

He reached out and put and weathered hand on her shoulder. His touch felt light. “I can understand why you would be disappointed, but the Rainor Family cannot eat this meal you’ve prepared for us. We dare not, lest we attract the wrong sort of attention.”

“Why the hell not?” Jane blurted out.

Dmitri sighed. “We do not hold the power to protect anything more than what we have. Without genuine power… without someone who has begun to understand their own image… well. it is not safe to be too successful on Expira.”

In the present, Jane finally felt how what Dmitri had said was indeed true. She couldn’t suppress the fascination she felt toward his every minute detail; this man felt more real than anything else she had ever encountered. The Ghosthound’s chest visibly rose and fell as he breathed. And Jane felt his muscles contract and relax. Sitting atop the planet, this man reigned. Had reigned for about as long as the System had taken over the world. This sensation was entirely different than Dmitri.

Jane had even once met the newly elected President of Zone 1 once, shaken his hand after a speech on expanding System education Classes to refugees. At the time, she had been captivated by the President’s charm and presence. He could manipulate attention at will, utilizing his clever framing to quickly rise to power in the cutthroat Zone 1.

That man would have been reduced to a stammering mess in front of this one. Jane didn’t have much experience with images, but now she understood on a very visceral level what they could accomplish. Just by being in this room, she felt drowned by his presence. Just by waiting here for her and Johann, he had transformed the location.

He was a natural force as much as he was a person. And for whatever reason, he had come to Ironwood Capital. Purposefully.

As she watched, the couch began to twist and stretch into a more aesthetically pleasing form. The synthetic fabric began to glimmer with an inner color. The fabric softened.

His voice was warm and sonorous. “I’ll be brief.”

Jane sucked in a breath laced with relief; as the Ghosthound finally spoke, a lot of the tension in the room eased as he opened his mouth. Something in his tone hung in the air, like the act of speech run a lovely and resonant bell. His emerald gaze flicked back and forth, weighing the two of them.

Jane couldn’t deny a small thrill of pride as he weighed them and his gaze settled on her on the more important decision-maker. And of course, a commiserate thread of bitterness emerged that this wasn’t actually the case.

“B’s Crossing. I know you are the company that bought up the land in the area. You have been pressuring the restaurant to sign a very unfavorable lease or give over management of the restaurant to you.” The Ghosthound exhaled from his nose. The tendrils from the corner plant continued to quest outward, covering more of the walls. “I’d like for you to instead give over control of the land on which the restaurant sits to me. I’ll handle the issue.”

“What?” That woke Johann up. “But I wanted-”

The Ghosthound glanced sideways at Johann. His facial expression remained neutral, but somehow his entire disposition changed. His cheeks and forehead seemed stiff and unfeeling. A hateful incarnation of violence sat on the chair, looking at Johann. It had resembled a human as it walked in and settled itself, but now it became obvious that its humanity was merely a mask. The civil veneer wore thin, as soon as Johann spoke.

No one wanted that stiff facade to be stripped away.

Its eyes were bonfires of green flame in hollow pits. Its attention was a hand at your throat, squeezing your windpipe closed. All the magic of the transformations it wrought with its presence seemed to twist to ash in Jane’s eyes. Because in the end, this vicious power could grind the entire area to dust, if it was unleashed.

Jane forced her dry mouth open. “What are you willing to offer in exchange?”

The Ghosthound returned to just a man as he turned and smiled at her. All his sinister impulses seemed to have vanished. “Well, I was hoping you’d be willing to do it in exchange for a favor. Besides, I’m going to save you from yourself. Pressuring B’s Crossing will just drive away the kid who is cleansing the food. And the celebrity chef they acquired recently will not stay without the kid.”

“We obviously would offer very competitive compensation packages,” Jane said quickly. Her mind raced. A favor from the Ghosthound was a treasure that most entrepreneurs didn’t even dream about. His relationship to Expira was impartial and distant: that was the Ghosthound’s whole deal. But if he would be willing to tip his hand in their direction, the entire Rainor Family would benefit.

“You want it for free?” Johann whispered. He almost sounded like he admired the Ghosthound’s audacity.

“A favor, as I said. Because I didn’t bring a wallet with me and I doubt you’d take either experimental steel or an image refinement as payment.” The Ghosthound’s smile stretched. “And also, I don’t think you’d find money to be a very good motivator for either of the characters that make B’s Crossing magical.”

Just when Jane was calculating how to get the most value from a favor from the Ghosthound, Johann spoke again. “I refuse. Let’s talk about real estate on Kharon. Or at the very least cash-”

“Johann-” Jane blinked several times.

Meanwhile, the Ghosthound released a bark of laughter. “Cash? And what would you do with more cash? Continue throwing your life away?”

For several seconds, Johann just stared. Standing like this, his limbs seemed too thin for his torso. Then he went red. “You have no right to talk that way to me-”

“You stupid- here, look.” The Ghosthound flipped his hand around and beckoned. Almost of its own accord, Johann’s body walked toward him. Her boss’s eyes bulged, evidencing his shock and fear as he approached. Jane could see sweat glistening on the back of his neck as he kneeled in front of the Ghosthound, who reached out and tapped a finger to his chest.

Dummmm.

That light touch resonated in Jane’s bones.

“You- what?!” Johann collapsed, beginning to cough.

The Ghosthound made a graceful gesture with his long fingers. A strange brown liquid flowed out of Johann’s nose and mouth. He gathered it into a ball, floating above his pointer finger. “You are being dosed with a nasty sort of Skill to make you addicted to something. And suggestable. And it would instill a certain sort of admiration in you toward the original user. See? All this trash was in your body. You agreed to have it within you, or else it wouldn’t have penetrated so deeply.”

The Ghosthound flicked his hand sideways, sending the brown liquid splashing on some of the plants growing on the wall. When touched by the strange liquid, most of the leaves began to wither and curl. Johann could barely breathe, let alone speak, as the Ghosthound leaned back in his chair. The coughing fit continued to stretch.

The Ghosthound’s face stiffened for a second time. Suddenly, his green eyes looked gleeful as he looked down at the heaving body of Johann. “Is this sort of favor acceptable as payment?”

His words echoed with a much more sinister question: how much cash is your life worth?

*****

Tatiana looked up and then beamed at him as he stepped out of the portal, lease in hand. “Oh my, what a pleasant surprise. You actually came back twenty minutes early.”

Randidly rolled his eyes. “Am I really that unreliable?”

“Undoubtedly,” Tatiana answered with mock seriousness. Then she offered Randidly a playful curtsy. “After you. We have a tournament to watch.”

When Randidly walked out of the preparation box and onto their dais above the arena, the crowd noise rose like the tide beneath him. Complex webs of Nether spun in the air, churning around his person in a grand pattern. The current of the present swept so much of history into its urgent pull. Even Randidly’s Nether Core hummed in sympathy to the rising tension that came over the arena.

Once Randidly and Tatiana were in their seats, the two competitors walked out onto the arena. The howls for Alana Donal were deafening; she was definitely the home favorite. Yet the pressure released by Kimpap silenced the crowd somewhat, forcing their jeers to recede before her presence.

Right before the end, she looked up at Randidly with sharp eyes, as though to ask if he truly wished for her to go through with this and utilize her full power to win.

Randidly just chuckled. “For the first match of the quarter-finals… Alana versus Kimpap!”