It’s the first time Zhang Xi truly furrows her brow. It isn’t anything explosive or theatrical. The change comes subtle, almost imperceptible, but enough to break the continuous serenity she’s carried since the moment she entered this room.

And the reason is obvious.

Silver Flow.

Even as a daughter guild, it’s the opposite of the Silver Fangs in nearly everything that matters. While the Silver Fangs preserve an image of order, healing, aid, and runic refinement, Silver Flow thrives in the chaos of the lower city. They’re opportunists, middlemen, dealers of information, specialists in turning any crisis into profit.

Legend says the discovery of the rune to clean the ducts came from some troublemaker in Silver Flow who tried to blow one of the ducts with a blood rune, drunk and with a cleaning deadline to meet.

Silver Flow is literally the black sheep of a family made up of three subsidiaries: Silver Flow, Explosive Wave, and Rapidots.

"Why did you choose us, of all guilds?" she asks at last. The smile that follows doesn’t match the sentence. "Do I look easy to you?"

"Not in the slightest." I rest my arm on the table, keeping my tone steady. "If anything, I barely know you. The plan existed before the arena even happened. But when I saw the Silver Fangs’ crest saving me in that Oathring... I remembered something."

She stays silent.

"You have the best runic mages in Azure Prime."

And that isn’t flattery. In my past life, Silver Flow dominated part of the market precisely because it inherited technical knowledge from the parent guild. Without the Silver Fangs’ runists, half their operations wouldn’t even function. Silver Flow won those mages over little by little, convincing them to abandon their leader and their ideals in exchange for wealth.

Zhang Xi tilts her head slightly.

"Explain it better." Her voice comes out low, almost meditative.

"The manual labor and infrastructure stay with your guild. I deliver the purification method. It’s a simple runic process, fast... twenty seconds per contaminated section. In exchange, the Silver Fangs keep thirty percent of every maintenance fee and all the Scales reclaimed from the city’s ducts."

She doesn’t react right away. But I notice the calculation happening behind her eyes.

Thirty percent of the OXI duct network, ducts that should be choked with the OXI sludge of Azure Prime, means more than just money. It’s a continuous river of it. Enough Scales to fund her orphanage for decades, expand facilities, hire protection, and still have surplus.

Of course... the ten percent promised to Zhang Xi would come out of my seventy percent share, not the guild’s. That turns the proposal into something even more absurd for her. She wouldn’t have to split it with the entire roster of the guild.

"The leader of the Silver Fangs is extremely cautious," she says after a few seconds. "Thirty percent is a high number, Dryden. He’ll ask why a Rank D needs our guild if he already has the method."

"Because I have another product to focus on."

I pull the small, nearly empty vial from my inventory and set it in the center of the table. The glass still holds amber residue from the LDP Potion. Under the bluish light of the room, the remaining liquid looks like liquid gold sliding down the inner walls.

"Besides... we’re four people with no political or military protection. And none of us is a runic mage."

Her eyes settle immediately on the container.

"You remember this potion, right? The one I used in the arena."

She nods slowly.

"Six hundred to seven hundred OXI points in a single gulp."

This time the interest becomes impossible for her to hide. Zhang Xi picks up the vial delicately, almost like someone holding a spiritual relic.

"May I?"

I nod slightly.

She tips the glass slowly over her tongue. Only two or three drops remain there, but it’s enough. The next instant, her expression changes. Her hand rises to her mouth in an involuntary reflex, and her eyes widen just slightly as the OXI and the taste run through her mouth and body, even if only faintly.

I continue before she can organize her thoughts.

"The Silver Fangs will be our first official client. On top of the thirty percent from the ducts, your guild gets a permanent ten percent discount on any batch of LDP."

She’s still looking at the vial.

"And what do you gain by cutting into your own profit?"

"Advertising."

I smile faintly.

"I want the Silver Fangs’ healers using this in the trenches. I want the duct cleaners working with it in front of the property owners. I want the market watching members of the most respected healing guild in Azure Prime run for hours without wrecking their stomachs on cheap OXI."

I rest my fingers on the table.

"The word of mouth from healers and runic mages is worth more than any commercial campaign. The moment they realize the Silver Fangs are working twice as hard without collapsing... and healing around fifty percent more on the battlefield, the demand explodes on its own."

The room falls quiet. Outside, I can hear the distant noise of the main street, metal carts rolling past and muffled voices drifting up from the inn. In here, though, it feels like we exist in another rhythm.

Zhang Xi studies the vial once more before lifting her eyes to me. Her serenity doesn’t vanish, but now I can see the strategist behind the monk.

She understands perfectly what I’m doing. I’m not just hiring a guild. I’m outsourcing influence, publicity, political legitimacy... and buying military protection in the same motion, all of it beneath the sheets.

"It’s an aggressive negotiation... and a cunning one," she murmurs.

"It’s a negotiation where no one loses... and everyone stays safe."

I hold her gaze for a few seconds.

"Can you convince the leader of the Silver Fangs?"

She stays motionless for a moment. Then she slowly unfolds her hands and brings them closer to the empty vial at the center of the table.

"I can arrange the meeting."

Her fingers touch the glass carefully again.

"But I’m gonna need two more vials like this one."