Rumors always moved faster than armies.
They slipped through cracks in reality, rode merchant routes, hid in prayers, and clung to the whispers of scholars who stared too long at broken divination tools.
And now, every road—visible and invisible—was bending toward one place.
---
Garron had been cooking his entire life.
Not as a hobby.
Not as a luxury.
As survival.
He was born in a border town that changed rulers every few years. Armies came and went, taxes rose and fell, but one thing never changed—soldiers needed food.
A man who cooked well rarely starved.
Garron had cooked for mercenaries, nobles, and once, for a minor god who demanded his meals be seasoned "with sincerity."
That god had paid him with a strange blessing.
Garron could taste mana.
Not see it.
Not sense it.
Taste it.
So when he woke up one morning and smelled something that didn't belong to the world, he froze.
It wasn't meat.
It wasn't spices.
It was abundance.
Rich. Clean. Endless.
Mana so dense it coated the air like flavor.
Garron's hands trembled.
"This isn't natural," he whispered.
The scent had no direction.
It came from everywhere.
By sunset, Garron had packed his knives.
---
Selvine didn't believe in fate.
She believed in margins.
She was a merchant who dealt in rare goods—artifacts, herbs, information. If something could be priced, transported, or leveraged, she had sold it at least once.
So when her ledgers began behaving incorrectly, she knew something was wrong.
Trade routes shifted.
Not gradually.
Not logically.
Demand drained toward a single point that didn't exist on any map.
"No declared nation," Selvine muttered. "No tolls. No tariffs."
And yet profit flowed outward from that point.
Impossible.
She activated a divination contract she had sworn never to use again.
The answer burned into her mind.
House of Sin.
Selvine exhaled slowly.
She packed her best wares.
---
Professor Halric studied rules.
Not monsters.
Not heroes.
Rules.
He studied what happened when they failed.
So when five separate laws of reality simply stopped responding in one region, he felt sick.
"This isn't chaos," he whispered, staring at blank parchment.
Chaos left traces.
This left nothing.
As if the world itself refused to comment.
Halric closed his books.
For the first time in decades, he chose curiosity over safety.
---
Kael Verin sat on the edge of the couch, elbows resting on his knees.
He stared at the open space in front of him.
"This place feels empty," he said. "A city needs people."
Valer stiffened.
Lyenne's grip tightened on her staff.
Brun paused mid-step.
Mirex adjusted his gloves.
"They will come," Mirex said calmly.
Kael sighed. "I don't even know how to find them."
Lyenne shook her head. "You don't need to."
Kael frowned. "Why not?"
"They already feel this place."
Before Kael could respond, the air shifted.
---
Garron was walking down a mountain road.
Then he wasn't.
Stone replaced dirt. Clean air replaced wind.
Mana hit him like a wave.
His knees buckled.
Knives clattered to the floor.
"Oh," he breathed. "Oh no."
This wasn't a treasure ground.
This was a center.
Kael blinked. "Uh… hi?"
Garron snapped his head up.
A young man in simple clothes stood there.
No aura.
No pressure.
And yet the air itself listened to him.
Garron bowed so hard his forehead struck stone.
"I don't know who you are," he said quickly, "but I can cook."
Kael stared.
"…That's convenient."
Valer looked away.
---
The air rippled again.
Selvine appeared mid-step.
Her eyes widened instantly.
Not at power.
At stability.
Absolute economic equilibrium.
She dropped to one knee without thinking.
"This place," she whispered, "has no inflation."
Kael looked between her and Garron.
"…Is this a job interview?"
Mirex coughed softly.
Selvine raised her head. "Are you hiring?"
Kael hesitated. "I guess. I need help running things."
Selvine smiled slowly.
"Then you won't regret this."
---
Halric arrived last.
No kneeling.
No panic.
He simply looked.
And the longer he looked, the more afraid he became.
No contradictions.
No paradoxes.
Rules that didn't argue.
"This place enforces order without enforcement," he said.
Kael frowned. "Is that bad?"
Halric laughed shakily. "It's unprecedented."
---
Kael clapped his hands.
"If you're staying, we should talk about payment."
The word hit like thunder.
Garron swallowed.
Selvine's pupils dilated.
Halric leaned forward.
"Payment?" Selvine asked carefully.
"Yeah," Kael said. "I don't expect people to work for free."
Mirex closed his eyes.
Valer looked away.
Kael tapped the air. "System. Normal salary."
The interface flickered.
A number appeared.
Then a unit.
Selvine's breath stopped.
"That's not a salary," she whispered.
"That's a national treasury."
Kael frowned. "Is it?"
Mirex spoke carefully. "That unit stores refined origin energy."
Kael shrugged. "Sounds efficient."
Garron's hands shook.
"With one month of this," he whispered, "I could feed a kingdom."
"You won't need to," Kael said. "Food's free here."
Silence followed.
Selvine laughed softly.
"A place with free food, absolute safety, and a salary that rewrites economies."
She bowed her head.
"This city will never be empty."
Kael smiled, relieved.
"Good. I was worried no one would come."
---
Far away, a guildmaster dropped his cup.
A god paused mid-prayer.
A demon prince tore up a contract.
Three people had entered a place—
And had not returned.
---
Kael leaned back on the couch.
"Tomorrow," he said, "we figure out housing."
No one spoke.
Because tomorrow, the world would start knocking.