Chapter 329: Bargain
Kael stared at the contract.
The paper sat on the counter like a trap that had learned calligraphy. Its borders were too ornate, its empty lines too eager, and the faint smell coming off it reminded him of burnt sugar and bad decisions. Baltak’s claw remained pressed against the top of the page, pinning it down as if it might crawl away if left unattended.
"We can always write up a contract, dear customer!" Baltak said.
Kael looked at the Porphyrite-Gloom Ore again.
The purple chunk sat beside the Malachor Jade Ingot, ugly and unrefined, with bits of black dirt still caught in its edges. It did not look like something worth ten thousand Vanity Shards. That was the annoying part. It looked like something someone had dug out of a cursed volcano and thrown into a sack after losing three workers and half a forge.
Which, from the lore, might not have been far from the truth.
"How bad is the contract?" Kael asked.
Yenna immediately turned to him. "Kael."
"What? I’m asking before signing. That’s growth."
"No, that is the first step of walking into a bear trap while complimenting the craftsmanship."
Baltak placed his other hand against his chest. "I offer only fair and lovingly predatory terms."
"That means bad," the honey badger said from Yenna’s hair.
Baltak smiled. "Ten percent interest each month."
Kael blinked.
"Ten percent total?"
"Each month."
"Of the original amount?"
"Of the overall owed amount," Baltak said, and his grin became sharper. "Interest should be alive, dear client. It must grow."
Yenna stared at Baltak as if she wanted to test her new sword on the counter first, then him. "That is robbery."
"It is financing."
"That is robbery with paperwork."
Baltak shrugged. "The best kind."
Kael rubbed his jaw.
Ten percent monthly interest inside Vanitas was not the same as ten percent outside. If this were Earth, he could maybe treat it as a terrible but manageable short-term loan with the right cash flow. In Vanitas, however, the problem was not money. It was access. He could not walk into this floor whenever he wanted. He could not guarantee when the Tower would invite him again. He could not guarantee he would be in a position to collect enough Vanity Shards the next time either.
Yenna saw the calculation forming behind his eyes.
"You do understand the issue, right?" she asked.
"That if I leave Vanitas, I might not come back for a long time."
"And even if you do come back, you need enough shards to pay him. Not cores. Not dollars. Not anything from Earth. Shards."
Kael’s brow twitched.
The contract suddenly looked less like a bad idea and more like a slow execution with flexible payment options.
If Vanitas did not invite him again soon, the debt would grow. If it grew too much, Baltak would no doubt find a way to collect. Merchants like him never offered contracts without teeth. Kael had enough problems without becoming the proud owner of demonic compound interest.
He pulled his hand away from the paper.
"No."
Baltak’s smile did not fade, but sadness entered it in the same way salt entered soup. Deliberately. "No?"
"No contract."
"A pity."
"I like my organs where they are."
"I never mentioned organs."
"That makes it worse."
Yenna nodded. "Good. You can still learn."
Kael looked back at the Porphyrite-Gloom Ore, then at his inventory.
He had materials. Junk. Monster pieces. Armature crystals. Shards. Cores. Iron Golem parts. The complete Corrupted Golem Core. If Baltak was willing to sell anything, he was probably willing to buy anything too, though Kael already expected to be insulted by the prices.
"What’s the price for some stuff I have?" Kael asked.
Baltak perked up immediately. "Selling now? Wonderful. A healthy market relationship has two directions."
"You mean you rob me coming and going."
"Symmetry is beautiful."
Kael began pulling out materials. Some metal parts from the creatures he killed.
Baltak glanced at them, clicked his tongue, and offered a price that made Kael wonder if murder inside a shop counted as poor etiquette. The Blind Armature weapon-limbs came next. Baltak found them mildly interesting, mostly for scrap and curse residue, but not enough to matter. Broken plates from Sector Two, bits of rusted chain, fused blade fragments, and several strange monster drops followed.
Baltak sorted through them with brisk, shameless efficiency.
"Most things from the first sectors are not worth the value you seek," he said. "Ten thousand shards is not a small number here. Not for early floors. You would need either rare Vanitas materials, intact cursed equipment, or something more special."
Kael paused.
Then slowly reached into his inventory.
The Corrupted Golem Core landed on the counter with a heavy thud.
Baltak stopped smiling.
Only for a second.
But Kael saw it.
Yenna saw it too.
The imp’s eyes sharpened, pupils narrowing as he leaned over the core, dark and dense, with rust-colored veins pulsing faintly under its surface. The thing still carried the weight of the Golem , not physically alone, but in the way it seemed to remember chains, impact, and repair.
Baltak tapped one claw against it.
"Ah," he said. "Now this is less boring. If only it was a stable one, those have value."
"How much?" Kael asked.
"Seven thousand Vanity Shards."
Kael stared at him.
Baltak stared back.
Yenna crossed her arms.
The honey badger emerged slightly. "Low."
Baltak’s grin returned. "Opinion."
"Low," Kael said.
"Unified opinion," the honey badger added.
Baltak spread his hands. "It is a damaged core from a lower-sector Reclaimer. Complete, yes, but not pristine. Extracted violently."
"That can be fixed." Kael pulls out his hammer and tapped the core lightly a few times, the small cracks and the rust peeled off immediately. It almost became shiny.
"How about now..."
"Slightly better..." Baltak was annoyed.
Kael placed one gauntleted finger on the counter. "It’s now whole and fixed. That means the core is stable. It’s not cracked, not drained, and not dead. You said stable cores have value."
Baltak’s eyes glittered. "Eight thousand."
"Nine thousand five hundred."
Baltak laughed. "You wound me."
"I’m trying to."
"Nine thousand."
"Nine thousand three hundred."
"Nine thousand."
Kael narrowed his eyes. "You didn’t move."
"I moved spiritually."
Yenna looked at Kael. "He won’t go higher."
Kael looked at Baltak.
Baltak smiled with the confidence of a creature who knew exactly how much greed could be applied before a customer walked away. Kael hated that he was probably right. The core was valuable, but Kael did not have enough time to find another buyer. Baltak controlled the counter, the inventory, and possibly the rules of this shop.
"Nine thousand," Kael said finally.
Baltak swept the core away before regret could form. "Sold."
Kael checked his shards again.
Still short.
One thousand.
He looked at the Porphyrite-Gloom Ore.
He could take a loan on the remaining thousand. It was smaller. Safer. Less likely to cripple him. Ten percent on a thousand was annoying, not catastrophic.
Unless he did not return for a year.
Unless Baltak’s contract had hidden clauses.
Unless the Tower decided it hated him more creatively than usual.
Kael’s brow twitched.
All is good, all is well.
Yenna sighed.
"I’ll cover the rest, if you really need this."
Kael looked at her. "You don’t have to."
"I know."
"That’s a lot of shards."
"I know."
"You were just warning me not to do something stupid."
"I still am," she said. "This is me choosing the less stupid version."
Kael looked at her for a long moment, then nodded.
"Then I’ll make sure to study well on runes," he said. "Enough to help you solve that problem of yours."
The honey badger’s eyes flicked toward him from Yenna’s hair.
Yenna placed the remaining shards on the counter. "You better."
Baltak looked between them, clearly enjoying the transaction more than he should. He took the shards, counted them with insulting speed, then slid the Porphyrite-Gloom Ore toward Kael.
"Full fee accepted."
With one claw, he tapped the contract.
The paper vanished.
"Heartbreaking," Baltak said. "A beautiful contract, left unsigned."
"Tragic," Kael said dryly.
Baltak chuckled. "You are a bit of a fool, you know."
Kael put the Porphyrite-Gloom Ore into his inventory with more care than he used for most things. "People keep saying that."
"Because it keeps being true," Yenna said.
Baltak pointed one claw at him. "You could have used that special map of yours to find even more extraordinary things on this floor. There are hidden caches, buried doors, drowned rooms, rare monster routes, and things that only show up if one is very unlucky or very profitable."
Yenna’s head turned sharply. "Special map?"
Kael froze for half a breath.
Then slowly looked at Baltak.
Baltak only shrugged, utterly unbothered by the fact that he had just thrown a secret onto the counter beside the merchandise.
"It’s pointless to hide it," the imp said. "His map is very unique. There is only one of them, as far as I know. Very helpful in finding stuff."
Yenna looked at Kael. "No wonder you were able to spot monsters when I couldn’t.
Kael looked at Baltak.
Baltak smiled.
Kael decided, for the sake of everyone’s health, not to punch the merchant inside his own shop.
"Done buying," Kael said.
"You say that now."
"I mean it."
"You said that last time too."
Yenna ignored the argument and turned back toward the list. "I still need supplies."
Kael stepped aside while she bought recovery potions. Several of them. Small glass vials filled with deep red liquid, pale blue liquid, and one ugly brown mixture that Baltak insisted was technically not poison if used correctly.
Yenna bought two.
Then her eyes paused on a piece of gear. But hesitation hit first.