Chapter 347: Masks And Smoke [Bonus - ]
His mind rapidly analyzed her words, her rigid body language, and the sudden irrational spike in her aggression.
’Fuu... so complicated...’
He didn’t understand why she was so incredibly annoyed about Harper’s presence at his apartment, or why she was suddenly lashing out with such venom over a simple request to get some street food.
Her logic was flawed, built on incorrect assumptions about his relationship with the woman.
But his common sense quickly kicked in, overriding his immediate desire to argue.
Engaging in a screaming match with a stressed girl in the middle of a crowded undercity street was a terrible decision.
It would draw unwanted attention. It was clearly her own deeply personal issue, and pushing her on it would only make things exponentially worse.
Silas let out a slow sigh, deliberately dropping his dominant, intimidating aura.
He shoved his hands into his coat pockets.
"Well, sorry then," Silas told her calmly, keeping his voice neutral and devoid of anger. "I won’t bring it up again... Let’s just go meet him and get this over with so you can go back to your fortress."
He didn’t yell and he didn’t try to defend his honor against her wild accusations.
Would she even listen?
Evelyn stopped walking.
She stood frozen in the exact middle of the sidewalk, letting the dense crowds of masked people part and flow around her like water around a stone.
She slowly turned back to face him as she reached into her pocket with trembling fingers, pulling out her slim silver cigarette case and her trusted plasma lighter.
"Thank you..."
She popped a pristine white cigarette between her lips and struck the flame, taking a desperate drag that burned the paper halfway down in a single breath.
FWOOSH!
She puffed a thick cloud of gray smoke into the neon-lit air, her dark eyes looking up at Silas’s calm completely unaffected face.
He just looked tired.
’It’s not his fault...’ Evelyn thought with a crushing wave of guilt instantly washing over her chest. ’Why did I say that? Why am I acting like such a bitch to the guy who literally saved my best friend’s life?’
She looked down at her battered mud-stained combat boots, her throat tightening with sudden unshed emotion.
The honest ugly truth was that she didn’t care about Harper Whitmore. She didn’t care about his romantic life or how he funded his territory.
The real reason she had snapped, the exact reason she was so irrationally defensive about the Shogitown festival, was born from her own personal failures.
She had desperately wanted to take her younger brother here on several occasions.
For the past three years, ever since she had begun making real money in the Sovereign Realm and secured her position as a top-tier Lord, she had tried to bring him to the Moon Festival.
She wanted to buy him expensive food, win him cheap carnival prizes, and show him that his older sister could finally provide for him.
She wanted to share her success with the only family she had left.
But he had repeatedly refused. He never wanted to come with her for some reason.
He always pushed her away with flimsy excuses, preferring to spend his time studying or hanging out with his normal civilian college friends rather than the sister who was actively bleeding in wars just to pay his tuition fees.
It was something that quietly devastated her soul.
It pissed her off, but mostly, it just broke her heart. And seeing Silas... a good brother who clearly loved his sibling and just wanted to experience a simple nostalgic festival had violently triggered her own deep-seated inadequacies.
Evelyn let out a long shaky sigh with the lingering smoke curling softly around her messy black hair.
She looked up.
Across the narrow cobblestone street, illuminated warmly by a string of bright red paper lanterns, she spotted a small weathered wooden cart.
An elderly man with a kind face and a thick gray beard was actively arranging a vast impressive display of traditional undercity masks.
Evelyn made a rapid decision to mend the bridge she had just tried to burn.
’I’m a dumbass I know...’
She suddenly reached out, grabbing the thick fabric of Silas’s trench coat sleeve in a vice-like grip, and pulled him firmly toward the street crossing.
"We are going over there," Evelyn instructed with her voice completely losing its venomous edge, replaced by a forced neutrality.
"Why?" Silas asked, allowing himself to be dragged through the gap in the bustling traffic without resistance.
"Because we will definitely need masks for this whole thing," Evelyn explained with a whisper, pointing a slender finger at the wooden cart. "Shogitown is beautiful and lively on the main streets, but the underbelly where he operates is incredibly dangerous... There are spies, rival syndicate thugs, and high-tier bounty hunters everywhere. If they recognize us walking together in the open, we might be dragged into something we don’t want to be in."
Silas processed the sound tactical logic and nodded in agreement. "Fair point. Lead the way..."
They walked up to the brightly lit wooden stall.
The cart was covered from edge to edge in an impressive array of beautifully crafted masks.
They ranged from terrifying demonic faces with elongated fangs to elegant painted animal visages.
They were all forged from lightweight durable alloys, designed not just for festival aesthetics, but to withstand minor impacts in a street fight.
The elderly vendor looked up from his polishing cloth.
His wrinkled eyes crinkled into a massive welcoming smile as he took in the tall, devastatingly handsome teenager and the petite dark-haired girl holding onto his sleeve.
"Welcome, welcome!" the old man greeted them warmly, his voice raspy but full of vibrant life. "Please, take a look at my humble shop! I craft all of these by hand using salvaged scrap metal from the northern industrial forges."
He gestured proudly to the sprawling display.
"Pick whichever masks you want, kids," the vendor offered generously, winking conspiratorially at Silas. "It is completely on the house for such a beautiful striking couple like yourselves!"
Silas blinked in genuine surprise.
He reached into his coat pocket, fully intending to pull out his cash and pay the man a fair, generous price for his hard work and craftsmanship.
He had seventy-five million credits sitting in his digital bank account... he was not going to take charity from a hardworking street vendor trying to make a living.
"Thank you, sir, but I can pa—"
BUMP!
Evelyn violently slammed her hip directly into Silas’s side, cutting him off mid-sentence with a sharp bruising impact.
Silas grunted, looking down at her in bewilderment.
Evelyn was staring right back up into his eyes with an expression of intense determination.
’Are you stupid?!’ Evelyn’s dark eyes screamed at him silently, her glare practically piercing his skull. ’It is free stuff!’
Silas stared at her, genuinely struggling to comprehend the absurdity of her mindset.
How the hell could a multi-millionaire, a Lord who commanded an entire mechanical fortress and controlled massive offshore bank accounts, care so deeply about saving fifty credits on a street mask?
Her unrelenting stinginess was a psychological marvel that defied all known logic.
Evelyn didn’t wait for him to ruin the grift with his noble intentions.
She instantly wrapped her arms tightly around Silas’s muscular bicep, leaning her head affectionately against his broad shoulder.
She looked at the old man with a sickeningly sweet fabricated smile that radiated pure innocent adoration.
"Oh, you are far too kind, sir!" Evelyn chirped, completely altering her vocal pitch to sound like a sweet naive civilian girl. "We would love a pair of masks! We are actually out celebrating our anniversary today, and money has been a bit tight!"
Silas’s jaw tightened, his pride screaming in loud protest as he was dragged forcefully into her shameless petty con.
"Is that so?" the old man beamed, resting his calloused hands on the wooden cart. "Young love is a truly beautiful thing in this harsh unforgiving city. Are you two planning on tying the knot anytime soon?"
"We are eventually going to get married, yes," Evelyn lied flawlessly, squeezing Silas’s arm even tighter to silently warn him not to blow her cover. "He is saving up for a ring working brutal double shifts down at the shipping docks."
Silas felt a massive sweatdrop form on the back of his neck.
He was a Gold Core Lord who had literally just slaughtered an army on live television, and he was currently standing on a street corner pretending to be a broke overworked dockworker just so his companion could score free festival masks.
"Wonderful!" the old man clapped his hands together, his eyes shining with genuine heartfelt happiness. "I truly hope my own granddaughter can find a happy supportive relationship just like yours one day. Go ahead, choose any masks you like, dear. Take your time."
Evelyn instantly dropped the sweet innocent persona.
Her eyes hardened, scanning the vast cart with the ruthless efficiency of a quartermaster surveying an armory.
She selected two specific pieces, examining the alloy density and the strap mechanisms.
For Silas, she chose a dark gunmetal gray Oni mask.
It featured sharp, menacing silver fangs and jagged metallic horns that swept backward, perfectly matching his intimidating broad-shouldered aesthetic.
For herself, she selected a sleek predatory Kitsune mask. It was painted in stark, glossy white and deep crimson, with narrow angled eye slits that projected an unreadable aura.
They both slid the masks over their faces, securing the leather straps behind their heads.
The cool metal instantly conformed to their features, hiding their true identities behind the traditional undercity visages.
"Thank you, sir," Silas muttered through the Oni mask, feeling a deep lingering guilt about the daylight robbery they had just committed. "Have a good night."
They turned to merge back into the crowd, but the old man suddenly raised a weathered hand.
"Hold on a second, young lady," the vendor called out, his eyes narrowing slightly as he looked at the slim silver cigarette clamped tightly between Evelyn’s lips beneath the lower rim of her new mask.
Evelyn paused with her shoulders tensing.
She braced herself for the usual, exhausting lecture about the dangers of smoking and lung cancer that she received from almost every civilian she met on the street.
Instead, the old man leaned over the wooden counter, sniffing the air like a seasoned experienced connoisseur.
"That is a Silver-Leaf imported blend, isn’t it?" the vendor asked, looking thoroughly impressed by the aroma. "You have incredibly good taste for someone so young... But those mass-produced sticks burn a bit too fast in the heavy city humidity."
He reached beneath his wooden counter, rummaging around for a moment before pulling out a small beautifully carved wooden box.
He flipped the brass latch open, revealing a row of thick premium undercity cigars wrapped tightly in dark mana-infused leaves.
"Here," the old man offered generously, pulling one of the thick cigars out and holding it across the cart. "Take one of my personal stock... It’s a Black-Ash root blend. You can only get them down here in the deep sectors of Shogitown. It burns slow, tastes like dark roasted coffee, and calms the nerves instantly."
Evelyn’s dark eyes widened to comical proportions behind her Kitsune mask.
She practically drooled.
The premium sought-after Black-Ash tobacco was a legendary luxury among heavy smokers.
It was incredibly rare, fiercely expensive, and almost impossible to find outside of syndicate-controlled black markets.
Without a single second of hesitation, Evelyn literally opened her mouth and let her current half-smoked cigarette fall directly onto her own stomach.
The lit cherry bounced harmlessly off her heavy gray hoodie and landed with a quiet sizzle on the wet cobblestone pavement.
She lunged forward, grabbing the premium Black-Ash cigar from the old man’s hand with desperate speed, and immediately stuffed it securely into the deep zippered pocket of her cargo pants.
"Thank you!" Evelyn bowed respectfully, her voice filled with genuine, hell almost religious reverence.
Silas watched the entire exchange with absolute, unfiltered disgust.
In this world, smoking was legal as long as you possessed a verified city license, but Silas couldn’t stand the habit.
He possessed a Gold Core so his internal biology was refined to a state of near-perfection, meaning external toxins like nicotine or alcohol would burn out of his system before they could even affect his brain chemistry.
He literally couldn’t get a buzz if he tried.
’Still...’