An alarm went off, one only he could hear.
One of his detection discs had been tripped. Kirias bolted upright, his charcoal robes flashing onto his body in a shimmer of mana before his feet even hit the floor. He didn't need to search for the threat, he sensed the intruder instantly. Through the dim moonlight filtering into the room, he saw the silhouette of a lizardman crouched on the sill, his clawed hand just seconds away from shattering the window latch.
A veil of invisibility draped over Kirias the exact moment the intruder's feet touched the floorboards.
The lizardman froze, his eyes darting around the dim room in confusion. He had clearly expected to find a sleeping target, but the bed was empty. Before he could even think of retreating back through the window, Kirias struck.
An invisible force clamped over the intruder's eyes like a blindfold, and a crushing weight slammed into his shoulders. The lizardman was forced to his knees, his limbs locked in place and his jaw sealed shut. He sat there, petrified and trembling, unable to utter a single sound as the silent room swallowed his terror.
Kirias maintained his invisibility, leaning down until his lips were inches from the lizardman's ear. His voice was a cold, distorted ghost of a whisper. "Who sent you?"
The answer came in terrified fragments. The intruder hadn't been sent by a guild or a rival; he was a common street-eye who had seen a "high-status elf" walking with the grace of the upper class through the mud of the lower district. Seeing Kirias exit the Iron Scale headquarters had been the confirmation—he was a walking bag of gold.
Kirias felt a flash of self-reproach. An amateur mistake, he had been so focused on the technicalities of the coin and the glass-making process that he'd forgotten his own appearance screamed wealth.
He didn't waste any more time. With a precise flick of his fingers, he sent a surge of mana into the lizardman's mind, neatly removing the memories of the last hour. The intruder's eyes rolled back as he lost consciousness. Acting quickly, Kirias levitated the limp body, floated it out the window, and deposited it gently on the cobblestones of the dark alleyway below. By the time the man woke up, he would remember nothing but a heavy night of drinking.
Kirias sighed, his fingers tracing a pattern in the air as he magically restored the window to its original state. The latch clicked back into place, as if it had never been tampered with. He checked the time: 3:23 AM.
The time in this world was one of the few things that remained familiar. He knew the hour thanks to a stolen magical artifact—a smooth, palm-sized stone that displayed glowing numerals when a physical button was pressed. During his examination of the local loot, he had noticed that these artifacts possessed a unique property: they could passively absorb ambient mana from the environment without blowing up. He hadn't yet incorporated that kind of stability into his own magitech. Understanding this principle would solve one of the biggest problems with the items he had brought along.
For now, however, he had more pressing problems to solve. He needed to move into his new home and begin scouting the city's infrastructure and defenses.
He went back to sleep. If there were any more attacks, he would deal with them the same way he had handled the other guy.
Kirias woke with the sunrise. The room was still, the air heavy with the smell of old wood and the lingering dampness of the lower district. He didn't rush. He moved with the deliberate precision of someone who had already calculated every minute of his morning.
He settled his tab with the innkeeper, paying the remaining silver without a word of complaint. He didn't offer an explanation for Flyn's absence, and the innkeeper, blinded by the sight of clear coin, didn't ask. He simply watched as the "elven scholar" walked out of the Blue Scale for the last time.
He returned to the guild headquarters. When he entered, the receptionist recognized him immediately, her professional mask softening into a brief, polite smile. Without needing to present his coin a second time, he was greeted as an expected guest.
She signaled for a guard, but rather than leading him toward the administrative offices, they headed deeper into the complex. They passed through heavy, reinforced doors into the guild's industrial wing, a sprawling space dedicated to the creation and testing of goods. The air here was warmer, humming with the low vibration of active furnaces and the sharp, metallic scent of heated stone.
In the heat of the workshop, Kirias stood before a group of veteran glassblowers. He didn't just perform the task in silence; he narrated part of the "science" behind it, speaking with the steady confidence of a scientist.
"The issue isn't your heat; it's the lack of a proper catalyst," he explained, gesturing toward the crucible. He described the way certain minerals interacted with the sand, acting as a "cleaning agent" that forced impurities to separate from the molten core. He spoke of "thermal equilibrium," explaining that if they didn't stabilize the temperature at a specific stage, the glass would trap air and cloud over.
He didn't dive into the complex equations or the molecular structures of his home world, such concepts would have been incomprehensible to them anyway. Instead, his rough explanation provided a new framework for the artisans to follow. He spoke of "impurities" and "thermal balance," giving names to the invisible forces they had struggled with for generations.
They watched the process in a heavy, focused silence as the substance melted, shifted, and eventually solidified. When the first batch was finally pulled, the artisans were no longer skeptics. They were students, and "Caldris" was the master of a process that was about to make the guild incredibly rich.
The Trade Master stood back, holding the cooled glass sample toward the light of the forge. He looked at the glass, then at the veteran artisans who were still murmuring in hushed, respectful tones.
"This changes everything," the Master declared, his voice carrying across the workshop. He turned to Kirias with a wide, predatory grin of a man who had just seen a mountain of gold. "Caldris, starting tomorrow, we are overhauling our entire production line. Every furnace in the guild will follow your method. You're going to be a very rich man."
Kirias offered a polite, measured nod.
As promised, a guild carriage was waiting at the front entrance. Kirias was escorted through the winding, cobbled streets of the upper district, where the buildings were taller and the guards more numerous. They pulled up to a gated stone residence, a small manor with a private courtyard and high, sturdy walls.
The guard handed him a heavy iron key and a sealed scroll containing the deed of occupancy. "The Master hopes this meets your standards, Master Caldris. It has been fully furnished, and the cellar has been reinforced for alchemical use, as you requested."
Kirias stepped inside and waited for the carriage to pull away. The silence of the manor was a sharp contrast to the grime and noise of the Blue Scale. He walked through the rooms, testing the locks and feeling the presence of the manor's wards. He'd need to study those later.
His eyes tracked the grand architecture of the nearby chapels and the fortified estates of the nobility. Then, his gaze hardened. A realization hit him—one so obvious he should have anticipated it from the start.
The Saintess wouldn't be staying in some remote temple or a common inn. When she arrived, she would be staying right here, in the heart of this district. He hadn't just moved into a position of wealth, he had moved himself directly into the path of the one person who was probably capable of seeing through his mask.