The silence in the scrapyard stretched, thick and heavy, long after the phantom's form had been swallowed by the fog. From the rusted-out cab of a derelict steam crane, a shadow deeper than the surrounding night detached itself and coalesced into a man.
Sett, the Rose Bishop, stood with the unnatural stillness of a predator who had learned patience through pain. His body still ached from the backlash of his encounter with Krieg and the Judge's Balancer. A hairline fracture of agony ran through his soul, a constant reminder of the Church's meddling and the rat who had led him into their path. His fine, tailored clothes were gone, replaced by the dark, practical wool of a laborer, but nothing could disguise the sharpness of his features or the fanatical fire in his eyes.
He had watched the man—the Marauder, the thief, the insolent gnat—with a cold, analytical fury. His initial impulse had been to simply reach out and turn the man's blood to boiling vinegar in his veins. A fitting, painful end. But he had stayed his hand. The thief's movements were too deliberate. The way he had stood in the center of the yard, exposed, was not the action of a careless man, but of a fisherman casting a line.
Cunning, Sett thought, his lips peeling back from his teeth in a silent snarl. Not like the usual gutter trash. He moves like he's reading from a script he wrote himself. But arrogance makes one blind to the larger garden in which they are but a single, wilting flower.
He had seen the man kneel. A flicker of disappointment had gone through him. Had the rat simply had a loose bootlace? Was this all a coincidence? But then he saw the small, folded square of paper left behind, weighted by a stone. A message. But for whom?
The moment the boy's presence had fully faded from his spiritual sense, Sett moved. He flowed down from the crane cab, his landing making no more sound than a falling leaf. He approached the note not with haste, but with a ritual slowness, his senses extended, probing for traps—both physical and mystical. He detected nothing but the faint, lingering spiritual residue of thief, a sensation like static electricity and stolen things.
He picked up the note, the paper cool between his fingers. He broke the blank seal and unfolded it. His eyes, capable of reading the subtlest shifts in mystical energy, scanned the words.
And the world turned red.
"…forged from the remains of your associates. They serve me with far greater distinction than they ever did you."
The words were not just an insult; they were a violation, a sacrilege. Jhin and Taric had been tools, yes, imperfect and ultimately failed ones, but they were his tools. Their characteristics, their very essence, were the property of the Aurora Order, resources to be reclaimed and reallocated. For this… this thief… to have not just taken them, but to have perverted them, to have named them like pets…
The names were a mockery of the sacred power the characteristics represented. A wave of pure, unadulterated rage, hot and black, washed over him. The air around him shimmered, the scent of ozone and rotting roses blooming briefly in the fog. The rust on the nearby machinery flaked and fell away, the metal beneath momentarily gleaming as if new before rapidly corroding again, succumbing to an accelerated entropy born of his fury.
He saw it then, in his mind's eye. The thief, in some hovel, using his thieving tricks to twist the glorious potential of the Hanged man and Demoness pathways into… into trinkets. It was an abomination. A desecration of the art.
His hand clenched, crumpling the edge of the paper. The civilized, calculating mask of the Bishop shattered, revealing the raw, chaotic zealot beneath. A low, guttural sound escaped his throat, a promise of violence that had no words.
"You think this is a game?" he whispered to the empty yard, his voice a rasp of broken glass and hatred. "You think your little tricks and your stolen baubles make you a player? You are a rat in the walls, chewing on the wires. You have not yet seen the fire that burns the house down."
He thought of the thief's refuge, the warehouse of the Harbor Vipers. A den of thugs and cutthroats. He imagined walking through the front door. He would not be subtle. He would let his aura flood the place, a tidal wave of corruption and blooming decay. He would make them watch as their flesh blossomed with cankers, as their bones grew soft and porous. He would find the Marauder, this 'Lutz Fischer,' and he would not kill him quickly. He would make a project of him. He would peel back the layers of his arrogance, his cunning, until there was nothing left but a screaming, broken understanding of what true power felt like.
"Just you wait, rat," he murmured, the words a sacred vow to the twisted god he served. "Savor your little victories. Polish your stolen toys. When I am restored, when this crack in my spirit is sealed, I will not simply hunt you. I will come for you. I will walk into your refuge as a plague walks into a city. I will pummel you inside your own home, surrounded by the men you call allies, and I will make you watch as I systematically unmake everything you have built before I unmake you."
He folded the note carefully, a blasphemous relic now, and tucked it into his pocket. It was no longer just a taunt; it was a warrant for annihilation. The boy had signed his own death sentence with his clever words.
The hunt was over. Now, it was a sentence waiting to be carried out. Sett turned and melted back into the shadows, a vessel of pure, focused hatred, moving to finish his healing. The phantom had won the night, but he had just ensured his own destruction would be bloody.
The fifth day did not dawn; it arrived like a verdict. A hard, grey light filtered through the warehouse windows, illuminating dust motes dancing over a scene of entrenched dread. The Vipers weren't just nervous anymore; they were hardening, like men waiting for a storm they knew would break them. Lutz Fischer welcomed the atmosphere. Fear was a solvent, and he was using it to dissolve the bonds of loyalty that held the Baron's empire together.
His morning ritual was more deliberate than ever. At his small table, he laid out his tools not of thievery, but of statecraft: his varied inks, his stolen papers, his collection of pens. Today's forgeries were not for peripheral clerks or street-level associates. Today, he was targeting the major arteries of the Viper's operation. He wrote with a chilling clarity, detailing the Baron's primary smuggling routes for Intisian brandy and Loenish firearms, complete with ship names, docking schedules, and the specific bribes paid to the harbor master's night-shift crew. He named the three lawyers on retainer who handled the gang's legitimate fronts and documented their methods of laundering coin through a series of shell companies and property acquisitions. This was the crown-jewel intelligence, the kind that could topple a small government, let alone a criminal enterprise.
He was done playing. The Church had proven its teeth; now he would give it the entire leg to chew on.
Along with the intelligence, he prepared his own gear. He got Creed in his pocket. The stiletto felt cold and hungry in his hand, its sleek, deadly lines a promise of final arguments. He felt the familiar, faint thrum of power from it—a slight sharpening of his senses, a potential for silver-tongued persuasion. He also felt the corresponding, baser pull in his gut: a heightened awareness of his own emptiness, a gnawing need for sustenance and sensation. It was a fair trade. Power always was.
He headed down to the main floor for breakfast. The usual gruel was being served, but few had an appetite for it. The men ate in silence, their eyes hollow. Lutz collected his bowl and found a spot near the wall, observing. He saw Karl speaking with a pair of enforcers, their expressions grim. They were likely discussing the new "protective" details for the lawyers and paymasters Lutz was just about to betray.
It was then that Peter found him, the boy's face a pale, anxious moon in the gloom. He slid onto the bench opposite Lutz, his hands trembling slightly.
"Lutz," he whispered, his voice strained. "It's bad. They took Hobbs the Fence last night. The one who handled the jewelry from the Upper Anchor jobs. The Church just… knew where he'd be. They knew everything."
Lutz feigned a grave expression, nodding slowly. "It's worse than I thought. The leak isn't just a leak; it's a flood." He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "Peter, I need you to do something for me. Something more important than anything you've done before."
The boy's eyes widened, the fear in them mingling with a desperate desire to be useful, to be the hero in this crumbling narrative. "Anything, i'll do it."
"I need you to be my eyes inside," Lutz said, his gaze intense. "I'm going to be out there, hunting this phantom, but I need to know what's happening here. A counter-strike, a consolidation. I need to know what they're saying, who they're talking to. If they're bringing in any new, heavy hitters. You're in the perfect position. No one notices a young, eager face. They talk around you."
He was weaponizing the boy's innocence, turning him into a perfectly placed spy against his own masters. It was a vile, beautiful piece of manipulation.
Peter swallowed hard, the weight of the request settling on his narrow shoulders. He was being asked to betray the inner sanctum. But he trusted Lutz. He saw him as the only competent man fighting a shadow war. "I… I can do that. I hear things. Richard was complaining this morning that the Baron is hoarding something in his office. That he's not spending it to bail people out or hire new muscle."
Lutz's interest sharpened, cutting through the artificial concern on his face. Hoarding something in his office. The hidden treasury. Peter had just independently confirmed its existence and its current state of lockdown. The boy was a gift that kept on giving.
"That's exactly the kind of thing I need to know, Peter," Lutz said, layring on the praise. "That's critical. You're not just helping me; you're helping every man in this warehouse who doesn't want to be the Baron's sacrificial lamb."
He was framing the ultimate betrayal as an act of loyalty to the rank and file. It was a masterstroke of psychological warfare. Peter's face firmed with resolve, the fear replaced by a sense of noble purpose.
"I won't let you down, Lutz. I'll find out everything."
"Good man," Lutz said, clapping him on the shoulder. "Now, act normal. You're just a loyal Viper, worried about the gang. You know nothing."
Peter nodded, his expression shifting back to one of generic anxiety, and slipped away to rejoin the others.
Lutz softened his grip on Creed, the instigation was done. He finished his tasteless gruel. The encounter had been more productive than he could have hoped. Not only was his unwitting agent now actively spying on the leadership, but he had received unsolicited confirmation of the treasury's status. The final piece of his heist was falling into place.
He stood, his bowl empty, his plan set. He moved through the somber warehouse, a ghost among the living dead, and slipped out the back entrance into the alley.