Alex staggered back to the shack, the new, faint lines around his eyes a terrifying receipt for the energy he had borrowed from his own future. He was physically and mentally shattered, but his mind, the accountant, knew the rules now. His survival depended on managing two distinct, yet interconnected, ledgers:
Ledger One: Life (Calories and Rest)
Currency: Food, rest, and water.
Purpose: Human survival. This currency prevents physical collapse and death from starvation/exhaustion. A healthy body creates a high threshold for the magic system, making it much harder for his natural Stillness supply to be depleted.
Crisis: He is facing immediate cellular bankruptcy and collapse. If he fails this ledger, he dies a mundane death.
Ledger Two: Power (Stillness)
Currency: Ambient Death Energy, acquired from concentrated sources (graves, decay, tragedy).
Purpose: Magic. It is the fuel for lending unnatural vigor.
Crisis: The Stillness tank is small. If he attempts to use his power when this tank is empty, he is forced to draw on his Biological Time, resulting in instant, irreversible aging.
His absolute, non-negotiable priority was to secure enough food to stop the physical collapse and create a threshold high enough that the Stillness tank never empties during minor movements.
The Scavenge for Clarity
Alex needed mental clarity for the upcoming negotiation. He couldn't risk using his own time to think.
He slipped out, using the inherent stillness of his near-dead state to move silently. The ambient cold led him to the tannery bins, where he found a tiny, discarded scrap of tallow—animal fat—greasy and repulsive, but pure energy. He forced it down.
The effect was instantaneous and purely mental. The sickening fog of starvation lifted. The anxiety of physical collapse retreated, replaced by the detached, clinical focus required for strategy. He now had the few precious minutes of clarity needed to face Theron.
The Utility Exchange
Alex moved back to the shack, his plan fixed: he would make himself too valuable to starve. He analyzed Theron's weakness—his inability to do the meticulous, fine-detail work required for high-margin small leather goods. Alex, the accountant, would trade his precision for calories. The negotiation for his life had begun.