Boundless Chronicles

Chapter 25: Diverged Timelines, V

Silence returned to Tally's cramped pawnshop.

The damp smell of oil, yellowed tax ledgers, and stale mana-smoke filled Noël's nostrils. The liquid mercury floor and calcified glass monoliths of the Mirror Mesh were gone, replaced by worn wooden floorboards and stacks of rusted Aethelgard gear-teeth.

Gideon sheathed his silver rapier with a soft click. He looked at Noël's bloody palm, then at the golden Tribute notification hanging in the air, and let out an exhausted breath.

"You let yourself get stabbed just to lock its blade?" Gideon asked, shaking his head in disbelief. "Are you insane?"

Noël looked at his bandaged palm, then at the floating System window.

"It was the most efficient choice."

"Efficient?" Gideon muttered, leaning his back against a pile of dusty scrolls. "You traded a flesh wound against a Tier-1 Peak entity to force a three-second opening. Normal warriors do not calculate combat like that."

"Normal warriors die pretty early," Noël said flatly.

Gideon stared at him for a long moment, then let out a dry, defeated laugh. "I suppose they do."

Tiiiing!

[Main Trial #8 Settlement Complete!]

[Total Tribute Earned: 8,000 (Clear Reward) + 16,200 (Gallery Sponsorships)]

[Current Tribute: 50,400]

[Reward Item Acquired: Tier 1 Superior Skill Scroll: 'Void-Weaver's Tread']

Fifty thousand Tribute.

For a vagrant who had crossed the wasteland threshold at Tier 0 less than two hours ago, this was an absurd sum of wealth.

Suddenly, a loud, panicked squeak erupted from behind the counter.

"B-Boss! Boss!"

Tally flew out from beneath a stack of parchment, its small, ink-stained wings buzzing at maximum speed. Its brass monocle hung upside down, and its glassy blue eyes were wider than tea saucers.

"Look at the network board! Look at the metrics!" Tally shrieked, waving its tiny white gloves in the air.

A glowing blue administrative window materialized before them.

[Channel #809-Tally Metrics Report]

Category: Lower Gallery Regional Broadcast

Peak Concurrent Viewers: 3,420

Subscriber Increase: +1,280

Channel Ranking: #4 (Sector Three Regional Node)

System Evaluation: Outstanding Operational Recovery!

"Number four?!" Tally choked, clutching its chest. "A Grade 4 Junior Registrar node reached the top four in the eastern quadrant?! The Spire Auditors just cancelled my fine!"

Tiiiing!

[The Gallery-being 'The Auditor of Ash' has added Channel #809-Tally to its bookmarked feeds.]

[The Gallery-being 'The Crowned Ember' is aggressively demanding your next live broadcast.]

[The Gallery-being 'The Hollow Cartographer' has sent a formal invitation to catalog unmapped instances.]

Noël looked at the notifications without changing his expression.

Entities in the higher domains were bored. They didn't want to watch clean, textbook combat. They wanted to see low-tier vagrants manipulate System laws to kill things that should have erased them.

"Tally," Noël called out.

"Y-Yes, Boss!" Tally hovered at eye level, saluting frantically.

"Clear your desk. We need to allocate resources."

Noël pulled out the dark leather scroll he had received as a Trial clear reward, the Tier 1 Superior Skill Scroll: Void-Weaver's Tread.

Gideon walked over, his eyes narrowing as he read the glowing Aethelgard runes etched onto the parchment.

"A spatial movement skill?" Gideon asked, surprised. "In the Pathfinder Academy, a skill scroll like that would sell for twenty thousand Tribute at auction."

Noël unrolled the parchment.

[Skill Scroll: 'Void-Weaver's Tread' (Tier 1: Superior Grade)]

Details: An ancient movement technique developed by the Aethelgard Void-Weaver clan. Converts latent spatial friction into rapid short-range thrusts.

Requirement: Void-Weaver Bloodline (Awakened), Tier 1 Ether Capacity.

Would you like to learn this skill? (Y/N)

Noël pressed 'Y'.

Whooooosh!

The dark leather scroll dissolved into dark violet particles, flowing directly into his palms and surging up his arms into his soul grid.

[Skill 'Void-Weaver's Tread (Stage 1)' has been learned!]

[Skill Effect: Allows instantaneous short-range spatial steps within a 3-meter radius.]

[Ether Cost: 15 per activation.]

Noël took a single step forward.

Pft.

His body blurred instantly, reappearing three meters across the shop floor without producing a single sound. It was as if his frame had simply been erased from one coordinate and pasted onto another.

Gideon's hand twitched toward his sword hilt out of sheer reflex. "Zero acceleration phase? That's a spatial leap!"

"It's a basic mobility technique," Noël said, dusting off his coat.

"Now," he said, opening the System Store interface. "It's time to spend."

"Spend?" Gideon blinked. "You're spending all fifty thousand Tribute right now?"

"Tribute sitting in an account is useless data," Noël replied flatly. "In the Cataclysm Trials, unspent currency is just inheritance for the person who loots your corpse."

Noël rapidly tapped the blue interface buttons.

[Purchasing: 2x Tier-1 High-Density Ether Cartridges (4,000 Tribute)]

[Purchasing: 1x Attribute Advancement Catalyst: Strength & Agility (10,000 Tribute)]

[Distributing Remaining Tribute into Core Attributes...]

[Strength: 12 → 20]

[Agility: 14 → 22]

[Vitality: 10 → 18]

[Ether Capacity: 100 → 180]

[Total Tribute Remaining: 33,400]

A warm, dense surge of energy expanded from Noël's heart, reinforcing his bones and nerve pathways. The physical fatigue from his bandaged hand vanished as his Vitality stat increased, sealing the cut into a faint silver line.

Gideon watched the aura settle around Noël's body, his mouth slightly open. "Your physical pressure... it doubled in five seconds."

At that moment, the creaking wooden door of Tally's shop was kicked open.

Clang!

Lyra Thorne and Elara stepped inside, carrying heavy leather travel packs stuffed with supplies.

"Noël!" Lyra panted, her face flushed from running down the stone stairs. "We got the supplies, but something's wrong in the upper market!"

Noël turned to her. "What happened?"

"The Syndicate Inquisitors just entered Sector Three," Elara whispered nervously, clutching her spear shaft. "Inquisitor Malakor himself... he set up an administrative lockdown at the main hub. He's searching for the vagrants who audited their Vanguard Walker at the gate!"

Gideon's expression hardened instantly. "Malakor? The Warden of the Iron Tomb?"

Noël's left eye throbbed quietly beneath his eyelid.

Inquisitor Malakor. A Tier-3 Fanatic who borrowed the senses of anyone who spoke his name inside his jurisdiction.

In the 1st timeline, Malakor was the one who had thrown Noël into the Iron Tomb as penal labor.

Noël looked at his companions, checked the Chronometer of the Unseen Clerk inside his vest, and spoke calmly.

"Let him search."