The sunlight was sharp against his eyes. Lucid blinked, the world swimming back into focus after the sudden vertigo had passed. He had wiped the blood from his nose, had smiled that hollow smile at Arthur, and now they were walking through the merchant district as if nothing had happened.
"No, I am not buying that," Lucid said.
Valen inched closer to his shoulder, nudging him, urging him to choose otherwise. "But look at the quality. It is immense. It can solve all our problems."
Arthur's eyes had managed to find their way to a new magazine as he stood beside Ayame behind both of them. Ayame's gaze was distant, but also acutely aware of their surroundings, her dark eyes tracking every person who passed within twenty feet.
"Hey Lucid, think about it. It is a good deal." Valen kept nudging him, putting his arm around Lucid's shoulder, dragging him, pulling at the hem of his clothes.
"I am not buying a fruit!" Lucid yelled finally, looking at the item in question. The seller was in front of a cart filled with delicious fruit, particularly a yellow fruit that resembled nothing from his home origin. It was golden, almost glowing, the skin smooth and waxy like something that had been polished by hands that cared too much.
"You gonna buy, kid?" the seller asked. He was a round man with a thick beard and thicker fingers, the kind of merchant who had been doing this long enough to know that persistence paid off.
Lucid looked back from the seller to Valen, now fully focused on him. The yellow-haired boy's golden eyes were wide with theatrical innocence. He was laying it on thick.
Lucid sighed.
He reached around his pocket, patting the worn fabric, searching for coins he knew were not there. His fingers brushed against the golden ring he still carried, the worthless thing from the fortune teller, and he remembered.
He had nothing. The queen had given him the sponsored mark. The Domain had taken everything else.
"Are you two just planning on sightseeing while not buying anything?" The seller's patience had run dry. "Now scram!"
Arthur yawned and flipped the man a silver chip. It spun through the air, glinting, and landed on the cart with a soft thunk. He glanced at Lucid, a look that said payments for later.
Lucid felt humiliated but also relieved. He had been moments away from begging.
"Yes!" Valen cheered, triumphant, a smug grin spreading across his face.
It had been a week since Valen and Lucid had exited the Domain through the seed rift. Lucid had gone out with Ayame, Arthur, and Valen to look for clues or apprehend any cultist members. After all, the four of them were surprisingly strong and efficient in their own way, though things had grown much weirder, much more disordered.
Not because they could not catch the cultists. Not because the wicked noblemen were using the Domain of Mercyros as a form of escape. Not even because the cultists seemed to have disappeared entirely.
No, it was something more than that. It seemed as if the whole town had gone weary. The bustling streets filled with laughter and sales were now dwindling. What had been a thriving district filled with merchants, dealers, and shops was now suddenly vanishing one by one.
"That is the fifth one we have seen," Arthur said.
Lucid quietly registered the observation as he held the golden fruit. It was heavier than it looked. Almost like the weight of a stone.
"Yeah. The whole place is going quiet now."
Arthur quickly shoved some barrels aside, pushing past cargo boxes as they came in front of a building. The wood was weathered, the door hanging slightly askew.
"Yeah, moreover it has to be because of that Domain. Mercyros is quite literally the Monolith of Commerce, appointed by Mother Alisia herself."
Lucid nodded in confirmation. He had briefly informed them about the domain. To their knowledge, it was not something that was supposed to exist here, at least not by any reasonable understanding. Monoliths were rare findings, and due to their sudden disappearance some time ago they had become practically mythical in nature.
Which was why Arthur had met the account with skepticism. Encountering a single Monolith was already the stuff of tall tales, but two of them was either a blatant fabrication, unparalleled luck, or something deeply unfortunate depending on how one chose to look at it.
He noticed the fruit hanging at the side of his right hand.
"Oh yeah by the way... why the fuck have we spent money on a fruit!?" Lucid yelled.
Arthur looked back at Valen. Ayame was behind them as well, as if she had just emerged from the shadows after covering twenty exits. Her ability to appear and disappear was starting to get unsettling.
Valen stood for a moment, his eyes closing, his face wearing an ingenuine, insincere smile, the kind street dealers used when trying to run you for money.
"Oh, that."
Lucid and Arthur leaned in, wanting to hear the answer.
"It's fish bait."
During the morning, Valen had pestered them about a golden thing that was supposedly of equal value to the relic Mercyros possessed. Well, that had led them to a cart full to the brim with golden exotic fruit that was surprisingly not expensive at all. The fruit was cheap. Suspiciously cheap.
"Huh... you could have just said we would go out fishing!" Lucid yelled back.
Lucid took the fruit and bit into it.
"I would not recommend that," Valen said under his breath.
Lucid immediately started throwing up. The taste was metallic, bitter, wrong in a way that made his stomach lurch as he doubled over, hands on his knees, retching onto the cobblestones.
"It is not edible. I told you it's Fish bait."
Arthur immediately hunched over, helping Lucid back up to his feet. His hand was firm on Lucid's shoulder.
Valen stood in front of the crumbling building. "Anyways. Is this the place?"
Lucid looked up from the ground. His eyes focused on the weathered door, the cracked windows, the sense of something lurking beneath the decay.
"Yeah."
He got up. It surprised Valen.
"Holy. Normally a bite like that is enough to send someone straight to the medics. You recovered in less than half a second."
Arthur took a slow step toward Valen. "And you let him eat that knowingly?"
Ayame stepped behind Valen as a silent threat, a promise of violence. Her presence was enough to make the air grow cold.
Valen squeaked. "Wait, wait, wait! I know your partner is immune to practically everything. I mean, he got crushed by Mercyros so many times. The times I thought he was nothing but a bloody pulp only for him to emerge again..."
Lucid gestured a hand. It was not the first time someone or something had tried to kill him. But that was not the main thing to focus focus on before him. He remembered this shed, tucked into the streets of Port Vexis under the pale golden sky. It was the place where he had discovered a painting with a woman looking at him, following his movement, pages where his name had been written again and again in a hasty manner. Also a painting of a lone, pale looking Oni woman under the moonlight holding the hand of a young man in torn rags with unclear facial features fleeing from blue guards in a blue forest.
Of course he remembered. He stepped inside, probably for what was the third time.
And discovered nothing.
He sighed.
"Did you expect something here?" Arthur came to stand beside him.
"No. Not much," Lucid replied.
They all wore questioned looks, except for Ayame, who wore her indifferent one.
As Lucid was about to turn away, he noticed a notebook lying on the ground. It was damaged but also intact. The leather cover was cracked, the pages yellowed, but the binding held.
Arthur and Valen were fighting amongst themselves for some unknown reason. Ayame had disappeared out of nowhere.
Lucid stepped inside the place fully. Immediately, he felt it. A golden vibrancy, a hue of the same twisted place of that Domain. The air shimmered at the edges. The light changed.
'How? But I do not even possess wealth...'
He looked around.
Ayame was frozen. Her hand was extended, reaching for something, but she did not move. Her eyes were open but unseeing like her eyes have lost focus.
Arthur was frozen. His mouth was open mid-word, his hand raised to gesture at something.
Valen was frozen. His golden eyes were locked on the blue haired knight.
Lucid did not pay much mind. He looked toward where the notebook had been. He took it. He opened it. He flipped a page until a name called out to him.
"Hey Lucid, we are going."
It was Arthur's voice. The golden hue was no longer there. He had been brought back to the real world.
'What in the...'
Could it be some access point that let him go through there? He could not tell. But normally you needed enough wealth to get there. There was the matter of a bell that rang every afternoon that seemed to activate the Domain's calling. He was not so sure anymore. The rules of entering the Domain of Mercyros were never clear. One said you needed wealth. Another said you needed potential wealth. And another said you needed to be in the right place at the right moment of time.
Well, considering the context, Lucid remembered how he had been trapped, fixated by the gaze of Celeste when he was in the town square.
Speaking of which. Celeste, the magistrate, had carried her duties like usual. She did not chase Lucid right after the Domain, nor did she continue to make her frequent visits. It was as if she had entirely forgotten their existence, he knew she was still the same person considering how the slums still operated more or less the same way, but Lucid doubted that things had gone well inside that Domain.
'She must have frozen.'
And the cultists. Well, there had not been any sign of them. But bodies appeared in the river Every three days, instead of one day.
And when Lucid arrived, accompanied by Arthur and Ayame, Valen was always there watching.
Something did not add up.
Suddenly sound broke through the quiet hum of the yellow ambient light, the yellow hue receded into a clear blue daylight. And shortly after sound came.
They walked.
He noticed that Arthur, Valen and Ayame walked a little further away from him, he caught up to them just in time.
'Weird...' He thought lazily.
As he walked he couldn't help but steal glances from behind where the shed stood. He had entered the domain by just stepping inside that shed.
Lucid had not noticed since he was deep in thought. They had exited the deeper part of the upper part of Port Vexis. The entire harbour stretched before them, now right next to the beach where he had landed after falling from the Domain.
"Well, strap on your life jacket. We are going on a fishing trip," Arthur said.
"Why?"
Arthur had a life jacket ready in his hands. Lucid caught it at the corner of his eyes, the bright orange fabric stark against the grey sky.
He sighed.