The sun was low over the eastern wall when the scream cut across the dungeon square.
Not a battle cry or a vendor's pitch.
Raw and choked. A sound dragged out of someone who did not mean to make it.
Every conversation stopped.
A D-rank party staggered out of the main gate—four adventurers in dented armor streaked with dungeon filth, dragging something between them. One of them was crying and didn't seem to know it.
Not wounded. Not unconscious.
Dead.
They let the body drop near the gate arch. It hit the dirt with a weight that carried. His D-rank badge hung crooked over a torn tabard. His eyes were open. His lips were parted as if he had been about to say something and never finished.
There was no blood and no visible wound. The man was already stiffening.
Three months had passed since the guild's reluctant approval and the price increase. In that time, Stamina Bar EX had settled into predictability. Demand stabilized. Pricing adjustment held. Lines formed without shouting. Coin moved in steady, repeatable flows. Adventurers bought, ran, returned. They no longer debated whether it worked; they debated how many to carry.
The cart had become a fixture, a stop adventurers made before going below. It was routine.
Until this morning.
The placard stood upright:
STAMINA BAR EX LITE – FIFTEEN COPPER
GUILD APPROVED CONSUMABLE
LIMIT: TWO PER PERSON
The square did not erupt; it tightened.
The potion vendor lowered his vial slowly. The jerky vendor paused mid-slice, cleaver hovering over meat. The former F-rank trio stopped on their way to the gate and did not move again.
Near the cart, the black-haired girl stood still, one hand hovering near her pouch. Her jaw had set. She did not look at the body at first; she looked at the sign.
"He just—" one of the men who had carried him out choked. "He just went quiet."
"He was fine," another insisted, voice cracking. "Better than fine. We were clean. No panic. No mistakes."
Rumors spread faster than breath.
"He was eating those bars the whole run…"
"Stacked them."
"Lasted deeper than anyone in his rank…"
"Heart just stopped."
The Adventurers' Guild healers arrived within minutes, white tabards cutting through the crowd. They knelt without ceremony. Fingers to neck. Palm to chest. A diagnostic spell flickered briefly and faded.
The lead healer stood.
"Cardiac failure. Extreme strain. No poison traces. No curse markers."
The second healer added, louder this time, "Stamina depletion beyond recovery threshold."
The phrase landed hard.
Eyes turned—not to the dungeon, but to the cart.
A space opened around the cart without anyone meaning to create it. Not wide, not dramatic—just enough to mark distance. Buyers who had queued an hour earlier took half-steps back, as if heat radiated from the wood. No one spoke to him. No one stepped forward either. Suspicion did not need words; it needed only proximity. The square had decided where to look.
He did not move.
Big Mute stood behind him, arms at his sides, expression flat.
The men who had carried him out followed the crowd's gaze. One of them shook his head as if rejecting the direction of it. Another didn't.
***
The Al de Baran Alchemists' Guild runners forced a path through the thickening ring of bodies. Behind them walked the vice guild master.
She wore the blue-and-silver insignia without ornament, dark hair pulled tight at the nape of her neck. Her expression was composed, not cold—precise. The kind of face that measured before it judged.
She moved at a measured pace, back straight, unhurried in a way that asserted control.
The crowd parted because it knew how this worked.
She studied the body first. Then the sign. Then him.
"Little Smith," she said, voice calm but carrying, "a public inquiry will be convened. Immediately."
He reached beneath the counter and placed a wooden bar across the front of the cart, signaling it was closed.
That gesture carried farther than any protest would have.
***
Crates were stacked into a small platform near the gate. The body was covered with a plain cloak, but the shape beneath it held the square in place.
The vice guild master stepped up.
"This morning, an adventurer died in the dungeon. Cardiac failure under extreme strain. He consumed Stamina Bar EX LITE during the run."
She let the name sit in the air.
"The product was registered under The Al de Baran Alchemists' Guild authority, bearing our seal."
A ripple of uneasy murmurs spread.
"But it was never formally designated as guild approved."
The men who had carried him out surged forward.
"He felt unstoppable," one said. "We've never gone that deep without trouble. He refused to fall back."
Another pointed at the cart. "You said two was safe."
"I said limit, friend," he replied.
The man stared at him. "You knew what it does. It makes you think you can keep going. It makes you think you don't need to stop."
A third jabbed a finger toward the placard. "He trusted that seal."
A coin struck the side of the cart and fell into the dirt.
"Fraud!" someone shouted.
The voice came from somewhere in the back—no clear face, no clear source. It did not belong to the men who had carried him out.
"Stamina Bar EX pushes him past his limit. This is not food!" someone yelled. "How many more bodies?"
Heads turned, but no one could quite place who had spoken.
"Bring him before a tribunal! Let the court judge him in chains!"
At the word chains, Big Mute's weight shifted subtly, his stance widening by a fraction.
The word chains spread quickly.
The crowd pressed closer.
"Compensation," one of the men who had carried him out demanded, voice shaking but loud. "He died using your product. He should have walked out of here alive. His family loses because of this. You pay it."
"Blood coin," another spat. "You owe blood coin."
"You profited off the burn!"
"You sold us more than food!"
"You sold us permission to ignore the warning!"
Hands tightened around weapon grips. Someone shoved. Someone else shoved back.
Big Mute stepped forward once, not aggressive but clearly present. Without being told, he positioned himself between the crowd and him.
The square edged toward something ugly.
The healer tried again. "His heart ruptured under sustained peak output. It did not fail at rest."
"No—he ran because of that thing!"
"That bar kept him standing!"
"It kept him dying!"
The argument fractured into noise. Grief sharpened into accusation.
The vice guild master raised her hand.
The noise did not stop immediately. When it did, it did so unevenly.
The vice guild master continued, her voice controlled.
"No toxins. No curses. Extreme strain is confirmed. There is no evidence of contamination. The risk lies in how the product alters user behavior."
She stepped down from the crates and faced him directly.
"Little Smith, do you dispute the healer's findings?"
"No."
The answer came clean.
She looked toward the healers. "Any contamination?"
"None."
"Then the risk is behavioral. That is sufficient."
She faced the crowd once more.
"Effective immediately, sales of Stamina Bar EX and all variants are suspended pending review."
The announcement carried across the square.
A profitable operation had just been halted in public.
He did not react, and Big Mute did not move.
"Temporary suspension. Pending review."
The same unseen voice tried to rise again, but the vice guild master did not acknowledge it. The runners shifted position subtly, creating distance without force.
The hearing ended.
The body was lifted and carried toward the cremation yard without ceremony.
***
The square did not return to normal; it resumed with hesitation.
The potion vendor raised his voice quickly, too quickly. "Certified safety! Tested and stable! No speculation!"
The jerky vendor began chopping again, louder than necessary.
Adventurers spoke in lower tones. Some looked at the closed cart and then away. Others looked at it longer.
The black-haired girl remained where she was, studying him rather than accusing or defending him.
He tied down the canvas cover carefully, one knot after another, unhurried.
The men who had carried him out watched him. One seemed ready to lunge. Another held him back.
"Blood coin," someone muttered again, softer but persistent.
Whoever had started it blended back into the shifting bodies and was gone.
He secured the final knot.
Three months of steady growth—predictable flow and reliable demand—had been stopped in a single morning.
He picked up the cash tin.
Big Mute looked at him but asked no questions.
He stepped away from the cart and into the alleys behind the square, where the noise dulled but did not disappear.
He did not look back.
The words followed him anyway: fraud, compensation, chains, suspension.
The board is hostile. Non-viable outcome.