Zaltis Vorn blinked. Not in surprise, for surprise was an active emotion requiring effort, but in a slow, almost languid acknowledgment of the impossible. The colossal, flayed hand, raw and scaled, held the blade steady—a relic of black metal tipped with a cut void-diamond that pulsed like trapped lightning.
“The… head of greens?” Zaltis drawled, barely stirring the dust. He did not shift in his wicker seat, letting its gentle sway bring his nose toward the claw. He pointed one languid finger toward the oversized crop still rooted beside his porch. “You want *this*?”
A sound, like boulders grinding together under immense pressure, emanated from the darkness above the claw. It was a guttural boom, a sound that could only mean yes. The claw dipped infinitesimally, a silent nod of terrifying import.
Zaltis exhaled, long and put-upon. “Of course you do. Everyone wants the produce.” He tilted his chin, cold interest stirring behind his heavy lids. “And you’re offering *this*? A bit steep for dinner, wouldn’t you say? Even one of mine.”
The grinding reverberation sounded again, sharp with impatience. Vorgath the Flayed, the sentient horror of the floor, was haggling over garden greens. The absurdity nearly twitched the corners of his mouth.
“Fine,” Zaltis mumbled. He raised his hand, the small, almost imperceptible arcane sigils etched into his palm flaring with a faint, amber light. His focus drifted past the talons to the bioluminescent brassica. The passive interface of the Ziggurat responded instantly, its cold, impartial text shimmering into existence before his eyes.
[QUERY: Identify Crop Value. Target: Verdant Heart Cabbage, strain: ‘Umbral Bloom’ (Mature, Prime Grade, Loom-Infused).]
[RESPONSE: Valuing ‘Umbral Bloom’ Cabbage. Base Nutritional Properties: Enhanced Vitality Regeneration (Tier 7), Minor Arcane Amplification (Tier 4). Mutation Analysis: ‘Null-Void Stability’ (Unique, 100% potency).]
[ESTIMATED MARKET VALUE: 2,750,000 Guilders (Standard Ziggurat Currency).]
Zaltis’s left eyebrow twitched. Two point seven five million. For one leaf-bundle. It was enough to purchase a frontier syndicate or finance an expeditionary force for a full cycle. Poured into surface trade, it would snap the marrow of the medicine cartels run by the Onyx Heralds—the very cabal that had thrown him down here. A thin, razored grin crept over Zaltis’s mouth.
“Well,” he murmured, the words laced with a newfound, subtle venom. “Looks like you have taste, Vorgath. This isn’t common roughage.” He leaned back, the slats creaking beneath his spine. “But I’m not standing up. And I’m certainly not handling *that*.” He flicked a hand at the ancient weapon. “Far too much effort to scrub grease off my knuckles.”
The cavern floor groaned beneath them like shifting tectonic plates. Vorgath seemed to understand. Zaltis wasn’t rejecting the trade; he was simply making it… convenient. For himself.
“Right then,” Zaltis announced, leaning sideways just enough to reach the brass toggles and carved glyphs inset into his chair arm. “Time to automate.”
He spent the next three hours, with Puddle occasionally misting a fine, corrosive spray over a particularly stubborn rock, constructing a ridiculously convoluted mechanism. It involved levitation runes, a perpetually spinning magnetic field, a series of intricately carved wooden gears that whirred with arcane energy, and a miniature, self-righting basalt tray. All of it was linked, through a network of humming, crystalline conduits, back to a single, worn, wooden button on his armrest. The mechanism was an enchanted carousel configured to spin precisely one half-turn, swapping loads without requiring him to lift his hip or, gods forbid, stand.
Vorgath the Flayed watched the entire process with unnerving stillness, its massive, unblinking eye-sockets fixed on Zaltis with an intensity that would have withered lesser men. The black halberd rested motionless in the monster's grip, seeping chill fog.
Finally, Zaltis leaned back, a faint sheen of sweat on his brow from the *mental* exertion. “Alright, Vorgath. Your turn.” He tapped one side of the circular basalt tray. “Place the… rent… here.”
With a slow, deliberate motion that somehow conveyed a deep, agonizing patience, Vorgath’s claw extended further. It lowered the war-scythe onto the designated marker. The basalt tray barely dipped, the suspension spells whining louder to bear the load.
Zaltis grinned, a flicker of genuine, spiteful joy in his eyes. He leaned over the railing, snipped the glowing Umbral Bloom stem with a quick thread of force, and set the crop on the opposite ledge. He then pushed the button on his armrest.
The basalt disk hummed, rotating with measured steadiness until the polearm swung to Zaltis’s hip and the leafy payload glided toward the pit. The beast let out a vibration of pure gluttony that rattled Zaltis’s molar teeth. It pinched the head of leaves as gently as blown glass, then pulled back into the depths, leaving behind a smooth, steaming sinkhole.
Zaltis let out a long, contented sigh. “Puddle, darling,” he cooed, “we’re rich. Again.” He nudged the void-forged polearm with his heel. “And we acquired a new paperweight.”
Just as he was contemplating a nap, the sky-lit cavern *rippled*. Not the ground, but the very air above him, as if a tear had formed in the fabric of reality itself. A sudden, sharp crack echoed, followed by a rush of displaced air, and then a figure tumbled through the shimmering tear, landing with a distinctly undignified *THUD* in the soft volcanic soil not twenty paces from Zaltis’s porch.
It was Juroq. Smudged with soot and crusty goblin bile, the runner shoved himself off the damp silt. He froze, taking in Zaltis slumped in the seat, a divine arming weapon leaning against the wicker, and the smoking rift where a floor tyrant had just fed.
“Zaltis?” Juroq wheezed. “You’re breathing? The Onyx Heralds swore they smeared you over floor seventy-three!” His stare bounced between the porch, the steaming pit, the dark steel, and the calm garden patch.
“A minor miscalculation on their part,” Zaltis said, waving a dismissive hand. “I’m farming now. It’s less strenuous than dying.”
Juroq stumbled closer, gawking at the swelling flora. “Farming? Here? What in the Ancestors’ names was that thing?” He aimed a trembling finger at the abyss.
“That was Vorgath,” Zaltis replied, lifting the war-scythe with two fingers to test its balance. “He pays board in steel. He prefers my brassicas to wandering paladins.”
Juroq stared at a neighboring plot where another violet-veined shoot was unfurling. “Crops?” he repeated, voice cracking. “What kind of vegetable earns ancient weaponry from the zone boss?”
Zaltis sighed, leaning his temples against the timber frame. “Don’t stand there like a struck calf. Sit.” He nodded toward a wooden bin. “Look at the appraisal yourself.” He touched his brow, casting the Loom's readout into the air between them.
Juroq locked onto the floating script. His throat clicked as air locked in his chest. His fingers curled, nails pressing into his palms, before going slack.
“Two point seven five million,” Juroq whispered, his skin turning gray. He looked up, staring into Zaltis’s flat face. “Zaltis… the Heralds just monopolized the surface healing trade. One crate of these will bankrupt every cartel in the capital.”