Kai's boots crunched softly against the gravel of Delta-Rho's cracked canyon floor. The air smelled faintly of ozone and ash. All around him, torch-lit tunnels shimmered with floating specs of raw mana dust—fine, bluish particles so reactive that even a breath could ignite them in volatile pockets.
A realm buried in ruin.A people cut off.And now… his market.
The miners regarded him warily. A few of them carried makeshift weapons—old plasma axes, crystal-tipped spears, things fashioned from salvage. Yet none of them stepped forward.
Until she did.
The silver-eyed woman who'd greeted him before. She wore a jacket made from salvaged void-beast leather, with sigils burned into the sleeves.
"Name's Lyra Vane," she said, extending a gloved hand. "Chief Miner. Or… what's left of one."
Kai shook it firmly. "Kai Thorne. Trader. One-of-a-kind."
"You sure picked the worst pit in the cosmos to pop into."
"Or the most valuable one," he said, eyeing the dancing threads of blue in the walls. "You're sitting on a goldmine. You just don't have buyers."
Her smirk faded.
"That dust isn't just valuable," she said. "It's cursed. The last traders who tried to mine it lost their minds. The Realm Churn here twists people."
Kai frowned slightly. "But you're still alive."
"Because we don't harvest it raw anymore. We scrape, store, and pray."
He liked her already. Smart. Grounded. Suspicious.
Perfect business material.
Building Trust: The First Trade
Kai reached into his dimensional pouch and withdrew a small chrome case. Inside: Refined Star-Steel, a lightweight alloy used to craft stabilizers, weapons, and even armor linings.
"I'll trade this," he said. "Five kilos. Pure. No Chain markings."
Lyra raised an eyebrow. "In exchange for what?"
"A kilo of dust. Unrefined. I want to test it. See if my tech can neutralize the Churn."
She hesitated. "You want to risk going mad?"
Kai grinned. "Madness is part of my business plan."
Eventually, she relented.
They made the swap, sealed in presence of a spectral miner-witness—some half-ghost tethered by old contracts and realm decay.
The moment the mana dust hit his containment pod, Kai's system pinged:
"Unidentified Energy Source Detected"Processing...New Material Added: Primal Aether ResidueMarket Value (Raw): 64 C.U./gramEstimated Value (Refined): 310 C.U./gram
Kai blinked.
310 C.U. per gram.A kilo = 310,000 C.U.
He checked his pod again. One kilo sat inside. Pure, humming faintly.
No madness. No distortion.
His containment matrix had worked.
He could corner an entire realm's market with one stabilizing protocol.
Kai turned to Lyra, tone casual.
"I'll take ten more kilos," he said.
Her eyes narrowed. "You get one. For now."
He nodded. Fair.
But inside, Kai's mind was racing.
This wasn't just a trade.
This was the beginning of an exclusive resource monopoly.
Yena's Update from Zeta-12
Back on Zeta-12, Yena managed the Mirage Market in his absence. Through Echo's dual-connection channel, her voice pinged in.
"You've gone silent for a full day. Is Delta-Rho hostile?"
Kai sent her the figures.
There was a pause.
Then: "You son of a star-witch… You found a realm-grade resource?"
"More than that," Kai said. "I think I just became the only trader in existence who can extract it safely."
Yena was silent again, then sighed. "I'm ordering more containment pods. If you're right, we're going to need bigger storage—and offsite vaults."
"Also," Kai added, "start putting out quiet feelers. We'll call it something exotic. Give it mystique. I want this dust on elite trader radars."
She smirked. "You want rumors."
"I want demand," he replied.
The Investment Begins
Kai spent the rest of the day working with Lyra to set up a formal exchange post—basic but clean. He offered her workers tools, food supplements, medicine from Zeta-12, and trade tokens they could use later.
In return, he took raw mana dust in small batches.
No one suspected the true value yet.
No one except Kai.
Current Status:
Kai has successfully established a temporary outpost in Delta-Rho, gaining exclusive access to a rare energy resource known as Primal Aether Residue. His system identifies its refined value as astronomically high—making it the single most profitable trade route he's found so far.
Using high-grade containment, he bypasses the mental corruption the dust usually causes. If he keeps his methods secret, he could control supply and pricing across multiple realms.
He now stands at:Cosmic Units: 2,112.2 C.U. (including the estimated value of current dust inventory)Earth Credits: 1,337.1Trade Skill Tier: Rank 4 (Chrono-Capable Ascendant Trader)Territory Owned:
Zeta-12 / Mirage Market
Delta-Rho (Outpost Active)Passive Income Stream: +73.2 C.U. per dayCommodity Secured: Primal Aether Residue (10kg)Competitive Status: Unmatched in Aether Dust Stabilization
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— S.A.