100X Returns: Starting with 1,000,000 System Points

Chapter 38: Chapter 38: Getting Closer

The idea came to me three days later, turning over Jones’s earlier observation about the operation’s careful recruitment pattern — desperate people, offered vague but generous work, approached individually rather than through any obvious public channel.

My own cover is perfect for exactly that kind of approach, I realized, the thought settling with the same cold clarity that had once pushed me toward Shadowfang’s sealed chamber despite every warning sign. An unremarkable F-rank adventurer, modest quest history, nothing that would obviously mark me as anything more than ordinary. If I made myself visibly available, desperate enough for coin to seem plausible—

I brought the idea to Jones, who received it with immediate, visible reluctance.

"Infiltration," he said flatly. "You want to present yourself as a potential recruit."

"It’s the fastest way to get inside without a frontal assault that risks the captives already being held there," I said. "Surveillance tells us the building’s layout and rough headcount. It doesn’t tell us where they’re keeping the people they’ve already taken, or how quickly those captives might be moved or harmed if we simply break the door down."

Jones was quiet a long moment, weighing the risk with the same careful deliberation he applied to everything. "If they see through the deception," he said finally, "you’d be walking into an unknown number of hostiles, alone, with no immediate backup close enough to intervene."

"I’ve survived worse odds," I said, thinking of the orc’s charge, the guardian knight’s blade, Shadowfang’s collapsing depths. "And my registered tier means they’d have no reason to suspect I’m anything beyond what I present."

"That’s exactly the argument that makes me nervous," Jones said. "You keep proving your registered tier means nothing about your actual capability. Which means I have no honest way to judge how much danger you’re actually walking into, versus how much you’re simply confident you can handle."

"Then trust the instincts that found this lead in the first place," I said. "I won’t do anything reckless. Just get inside, confirm what’s happening to the people they’ve taken, and get back out with enough information for a proper, coordinated response."

Jones studied me a long moment longer before finally, grudgingly, nodding. "One attempt. If anything feels wrong — anything at all — you abort and get out. I’ll have people positioned nearby, close enough to intervene if you signal trouble, though God knows how you’d manage that from inside without blowing your cover entirely."

"I’ll manage," I said, with more confidence than I entirely felt.

◆ ◆ ◆

Before committing to the plan, I spent a final evening in my domain preparing in the quiet, deliberate way I’d learned mattered as much as raw capability. I reviewed my Status carefully, weighing which skills might prove useful in a confined, deceptive infiltration rather than open combat.

Sharp Soul Perception, obviously — my best tool for reading a room’s true shape without obviously appearing to look. Controlled Berserker State and Focused Qi Detonation both felt wrong for this kind of work, too loud, too destructive for a situation that demanded patience over force. My swordsmanship, hopefully, would remain unnecessary entirely, a last resort rather than a first option.

I considered, briefly, whether Absolute Appraisal’s reach might extend usefully to reading masked figures themselves, the way it had read Alphina’s own hidden talent in that boar-guarded clearing weeks ago. If I could appraise a captor’s rank or capability at a glance, it would tell me considerably more about what I was actually walking into than surface observation alone could manage.

I also spent a portion of that evening finally purchasing something I’d been putting off since Jones first raised the question of a signal — a modest tracking charm from the Shop’s catalog, small enough to conceal easily, keyed to activate only on deliberate intent rather than passive detection that might betray itself to anyone searching me.

[Concealed Signal Ward — 2,000 pts]

A discreet enchantment allowing the user to transmit a location-based distress signal to a pre-designated recipient, activated through focused intent. Designed for minimal magical signature, resistant to casual detection.

[200,000 Points refunded via 100x Rebate.]

[Effect upgraded: Sovereign Signal Ward — near-total resistance to detection, extended range, additional one-way status confirmation transmitted alongside location.]

I tucked the resulting charm — a small, unremarkable stone, cool to the touch — into a hidden seam of the plain traveling clothes I intended to wear rather than the Voidthread Raiment, unwilling to risk anything that might draw a trained eye’s attention during the transport itself. Jones would know, roughly, where I was and whether I remained unharmed, without any masked captor having reason to suspect I carried anything beyond the desperate, ordinary belongings of a genuine prospect.

I delivered the ward’s twin to Jones the following morning, watching him turn the small, matching stone over with careful curiosity.

"This will tell me you’re alive and roughly where you are," he confirmed, "but nothing more detailed than that."

"It’s enough," I said. "If something goes badly wrong, at least you’ll know to come looking, and roughly where to start."

"Small comfort," Jones said, though he pocketed the stone with obvious care regardless. "I’ll have a small, discreet team ready to move the moment I get any signal suggesting trouble. Try not to need them."

"I’ll do my best," I said, and meant it, turning my attention now fully toward that evening’s approach in the lower market district, and the careful, deliberate performance of desperation I’d need to sustain until the trafficking network’s own recruiter came looking, exactly as Poll’s earlier description and my own careful observation suggested he eventually would.

◆ ◆ ◆

I spent the following evening deliberately visible in the lower market district, playing the part of a struggling, desperate adventurer with careful, understated conviction — mentioning, within earshot of the right kind of loitering figures, financial troubles that didn’t exist, frustration with meager Guild quest pay, the particular restless dissatisfaction that made someone an appealing target for exactly the kind of vague, generous offer the recruiter specialized in.

The approach came faster than I expected, a different masked figure this time — no, not masked yet, I realized, studying the well-dressed stranger who settled uninvited into the seat across from me at a modest tavern considerably less shabby than the Salted Anchor. Younger than the original recruiter, but carrying the same unhurried, practiced confidence.

"Rough week?" he asked, without preamble, in the tone of a man who’d opened this exact conversation dozens of times before.

"Rougher month," I said, keeping my expression carefully weary. "Quest board’s dried up, coin’s tighter than I’d like."

"I might know of something," he said, leaning in with the confiding ease of someone offering a genuine favor rather than a calculated trap. "Steady work, better pay than Guild quests typically offer. Discreet, though — the kind of arrangement that doesn’t suit public postings."

"Discreet how?"

"Private employer, prefers to vet prospects personally before discussing specifics." He studied me with the same assessing thoroughness Alphina had first shown in that boar-guarded clearing, though considerably colder, more transactional. "You interested?"

I let a carefully calculated hesitation show, the same measured caution I imagined a genuinely desperate stranger might display before finally, deliberately, nodding.

"I’m interested," I said, and felt the trap’s jaws settle quietly, deliberately, around my own willing participation.

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