By the time I get back to the main area of the Oathring, the afternoon is already coming apart over Azure Prime.
The light crosses the ocean sky in an orange tone, scattering reflections between the suspended structures and the city towers. Creatures swim above the stands, reduced to slow shadows against the brightness. They remind me of the conversation I had with Freya minutes ago, and a chill runs through me.
The arena still carries the marks of the battle, but almost no one pays attention to the workers replacing floor plates or the barrier runes being recalibrated.
The crowd has found another spectacle.
The commercial sector is surrounded.
Guards keep three separate lines, staff hand out small numbered markers, and an improvised barrier stops buyers from pushing in on the coach. Even so, I hear arguments break out every time someone tries to switch places or claims they were given an earlier number.
Leona’s voice crosses the area through an amplification rune.
"One unit per number. Anyone who tries to buy again using a cousin, an employee, or a grandfather who isn’t even here will be pulled from the line."
A few people complain.
Leona keeps smiling.
"Complaining doesn’t make new bottles either."
Above the coach, the Silver Fang sigil stays lit. The white and silver take on golden tones under the late afternoon, visible from almost any point in the arena.
Safe Harbor would stay far from the screens, the merchant families, and the men who’d start hunting for the formula before nightfall. Silver Fang would take all of that in its place.
That was what the mark existed for.
Even so, watching the line bend around one of the lower corridors, I realize Silver Fang may have stopped being only a shield.
People are already repeating the name.
Some hold the LDPs above their heads to show their friends. Others study the labels while they wait their turn, trying to memorize details before the stock runs out. A group near the stands argues over how many units they should take on the next mission.
This doesn’t look like a launch anymore.
It looks like the start of a habit.
Leona finds me before I reach the coach. She hands the voice and organizing work over to Zhang Xi and crosses the roped-off area, stepping around empty crates scattered across the floor.
"So my disaster decided to wake up?"
"How much did we sell?"
She slows her pace.
The smile stays, but her eyes study my face carefully.
"Not one question about how I’m doing?"
"You look happy."
"I’ve been working since you fell into the arms of a woman who tried to kill you."
"Then you’re still happy."
Leona sees I’m not in the mood to drag it out. Her expression shifts into something more professional, though it still carries satisfaction.
"Two thousand three hundred and forty-seven units."
She passes me a holographic screen. I open the administrative panel tied to the operation.
[LDP Manufactured: 2,500][LDP Sold: 2,347][Remaining Stock: 153][Gross Revenue: 65,716 Scales]
I read the last number again.
"Sixty-five thousand?"
"Sixty-five thousand, seven hundred and sixteen Scales so far. When the last hundred and fifty-three go, we’ll have seventy thousand in gross revenue."
I look at the line.
It still runs past the part of the area I can see.
"How much longer?"
"To sell out the stock? Less than fifteen minutes. To find out how many people leave here angry because they got here late? The rest of the night."
Seventy thousand Scales in one afternoon.
Before the regression, I learned to measure every purchase by how much it could delay my next meal or leave me with nothing in an emergency. Even after coming back, I still compared equipment, ingredients, and information by the impact they’d have on a limited reserve.
Now Safe Harbor would earn nearly seventy thousand Scales before sunset.
And this was only the first batch.
"How much did you spend to produce all of it?"
"I’m still tallying the costs. Ingredients, vials, labor, transport. The margin will be good, but I’m not calling revenue profit until the accounts are done."
"Does Richard know yet?"
"What do you think?"
Leona smiles.
"He’s learning."
A new argument breaks out near the head of the line. Two men hold numbers with the same digits, and a guard has to step in between them.
Leona watches for a moment before speaking again.
"The seventy thousand Scales are the least important part."
"You say that because you haven’t put your hands on them yet."
"I already have. I’m just not impressed."
She points at an improvised table behind the coach. There are papers, message plates, and records stacked on top of it.
"We’ve had requests from six supply shops, three guilds, and two distributors. One of them wanted to buy the next ten thousand units before knowing when or how many we could make. Another offered exclusivity across all of Azure Prime."
"You refused."
"Obviously."
"Why?"
Leona looks at me with an expression that says the question insulted her profession.
"First, because you’re the owner and the call is yours. Second, because exclusivity is for products that have to beg for shelf space. The LDP already has people fighting over spots in line."
I pick up one of the empty vials on the table and turn the bottle between my fingers.
"We’re not turning this into a rare potion someone buys once a year. I want a bottle in every supply shop. I want guilds buying crates before expeditions, and Divers checking whether they still have one in their bag before they leave the house."
Her face shows my vision fits with hers.
The LDP didn’t need to be the most expensive item on the market. It needed to become the first name remembered when someone thought about recovering OXI. A product simple enough to be everywhere and reliable enough that no one would settle for an imitation.
"Do you know about Simon?"
"Richard announced his shop as one of the first official points. People are already asking when deliveries start."
"Good."
Leona takes the vial from my hand and sets it back in the crate.
"Don’t celebrate yet. The success created problems we didn’t have yesterday."
"What are you talking about?"
"Competitors, counterfeiters, merchant families, authorities interested in taxes, and guilds interested in the formula. We also had four attempts to buy large quantities through middlemen. Richard caught two. I caught the others."
"We need a way to authenticate the packaging."
"The formula, the seal, the bottle, and any authentication method that stops someone from filling blue glass with water and selling it under our name. We also need to raise production without leaving the ingredients exposed."
I look at the Silver Fang sigil again.
The mark had done its first job. Now it needed to survive the result.
"Make a list of what you need."
"I already made three."
"Pick the most expensive one."
"That’s the only sensible one."
Zhang Xi, running the announcements now, calls Leona. Fewer than a hundred units are left, and the guards need to close the head of the line.
Leona touches my arm before stepping away.
"You look worse than when you passed out."
"My tank is full."
"I didn’t ask about your reserve."
She waits for an answer. When she realizes she won’t get one, she goes back to the coach without pressing.
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