(3rd Person POV)

The Six of Diamonds were punished. And the mastermind behind it all — Delly Wulf, master of the Western Theatre and two other establishments in Eisen City — was brought in for questioning by the «Wizard Knights», under the authority of Mage Guardian Proffelie.

In the interrogation room, Master Delly denied everything.

"I know nothing! The Six of Diamonds are lying!" He slammed the table, hands cuffed, magic sealed. "Arthur Pendragon set me up — it’s obvious! I am innocent! You have to believe me!"

Across from him sat Guild Master Alun.

"There is an eyewitness placing the Six of Diamonds at your door just days before they moved against Lord Arthur." Alun’s tone was measured. "And you’re saying they lied?"

"Yes! You have to believe me!" Delly pressed. "I met with them, yes — I was going to issue them a task. But it had nothing to do with Arthur!"

"I’m afraid that won’t hold." Alun’s eyes sharpened. "The apprehended members of the Six of Diamonds have already confirmed it was you who ordered Arthur Pendragon captured or killed." A pause. "Was it jealousy? Lord Arthur’s success with the Eastern Theatre getting under your skin?"

Delly flinched. His fists tightened beneath the cuffs. Then something in him snapped and the pretense dropped entirely.

"You bastard — you’re just a Guild Master. Who do you think you are?" His voice rose. "Do you know who is standing behind me? Duke Hartvel Graustein — the duke who governs the Eisenmark region. This city sits under his jurisdiction. Under his authority."

Alun looked curious rather than rattled. "Oh? Duke Graustein is actually backing you?"

"That’s right." Delly’s mouth curved into something ugly. "Scared now?"

"Why would I be?" Alun said simply. "The Duke has no obligation to ruin his reputation over someone like you. I wouldn’t count on that protection if I were in your position."

The smile died on Delly’s face.

Alun stood and left without another word.

---

Outside the interrogation room, Arthur had heard all of it. Alun stepped out and came to a stop beside him.

"I knew Delly Wulf was going to be trouble." Alun exhaled. "He’s not as small as he looks. Whatever is behind him — be careful."

"Who exactly is this duke?" Arthur asked. "Delly seemed very confident that name alone would protect him."

Alun’s expression settled into something heavier. "Duke Hartvel Graustein. He governs the Eisenmark region — Eisen City falls under his authority. But the title alone isn’t what makes him dangerous."

"Indeed." Mage Guardian Proffelie stepped in. "Duke Graustein is two hundred years old. Half-dwarf, half-elf. Exceptional with both sword and bow, and a formidable mage on top of it. If Delly genuinely has his backing, touching him becomes a very different problem."

Arthur nodded, turning it over quietly.

Considering Proffelie’s own aura — the weight of it sitting just below Saza’s level — his assessment wasn’t something to dismiss lightly.

Duke Graustein was not a simple figure.

More likely than not, the man was embedded somewhere in the Legion Swords. And given his standing, he wasn’t sitting at the bottom of it — not a minor piece like Granak. Someone that old, that capable, with that much regional authority — the Legion would have placed him considerably higher than that.

After some more words between them, Alun excused himself and left. Arthur and Proffelie stood alone in the corridor.

"You’ve only been in this world a short while, and you’ve already attracted enemies of this caliber." Proffelie stroked his beard, his voice measured. "I won’t interfere with what you’re doing — that’s not my place. But I will say this: be careful. There are forces in this world that are not easy to deal with."

Arthur nodded. "I’ll keep that in mind."

He took his leave of the Knight Station shortly after and made his way back toward the Eastern Theatre on foot. The city moved around him at its usual pace, but his thoughts were elsewhere.

’Delly. The Duke. The Legion Swords.’ He turned it over slowly. ’Proffelie is right — this world shouldn’t be underestimated. It’s bigger than the home world was. Dragons exist here. Legendary races. The mana density alone changes everything about what’s possible.’ He stroked his chin. ’Fully reshaping a world like this — actually establishing myself as Dionysus — it won’t be a simple thing.’

And somewhere further down the road, Solarus was waiting. A deity older and more experienced than him by a considerable margin. That confrontation was still years off — but it was coming, and when it arrived, he needed to be standing on solid ground.

Everything he was building here was part of that.

---

Three days passed since the Six of Diamonds matter had been settled, and the city had largely moved on. What hadn’t moved on was the Wizard of Oz.

If anything, it had grown. Word had spread beyond Eisen City — travelers were arriving specifically to see what all the noise was about, having heard about it from merchants and wanderers passing through their own towns. They filed into the Eastern Theatre not entirely sure what to expect.

None of them left disappointed.

Around that same time, the Hellfire Store officially opened its doors — positioned right beside the Eastern Theatre, close enough that foot traffic from one fed directly into the other. Apollonia and Sylwen ran the floor. The store sold Coke, popcorn, and french fries alongside something the city had never encountered before.

"What is this drink — is this the water of the gods!?"

"This popcorn — I’ve never tasted anything like this in my life!"

"French fries! I never knew potatoes could taste like this!"

The reactions were consistent across every customer. Business was immediate and loud.

But food and drink weren’t the whole of it. The store also had cameras and Hellphones on display — objects so far outside the city’s frame of reference that most people circled them with curiosity and no real understanding of what they were looking at.

That changed the moment word spread that the camera was the device used to create the Wizard of Oz. After that, the interest turned into something closer to frenzy.

The Hellphone drew its own attention — a device capable of long-distance communication, treated by most customers as a magic artifact of unusual sophistication. The reason the stock hadn’t been wiped out already came down to one thing: price.

The Hellphone sat at 12 silvers — expensive, but within reach for the right buyer. The compact camera was 5 gold. The filming camera, 20. The projector, 15.

Commoners pressed their faces to the display cases and marveled. Buying was another matter entirely. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

The nobles were a different story. Several had already made purchases, quietly and without spectacle. It made a dent, but not enough to seriously move the inventory.

That changed when a young duke from the capital arrived.

Lukas von Eisner walked into the store with the particular energy of someone who had never once in his life been told a price was a problem, looked over the display cases, and announced to the room at large:

"I’ll take every filming camera and projector in this store."

The customers around him went silent.

Apollonia and Sylwen turned to look at each other. Something lit up behind both their eyes at exactly the same moment.

’Big fat wallet.’

The bonus was already halfway to being spent in their heads.

"Welcome, welcome!" Apollonia and Sylwen’s enthusiasm was immediate and entirely unsubtle.

They didn’t particularly care what a young duke wanted with every filming camera and projector in the store — a sale was a sale. But as the transaction moved forward, Lukas von Eisner talked. At length. About the Wizard of Oz, about the experience of watching it, about the way it had stayed with him for days afterward, about how something like that could only have been made by a person of extraordinary vision and taste.

And then, with the particular candor of a man who had never learned to be embarrassed about his own motivations:

"He-he. If I make something just as good — something that moves people the way that film did — the Second Princess might finally look at me properly. Maybe even confess her feelings."

Apollonia and Sylwen looked at each other.

’Sure, buddy.’

They kept their expressions perfectly pleasant. In truth, a man spending a small fortune on filmmaking equipment to impress someone who hadn’t given him the time of day was not a new phenomenon.

Back home, once the film industry had properly taken off, there had been no shortage of Lukas von Eisners — lovesick, wealthy, and absolutely convinced that a good enough production would solve the problem. Some of them had even been right.

They rang up the sale without further comment.

---

Meanwhile, Hellfire Company was growing — not just in reputation, but in real, tangible terms. Ticket revenue from the Wizard of Oz combined with the Hellfire Store’s opening had pushed their accumulated funds well past what was needed to simply sustain operations. There was enough now to move.

Arthur had already decided what came next: Leon: The Professional.

While he’d been occupied with the Six of Diamonds and the Delly aftermath, Elira had been quietly preparing for her role. He’d given her the material, pointed her in the right direction, and left her to it — and what she’d shown him since had been more than promising.

There was something in her that responded to the work in a way that couldn’t be taught. It just had to be found.

The Leon role required a different conversation.

Arthur brought it to Leonard directly.

Leonard’s first reaction was that he was being made fun of. He looked at Arthur, then at the materials, then back at Arthur — waiting for the part where it turned out to be something else.

It didn’t turn out to be something else.

"You’re serious," Leonard said.

"I’m always serious about casting," Arthur said.

Leonard went quiet for a moment, genuinely thrown. He’d understood his position here as an employee — someone useful, someone trusted, but an employee nonetheless. The idea that he might also stand in front of a camera and become something on screen hadn’t crossed his mind as a real possibility.

"I don’t know the first thing about acting," he said finally.

"That’s what rehearsals are for," Arthur said.