The tavern was loud enough to shake the walls.

Heat rolled through the crowded room in waves while snow hammered softly against the windows outside. Workers packed nearly every table inside the trade quarter inn—miners, blacksmiths, patrol guards, laborers fresh from the workshops.

The smell of smoke, ale, wet leather, and furnace ash filled the air.

And somewhere near the fireplace—

Two dwarves were very close to starting a war over rifle barrels.

"I am telling you," one of them barked while slamming a metal rod onto the table, "the barrel bends slightly left after repeated firing!"

"That is because humans keep overheating the steel!"

"You say that about everything!"

"Because humans ruin everything!"

A nearby blacksmith pointed angrily with his mug.

"You dropped molten iron on your own boots yesterday!"

"That was tactical."

"That was stupid!"

Laughter erupted across half the tavern.

Raven sat quietly near the corner of the room, one gloved hand wrapped around a warm mug while carefully watching everything around him.

On the surface, he looked like any other southern merchant trying to survive northern winter.

Inside—

His mind was working constantly.

The reports had not prepared him for this place.

Not even close.

Elarion should have felt desperate.

A dying frontier territory buried beneath snow and isolation.

Instead the settlement pulsed with life.

Workers argued about production quotas.

Soldiers joked with blacksmiths.

Supply runners moved in and out nonstop carrying tools, steel parts, crates of coal.

Even the guards looked... sharper than expected.

Not pampered royal soldiers.

Veterans.

People used to surviving harsh winters.

Raven took another slow sip from his mug.

Then froze briefly as another thunderous sound rolled faintly across the valley.

BOOM.

The tavern quieted for half a second.

Then someone near the bar shouted:

"They’re testing rifles again!"

Groans immediately followed.

"One of those lunatics nearly deafened my horse yesterday!"

A younger worker laughed loudly.

"You should hear the dwarves when the barrel cracks!"

"I HEARD THAT!" a dwarf roared from across the room.

More laughter followed.

Raven’s eyes shifted subtly toward the windows.

Rifles.

Real rifles.

Not rumors.

Not exaggerated merchant tales.

Actual weapons being produced in the north.

One of his disguised agents slipped into the empty seat across from him.

The man smelled faintly of snow and stable hay.

"Bad news," the agent muttered quietly.

Raven didn’t look at him directly.

"Explain."

"The dragon saw me."

Raven’s fingers paused slightly against the mug.

"...Saw you how?"

The agent swallowed.

"I don’t know."

That answer alone irritated Raven.

"You’re trained better than that."

"I know."

The younger operative lowered his voice further.

"But when I passed near the western district..."

He hesitated.

"It looked directly at me."

Raven finally glanced toward him now.

The man genuinely looked unsettled.

Interesting.

"What did it do?"

"...Smiled."

Silence.

The tavern noise suddenly felt much farther away.

Because dragons smiling at spies rarely ended well in historical records.

The agent rubbed his hands together nervously.

"This mission feels wrong."

Raven leaned back slightly in his chair.

"Why?"

The operative frowned while looking around the tavern.

"Because nobody here acts afraid."

That answer lingered between them.

And unfortunately—

Raven understood exactly what he meant.

Fear should exist here.

Elarion was isolated.

Frozen.

Poor.

Yet the people inside this tavern laughed like they were building toward something better.

That kind of morale did not appear naturally in frontier territories.

It was created.

Built.

Maintained.

And usually—

It formed around leadership.

Before Raven could continue the conversation, someone suddenly stopped beside their table.

Lucas.

The administrator carried three rolled documents beneath one arm and looked exhausted enough to personally challenge death itself to a nap.

He glanced once at Raven.

Then at the untouched second mug across the table.

"Making friends already?"

The disguised agent stiffened slightly.

Raven smiled smoothly.

"Trade requires conversation."

Lucas hummed softly.

"That sounds dangerously southern."

The nearby dwarves burst into another shouting match after someone accidentally snapped a rifle spring.

One dwarf immediately pointed accusingly.

"You touched it wrong!"

"I assembled it exactly how you instructed!"

"That was your first mistake!"

Lucas closed his eyes briefly.

"...I miss silence."

Even Raven nearly smiled at that.

The administrator suddenly looked toward the tavern window as another distant rifle shot echoed faintly across the valley.

BOOM.

The glasses behind the counter rattled slightly.

Lucas muttered under his breath:

"At this rate the entire mountain range is going to develop hearing damage."

Raven decided to probe slightly.

"The weapons seem important."

Lucas gave him a long look.

"Steel is important too."

"That wasn’t really an answer."

"No," Lucas agreed tiredly. "It wasn’t."

For a moment both men watched the tavern together quietly.

Then Lucas suddenly asked:

"So."

A pause.

"What exactly brings southern merchants this far north during winter?"

The room still sounded loud.

Yet Raven noticed immediately—

Several nearby guards had become quieter.

Not obvious.

Just enough.

Watching.

Listening.

Interesting.

Raven kept his expression relaxed.

"Opportunity."

Lucas nodded slowly.

"Mm."

The administrator rested one arm against the chair beside the table.

"Funny thing about opportunity."

"What’s that?"

"It usually arrives after people hear rumors."

Raven smiled faintly.

"And what rumors are spreading about Elarion?"

Lucas looked directly at him this time.

Not hostile.

Not friendly either.

Just sharp.

"That depends."

Another pause.

"Which ones reached the capital?"

For the first time since entering Elarion—

Raven genuinely felt pressure.

Not from knights.

Not from politics.

From conversation.

Lucas spoke like a tired administrator.

But every sentence tested reactions.

Measured responses.

Tiny hesitations.

The man was far more dangerous than his exhausted appearance suggested.

Raven answered carefully.

"Mostly stories."

"Stories become problems surprisingly often."

"That sounds personal."

"You have no idea."

A sudden loud crash interrupted them.

Everyone turned.

Near the center tables, one of the dwarves stood atop a chair furiously pointing toward a rifle blueprint covered in spilled ale.

"I refuse to work with blind humans anymore!"

A nearby knight frowned.

"What now?"

"The rifles!"

The dwarf waved the soaked blueprint dramatically.

"The weapon reaches farther than the human eye can aim properly!"

Another worker blinked.

"...That sounds like a difficult problem."

"It is a stupid problem!"

Then the dwarf pointed angrily toward Gandalf sitting near the fireplace.

"And the old wizard keeps suggesting crystals!"

Gandalf looked deeply offended.

"Precision optics are a legitimate scientific direction!"

"You almost exploded a wall yesterday!"

"That is unrelated!"

"It is never unrelated!"

The entire tavern erupted into noise again.

Laughter.

Arguments.

Someone started taking bets on whether the next rifle prototype would explode.

Raven quietly watched all of it.

And slowly realized something dangerous.

Elarion wasn’t simply growing stronger.

It was innovating.

That changed everything.

Because kingdoms could suppress rebellious nobles.

They could crush isolated territories.

But ideas?

Ideas spread.

And somewhere above the tavern beyond the snowy rooftops—

A pair of ancient golden eyes watched the settlement silently from the fortress wall.