Chapter 15: Her Offer

He walked over to the bar, standing in front of the damaged steel safe. Mister Sevi backed away nervously. Victoria, on the other hand, followed right behind him.

"Mmm, let’s see those tiny hands work," Victoria whispered softly into his ear. "Show me what you’ve got, little lamb..."

"Please move back two feet," Silvester said without turning around. "Your perfume smells like a whole garden, and it’s ruining my concentration."

Vespera gasped again. She clutched her cheeks with absolute delight. "Oh! He’s so mean! I love him!"

Silvester ignored her completely. He closed his eyes halfway.

Locksmith’s Eye.

In his vision, the inner parts of the safe revealed themselves instantly. The drive pin was indeed snapped and blocking the main cylinder track. The anti-tamper latch was sitting on a coil spring, ready to trigger if force was applied.

Silvester didn’t even pull out his main tools. He flexed his right wrist.

A golden mana wire pick, which was as thin as a hair, extended silently between his fingers. He inserted the wire into the keyway. People wondered what he was doing because he was the only one who could see the golden mana thread.

Open.

CLICK

The heavy steel door of the safe popped open three inches, revealing stacks of paper ledgers and bags of silver coins inside.

The entire process took exactly 1.3 seconds.

Silence fell over the tavern once more.

Mister Sevi’s jaw dropped low. The off-duty guards stopped drinking mid-sip.

Master Victoria stood completely frozen. Her dark red eyes were wide with overwhelming shock.

She was a guild master. She had spent twenty-five years studying the craft. She knew for a fact that opening a safe without drilling required at least an hour of painstaking labor. But no tool to open a safe? That was absurd.

This eight-year-old boy had done it in less time than it took to take a breath.

"By the goddess..." Victoria whispered, her seductive composure completely shattered into professional awe. "No tension wrench... no rotational torque... You did not cast a spell... You aligned the shear line with nothing?!"

Victoria dropped to her knees right there on the tavern floor, bringing her face level with his.

Her dark eyes were burning with an intense desire. It was no longer just flirtatious banter, but an absolute obsession with his terrifying genius. She grabbed both of his small hands and squeezed them gently against her soft palms.

"You... you are a legendary lamb," Victoria said, her voice trembling slightly with excitement. "Where did you come from?! Who is your master?! No... forget your master! Come with me, Silvester! Join my Guild right now! And I will make you the Vice-Master! I’ll give you your own private wing in my mansion, gold coins, fine silk clothes – anything you want, baby!"

She leaned in close, her tone dripping with dramatic temptation. "I’ll personally take care of you every single day~ You’ll never have to lift a heavy tool again..."

Silvester gently pulled his hands out of her grip. Then he took two steps back to restore his personal space.

"I don’t need a vice-master position," Silvester said coldly. "And I don’t like silk clothes."

Victoria let out another dramatic moan of despair. "Ah! Rejection! Cold rejection from an eight-year-old master! My heart is completely broken!"

She stepped forward and slid a small brown card directly into the front breast pocket of Silvester’s coat.

"That is my personal card," Vespera whispered. She winked at him with a seductive smile. "It grants you full access to my private workshop, the Guild’s research archives, and... my personal quarters at any hour of the day or night. If you ever get tired of playing around in the city, little lamb... come find me. I will be waiting for you~"

Silvester pulled the brown card out of his pocket. He inspected the gold designs. It had a very small magic circle. A door key.

"I’ll use it if I need high-grade mineral oil," Silvester said plainly. "Your Guild’s oil supply seems better than the open market."

That was true. The guild supplied mineral oil to Lerwicks, and it was top quality.

Victoria burst into laughter again. She waved her gloved hand as Silvester walked back to his table. He picked up his fifty gold coins and finished his cider.

"Until next time, my sweet little lamb!" Victoria called out playfully. Silvester put on his magic bag and walked toward the tavern exit. "Don’t break too many hearts out there!"

Silvester pushed open the oak door of the tavern and stepped out into the cool evening air of Primgrad.

"Wasteful woman," Silvester muttered to himself and then shook his head as he walked down the street. "Too much perfume and so dramatic. That woman is exhausting."

By the time Silvester reached the borders of the Noble District, the sun had sunk below the horizon.

The orange glow of the sun’s rays gave way to a dark indigo sky. Silver mana lamps along the Noble District flickered with life across the marble stone walls of the city.

The Noble District was a completely different world from the bustling Commercial District below. The district was wide and lined with old oak trees. Massive stone manors sat behind high fences, surrounded by lush green lawns, state-of-the-art fountains, and private guards wearing expensive plate armor.

Silvester walked along the edge of the high iron wall. His small boots made no sound against the smooth stone.

Finally, he stopped in front of a huge estate that occupied an entire city block.

The property was surrounded by a twenty-foot-high wall built with high-grade granite blocks and topped with iron spikes. A massive iron gate bearing the crest of a firebird stood in front of the estate.

The Lerwick Manor.

He stood across the street in the shadow of a chestnut tree, his calm, dark eyes fixed on the firebird crest.

His face settled into a cold, unbothered expression.

Memories of this wicked manor started to return. This was the ancestral home of his noble family, the Lerwicks. The same place where he had lived as Silvester Lerwick before he escaped.

He remembered the cold hallways. He remembered his strict and indifferent family. They had treated him like a disgusting child. They had laughed at him. They had treated him as if he were not family.

When Silvester vanished into the southern dungeon, he knew they would never care. Whether he was alive or dead, having a Close and Open skill was the most useless trait to this family.

"I didn’t come back here for a fucking emotional reunion," Silvester said into the night wind, his voice flat and emotionless. "I came back here for information."

During his research on the book of Forge Master Albatriar inside the dungeon, he had discovered that the ancient dwarven craftsman Alister had previously written two research scrolls. One of the scrolls, containing information about the Master Key, was bought by the Lerwick family years ago at a royal auction and placed inside their private library. He knew that was the scroll he needed.

Before he was locked up in the stone room, Silvester had tried to sneak inside the library. He could see golden mana back then, and the golden mana threads that embraced the Master Key matched the small traces of mana on the scroll.

Silvester needed that scroll to finally understand how to use the ancient artifact, the Master Key.