Elias barely had time to register the shift before the world around them was gone.

  It wasn’t like stepping into another room. There was no movement, no transition. One moment, the streets of the Pawn Shops surrounded them, filled with shifting figures, towering structures, and the low hum of whispered transactions. The next—silence.

  The weight of the Pawn Shops vanished.

  The people. The buildings. The sky-that-wasn’t-a-sky.

  Gone.

  Instead, they stood in a vast, empty space.

  Not white. Not black. Not anything Elias could name.

  A lack of color.

  A place that didn’t exist.

  A space that shouldn’t be.

  He exhaled sharply, his breath too loud against the unnatural quiet. “Alright. What the hell just happened?”

  Sera turned, gaze sharp. “Valen.”

  Valen stood at the center of the nothingness, hands in his pockets, head tilted slightly. He wasn’t smirking this time. He wasn’t offering some half-amused remark.

  His eyes flickered, scanning their surroundings.

  “Interesting,” he murmured.

  Elias crossed his arms. “I’d really appreciate more than interesting right now.”

  Valen’s gaze finally settled on him.

  “You accepted something,” he said.

  Elias frowned. “The ability to see the deals?”

  Valen nodded once. “The Pawn Shops don’t give power freely. It’s not in their nature to be generous.” His fingers tapped against the side of his coat. “They wanted to see if you were worth keeping.”

  Elias exhaled. “And?”

  Valen studied him for a long moment before smiling.

  “They think you are.”

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  Sera’s posture tensed. “That’s not a good thing.”

  Valen chuckled. “No. It isn’t.”

  Elias rubbed the back of his neck. “Great. Love that for me.”

  Sera stepped forward, crossing her arms. “Then why bring him here? Why show him anything?”

  Valen’s amusement didn’t fade, but there was something thoughtful behind it now.

  He reached into his coat and pulled out something small.

  A record.

  Not paper. Not a book.

  Something conceptual, shifting between form and structure, its existence flickering like the rest of this place.

  Elias took a slow breath. “That’s…?”

  Valen turned it over in his hands. “A record.”

  Elias narrowed his eyes. “Of?”

  Valen’s smile thinned.

  “The Lie Seller.”

  Sera stiffened. “Why would you show him that?”

  Valen’s gaze flickered to her. “Because he’s already seen the cracks.”

  Elias frowned. “What cracks?”

  Valen hummed. “You wouldn’t notice them yet. Not fully.” He exhaled, tossing the record toward Elias.

  Elias caught it automatically.

  The moment his fingers closed around it—

  It entered him.

  Not physically. Not like something being absorbed into his body.

  It simply… became part of him.

  A contract written into his existence.

  His vision blurred.

  The nothingness around them shattered.

  And Elias fell.

  —

  There was no ground beneath him.

  No sky above.

  Just void.

  Not darkness. Not light.

  Nothingness in its truest form.

  A space before existence.

  A place between reality and the Lie.

  Elias couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t be.

  Because he was not here.

  Nothing was.

  But then—

  A sound.

  Not a voice. Not a whisper.

  Something older than words.

  Something that had been waiting for him.

  The first Lie.

  And suddenly—

  Elias saw.

  —

  It hadn’t started as deception.

  It had started as a choice.

  One man. One moment. One truth too unbearable to accept.

  And so, he refused.

  And reality bent.

  That was the first Lie.

  A simple denial of truth, a rejection of what was. And yet, the world had not fought back.

  It had adapted.

  Because if enough people accepted a Lie, it became Truth.

  The man who had first spoken it had not intended to create something new. He had simply sought to escape. But the world does not tolerate gaps.

  And so, it filled the void with something else.

  The Lie became a foundation.

  And the man?

  He became its keeper.

  —

  The first Lie Seller had not been chosen.

  He had not sought power.

  He had stumbled into it, like falling into the depths of an ocean and realizing it had been waiting for him all along.

  But the weight of it changed him.

  Because a Lie Seller does not live as themselves.

  They inherit.

  They carry the voices of those before them, the remnants of all who have taken the title, a long, unbroken chain of deception woven into their soul.

  And with each cycle, they lose a little more of who they were.

  Until nothing remains but the Lie itself.

  —

  Elias existed in the void, and he knew.

  The system did not simply create Lie Sellers.

  It consumed them.

  Each one absorbed the last, their thoughts, their fears, their tricks, their sins.

  A never-ending cycle of identity, erasing, replacing, becoming.

  Until the Lie itself became the only thing that remained.

  And Valen?

  He had won his place.

  He had devoured the one before him.

  And he had remained in control for longer than any other.

  But even he was not immune.

  Time did not move for Lie Sellers the way it moved for others. They were bound to the Pawn Shops, twisted into its fabric. Even as the world outside shifted, even as centuries turned to dust, they remained.

  But not untouched.

  Because the Lie always changed.

  And the Lie Seller was the Lie itself.

  —

  Elias inhaled sharply.

  His first breath since falling into this place.

  And then—

  He was back.

  The void shattered, pulling him out, and suddenly he was standing exactly where he had been, the weight of the record gone but its truth burned into his mind.

  Valen watched him.

  His smirk had returned, but his eyes were sharp.

  “Well,” he murmured. “What do you think?”

  Elias’ hands trembled.

  He clenched them into fists.

  Sera exhaled, stepping closer. “Elias—”

  But Elias’ gaze locked onto Valen.

  His breath was unsteady. His heart pounded.

  Because for the first time since meeting Valen, since stepping into this world, since understanding even a fraction of what this all meant—

  He saw him for what he really was.

  Not just a man.

  Not just a deceiver.

  A collection of every Lie before him.

  A being that had devoured itself over and over, until only the Lie remained.

  Elias swallowed hard. “How much of you is you?”

  Valen’s smirk didn’t fade.

  But it didn’t reach his eyes.

  And he did not answer.