CHAPTER 160: DORAN

"...In the end, I can’t ask her about this." I couldn’t help but mutter under my breath.

I had already pointed out the reasons why asking Amelia for funds was a stupid idea.

She would bleed me dry.

Not in coin, but in leverage. In promises. In favors that would weigh more heavily than any gold ever could.

She would smile that sly merchant smile, tilt her head just so, and say something like: ’Of course, Julies, I’ll help you. But in exchange...’

And whatever came after those words would be a chain. A chain I’d willingly lock around my own neck.

No. I’d rather starve for opportunities than hand her that kind of control.

"...So, what else is left?"

My pen hovered over the page again. The words scrawled there stared back mockingly: Salary. Robbery. Raid. Connections.

Three crossed out. One dangling uselessly.

But maybe I’d been thinking about this the wrong way.

Why only those? Why force myself into the obvious routes—the ones anyone would think of first?

Velra always told me that the strength of a trickster isn’t just knowing the rules of the game. It’s bending them until nobody recognizes the board anymore.

If I couldn’t buy Frostroot through coin, then I had to secure it another way.

Influence. Timing. Pressure.

Perhaps the winner of the auction didn’t have to keep their prize.

A noble house, proud and bloated, might strut away with the Frostroot after outbidding everyone else. But nobles weren’t invincible. Their guards could be bribed, distracted, or broken. And their pride—ah, their pride was a weapon all on its own.

"...Interception."

The word slipped out of my mouth before I realized it.

Not theft. Not robbery. Not some suicidal raid.

But interception.

If I couldn’t outbid them, I could outmaneuver them.

Find out who planned to buy the Frostroot. Learn their route back. Cut it off. Replace it. Switch it. Even blackmail them afterward, if I had to.

I leaned back, a grin tugging at my lips despite myself.

Yes. That was it.

It wouldn’t be easy—nothing ever was. But it played to my strengths: deception, precision, patience.

Alice had talent. Amelia had money. But me?

I had the will to take what neither of them could without dirtying their hands.

And that was enough.

"...I’ll need information first."

Which meant finding someone who already knew which noble had an eye on the Frostroot.

The Thieves’ Guild, perhaps. Or one of the black market’s auctioneers—those vultures always circled coin before it even hit the table.

Either way, it was a dangerous path.

But then again, what about my life wasn’t?

I blew out the candle. Shadows swallowed the room, but my smile remained sharp in the dark.

"Yes. Interception it is."

At that moment, a new voice drifted from my side.

"Do you need help?"

My head snapped around.

I hadn’t heard the door open. Had I really been that lost in thought?

A maid stood there, bowing slightly. Her uniform was plain, the kind given to the lowest of the household staff—kitchen runners, laundry hands, stable girls. She shouldn’t have been anywhere near my quarters, let alone stepping inside without leave.

My voice cut through the dark.

"What are you doing? How dare you enter this room without my consent?"

Even within the ducal household, there was a hierarchy.

Hans stood at the top as chief attendant, managing the duke’s affairs with tireless precision. Then came attendants like myself, noble-born, even if my title was buried under dust. After us were the mid-tier maids and valets—educated commoners who’d proven reliable enough to serve closer to the family.

And beneath them, at the very bottom, were the likes of her. The drudges. The hired hands plucked from villages and slums, destined to scrub floors and carry firewood until their backs broke.

For one of them to waltz in here unannounced? Insult enough.

I narrowed my eyes. "You’re new, aren’t you? ?"

She flinched but kept her head bowed.

"Tch." I waved her off. "Forget it. I’ve no time to scold every fool who doesn’t know her place. Just go, and be careful next time."

I turned my back on her, expecting retreating footsteps.

Instead, her voice followed me. Calm. Certain.

"But if it’s money you need, I could lend you some."

I froze.

Slowly, I looked over my shoulder. The girl wasn’t fidgeting. She wasn’t nervous. Her posture was too steady, her words too deliberate.

This wasn’t some green recruit spilling foolish sympathy.

"...What did you just say?"

Her lips curved faintly, the flicker of a smile daring to exist in the candleless dark.

"I said, if coin is what you seek, I can provide it."

My fingers tightened against the desk. The plan I’d been nursing in silence—no one should’ve known. Not Hans. Not Alice. Not Amelia. And certainly not some faceless maid.

So who was she really?

The shadows made her features indistinct, but her voice carried an edge I recognized. An edge that spoke of purpose.

Not a servant. Not really.

An intruder.

A player.

My mind raced.

"...Interesting. So, you finally decided to show yourself in front of me?"

"You say finally," she replied, voice low but steady. "As if you were waiting for me."

I pushed my chair back with a slow scrape of wood against stone, rising to my feet. Every instinct screamed at me to treat her words as a threat, but there was no point in showing teeth too quickly. Wolves that bared their fangs first often lost to those who waited.

"Don’t play games," I said, circling her just enough to catch the faint light bleeding in through the shutters. Her features sharpened in fragments—eyes too clear for a servant’s, posture too straight, hands uncalloused. "You’re no maid. That uniform doesn’t suit you."

"Perhaps," she said. The smile tilted, amused now. "But it opens doors, doesn’t it? Doors even noble-born attendants like you would rather keep shut."

So she was a player. Not Amelia—no, Amelia loved her theater too much to waste it on disguises. Someone else. Someone bold enough to slip into the ducal estate under the guise of a servant.

"Don’t beat around the bush... I know it’s you."

The maid’s eyes widened. Her lips parted, and when she spoke again, it wasn’t a girl’s voice that came out.

"Haha... caught me, huh? I was enjoying this role. Two whole days in disguise, and nobody suspected a thing. I even fooled you—almost."

The voice was low, gruff, unmistakably male.

I exhaled slowly. "So it really is you."

The figure before me chuckled as his posture shifted, the delicate frame of the maid unraveling like an illusion. Features warped and reformed, until I was staring at a familiar, weather-worn face.

Doran.

My master.

The man who had first guided me down the shadowed road of assassination and theft.

"It seems I got a little carried away," he said, rolling his shoulders as if shaking off the disguise. "The Voss ducal house tightened their net far more than I expected. Had to wriggle through it piece by piece. Nasty business."

I raised an eyebrow. "And your solution was to play dress-up as a maid?"

"Bah. Don’t mock me. It worked, didn’t it?" he retorted, grumbling. But soon his sharp eyes locked onto me. "Besides... I heard the whispers. The notorious Faceless Imposter in the North. That’s you, isn’t it?"

I leaned back in my chair, feigning nonchalance. "What if I said it wasn’t me?"

"Then," Doran said without hesitation, "I’d be disappointed. Because that would mean my disciple lost to some nameless thief."

A wry smile tugged at my lips. "Really now. If it weren’t for the Faceless Imposter, you wouldn’t have given me a second glance."

He let out a satisfied laugh at my half-confession. "There it is. I knew it. My instincts never fail."

"...Instincts," I muttered, shaking my head.

"Of course. How else do you think I stayed alive this long?" Doran smirked, then leaned against the wall, arms crossed. "Still, I have to admit—I didn’t expect you to spread so many rumors this fast."

"Rumors?"

"It’s inevitable for a phantom thief," he said, waving his hand lazily. "But some of these are wild even for you. The Thieves’ Guild is in shambles trying to make sense of them. They’re saying all kinds of things: that some unidentified demon slipped into the North, that a demon hunter is on the prowl, even that someone killed the great spirit guarding the mountains."

My spine stiffened. A cold bead of sweat slid down my temple.

Was the Thieves’ Guild really tracking things that closely?

"...And you believe that?" I asked carefully.

"Of course not," he snorted. "Half of it is just coin-grubbing lies. The guild’s gotten lazy—spinning stories just to charge for information."

He shook his head, disgusted. Fortunately, his disdain blinded him to the tension in my shoulders, the way my pulse jumped.

I schooled my expression back into calm, letting the moment pass. "So," I said, steering the conversation away from dangerous waters, "what brings you here?"

Doran’s grin widened, sharp and mischievous. "Do I need a reason to visit my apprentice? Or..." His eyes gleamed. "Is it that you’re afraid the teacher might steal the spotlight from his student?"