The tavern smelled of sweat and smoke, the kind of stink that clung to skin no matter how hard one scrubbed. Sailors brawled in the corner, dice clattered on tables, and the barmaid cursed as she spilled ale on a gambler's lap.
Arjun sat in the back, silent as always, his cup untouched. Around him, Ratan's men laughed loudly, boasting of the blood spilled on the docks days ago. They slapped his back, calling him "wolf cub," but Arjun barely heard them. His thoughts lingered on the words of the drunken guard.
A mountain of gold. Dhanvara Mines.
The name gnawed at him like a wolf at a bone.
He turned the thought over and over in his mind. If it was true, then the city of Vallur—the gangs, the smuggling, the scraps of coin—was nothing but dust compared to what lay in those mountains. Gold enough to buy kings, to build empires.
He left the tavern before the others, slipping into the fog-choked streets. Vallur was loud that night, music spilling from brothels, knives flashing in alleys. But Arjun heard none of it. His mind was already north, among the mountains whispered of but unseen.
In the days that followed, he asked questions—carefully, quietly.
At first, he heard only laughter. "Dhanvara? Just drunken tales." Others scoffed, "A mine that rich would be on every map. Don't be a fool, boy."
But Arjun kept pressing, asking dockworkers, smugglers, guards. And slowly, threads emerged.
A caravan that had vanished on the northern road. A smuggler who returned with strange coins, unlike Vallur's mint. A guard's cousin who had "gone to work in the hills" and was never seen again.
The whispers always ended the same way: The Patils.
The family's name carried weight in Vallur. Wealthy landowners, ruthless in business, with ties to both the king's court and the city's underworld. Most people lowered their voices when speaking of them. Others spat, but only when certain no ears were listening.
To Arjun, the pieces were clear. The Patils controlled the mines. They hid them from the world, erased them from maps, silenced those who spoke too loudly. And the gold they drew from the mountains was the source of their power.
It wasn't a drunken tale. It was truth.
And it was his chance.
One evening, Arjun returned to the cliffs where his mother lay. The sea roared below, the wind tearing at his clothes. He stood over the mound of earth, his jaw clenched.
"Ma," he whispered, "I've seen Vallur's underworld. Its gangs, its scraps. It's nothing. But the mines… they're real. Gold enough to drown a city. And they belong to the Patils."
He closed his eyes, his voice hardening. "I'll take it. All of it. Their gold, their power, their empire. I'll make the world bow to me."
The waves answered, violent and cold.
Ratan noticed the change in him.
"You're restless," the smuggler said one night, studying him over a game of dice.
Arjun shrugged. "The city feels small."
Ratan raised an eyebrow. "Small? Vallur is a beast, boy. She devours men greater than you."
"Then I'll devour her," Arjun replied, his tone flat.
Ratan laughed, shaking his head. "Careful. Ambition's a blade. Hold it wrong, and it cuts you."
But behind his laughter, there was approval.
Weeks later, a caravan returned from the north, broken and bloodied. Its guards limped into Vallur, clothes torn, eyes hollow. They spoke little, but Arjun found one of them drunk in a tavern, too deep in his cups to keep silent.
"Chains," the man slurred, staring into his ale. "Thousands of them. Men whipped till their backs split. Women starved. Children in tunnels too small for grown bodies. All digging. All bleeding. And the gold…" He trailed off, shivering. "So much gold. Enough to blind you."
Arjun leaned closer. "Where?"
The guard's eyes flicked up, hazy. "North. Always north. But you'll never see it, boy. They keep it hidden, guarded by devils. Best forget you ever asked."
But Arjun did not forget.
That night, he could not sleep. He lay on his cot, staring at the ceiling, his chest burning. He saw the mines in his mind—slaves in chains, overseers with whips, rivers of gold flowing through tunnels.
He did not pity the slaves. He did not curse the overseers.
He saw only opportunity.
If the Patils could carve an empire from gold, then so could he.
No—he would take it from them.
His decision came quietly, without fanfare.
One dawn, he rose, gathered what little he owned, and left Vallur behind.
He wore the clothes of a laborer, rough and plain. His hair was unkempt, his face shadowed by weeks of growth. To any who saw him, he was just another desperate soul heading north in search of work.
But within him burned the hunger of a wolf.
As he walked the mountain roads, past caravans and villages, his vow echoed with every step. He remembered his mother's last words, the knife he had driven across Madesh's throat, the whispers of the mines.
The world bowed only to power.
And he was ready to seize it.
The mountains loomed closer with each passing day. Jagged peaks tore the sky, their slopes veined with stone and shadow. The air grew colder, thinner. Villages dwindled, replaced by barren fields and silent roads.
At last, Arjun saw it: the great scar on the mountainside. Black tunnels, smoke rising, guards patrolling with whips and blades. Workers moved in chains, their bodies thin, their faces hollow.
Dhanvara Mines.
Arjun's chest tightened—not with pity, but with fire.
This was it. The empire hidden from the world. The prize he had chased since boyhood.
He lowered his head, blending with the other laborers approaching the gates. To the guards, he was just another poor soul, another body to bleed for gold.
But in truth, he was something far more dangerous.
A wolf entering the pit.