"So...can you find customers today?" I asked, my voice betraying a touch of impatience.
Slowly, he took a long drag from his half-smoked cigarette, the faint white smoke swirling, obscuring his true expression.
"Could be." He answered. "But typically, transactions go down at night, when the dealers are most active. Since this is your first go, I'll lend a hand and show you a few tricks down here." A lopsided smile played on his lips as he added. "They'll buy it all anyway, those junkies are desperate for goods."
Silently, I looked at him, my gaze a bit bewildered. Nighttime? No, I definitely couldn't stay that late.
"I don't think I can stay today. Could we do this another time?"
''Sure, your call.'' He shrugged indifferently.
Then, slowly, he stood up, the wooden chair scraping against the floor with a hollow sound in the quiet space. Turning, he walked toward the red curtain facing the front of the kitchen. Silently following, I saw him kneel behind the dark wooden liquor cabinet. The faint creak of cabinet doors echoed as he carefully opened them.
Inside, large glass jars were neatly arranged, some holding coiled snakes lying motionless, their scales glimmering in the dim light. Others contained strange plants, their spindly branches stretching through amber liquid like slumbering relics of another time. A pungent, herbal scent, mixed with something indescribable, filled the air as each jar was opened. Then, with painstaking slowness, he bent forward, pouring different liquids from the emerald green of leaves to the deep red of dried roots into empty bottles.
Was that liquor or something deadly? The question burned in my throat, but I couldn't bring myself to shatter the quiet.
The wax candles had burned down to stubs, their tiny flames flickering in wisps of smoke. The tavern was almost deserted, save for the two of us. Occasionally, bursts of lively chatter drifted in from the alley outside.
Finished, he stood, his rough hands clutching the newly filled bottles before tucking them into a timeworn bag. Four in all, each capped with a tidy wooden cork.
"Where're you taking those?" I finally spoke up.
"Out to make a living. Same as always." He said flatly, as if stating the obvious.
I scrambled to gather the Torbica blooms into my bag and trailed after him.
"Take me with you! I still have so many questions!"
Without turning around, his movements deliberate yet unhurried, just adjusted the sack on his shoulder then slowly headed for the exit. ''If you insist. I'll give you the tour, then.'"
The door thumped shut behind us, sealing off the tavern. Oil lamps sputtered along the narrow passage, their light slicing through the darkness in uneven streaks. Ramshackle stalls, patched with moldering canvas and splintered wood, forming a labyrinth of crooked paths through the black market.
He moved with the ease of long familiarity, as though every winding lane and hidden turn were etched into his bones. I struggled to keep pace, my heartbeat quickening with every step. The air hung thick with the cloying scent of strange, resinous tobaccos, mingling with the damp earth underfoot. Vendors crouched behind their bizarre wares, faces shrouded. Occasionally, curious eyes gleamed behind veils, but none lingered on us for long.
"Eyes forward." His whisper barely cut through the ambient noise. "And don't touch anything."
I nodded, though he couldn't see it. "Armin... is this kind of work dangerous? What're the odds of getting caught by the authorities?"
"Obviously risky." His boot sent a glass jar skittering across the stones. "Sure, in theory. You've got suppliers, contacts, and a place where laws might as well not exist. Sounds simple, right? But skipping the details doesn't make it easy money."
"Wasn't implying it would." I deflected. "Just...wondering."
''Only a fool would think illegal dealings are simple." He muttered. "Spoken or not, the moment you choose this crooked path, danger becomes your shadow."
At the crossroads, we veered right beneath a monolithic statue. It loomed like a mute gatekeeper, its stone face bleached gray by time, yet the details of its chiseled cloak remained unnervingly precise, as if defiance against the ages. The torso soared toward the cavernous ceiling, flawlessly preserved, but the head had long shattered, leaving only a jagged maw of broken stone.
"But wait, where exactly are we going?" Anxiety crept into my words as I stared at his back.
"Delivery run." He gave the cloth bag slung over his shoulder a slight shake, glass clinking inside.
"Your clients actually live in places like this?"
He didn't stop, but the look he tossed back was razor-edged, equal parts amusement and something darker, as if savoring my naivety. "Did you really think the underbelly of an empire could be summed up in just 'black market'?"
The deeper we went, the heavier the stench grew, sewage pipes exhaling a foul cocktail of waste and dampness that made me cover my nose. Now and then, something skittered in the unseen, its clicks ricocheting off wet brick.
This place was far more expansive than I'd imagined.
The tunnel spat us out before a bridge of rust and decay, its skeleton veined with moss and an unnatural green ooze. Time and damp had warped the metal into arthritic angles, the entire structure a fossilized remnant of another age. Moss devoured its surface like a living shroud, while that viscous fluid, glistening faintly in the gloom, smelled of rotting tide pools and something far worse.
"It looks...unstable" I whispered, voice tinged with unease. "Like it's one step away from crumbling. And this liquid...what is it?"
Stepping onto the bridge without hesitation, he barely seemed to notice. "Doubt it's anything special. Just runoff, most likely. Harmless."
"What if it collapses?" I muttered, more to myself than to him.
"It won't," he replied, casting a look over his shoulder. "Feel free to turn back if you're afraid."
Turn back? After everything I'd been through? After all the trouble to get here? No way!
Hesitating between fear and curiosity, I finally decided to follow. Thick rust flaked off when I grabbed the railing, leaving reddish-brown crumbs on my palm. The bridge swayed under our weight, its aged metal joints groaning ominously.
As we crossed the bridge, though I tried not to glance downward, fierce curiosity eventually got the better of me. Below, a hazy, unnatural green mist lingered. It was unlike anything I'd ever seen, shifting in slow swirls, as if the air itself had grown murky. Occasionally, wisps of fog surged upward, almost grazing the bridge's foundation, then retreated like a living breath. From here, I could also hear the faint trickle of flowing water somewhere below, mingling with other indistinct sounds echoing from the depths.
We seemed to be leaving the Black Market behind, stepping into a place utterly foreign.
On the far side, massive stone structures rose, too symmetrical to be natural. Some resembled ancient watchtowers, while others looked like crumbling houses with staircases leading nowhere. All were covered in thick moss and streaks of running water, giving the impression of ruins from a long-forgotten civilization.
"Hey." I whispered. "Do people actually live down here?"
He stopped where the bridge met land, the edge of a oil lamp's light pooling at his feet. "Call them the overlooked," he replied. "The ones the surface world abandoned or pretended not to see. Criminals, runaways, folks bored of their own lives. Here, they make their own damn rules."
I glanced around, trying to picture a life in this place. How could anyone adapt to a world so damp, so starved of light?
"And...what do you provide for them?"
He gave the cloth bag a pat, and the vials inside clinked again. "Stuff they can't get up there." He said. "Special drugs, rare chemicals, intel...and once in a while, a little hope."
The farther we went, the more the road took shape, but it was still smothered in that hazy blue glow and heavy air. The path twisted, its wet cobblestones slippery underfoot, sinking us deeper into some buried district. Ramshackle houses leaned into each other, their boarded-up windows like closed, weary eyes. A few lone lanterns dangled from porches, their shaky glow the only light in the soupy fog.
Pausing at a warped wooden door, he knocked softly, glancing at me over his shoulder. "Or, you know. Booze."
The knock was gentle yet deliberate, three quick taps, one drawn-out, then two sharp raps. Undoubtedly a coded signal, a secret language of this underground world. A few seconds of silence followed before I heard movement inside, unfamiliar footsteps on wooden planks, then the metallic clink of a lock disengaging.
The door cracked open just a slit, but the faint light revealed nothing of the figure behind it. A rasping voice spoke in some impossible tongue, its gravelly tones making sounds I'd never heard before. Some sounds hissed like serpents, others echoed like wind whistling through caverns.
Shockingly fluent, he responded fluently in that same strange tongue. From his cloth bag, he produced a reddish-brown glass vial and handed it to the figure inside, receiving in return a pouch heavy with gold coins.With practiced ease, he tucked the payment deep into the folds of his cloak before moving on, his motions quick and precise, as if he'd done this a thousand times before.
"So what exactly do you do for a living?" I asked, keeping pace.
"Whatever puts food on the table." he said, eyes still trained on the darkness ahead. "And amused."
Amused? Where I came from, scraping by was anything but fun. How bizarre.
"Ah, I'm a wanderer. Drifting from one place to another, encountering countless souls. This rootless existence is my greatest joy."
Oh, so he wasn't from around here.
Stopping at a crossroads, he surveyed both paths thoughtfully. "From floating cities on the sea to hidden mountain valleys. From scorching deserts to frozen forests. And of course, underground worlds like this too."
Now that's living life right.
Next, he took me to a rundown shop, its wooden planks cracked and decayed, like old scars. The bell above the door chimed faintly, its tone a ghostly whimper, as if sighing with the voice of some long-dead soul. Inside, the shop resembled a cabinet of oddities, crooked shelves stacked with bizarre artifacts. There were metal boxes etched with unreadable markings, small statues shaped like humans but twisted in unsettling ways and thick leather-bound books, their covers faded with age.
Behind the counter sat a gaunt old man with silver hair. His deep-set eyes were hollow, like empty pits staring into one's spirit. My companion spoke to him in a strange, fluid language, harsh syllables mingling with whispers like rustling autumn leaves. I stood silent, not understanding a word but sensing the tension hanging heavy in the air.
From his sack, he produced the last three glass bottles, each holding a distinct liquid, one deep ocean blue, another blood-red and the last transparent but threaded with eerie swirls. They traded hands with polished gold coins. The soft clink of metal rang like tiny bells, each coin stamped with symbols I couldn't decipher.
Then, suddenly, he said something to the shopkeeper that made the old man glance my way. His eyes flickered with sudden interest. A slow nod, followed by muttered words in that same unfathomable tongue. The air in the shop grew thick, shadows from the candlelight dancing wildly along the walls. I could've sworn the objects around us were watching, their unseen eyes pressing in from the dark.
With that, we stepped out of the eerie shop. My head buzzed with unanswered questions, a gnawing dread tightening in my chest.
"What did you say to him?" My voice trembled.
"Oh, just negotiating a potential business deal. He's a valuable contact." He said, so nonchalantly it might as well have been a grocery run. "That place deals in relics from the other side, though most of it's just overpriced trinkets."
The other side? What the hell does that even mean?!
"But...why not close the deal now?" I demanded, my confusion mounting.
He stopped mid-step, fixing me with an unreadable glance. "Patience isn't your strong suit, is it?"
"Hold on, so you regularly deal with these people? How do you even exist in this place? Where did you come from? And what is this city-no, scratch that-what kind of world is this?"
A faint smile touched his lips, his gaze still holding that detached calm. "Easy now. We've only just met."
"I'm just...overwhelmed. I never imagined it'd be this huge underground."
"You haven't even seen half of it yet." He said, lighting a cigarette and taking a long, slow drag.
We turned onto another path, perhaps heading back, when he suddenly halted before a derelict old house just a short distance away. Its once-grand stained glass windows were now shattered mosaics, their jagged fragments jutting like scars across the face of some slumbering giant. A peculiar light filtered down from above, neither warm nor bright, but carrying an eerie, mystical glow. The musty scent of mildew and time-worn dust suddenly filled the air, making me feel as though I stood on the threshold between reality and illusion. It was as if time had forsaken this place, transforming it into a forsaken sanctuary, where only silence and echoes of the past remained.
Passing towering stone columns choked with wild vines, he remained silent, striding purposefully toward an ancient iron staircase hidden behind a crumbling wall. Each step he took was deliberate, his boots landing carefully on the rust-eaten treads.
"Come up here." He glanced back at me.
Following his words, I took a deep breath and began climbing step by step. My fingers tightened around the icy handrail, the rough texture of rust scraping against my skin. Every movement was a fight, against the creeping dread of rot, of the unknown lurking in this place. But oddly enough, tangled in that fear was a thrill I couldn't explain. A thrill of adventure, of uncovering something beyond my wildest thoughts.
We finally reached the top. A desolate rooftop emerged before us, weathered stone cracking underfoot, blanketed in moss and glittering shards from long-collapsed rose windows. The wind whispered through our hair, carrying winter's bite and the damp kiss of fog.
Edging toward the corroded iron railing, the city unveiled itself below. Sickly green and bruised purple neon lights flickered like dying fireflies in the darkness, illuminating serpentine alleyways and rust-eaten bridges spanning bottomless crevices. Phantom-green smoke coiled from chimneys, clotting into low-hanging clouds between buildings. The city's breath washed over me, oxidized metal, coal dust and the vinegary sting of decay.
From this height, gazing at the endless vista, I felt infinitesimal against the immensity of it all. Yet at the same time, I felt strangely free and at peace, as though standing atop the summit of another world. Every flickering light, every moving shadow winding through those labyrinthine streets, was but a tiny fragment in the grand mosaic of existence.
What tales, I mused, were being lived behind those glowing panes? What dreams nursed, what griefs buried, what truths hidden in the night?