My Infinite Investment System

The final licensing gate opened beneath Northstar at six exactly and dropped all three founders into ankle-deep water.

Ryan landed upright, trusted Spark Step for half a second, and slammed sideways into a stone pillar.

She caught the back of his jacket before his face reached the wall and said, "Your new ability hates you."

"The feeling is becoming mutual," he replied, finding the floor with both shoes.

Nia lifted her tower shield from the black water and studied the circular chamber around them.

Six pillars supported a low brick ceiling, rusted chains disappeared beneath the flooded floor, and one sealed iron door carried the city trial crest.

The room smelled like wet stone, old pennies, and the sharp ozone leaking from Mika’s regulator.

"Boss chambers do not usually provide handrails," the bulwark said, pointing toward the chains.

Ryan opened Spark Sense before touching anything.

Gold moved through the water in six narrow paths, climbed every pillar, then converged beneath the iron door.

’The door is the boss,’ he thought as a metal link tightened beneath his shoe, ’or the floor is, which feels unnecessarily architectural.’

"Nobody touch the chains," he said, stepping away from the nearest length.

She raised both hands clear of the water and asked, "Does standing on one count?"

The submerged chain beneath her boot snapped tight and rang against the flooded stone.

All six brick pillars rotated toward the center of the chamber with grinding force.

Brick split around the iron door as two plated arms unfolded from inside the wall.

A narrow head followed them, carrying a furnace grate where its mouth should have been.

The Gate Warden pulled itself free from the broken wall on eight jointed metal limbs.

Every remaining chain inside the room connected to a different plate along its spine.

"Standing counted," he said, backing toward the center.

"Your warning lacked confidence."

The Warden yanked one chain.

Water rose into a spinning wall that cut the chamber in half, separating Mika from both of them.

Nia moved left with the current instead of planting against it, her blue field turning the force around Ryan while the boss crossed the ceiling on four hooked limbs.

"Three anchors behind its neck," he called, following the gold marks across its spine, "chains feed the armor, break the pillars in order."

"Order?" she shouted over the rushing water.

Gold jumped from the nearest pillar to the farthest, then returned along the center pair.

"One, six, three, four!"

Lightning struck the first pillar.

Nia drove her shield through the sixth.

Ryan used Spark Step toward the third, fought the sideways pull this time, and appeared beside it without meeting another wall.

He wrapped one chain around the pillar base before the Warden could retract it.

"Four!" he shouted as the third support cracked beneath the sudden tension.

Mika discharged through the flooded floor.

Current followed the exposed chain into the fourth anchor, bursting brick from its foundation while the regulator kept the lethal edge away from both teammates.

The Warden fell from the ceiling.

Nia caught its plated head on her moving shield, turned with the impact, then drove the furnace mouth beneath the water.

Ryan saw one final gold seam open below its jaw.

"Hold it there!"

"Already doing that," she replied, boots moving through a tight half circle while the boss thrashed against her field.

Mika crossed the chamber at a run and pushed both palms against the exposed seam.

White light filled the black water.

The Warden convulsed once before every chain went slack across the floor.

**Final boss cleared**

**Northstar final trial passed**

The iron door opened onto the city inspection platform, where three officials waited with dry towels and expressions suggesting the trial should have taken longer.

He accepted a towel, looked at the timer, and said, "Four minutes twelve seconds."

She wrung water from her hair over his shoes and replied, "You sound disappointed."

"I prepared emotionally for seven."

She stepped onto the platform with the stable core humming beneath her shield frame and said, "Your preparation hit a pillar."

The chief inspector placed Northstar’s silver trial certificate on the table between them.

Nobody reached for it until Mika pushed Ryan’s wet hand onto one corner, added hers, then looked toward the shieldsmith.

Nia covered the remaining edge with her broad palm until all three founders touched the certificate.

The trial camera captured all three founders without asking them to rearrange for the frame.

For once, nobody performed.

Northstar completed its field requirement beneath fluorescent lights while black gate water dripped from their clothes.

Four hours later, the nightclub had finally gone quiet.

Nia slept in the workshop beside her shield calibration rig, while every donated phone charged facedown behind the bar.

Upstairs, rain pressed softly against the office windows and the new trial certificate rested on the desk beneath a clean glass sheet.

Mika stood beside it wearing Ryan’s dry white shirt again, its hem reaching the tops of her thighs.

He closed the office door but left his hand on the lock.

"I was wrong," he said.

She folded the torn VoltEdge page into smaller squares without looking up and asked, "Which part?"

"The part where I treated your choice like a calculation I could correct."

The paper stopped between her fingers.

"That is annoyingly close to a good apology."

"I believe this guild deserves you," he continued, forcing himself not to look toward the safer window, "I am still learning that it might deserve me."

Her public face never appeared.

She set the folded paper beside the certificate, crossed the narrow space, and pressed two fingers beneath his chin.

"Say the first part again."

"I believe this guild deserves you."

She kissed him before the last word fully left his mouth.

No emergency shook the building, no camera waited downstairs, and neither of them had an argument left to hide inside.

Her mouth stayed slow against his until his hand moved from the lock to her waist.

She felt the hesitation and whispered, "Touch me like you intend to remain employed."

"The guild has no intimacy policy."

"Make one tomorrow."

Her fingers opened his shirt from the collar downward, missing one button before returning with an impatient sound in her throat.

He pushed the white shirt over her hips, exposing bare skin and the dark curls between her thighs.

She had worn nothing beneath it.

’She came upstairs dressed like one bad decision,’ he thought as his cock hardened against his trousers, ’I was expected to understand this.’

She read the thought from his face and asked, "Still doing math?"

"Losing numbers quickly."

She took his wrist and guided his hand between her thighs.

Wet heat coated his fingertips before he reached her clit, and her breath changed against his neck when he circled it once.

"That," she said, catching his lower lip between her teeth, "keep that while you undress."

He managed his belt one-handed until the buckle caught.

Her laugh opened against his mouth.

"Future guild master defeated by pants."

"They are an experienced opponent."

She freed the buckle, pushed his trousers and briefs down together, then wrapped her hand around his cock.

He was hard enough to twitch against her palm, with a clear bead gathering beneath the head.

Her thumb spread it along the ridge before she looked up through lowered lashes.

The look tightened his stomach and made his fingers press harder against her wet clit.

"Condom?" she asked.

He reached toward the desk drawer.

"Top left, behind the unpaid electric notice."

One eyebrow lifted as she said, "Romance lives."

He opened the wrapper, rolled the condom over his cock, and caught her watching every movement without pretending otherwise.

She pushed him backward until his knees met the recovered couch.

"Sit."

Ryan sat.

She climbed over his lap, planted both knees beside his hips, and held his cock against her wet cunt.

The first pressure made her mouth fall open.

He kept one hand on her hip and asked, "Good?"

"Slow."

She lowered herself an inch, stopped while her body adjusted around the thick head, then tried to move farther.

Her right knee slid off the narrow cushion.

Both of them tipped sideways.

He caught her waist, she caught the couch back, and his cock slipped free with a wet sound while one cushion landed on the floor.

Silence held for one beat.

Then she buried her face against his shoulder and laughed until her thighs shook.

"Do not," he said, failing to keep his own mouth straight.

"Your furniture rejected us."

"It was donated," he replied, tightening both arms around her waist.

"By an enemy, apparently," she said, laughing into the side of his neck.

The failed position loosened something the argument had left tight between them.

He lifted her onto the desk instead, swept the folded contract pieces aside, and placed the certificate safely beneath the lamp.

She spread her knees around his hips while he stood between them.

"Better?" he asked, rubbing the condom-covered head through her wetness.

Her heels locked behind his thighs as she said, "Much."

He entered slowly.

Her body opened around him in small, tight pulses, warmer with every inch until his hips reached the inside of her thighs.

"Nnh... wait," she breathed, gripping his shoulders while her cunt adjusted around the full thickness.

He held still.

Her forehead rested against his, and the next movement came from her hips rather than his.

"Now."

He withdrew halfway before pressing in again.

The desk moved one quiet scrape across the floor, so she covered her laugh with his mouth and pulled him deeper using both heels.

His strokes settled into a slow rhythm while her wetness gathered around the condom and each inward push rubbed the base of his cock against her clit.

Her breathing broke first.

"Ryan... harder."

He gripped beneath one thigh, lifted it higher, and changed the angle until the next thrust made her nails drag over his shoulder blades.

"Ahh, there... fuck, keep hitting that."

The instruction stripped the caution from his hips.

He drove into her with the desk braced behind her, every thrust pushing her open around him while her breasts moved beneath the unbuttoned shirt.

She pulled one side aside and guided his mouth to her nipple.

His tongue flattened over it as her cunt tightened.

"I chose this," she said through a broken breath, one hand closing in his damp hair, "the guild, you, all of it."

He lifted his head and met her eyes.

"I know."

"Act like it."

He kissed her hard and slid one hand between them, pressing two fingers over her clit while his cock continued filling her.

Her thighs locked around his hips.

The next sound caught behind her teeth, low and helpless, before her whole body tightened.

"Nnnh... fuck, Ryan, I am..."

Her cunt clenched around him in quick waves, pulling at every stroke while her heels dug into the backs of his thighs.

He kept moving through her orgasm until she shook against the desk and hid one cry inside his shoulder.

The pressure broke his control.

His hips drove deep once, then again, and his balls drew tight before he started to cum inside the condom with a rough sound against her neck.

For several seconds, neither of them trusted the couch, the desk, or their legs.

She rested her forehead on his shoulder and said, "The desk stays."

"First official guild policy."

"Second," she replied, kissing the skin beneath his ear, "I made the first one downstairs."

They slept in the office bed without discussing whose room it had become.

Morning light found Ryan beneath one blanket with her foot hooked over his ankle and her regulator charging beside his dead phone.

He tried moving his trapped leg without disturbing the blanket gathered around her knees.

Her toes tightened around his ankle in her sleep and pulled him back toward the warm center of the bed.

’Apparently I am retained by foot,’ he thought, letting his head fall back into the pillow, ’the benefits remain unclear.’

The translucent system opened above the bed while dawn moved across the office wall.

[New eligible target detected nearby]

Before he could read the final line, Mika dragged his ankle closer without waking and stole the remaining half of the blanket.