The Guardian gods Chapter 901

Back in the mortal realm, Tyrion sat in absolute silence, his unblinking gaze locked onto the brick resting before him.

If before he had moved out of mere curiosity, now he was more than certain, Tide was planning something monumental. Something that would violently alter the trajectory of this entire world.

The question currently weighing on his mind was whether he should bring this matter directly to King Edward. This was an ordeal of catastrophic proportions, and no matter how confident Tyrion was in his own abilities, a clash of divine laws and involvement of pantheons was clearly far above him right now.

But the moment the thought rose, it died out just as quickly.

There was far too much to lose and entirely too little to be gained if Edward became aware of this. To involve the crown meant surrendering immense leverage, and the potential profit of this discovery would instantly be seized by the royal family.

Worse still would be Edward’s inevitable approach to the crisis, sharing this piece of the pie evenly among all the noble houses to ensure everyone was kept happy and the kingdom remained stable. It was an admirable, logical quality for a sovereign ruler to possess.

But Tyrion was no ruler. He was a mage and a noble, hence stability held absolutely no interest to him.

At the same time, a darker thought crossed his mind "what if Edward was already aware? What if the King knew everything and was intentionally keeping him in the dark?" The same could easily be said for the other Paragons. They were all calculating, ruthless entities in their own right, if they had noticed the anomalies, they would absolutely keep the knowledge to themselves to maximize their own eventual profit.

He would be a complete fool if he didn’t do the exact same.

Pushing the political paranoia to the side for the moment, Tyrion leaned forward and focused his attention entirely back on the brick. Igniting his Luminous Logic once more, his law provided him with deep, unparalleled insight into the artifact’s composition.

The data flooded his mind. The brick was the result of a highly complex synthesis, various raw components and specialized ores melted down, followed by a delicate, master-level crafting process to become the self-healing, mana-conductive anomaly it was now. That much he was completely sure of.

What he was unsure of, however, were the specific names and origins of those components. Through the light of his law, he now perfectly knew the visual signatures, the density, and the exact look of the exotic materials used. But he didn’t know what they were called, nor did he know where they were being mined.

It was clear that Tide was dealing with the entirety of Nana to pull this project off. With the merchant god’s continent-spanning trade networks, any of these materials which Tyrion could now recognize on sight could be located anywhere in the wide world.

He could simply capture one of the high-ranking merchants managing the refinery on his land. But doing so carried an immense, unpredictable risk. Tyrion wasn’t entirely clear on how deeply those merchants were tethered to their deity, a direct assault on Tide’s chosen agents might grant the God of Treasury the perfect justification to fully descend into the mortal plane and wage open war against him.

His other option was keeping a watchful, constant eye on the refinery by blanketing the surrounding space with his own domain. Yet, that too was a gamble. Spreading his Luminous Logic over the facility could easily intersect with Tide’s divine surveillance, triggering another immediate, violent counter-measure.

Tyrion paced back and forth across the cold stone floor of his sanctuary, his sharp brain aggressively conjuring and discarding ideas. He needed the origin points of those materials. The only truly effective, low-risk method he could find was to track the shipments, following the exact deployment paths of the logistics vessels and pinpointing where each raw product brought to the harbor originally came from.

The moment this thought took root, he abruptly halted in his tracks.

A smile slowly spread across his face as the pieces fell into place. It made perfect sense. He didn’t need to infiltrate the heavily guarded facility or actively provoke a god. He owned the very land where this creation was taking place. More importantly, he owned the massive, bustling Sunward shipyard where the merchant fleets under Tide were offloading their cargo every single day.

As the absolute lord of the land, he held a staggering amount of executive power and legal leverage. But the moment the sudden thought arose to actively use his lordship rights, to implement tariffs, blockade the shipyard, or legally force the hands of Tide and his merchants, a violent, suffocating palpitation washed over him.

Tyrion threw the thought away instantly, his eyes darting around the sanctuary as he looked around vigilantly. There was no sudden presence, no manifestation of light, and no divine law actively acting upon him this time. So where was this overwhelming sense of danger coming from?

Testing a theory, he deliberately tried to steer his mind back to his previous thought process of using his legal authority over the land. The moment he did, the terrifying, phantom palpitation returned with a vengeance.

A sharp, thoughtful look crossed his face. The danger wasn’t an active physical attack, it was a dormant trap. The only thing that could possibly bypass his senses as a paragon was "A contract"

His figure instantly disappeared from the peak.

In the next heartbeat, he materialized inside the central administrative compound owned by the main Sunward family leaders, a grand, sprawling estate he hadn’t bothered to step foot in for years. He ignored the grand architecture and the lingering scent of tea. His target was the archive room. He needed the paperworks, the trade agreements, and the exact legal contracts signed during the business dealings with Tide’s merchant guild. If his lordship rights were triggering a conceptual warning, it meant the Sunward family may have already signed away their sovereignty in ink.

He traced a pale, elegant hand over the rows of parchment before his fingers hovered over one specific, heavily sealed scroll. Snapping the wax, he unrolled the document.

It detailed the massive trade deal between Tide’s merchant guild and the House of Sunward. But it was the final clause at the very bottom that made his blood run cold. The contract explicitly stated that this entire grand dealing was witnessed and enacted under the absolute gaze of Krogan.

Krogan. The ascended Beast King, the god whose terrifying divinity dealt heavily and strictly with the enforcement of contracts.

As Tyrion read through the intricate legal jargon and the divine clauses, he became fully aware of just how meticulously prepared Tide truly was. The merchant god had left absolutely no loopholes. Even though Tyrion himself had never picked up a quill to sign this paper, the contract somehow bound him anyway. Because he was the undisputed head of the Sunward family, his territory’s legal authority was tied to the crown’s grand treaty. Even if he decided to abdicate and forgo his leadership tomorrow, the divine contract would still hold him personally liable. This was why his instincts had screamed, he could not, should not even have the thought of using his lordship rights to act against the interests of Tide and his followers without invoking the wrath of the Beast King.

The worst part of it all was the sheer, infuriating brilliant fairness of the document. The contract wasn’t a scam. His family was gaining astronomical wealth, resources, and protection from this arrangement; they were not at a loss in any capacity. Because the deal was completely fair, Tyrion was entirely cut off from approaching the issue from an "unfair exploitation" angle to break the bond.

A rare wave of pure, unfiltered anger flushed across his face. With a sharp motion, he threw away the parchment, letting it flutter carelessly to the stone floor. For a split second, his terrifying Paragon presence slowly bled out into the surrounding room, causing the very air to distort and the wooden bookshelves to groan under the pressure.

It took a long, tense moment before he forced himself to calm down, the oppressive aura snapping back into his body. Slowly, a dark, amused smile spread across his face.

The more careful and airtight Tide was being, the more it proved one absolute truth, whatever the merchant god was building, it was of unprecedented, reality-shattering value.

This didn’t make Tyrion back off. Instead, the challenge only made him more fiercely determined to tear the secret from the god’s hands.

Tyrion stood in the center of the quiet archive room, the shadows dancing along the walls as the discarded contract settled on the floor. He had been outmaneuvered legally and conceptually, the web Tide had spun was built on the assumption that Tyrion would play by the rules of the realm. Tide expected a lord to act like a lord, or a Paragon to act like a conqueror. Which he unfortunately did.