The smoke in the Black Barnacle tavern hung thick and gray, clinging to everything it touched. Raven sat at a corner table, cards fanned in her left hand while her right rested casually near her hidden dagger. The men around her were the dregs of Corsair's Cradle – smugglers, informants, hired blades – exactly the sort she needed.

"Call," said a scarred man with a braided beard, tossing his coins into the growing pile. His eyes never left Raven's chest.

She matched his bet without looking at her cards. "This run to the Dawn Islands. What's the real payout?"

The bearded man grunted. "Two hundred thousand if you don't get caught. Half that if you dump cargo."

"Heard it was five," Raven countered, her blue eyes watching as a fourth card landed on the table.

"Maybe for someone the harbormaster trusts," said a woman to Raven's right, her face marked with elaborate tattoos. "New faces get the risky routes and lower rates."

Raven nodded, filing away the information as she raised her bet. "Raise. I also heard someone's putting together a crew for the Royal Mercantile Company strongbox."

A collective tension rippled around the table. The tattooed woman folded immediately.

"Suicide," said a thin man with missing fingers. "Tried it five years back. Lost three men to those mechanical traps they've got. Made off with less than a million."

"For that kind of risk?" Raven kept her voice casual. "Barely worth getting out of bed."

The scarred man laughed, a harsh sound like rocks in a grinder. "Yet fools line up for the chance. Same ones who end up feeding the harbor sharks."

The dealer laid down the final card. Raven studied her hand, then the communal cards. Two pair. Decent, but nothing spectacular.

"There's that Navy captain that docks here sometimes," she offered. "The one with the bounty on his head."

The thin man spat on the floor. "Million Cori for his head. Good money if you don't mind the entire Dawn Sea Navy hunting you afterward."

"Call," Raven said, matching the final bet. "What about bigger scores? Must be something worth the risk."

The scarred man revealed his cards – three of a kind. Better than her hand. "There's always something," he said, raking in his winnings. "But anything paying six million? That's not a score. That's a fantasy."

Raven's expression remained neutral as she gathered the cards for her turn to deal. Six million in two weeks. Every lead she followed ended the same way – too slow, too dangerous, or nowhere near enough money.

"That or the Crimson Tide," slurred a voice from a nearby table.

The scarred man rolled his eyes. "Shut it, Garrek. No one asked you."

Raven's fingers paused mid-shuffle. "What's the Crimson Tide?"

The drunk – Garrek – laughed, lifting a nearly empty bottle. "Only the biggest damn game in the whole Cradle. But the entry fee alone would choke a sea king."

"Don't put ideas in her head," the tattooed woman warned. "That tournament's a death trap."

Raven dealt the cards, her mind racing behind her carefully bored expression. "I've never been afraid of a little danger."

The scarred man leaned forward, sudden seriousness replacing his lecherous demeanor. "Listen, pretty thing. The Crimson Tide isn't 'a little danger.' It's where desperate people go to die. Or worse."

"Worse?"

He tapped a jagged scar running from his temple to his jaw. "Some things make death look like a kindness."

===

The Gilded Kraken glittered like a fever dream, all polished wood and gold leaf under crystal chandeliers. Alyssa moved through the upper-class casino with practiced grace, ignoring the appraising looks from men in tailored suits and women dripping with jewels.

She recognized their type immediately – the same people who had attended her father's formal dinners, who had praised his strength to his face while plotting against him behind his back. The wealthy, the connected, the dangerous.

Alyssa claimed a seat at the bar, ordering a glass of wine she had no intention of drinking. The bartender – a silver-haired woman with sharp eyes – placed the glass before her with a respectful nod.

"New face," the bartender observed. "Passing through or looking to stay?"

"Just exploring options," Alyssa replied, allowing a hint of her natural aristocratic tone to surface. The effect was immediate – the bartender's posture straightened slightly.

"Well, you've found the right place for that. The Kraken caters to those with... discerning tastes."

Alyssa took a small sip of her wine, using the motion to survey the room. Three distinct groups dominated the space: older men in Navy-inspired formal wear, likely retired officers or contractors; merchants in gaudy displays of their wealth; and the true powers – those who dressed simply but commanded attention whenever they moved.

"I heard there might be investment opportunities," Alyssa said, keeping her voice low.

The bartender wiped an already clean section of the bar. "What sort of capital are you working with?"

A test. Alyssa met the woman's eyes directly. "Enough to be taken seriously. Not enough to be careless."

A slight smile. "The gentleman in the blue jacket by the dice table is Harmon Vess. Shipping magnate. Looking for silent partners on a new trade route to the Meridian Archipelago. Minimum buy-in is two million, but the quarterly returns are rumored to be substantial."

Alyssa nodded her thanks, making a show of considering the information while her mind dismissed it immediately. Even if they had two million to invest, they couldn't wait for quarterly returns. Lily needed freedom now.

She spent the next hour circulating the room, listening more than speaking. She learned of trading companies seeking investors, of property developments in emerging ports, of rare collectibles coming to auction. None of it helped.

"The Spirit Seed auction starts at ten tomorrow morning," said a heavyset man in an expensive suit, speaking to his companion at a nearby table. "Betting starts at eight million. They say it's a Mutation type."

"Pricey," his companion replied, swirling amber liquid in a crystal glass. The golden light caught in the facets, casting tiny prisms across the tabletop. "But worth every Cori. My nephew acquired one last year. Transformation ability. The man can turn into a spotted jaguar at will. Made him the talk of the Grand Line. Haven't seen him pay for a drink since."

Eight million minimum. Alyssa did the mental calculation, tallying their combined assets. Even if they pooled everything they had—the ship's treasury, Raven's personal stash, what little she'd managed to take when she fled—they'd fall pathetically short. Another dead end in a night full of them.

Alyssa drifted away from the conversation toward the high-stakes tables, where the air seemed thicker with tension and desperation. Fortunes changed hands with nothing more than the turn of a card or the roll of dice. The minimum bets were staggering—fifty thousand Cori just to take a seat at some games. She observed a gray-haired woman in an emerald dress win nearly three hundred thousand on a single hand, her face betraying nothing. Three hands later, the same woman watched impassively as the dealer swept away everything she'd won and more.

"It's a fool's game," said a quiet voice beside her.

Alyssa turned to find a man in his fifties standing at her elbow. He was impeccably dressed in what had once been expensive clothes—tailored navy jacket with silver buttons, crisp white shirt—but the haunted look in his bloodshot eyes told a different story. He nodded toward the tables where chips worth small fortunes stacked and collapsed like miniature empires.

"The house ensures everyone loses eventually. I should know."

"Sounds like you've had a rough night," Alyssa said, studying him carefully. The quality of his clothes suggested wealth, but the frayed cuffs and worn elbows told another story entirely. This was a man on his way down, not up.

"A rough decade." He laughed without humor, the sound hollow and raspy. "I owned three shipping vessels once. Had offices in Loguetown and Alabaster. Now I can't even afford the entry fee for the Crimson Tide."

Alyssa kept her expression neutral, though her interest sparked. "The Crimson Tide?"

"Tournament. Highest stakes in all of Corsair's Cradle. Winner takes everything." His eyes grew distant, as if seeing something beyond the opulent casino floor. "One million Cori entry fee. Winner's purse this year is rumored to be fifteen million. Last year it was twelve, year before that, ten. Keeps growing."

Fifteen million. The number blazed in Alyssa's mind like a lighthouse beacon. More than double what they needed for Raven's sister.

"Why not just play the regular tables?" she asked, trying to keep her sudden interest from showing in her voice.

The man's laugh turned bitter, ending in a cough that he covered with a monogrammed handkerchief. "Because the Tide isn't just about money, young lady. It's about everything. Your possessions, your future, your connections, your very life—all placed on the table." He drained his glass in one swift motion. "But oh, the glory of winning... to walk away with enough to start over, to be truly free..."

"Where exactly is this tournament held?" Alyssa asked, unable to contain the urgency in her voice.

He looked at her then, really looked at her, his bleary eyes suddenly sharp. He shook his head slowly, a paternal concern crossing his features. "Don't. Pretty thing like you? They'd eat you alive in there. The Tide draws the most ruthless gamblers in the Dawn Sea, maybe in all the seas." He stood, slightly unsteady on his feet. "Take my advice, miss. Find another way. Any other way."

As he walked away, wobbling slightly between the tables, Alyssa's mind whirled with possibilities. A million Cori entry fee. Fifteen million purse. Life or death stakes. It sounded impossible, ridiculous, completely suicidal.

It also sounded exactly like their only chance.

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