Double sixes.

The dice sat on the board, taunting her. Twelve spaces. Natalia's eyes traced the inevitable path—St. Charles Place, States Avenue, Virginia Avenue, and then the soft click of her battleship token settling onto New York Avenue. The blood-red hotel gleamed under the common room's lights like a executioner's blade.

She lifted her gaze to find Satori watching her, that infuriating smile playing at the corners of his mouth. His dark eyes held more than simple victory—there was possession there, a private heat that made something low in her belly clench even as fury coiled in her chest.

The fact that their one-eyed, perpetually drunk Teaching Assistant was still draped across his shoulders like a living scarf only stoked the jealous fire burning in her gut.

From his position on the couch, Juan didn't bother opening his eyes. "One thousand, one hundred dollars," he announced to the room, his tone carrying all the enthusiasm of someone reading a grocery list.

Natalia's fingers moved automatically, sorting through their team's pathetic pile of colorful bills. Beside her, Akari and Jacob were doing the same calculation. The result was the same no matter how many times she counted: nine hundred dollars. Two hundred short. Her hands curled into fists beneath the table's edge, nails biting into her palms.

Losing was bad enough. Losing to him—while he was being used as a human pillow by that woman—was intolerable.

Satori extended his hand across the board, palm upturned in silent expectation.

Natalia opened her mouth to concede, to shove their inadequate funds across the board and swallow the bitter pill of defeat, when a calm voice cut through the tension like a blade through silk.

"A moment, if you would."

Every head turned toward Isabelle. She sat with the perfect posture of a painting's subject, her wine-red eyes assessing the board with the detached interest of a general surveying a battlefield.

"Bankruptcy is not your sole recourse, Kuzmina-san."

Beside her, Skylar's lips curved into a smirk. She blew a small pink bubble with her gum, letting it expand before snapping it back with her teeth. "We'll assume your debt," she said, her voice carrying that particular brand of bored amusement unique to the chronically unimpressed.

She gestured lazily toward the $1,100 owed to Satori. "In exchange, you transfer control of your remaining prime assets to our portfolio. The Red properties, to be specific—Kentucky Avenue, Indiana Avenue, and Illinois Avenue."

Natalia's mind spun through the implications. It was a predatory offer wrapped in the veneer of assistance. The Red properties represented the most valuable monopoly currently in play. But it was also a rope thrown to a drowning woman—a way to avoid the particular humiliation of losing directly to him.

"And because we're not complete savages," Skylar continued, twirling a strand of her indigo-and-pink hair around one finger, "we'll even sweeten the pot. You'll receive our Light Blue set, Electric Company, and..." she paused for dramatic effect, "three hundred and fifty dollars in working capital. Enough to keep you breathing, at least."

It was a masterstroke of calculated charity. Isabelle provided the cold strategic framework while Skylar delivered it with just enough sarcastic poison to make the medicine go down. Soomin, for her part, simply nodded along with the wide-eyed trust of someone who believed Isabelle incapable of error.

Natalia weighed the offer, each second of silence feeling like an eternity. Surrendering the Reds stung like salt in a wound, but it was a strategic retreat rather than a rout. She could rebuild from this position. She glanced sideways at Akari, then at Jacob. The data analyst was already running probability calculations behind those thick glasses, his face a mask of intense focus. Akari merely gave her a sharp nod. Your call, boss.

"I—"

"No."

The word came from Satori's side of the table, but not from Satori himself. Juan had straightened in his seat, both eyes now open and alert. The indolent sloth who'd been half-asleep thirty seconds ago had vanished, replaced by something sharp and dangerous.

Satori still hadn't moved. Carmen remained plastered against him, apparently dead to the world. But his eyes had changed. The playful amusement had drained away, replaced by the same cold, analytical focus Natalia had witnessed in the depths of the Gate. He and Juan exchanged a glance—brief, wordless, utterly comprehensible to each other.

Juan addressed Isabelle directly, completely bypassing Natalia as if she were a piece of furniture. "Cute offer. But you're undervaluing your own assets while simultaneously overvaluing theirs. Classic amateur mistake." He leaned forward, every trace of his characteristic laziness burned away. "Allow me to propose an alternative."

He finally turned to Natalia, though his attention remained locked on Isabelle. "We'll forgive the debt. Completely. No strings, no payment required."

The room fell into the kind of silence that precedes earthquakes.

"We'll wipe the slate clean," Juan continued. "In exchange, however, we want something more valuable than rent money. For the remainder of this game, you work for us. Your properties become extensions of our empire. Your capital flows into our treasury. Your team becomes a vassal state of the Iron Empire. Total integration."

The air itself seemed to crackle with new tension. This had stopped being Monopoly somewhere in the last thirty seconds. This was feudalism, writ small on a game board.

Isabelle's expression transformed. Her lips curved into a smile of genuine delight, the kind of expression that suggested she'd just found a puzzle worthy of her attention. She wasn't insulted—she was thrilled.

"How fascinating," she murmured, her cultured voice rich with appreciation. "You're offering complete debt forgiveness in exchange for absolute subjugation. How wonderfully ruthless."

Satori finally stirred, carefully shifting Carmen's weight so she leaned more heavily against the couch cushions than against him. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and when he spoke his voice was low and dangerous—a purr that somehow carried to every corner of the room.

"It's not charity. It's an acquisition." His gaze locked onto Natalia like a heat-seeking missile. He paused, letting his words sink in. "She can remain a princess in a crumbling kingdom, clinging to the illusion of independence while she slowly drowns. Or she can become a general in an empire that's about to conquer the board. The choice, naturally, is hers."

Natalia felt the trap snap shut around her with almost audible force.

Option A: Accept Isabelle's offer, maintain some semblance of autonomy, and become a minor power destined to be crushed in the endgame.

Option B: Accept Satori's terms, ensure her survival, and publicly bind herself to the man who'd just orchestrated her humiliation—becoming a willing instrument of his victory.

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