Arcane: The Gods Want Me to Pick a Route

"Try it."

With one boot crossed over the other and her body leaned back against the tilted chair, she narrowed her eyes at the Noxians, every bit of her expression dripping with contempt.

The Noxians' faces turned livid. The one in front looked toward the bartender and saw that he had already stepped out from behind the counter with a gun in hand, walking straight toward them.

Seeing that, the Noxian leader said in a low voice, "So this is how Zaun treats its guests?"

The bartender stopped behind the blue-haired girl with a smile, worked the rifle with a sharp click, then said, "You Noxians really have the wrong idea, don't you? Haven't the Demacians' situation these last two days taught you anything yet?"

As he spoke, he lowered the rifle again and went on, "The Demacians got rounded up, and you lot got away lucky. If you kept your heads down, then everything you did before could've been treated like it never happened. Zaun was willing to swallow that bitter pill. We were willing to take that hit and let it pass. But now you want to jump back out again, so tell me, aren't you asking to get your ass kicked?"

"Starting yesterday, Zaun stopped being the Zaun you used to know. Before, we looked the other way when you pulled your crap. But now that Lord Logan is back, you really think you can still come in here and make trouble?"

As he said that, the bartender picked up the glass bottle from the table, bent down, and refilled the half-empty cup in front of the girl.

"We weren't planning to cause trouble. We just wanted to talk to a Demacian. Is Zaun going to police that too?" the Noxian asked after a pause, taking a step forward.

He glanced at the blue-haired girl and saw her pick up the cup and sip her juice through the straw. She seemed to notice him watching, because she suddenly looked up and gave him a smile that wasn't a smile at all.

With the light makeup on her face, that expression carried a kind of sickly beauty, something almost... unhinged.

Then the girl said casually, "I am going to police it. What are you Noxians gonna do about it?"

The bartender laughed behind her.

Then the rest of the Zaunites laughed too.

They had already been fed up with both the Demacians and the Noxians for quite a while now. They were Zaunites, and this was Forgen Tavern, Zaunites from Black Lane at that. Those bastards, yeah, bastards, the whole lot of them. Before Zaun gained self-rule, which one of them didn't have blood on their hands? Which one hadn't done things with a knife at someone's throat? To put it plainly, they were a lawless pack to begin with, and the crap the Demacians and Noxians had been pulling in Zaun lately had already rubbed them raw.

The same day Logan returned, the Enforcers mobilized that very night. Upper and lower city alike, they started sweeping up Demacians in large numbers. If you were Demacian, then into the station you went for questioning. If, after questioning, it turned out you had nothing to do with all the recent incidents, then fine, you were released. If you were involved... then enjoy a jail cell and prison food.

The Noxians had gotten lucky and hadn't been the first target, but the reason they weren't targeted wasn't because Zaun didn't dare. It was because there hadn't been a good opening yet. If Noxians kept their heads down from here on out and followed Zaun's laws, then fine, no one would arrest them. But if they still dared to come out and stir up trouble...

Heh.

The laughter made the Noxians feel like they were losing face. Then one of them, emboldened, reached out to grab Lux's arm.

Lux startled and was just about to dodge when a blue flash cut across her vision. The Noxian who had reached for her cried out, then clutched his arm and crouched down.

"Get bent!" the blue-haired girl snapped. A compact little pistol had appeared in her hand, spinning around her finger joints, and then she kicked the table in front of her over with one hard strike.

Crash.

The Noxians quickly dragged their injured companion back behind them. Then the leader stepped forward, spreading both arms as if to block the situation from escalating, clearly about to tell everyone to calm down. But before he could get a word out, a hand suddenly clamped around his throat.

Behind the girl stood a hulking brute over two meters tall, broad and heavyset, his face covered in tattoos. His expression was vicious. One hand locked around the man's neck, while the other rose before the Noxian could speak, and smashed into his face like a cannon shot.

"You dare lay a hand on Jinx? I think you Noxians have a death wish!"

"Hell yeah, beat the crap out of these Noxians! They actually dared to go after Jinx!"

"Damn it, if Silco finds out Noxians gave Jinx trouble, he'll peel our hides off if we didn't step in!"

Calm down?

Nobody was calming down.

The second she fired, the shot itself became the signal to move.

The Zaunites had been sick of these Noxians for a long damn time. If Silco and Logan hadn't given no order, these Noxians thought they could stroll into Forgen Tavern and drink? Yeah, drink somewhere else.

And now that Jinx had made the first move, with Jinx backing it, was there any problem with brawling?

Not a single one.

Who in Zaun didn't know how spoiled Jinx was?

The number one figure was Logan. Number two was Silco. Number three was Vander. Number four was Vi. And Jinx stood above every last one of them.

With "protecting Jinx" as the excuse, forget beating up a few Noxians, even if they killed them and dumped the bodies into the sea for the sharks, Silco would probably just praise them and hand out cash bonuses.

Jinx stayed right where she was, smiling with bright eyes and white teeth, the smile sharp and mean. Around and behind her, the Zaunites surged forward. But even while they rushed in to beat the Noxians bloody, they still paid attention to where they were moving, making sure not to bump into Jinx.

"Get over here. Why are you still standing there like an idiot?"

Lux turned toward the voice and saw Jinx waving to her. She hurried over at once.

"Huh. We really do have a thing going, don't we? My name's Jinx, your name's Lux, they kind of rhyme."

Jinx turned and walked toward the bar without looking back once at what was happening behind her. Lux followed, though she kept glancing over her shoulder.

As the little princess of House Crownguard, Lux wasn't the sort to think Jinx must be some grand noble figure just because of this. Demacia's population far exceeded Zaun's, and the capital alone outnumbered Zaun several times over. House Crownguard was the greatest family beneath the throne. In the capital, Lux's status could almost be described as second only to one.

What surprised Lux was the quality Jinx carried. It was something Lux herself utterly lacked. No, more accurately, it was something Demacians simply did not have.

And just as Lux was about to ask whether someone should stop this before things got worse, the tavern doors were suddenly shoved open.

A group of uniformed officers rushed inside.

"Everybody stop!" shouted the woman leading them, pink-haired and wearing a fitted uniform vest on top and tailored pants with multiple pockets below. That was naturally Vi.

The second she entered, every Zaunite who had been stomping the Noxians immediately stopped.

"Finn, are you trying to die? Instead of honestly getting your ass out to sea and doing your job, you're here causing trouble at Forgen?" Vi snapped at a tall, skinny blond man in the crowd.

Finn got chewed out and answered with a grin, raising both hands in surrender. "Not my fault, boss. I'm off today. And as for why we beat them, well, that's because these blind dumbasses picked a fight with Jinx."

Hearing that, Vi looked toward the bar and saw Jinx.

When Jinx saw Vi, she leaned back against the counter and braced herself with her right hand. Then she lifted her left hand and rose onto her toes, the movement tugging her shirt up at the waist and revealing a strip of her snow-white midriff. With a cheerful little wiggle of her fingers, she greeted Vi with a grin.

"Hey, sis~"

A good chunk of the anger vanished from Vi's face at once, replaced by helpless affection. She walked over in a few quick strides, glanced at Lux first, then at Jinx, and asked, "What happened?"

"They ticked me off, and they tried something right in front of me. So then, I shot one of them." Jinx held out the juice she had already drunk from toward Vi. Vi reached to take it, but Jinx moved her hand away at the last second.

Vi laughed, opened her mouth, caught the straw, and took a sip. With juice still in her mouth, she said, a little muffled, "You. You've barely been back and you're already stirring up trouble again."

"What do you mean I'm back and already causing trouble? It's been forever since I did anything!" Jinx instantly flared up and shot back.

Come on, in Zaun or in Piltover, who dared mess with her? Who dared give her trouble?

Only outsiders who didn't know who she was would try.

So where Vi saw trouble, Jinx just saw entertainment.

It had been forever since she'd gotten to play the mafia princess again.

"And who's this?" Vi looked at Lux and asked.

Lux had just started to answer when Jinx casually beat her to it. "A friend I just met. She's pretty nice. I like her."

Jinx wasn't lying. From the moment Lux tried to leave because she didn't want to drag Jinx into trouble, Jinx had already decided Lux was decent.

She really did feel strangely compatible with Lux. Just like she'd said, the two of them had a kind of fate going on. Their names were even kind of alike.

"Demacian?" Vi narrowed her eyes.

"So what if she's Demacian? I already told you, sis, she's my new friend," Jinx said, pouting.

Vi shrugged, turned, and gestured to the crowd as she spoke. "All right. Bring them over."

The Enforcers immediately hauled the group of Noxians over and forced them down in front of Vi.

The Noxians, dizzy and battered, noses swollen and faces bruised, snapped fully awake at the sight of Vi. The leader shouted at once, "Enforcer, thank God you're here. They attacked us without provocation and damaged the friendship between the Twin Cities and, "

"Enough. Save your complaints for the station. I'll listen to all of it there." Vi cut him off impatiently. Then she grabbed him by the hair and yanked hard. As he winced in pain, she bent down and stared at him coldly.

"What I want to know first is how exactly you managed to make my sister unhappy."

"She's your sister?" The Noxian leader froze, his face full of disbelief, and he couldn't help glancing toward Jinx.

Jinx smiled and waved at him.

"You really had to pick the worst possible person to mess with. In this city, she's the one person you absolutely cannot afford to provoke. Understand?" Vi let out a sigh. She had been head of the Enforcers for quite a while now, so she could tell these Noxians really did have a grievance. Maybe they had done something they shouldn't have, sure, but as for them deliberately provoking Zaunites or trying to attack a Zaunite in Zaun, Vi didn't believe that for a second.

But so what?

Compared to some wronged Noxians, Vi was obviously going to side with Jinx.

The Noxian fell silent. Vi was only a hair away from flat-out telling him he was screwed.

So after a moment, he asked, "Who is she, exactly?"

That was all he wanted to know. From beginning to end, they had never openly shown hostility toward Zaunites. If anything, they had already backed down quite a bit.

They were Noxians, Noxians who had thrown their weight around Valoran for years. In his eyes, the fact that they had already chosen to save face and give Zaunites room was about the limit of how much pride they could swallow. And yet the Zaunites were willing to risk a diplomatic incident with Noxus over that girl?

So who the hell was she?

"Who is she? Listen carefully."

"Her name is Jinx. She's the daughter of Silco and Vander, the wife of Logan, Zaun's ruler, my sister, and she also holds major posts like professor at Piltover University and director of the Zaun Weapons Bureau. So now do you understand how massive a disaster you almost caused?"

"All right, stop thinking about useless things. Instead of that, you should start thinking about what you're going to say when we hold Swain accountable and ask him what exactly he was thinking."

After saying that, Vi waved a hand.

The Enforcers promptly took the entire group away.

"Hey, everybody's here?"

At that moment, another voice sounded out.

Every Zaunite in the tavern instantly turned toward him. One by one, they straightened up, their gazes filled with admiration, and some of the bolder ones even greeted him first.

The man smiled and nodded back, greeting them in return.

"What happened? It's lunchtime, so I came to bring Jinx home. Why does everyone look... like that?"

The one who had come in was Logan. He looked at Vi curiously, then at the smiling Jinx.

The moment Jinx saw Logan, the slightly unhinged smile on her face vanished. In its place bloomed a bright, sincere, genuinely happy smile.

It was the kind of smile that almost looked silly. Even the unique aura around Jinx seemed to disappear with it, leaving behind only a ridiculously pretty young girl who seemed like she ought to have pink sparkles floating around her.

Jinx ran to Logan, then in full view of everyone in the tavern, leaped onto him like an octopus. Logan caught her easily in his arms. He was long since used to being openly affectionate with Jinxie in public.

After all, Jinx never hid how much she liked him. When she showed affection, it didn't matter whether they were in Forgen Tavern or in a packed commercial square in Piltover, she was exactly the same.

Logan rubbed at Jinx's hair and said with a smile, "You caused trouble again?"

"My ass I did. They started it," Jinx said at once. Then she turned toward Lux and added, "They were picking on the friend I just made."

Logan followed her gaze and then froze.

A second later, he laughed helplessly. "Vi, when you bring those people back to the station, go tell Silco we found her. She really is in Zaun."

Vi paused, nodded, gave Lux a few extra looks, and muttered, "Got it."

Logan carried Jinx right over to Lux. Since he had Jinx in front of him, she couldn't see Lux, so she dropped one leg to the floor and squirmed around with little pushes and kicks until she had rotated herself into a position where Logan was carrying her on his back instead.

Then she poked her head out over his right shoulder and looked at Lux.

Lux still hadn't fully figured out what was going on, but when Logan approached, she still bowed slightly out of politeness and prepared to introduce herself.

But before she could say a word, she heard Logan speak. His voice was warm, pleasant, and carried a note of amused resignation.

"Excuse me, are you Miss Luxanna Crownguard of Demacia?"

Lux: "?"

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