My Femboy System

There are moments in a gambler’s life where time doesn’t just slow—it folds.

A second becomes a stage. A breath becomes a sermon. And right now, I was holding court in the chapel of excess with enough crowns to my name to buy a small vineyard and an appointment with a man who’d murdered gods with pocket change.

My party was waiting at the edge of the second-tier balcony, gathered around a pile of chips so tall it could qualify for noble status.

We looked like royalty about to commit tax fraud.

Willow lounged with a goblet of crimson temptation, leg hooked over the chair like she owned the floor. Miko held up a blade of shadow, twirling it lightly between his fingers. Leo sat quiet, watching the crowd like he expected to need to punch someone in the next thirty seconds.

Aria was counting.

And I mean that literally. One by one, her fingers slid chips into stacks—obsidian, ivory, gold-leafed, rune-etched—and she murmured values like a priest reciting holy verse.

"Four hundred, eight...eleven thousand, five here...another two in the satchels... nine from Miko, fifteen from Leo, six from Willow, thirteen thousand..."

Her voice went tight.

"Total: Fifty thousand and change."

I let out a low, incredulous whistle. "Hells."