Chương 158: Chapter 157: Rich Poison

Meno and Rina climbed the stairs first, and the Cordjet F88 looked every bit as expensive inside as Meno remembered. Dark wood-finished panels ran between broad windows, and white leather seats sat around polished tables. One wall had a liquor cabinet full of several shelves of poison and not a single sandwich. Bad priorities. Rina slowed to take everything in before following Meno toward two seats near the front.

Honeygrave's party filled the opposite end of the cabin, with Merry immediately claiming the spot beside Honeygrave while Sway and the twins spread around the remaining seats. Vivi joined their side rather than Meno's because she was still talking to Jammon. At least Meno thought it was Jammon. Whichever twin Vivi had chosen seemed happy enough with the attention, though she was trying a little too hard in Meno's expert opinion.

They should have been ready to leave almost immediately, but the Feltforge goon squad took another five minutes. By minute three, Meno regretted the joke about higher Attack Speed. When the guards finally boarded, all three carried large black bags heavy enough to contain things best left far away from an airplane. The bearded guard took a seat near the front, another settled into the middle, and the third positioned himself near the rear.

Once seated, all three performed the strange professional trick of being impossible to miss while acting as though nobody should notice them. Rina watched the bags, then the guards, before leaning closer.

"You know this is quite strange, right? We're sitting on a plane you can't afford, protected by security you couldn't hire, and now they're carrying huge black bags onto it." Meno glanced toward the nearest one.

"I agree. But better safe than sorry. It's like if you don't have your sword, you can't use Quadrillionator, and then you can't build Chain." Rina blinked at him.

"You know I play Veyrath too, and I still don't understand what you're talking about half the time."

"It's fine. You'll get used to it."

"Oh?" She turned slightly in her seat, pink hair slipping over one shoulder.

"Will I? We barely know each other."

"Then maybe you can start by telling me your big secret. I'm not the only person here that needs solving." The playfulness faded from Rina's expression. She looked toward the window instead, tracing one finger along the edge of the armrest before answering.

"I don't want to yet. I like it this way." Meno considered that and realized he liked it too. There was something better about not opening every box the moment he found it.

"See? Instead of trying to solve everything, we can just focus on whatever part we actually want to. That's more fun." Rina glanced back with a small smile.

"That is a very convenient philosophy for you."

"Yes." The cabin door sealed soon afterward, and the engines deepened from background noise into a vibration Meno could feel through the seat. The restraints made more sense once the Cordjet started moving, lined itself up, and accelerated hard enough to press everyone into the white leather. Meno barely reacted. After the Nova X9 simulator and everything Grandpa had put him through, this was gentle. Rina was less prepared.

Her hand snapped around his during the strongest part of the acceleration, fingers tightening automatically until the jet climbed high enough for the force to ease. Watching the clouds sink beneath them made him wonder whether Grandpa would ever drag him back into the drone-jet simulator. The Nova X9 had been a million times faster than this, and despite everything surrounding that test, Meno still wanted another attempt. Once the plane leveled out, the cabin quieted enough for normal conversation.

One of the stewardesses approached from the front and stopped beside Meno's seat with a practiced smile.

"Would you like anything to drink, sir?" Meno was about to ask for blueberry juice when Rina answered first.

"Champagne, please. For both of us. Dry." Meno looked at her, then back at the stewardess.

"Also bring something to Merry back there. She needs to loosen up. Something yellow with one of those tiny paper umbrellas. Tell her I sent it and it's called Honeyjuice." Rina burst out laughing and immediately reached toward the stewardess.

"Don't do that. Please. Just bring them champagne too." The woman looked at Meno with an expression so professionally neutral that he suspected she had dealt with much worse passengers. Meno nodded. Rina waited until the stewardess moved away before shaking her head.

"You need to be more considerate."

"Of Merry?"

"She's worried you'll be a bad influence on her boyfriend. You have quite a reputation." Meno turned toward her.

"I do? What kind? I think I'm usually very nice and friendly." Rina's expression made it clear she had expected exactly that answer.

"Yeah, not really. If I had to describe you with one word, it would be chaotic. You do whatever feels right to you in the moment, and if you see an opportunity, you take it. You pretend to be nicer than you really are, then cause massive amounts of suffering for other people without thinking much about it. Veyrath is a simulation, but the players are real." Meno frowned.

"Okay. That's a bit harsh. Now I'm confused about why you'd want to be anywhere near me if that's what you think."

"That part is simple." Rina shifted toward him more fully.

"I like that you always seem to know how to move forward regardless of what happens. If somebody puts a wall in front of you, you don't spend forever trying to climb it. You find where they left a gap and walk through." Meno was not sure that counted as a compliment, but she continued before he could decide.

"When I came here and shouted at you for ruining my brother's time in Veyrath, you just sat there and took it. You looked at me without flinching while I was furious at you." Her smile returned slowly.

"That was pretty hot." Meno compared her version with his memory and found a pretty serious gap between the two.

"Uh. I was mostly waiting for my food. I wasn't really caught up in your episode."

"Yeah, that's what I'm saying. You don't get fazed by much, and that matters to me. Even today, when you saw my outfit, most guys would have acted way more awkward." You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. She paused just long enough to enjoy the next part.

"You offered to take your shirt off." Rina tried to hold the laugh in for about half a second, failed, then covered her mouth with one hand while pressing the other against her stomach. Meno sat beside her and accepted that, viewed from outside his own head, offering to remove his shirt had been spectacularly dumb, even if it had felt right in the moment and he regretted nothing.

"Okay, that's enough. Come on. It wasn't that bad." That made her laugh harder, and she was still recovering when the stewardess returned with two champagne flutes. The woman's face remained neutral, but Meno caught the slight curl at one corner of her mouth as she handed over the drinks. Traitor. Rina accepted hers first.

"Oh, it was amazing." The stewardess escaped toward the back with the remaining glasses before Meno could accuse her of listening. Rina took a sip immediately, while Meno smelled his own glass with suspicion. He had never liked champagne or most alcohol. Cheap alcohol was synthetic garbage, and the flavor seemed designed to remind people they were poisoning themselves. Meno tried a sip, then another, and had to admit it was much less terrible than he remembered. Rich poison was good poison.

They spent a while watching the clouds and drinking without forcing conversation. As the minutes passed, Rina grew more thoughtful, turning the stem of her glass between two fingers before she looked toward him.

"What were you like as a kid, Meno? What did you want to become?"

"When I was little, I wanted to be a helicopter." Rina stared at him long enough for Meno to realize the answer needed more content.

"By the time I got to around nine, nobody cared about helicopters anymore because VTOLs had taken over," he added.

"Huge disappointment."

"Are you making fun of me?"

"No. When I was six, my father bought me this RC helicopter I had to assemble myself. I loved that thing. Our neighbor hated the noise, though, so one day while I was flying it he knocked it out of the air with a fire poker and destroyed it." Rina's expression changed at once.

"He did what?"

"Yeah. My father never did anything about it and never replaced the helicopter either. Major asshole."

"That's horrible." Rina studied him over the rim of her glass.

"Has your father tried reaching out since you became famous?"

"No, and I prefer it that way. We have nothing to discuss. He left my mom after I became an adult, and that was that." Meno had no interest in reopening the subject, so he shifted it back toward her.

"What about you? Still close with your parents?"

"Very. They're supportive. They're both sculptors, so they understand art." Rina drank again and looked through the window, her reflection faint against the clouds.

"So did you want to be like them?"

"No, they're all over the place all the time. They go in circles debating the same thing to death, and I prefer moving forward. I wanted to be a lawyer because it's one of the few places where machines are still banned, so if you're good, there's always money in it. But during university, I found a much better way to make a lot more, and finishing the degree stopped making sense." There it was again: the secret. Meno noticed it but did not push.

They had already agreed that some things were more interesting unopened. Meno finished the champagne.

"I never went to uni. After school, I worked in a warehouse watching robots do stuff for no reason except that a human had to be present. It was mind-numbingly boring, but it paid enough to support me while I tried to make it as a streamer. Then it started holding me back too much, so I quit and went full-time while leeching off my sister's schoolteacher salary."

"What would you have done if streaming never worked?" That made Meno stop for a moment. He had never thought about his life that way. There had never been one clean line between making it and failing, just the next thing that seemed worth doing, then the next thing after that. Sometimes progress dragged so slowly it barely counted as movement. Other times, everything clicked and he caught a rhythm that carried him forward.

"Probably the same thing. Just without the nice clothes or cool plane, and with way less attention from women like you." Rina's eyebrows rose.

"You think I'm only interested because you're famous?"

"No. But let's be real. If I wasn't famous, you wouldn't even know who I was."

"That's different."

"It's part of the same thing." Meno leaned back into the seat.

"The qualities you said you like only look good because they worked. If I kept stubbornly moving forward for years and failed every single time, you wouldn't be sitting here talking about how cool it is that I find gaps in walls." Rina listened without interrupting.

"I'm not saying you're chasing my fame. I mean without it, we wouldn't be having this conversation at all. That's how the world works. I get it." Rina emptied her glass and lifted it slightly. The stewardess noticed from halfway across the cabin and started preparing another round before Rina answered.

"You're right. If you weren't famous, I probably wouldn't bother." Meno glanced over.

"There. I said it. Not because I want to use your fame. It's almost the opposite. If we're both famous, then fame isn't something we need to think about between us. It feels normal." Meno had not considered it from that direction, but it made sense. Part of what had drawn him toward Oxy so quickly had been that same comfort: they both understood viewers, streams, strangers recognizing them, and the way personal things could become public without warning. There had been far less explaining required.

Maybe Rina meant the same thing.

"Okay. If we're doing this, you might be richer than me. I've got a bit over four million right now, plus maybe twenty thousand shirts sold by this point and whatever Streamline money comes in. Could be six or seven million total soon." Rina lowered her glass slowly, like the number had suddenly turned the conversation hardcore.

"I also don't own a house or a car. Most of my stuff is parked at my sister's house."

"Only," Rina said.

"He says only. How long did it take you to make that?"

"Less than a month."

"And how did you get this plane?" The stewardess arrived with another pair of glasses and replaced the empties before heading toward the back again. Meno watched her go and noticed there seemed to be a lot of drinking happening behind them too, although he had no interest in checking whether Honeyjuice had somehow become real.

"Wait. You're not going to tell me how rich you are? That's unfair. Maybe I want to retire from streaming. You can pay for everything." Rina almost spat champagne onto herself.

"No, Meno. I'm not breaking down my bank account for you right now."

"I knew it."

"You knew what?"

"I'm richer. That's why you're embarrassed." Rina turned toward him with immediate competitive energy.

"No, you are not. I actually own a house."

"Then why do you live in a hotel?"

"Because it's safer, and I don't need permanent security. It comes out cheaper when you account for everything." Meno held out one hand.

"Show me your phone. I want to see the number."

"What? No."

"I understand. Don't worry. I used to be poor too."

"I am not poor. Like, at all." Meno finished his second glass and waved toward the stewardess, who approached quickly enough to prove she had been keeping an eye on them.

"Tell me something. What do poor people drink?" The professional mask struggled for the first time.

"Um. Sir, I suppose mostly water."

"Great. Bring Rina some water, please."

"Do not!" Rina was already digging through her tiny handbag with far more aggression than necessary.

"Fine. Here." She unlocked her phone, opened an account screen, and shoved it toward Meno while the stewardess made a tactically excellent retreat. Meno read the figure and laughed.

"That's only 3. 9 million. I win."

"You show yours too."

"Fine." Meno opened his own account and turned the screen toward her. A little over 4. 1 million sat there in clean numerical proof of victory, and Rina frowned at the number as though the banking application itself had betrayed her.

"Damn. That doesn't mean anything anyway. Add the house I just bought and I'm way richer."

"Then you should add this plane to mine. I didn't buy it, but I can use it whenever I want."

"That is not how net worth works."

"Sounds like loser math." Meno put his phone away.

"Now that we've established the pecking order, should I take my shirt off or not?" They made it one second without laughing. Somewhere in the middle of it, Meno realized that drinking champagne before the event might not have been his smartest tactical choice. It was only around 18: 00, the main event started at 20: 00, and the actual party did not begin until 22: 00. His alcohol tolerance was terrible too, which meant slowing down would have been sensible.

Then again, the Feltforge goon squad had packed enough equipment to invade somewhere, so maybe they carried an antidote. The rest of the flight blurred pleasantly after that. The Cordjet only needed about an hour to reach Skyline, but champagne kept appearing, and Meno and Rina drifted from serious questions back into useless arguments about food, VR, hotels, planes, and whether owning a house counted if you deliberately refused to live there.

At some point, Rina stopped sitting entirely in her own seat, which became a problem during descent. The stewardess had already announced twice that everyone needed to prepare for landing when the bearded guard appeared beside them. Rina had one hand hooked lightly at the back of Meno's neck, and Meno was busy discovering that champagne made her lips taste dangerous, so neither of them noticed him at first. The man cleared his throat. Neither reacted.

Eventually, he put one hand lightly on Rina's shoulder and moved her off Meno's lap with careful, practiced efficiency, like two pieces of equipment had been stored incorrectly.

"Landing restraints." Rina started laughing again as she returned to her seat. Meno glared at the guard and decided he was an asshole, but the useful kind. He had almost started liking him before the man leaned closer while checking that Meno had actually fastened his restraint.

"Mr. Felt wants to speak with you before the event." Meno's good mood took a small hit. Of course Morlando wanted a meeting. Probably petty revenge for the plane. Meno glanced toward the champagne glass the stewardess had already confiscated for landing and decided the poison might have been the correct play after all. If you poisoned yourself first, the snakes could only leave a mark.

The thought made him chuckle, mostly because it made no sense, which was a good sign that he had consumed enough champagne for one flight. The Cordjet touched down in Skyline a few minutes later. Once the cabin opened, Meno grabbed Rina's hand before anyone could invent another conversation he did not want.

"Come on." She let him pull her toward the stairs while Honeygrave's party gathered their things behind them and the Feltforge goon squad collected the suspicious black bags again. Meno tightened his grip on Rina's hand and headed off the plane with her fingers warm between his. Beyond the stairs, Skyline waited like a dungeon to be solved.