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John stepped aside and let them see what he had, and what he did not have. The front shop was bare except for the counter and a few shelves that wanted an upgrade. The back room had the forge corner, the vent, the small storage, and the new crafting table that still looked too clean to trust. They need to build so furniture.
Gael, Orna, and Kel began unpacking what they had brought from the village like n and won unpacking a future. Wrapped blades. Simple tools. A dozen neat hamrs. A row of tongs with different jaws. Nails bundled in waxed cloth. A stack of basic ward plates that could be sold as "safety charms" to shopkeepers who feared thieves more than gods.
Orna lifted one of the plates and whistled. "This one is clean," she said. "Bren did the tempering."
Gael grunted. "Bren never misses."
Kel held up a small box. "And these are the hinges," he said. "Good ones. Not city tin. Proper iron. If soone tries to pry your back window, they will break their pride before they break the tal."
John felt sothing in his chest ease. It was not magic. It was simply the sense of not standing alone.
Fizz flitted onto the counter and spread his arms dramatically. Repeat his old speech, "Welco to Fizz Holdings, Capital Main Branch. We sell tools, hope, and occasional intimidation."
"We do not sell intimidation," John said.
Fizz leaned close. "We sell the idea of intimidation. It is very popular."
Gael set a ledger down on the counter with a thump. "First thing," he said. "We record everything. Stock. Costs. Sales. Waste. If you want this to last, we count."
John nodded. "Do it your way."
Gael’s brows lifted slightly, as if he had expected more resistance. Then he looked pleased. "Good," he said, and began writing like the page owed him money.
Orna started lining up tools on the shelves, spacing them the way weapons get spaced on a wall: not just for display, but for speed. Kel hung a plain curtain to separate the shop front from the back area so curious eyes would not see the more interesting work.
Fizz watched all of it and sighed dramatically. "So responsible. So adult. I hate it."
"No you don’t," John said.
Fizz brightened instantly. "True. I love it. Responsibility is adorable when other people do it."
By noon, the shop had shape. Not finished, but shaped. A custor could walk in and see real things and real hands behind them.
John stood in the back room and rolled his shoulders. His palm felt heavy again, like the world itself had beco a thing with weight that could be tugged.
His new skill.
Gravity.
It had behaved during the shop opening preparations, but only because he had been too busy not dying to experint. Now he had ti, space, and a private room where mistakes would only destroy his own dignity.
Orna appeared behind him, wiping her hands on her apron. "You practicing?" she asked.
"Yes," John said. "I need to control my new skill."
Kel leaned into the doorway. "Should I stand farther back?"
"Probably," John admitted.
Fizz drifted in behind Kel. "I will supervise. I am qualified. I have watched gravity happen my whole life."
"That is not qualification," John said.
"That is experience," Fizz argued.
John inhaled slowly. He set his feet. He pictured the pull not as a violent yank, but as a gentle insistence. Like a rope thrown carefully, not a hook.
He lifted his hand and willed the air to obey.
The room answered.
Not with sound, but with sensation. The loose rag on the workbench slid an inch. The curtain fluttered inward. A single nail rolled toward him like it had decided John’s direction was the best direction.
John frowned, focusing harder. He tried to narrow it, control it, make it precise.
The pull deepened.
Orna’s breath caught.
John’s eyes snapped to her, alard. "Are you okay?"
Orna’s cheeks flushed as if soone had lit a small fla under her skin. Her posture shifted half a step forward, not by decision, but by the body’s instinctive response to being tugged. She looked angry at herself for it, which only made it more obvious.
Kel’s brows rose. "Ah."
Fizz’s whiskers twitched. "Ah," he echoed, with far more amusent.
John released the pull instantly. The room exhaled.
Orna blinked once, like waking from a strange dream. "That is... not normal gravity," she said, voice a little rough.
"It is new," John said quickly. "I am sorry. I did not an to—"
"You didn’t pull my boots," Orna said. "You pulled sothing else."
John froze.
Fizz floated up beside his face and whispered like a devil with excellent timing. "Your charm stat is apparently on fire."
John shot him a look sharp enough to carve stone.
Kel cleared his throat and stepped back out of the doorway as if he had suddenly rembered urgent business elsewhere. "I will go," he said. "Buy... supplies. Yes. Supplies."
Fizz clapped his paws. "Excellent idea. I will escort you. I am a respected public figure and people give discounts when I look heroic."
Kel did not look convinced, but he did look relieved to have an excuse.
Gael called from the shop front, "I will co, I need chalk and oil."
Fizz saluted. "We will return with riches."
John opened his mouth to stop them, but the two were already moving. Kel was gone. Fizz and Gael was gone with him, already talking loudly about the importance of shopping as a heroic act.
That left John and Orna in the back room with the forge vent humming softly and the air still holding the mory of that pull.
Orna stared at John, and her expression softened in a way that made him feel more exposed than any battle.
John swallowed. "I did not intend—"
"John," Orna said, stepping closer on purpose this ti. "Stop apologizing like you stabbed soone. You didn’t hurt ."
"It felt... wrong," he admitted.
"It felt," Orna corrected, and her voice went lower. "That is not the sa as wrong."
John’s pulse took a step upward.
He tried to breathe normally. "I need to learn control."
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