***
{Inside The Projection}
The area between him and Nasir's base was chaos on legs.
Sure, on the surface, it was your typical marketplace—jam-packed with vendors screaming over each other, kids darting between stalls like pickpockets-in-training, and old women squatting in the shade, selling clay pots of something that smelled like fermented regret and probably tasted worse.
But there was a difference. A big one.
Everyone here was a refugee.
No one had to tell Malik that.
It was obvious.
He saw it in the way people clung to their belongings, the way they flinched at sudden noises, eyes constantly darting toward the soldiers passing by.
He'd also heard it in the desperate edge of their voices.
"Finest Eastern carpets! Stolen fresh this morning!"
And the words themselves.
Malik didn't even blink at that.
Because, first of all, no sane merchant would straight-up admit their stock was stolen.
That just wasn't how the game was played.
