Chapter 87 - An Assayed Insurrection

The waxing crescent moon hangs heavy in the night sky, its silvery light cascading a shy light over Clovis City like a spectral shroud. Beneath its pale glow, the city is a hive of shadowed intrigue and simmering tension. The night sky hangs in stillness, draped in a velvet blackness that swallows the horizon whole. The new moon hides in plain sight, its presence felt more in absence, an ineffable darkness casting an ethereal hush over the world. It’s a night for shadows to skulk across the city, for the stars to form a mellifluous choir, quietly harmonizing above the strewn whispers of leaves below. The air smells of fresh smell of rain that recently subsided, that damp scent of rain-soaked earth rising like an ephemeral breath from the ground, a fleeting reminder of nature's recent kiss.

For some, it feels as though the universe is bamboozling them, hiding its celestial panoply behind an opaque curtain. Yet, for others, there’s a serendipity in this dark sky, a chance to dial in to