The problem with Hiccup Horrendous Haddock was not that he was clever.

It was that he endured.

Plans bent around him. Armies thinned. Sigetsils burned faster than Johan could replace them. Every engagement left the dragon hunters poorer, angrier, and more exposed than before. Krogan called it bad luck. Johan called it sabotage. Viggo, quietly, called it an imbalance that required a new variable.

That variable had a name now, whispered in the North Market with the kind of reverence usually reserved for storms or curses.

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The rumors were maddeningly inconsistent. Some spoke of devices that moved without dragons. Others swore of mechanisms that folded steel like cloth, traps that learned, weapons that did not miss twice. No one agreed on origins, only results. Viggo listened. Viggo believed probabilities. And probabilities suggested opportunity.

The North Market breathed like a living thing after sundown. Tarps fluttered. Salt and oil hung in the air. Candlelight cut shallow wounds into the dark, revealing tables stacked with scavenged wonders and things that hummed faintly when touched. Viggo moved through it all like a patient thought, cloak dark, presence minimal. Krogan followed reluctantly, bulk pressed into shadow, every muscle coiled with impatience.

Negotiation had been… tolerated. Barely.

Viggo had chosen the vantage point carefully. A recessed alcove between two leaning structures, sightlines clear, exits counted, sound swallowed by hanging cloth and night fog. He waited. He always did. Waiting revealed more than force ever could.

A pause in the dark. The market seemed to hold its breath.

Behind him, Krogan let out a low, humorless huff. “If this is another waste of time—”

“It isn’t,” Viggo replied softly, cutting him off without turning. His eyes never left the maps and papers hanging on the walls. “Not if the rumors are even half true.”

The balance of the archipelago was shifting again.

And Viggo intended to be standing precisely where it broke.

When footsteps came to earshot and a sillhoute walked inside the hut, they both became silent. The candle on the central table was lit again, Viggo’s attention sharpened. Tools were set down with practiced familiarity. Metal met wood. Weight shifted. The figure was them, there was no doubt on that.

So the rumors were not exaggerated. Interesting.

Krogan’s silhouette shifted near the doorframe, a quiet threat waiting to be unleashed. Viggo did not look at him. He did not need to. Krogan was a blunt instrument, and blunt instruments were loud when handled improperly.

Viggo stepped forward just enough for the candlelight to catch his face.

“Fascinating craftsmanship,” he said calmly, voice smooth as oiled leather. “One might even call it… disruptive.”