He had told Mart that he knew what his plan was and he even knew that Yuma was involved. It wasn’t too difficult to find out since anyone paid attention to the affairs of the students could easily find out who had helped Mart. But he hadn’t said those to punish him even though Mart had kept denying the fault. He wanted something else, a cooperation that both of them could benefit from. All Akhgar needed to do to bring Mart to his side was to blackmail him. He had to cooperate with Akhgar or else he would be blamed for the fire and stealing of the coins and executed the same way as the boatmen. At first, he hadn’t asked much. He wanted him to pay attention to all the comings and goings and report to Akhgar about what everyone was doing. The outcome of the spying was also interesting to Mart: the suspicious visits of the maids to the Disciples’ cabins, secret meetings of the Disciples with the tradesmen who came to the Ship as pilgrims and hidden locked safes in the Disciples’ cabins. Mart couldn’t lookout for everything single-handedly. He had brought Yuma in the game using the same tactic that Akhgar had used upon him; he had threatened Yuma of getting exposed for starting the fire. What Mart saw and heard while peaking and ears dropping had cleared away a thick fog that once befell his eyes. He heard about deals made by the Saviour Ship’s purchasers with the fishers and divers and saw inappropriate relationships between the maids and women pilgrims and the seemingly pious disciples of the Ship. He was at last hopeful about his future on the Ship and had found himself a new path that was paved just for him towards what he had always wanted: power! He had learnt how to make a fortune through unlawful ways, bribing, dealing and secretly investing in profitable businesses. He had also found a way to satisfy his lust behind the closed cabin doors.

Most of the offerings received by the Ship were not cash but the Saviour Ship had to pay cash to buy the residents’ essentials. Figuring these things out was not too difficult especially for an ambitious, young man like Mart who needed coins to pay off the maids who secretly slept with him. All he had to do was a slight shift in the declared figures: the sold goods were declared lower than their paid price and the purchases slightly higher. What left from the margin would go to Akhgar and his accomplices, those who had helped and those who had turned a blind eye. And if anyone else outside the Akhgar’s circle made a similar mistake by changing the numbers or declaring false figures, they would be punished, since stealing from the Saviour Ship meant disobeying the Rules followed by a death sentence. It was the same for having sex with the maids, for the maids themselves and for those who secretly slept with them. None of the relationships were allowed to go on unless Akhgar’s secret circle was paid not to act on them. Akhgar’s team often would not expose anyone to Hurmaz or the rest of the Circle members. These disobediences and faults were a good source of income and a winning hand for those who used them to pressure and blackmail the faulty to their advantage, asking them to pay their debts when their services were needed. Those who truly believed in the Saviour, his Narratives and Rules were numerated. The best Mart could do to expose Tirad was to send his fiction books to the forbidden library. He would only go to Lealy’s room and ears dropping by her room had proved that Tirad had stayed a virgin and so did Lealy.