Old Pistol

Old Pistol sits on a scarred oak table, its brass frame catching the lamplight while the steel barrel wears a fine patina of salt and smoke. The grip is wrapped in worn leather, the texture grainy under the fingertips, and the engravings along the frame curl like ivy: a tiny compass, a gear tooth, a maker's mark so faint you could call it a rumor. The muzzle bears a small nick from a long fall, as if the gun learned to bruise the world before it learned to shoot. When you tilt it toward the glow, you can see fingerprints pressed into the brass, faint as a memory you aren’t sure you should repeat. Tell the tale of its origin slowly, and it would almost feel like a whisper on the docks. They say it was forged in a workshop that traded in salvaged ship parts and second chances, stamped with a winged wheel and crescent — emblems of a caravan that vanished in a storm rather than in a blaze. A courier, trailing debts and promises, carried it through rain-slick alleys, until a town tucked the pistol into an old saddlebag to keep it safe. Since then, the gun has moved from hand to hand like a rumor with a trigger, always reappearing when the coins in someone's pocket speak louder than the pistol's caress of the air. In gameplay terms, the Old Pistol feels earned. It’s light enough to wield quickly, heavy enough to leave a mark, and its quick-draw promise makes it a favorite for those who slip from shadow to shadow, always a breath ahead of the crowd. It rewards patience and timing: a precise shot to break a foe’s rhythm, followed by a careful reload while you step behind cover, listening for the clink of metal against metal. It’s not merely a damage deal; it’s a narrative instrument, a reminder that every encounter has a past and a purpose, and that sometimes the true value of a weapon lies not in its power alone but in the stories it carries and the markets it shapes. Prices drift in the light of a rain-slick dawn at the Saddlebag Exchange, where traders appraise curios with quiet skepticism. I watched the Old Pistol pass between gloved hands, its value ticking up and down as the teller reads the markings and a buyer offers a story in exchange for steel. In the end, a fair sum—usually just a few silver pieces if the patina is honest, more if the engravings glow with memory—changes hands: enough to buy a tale-worthy breakfast, enough to remind anyone that every gun has a ledger. To own it is to own a piece of that ledger, a small but stubborn flame in a quiet world. Even now, as markets close and rain beads on the awning, the Old Pistol waits for the next hand to lift it, to listen for distant caravan wheels and perhaps write a few more lines into its stubborn ledger.