Three pockets
Guttermint names Outer Rim trade in useful material and convertible value. Dregbone Crystal is patchweight: reinforcement and repair stock judged by dryness, condition, and the work it can safely carry. Wardstone key-chips and Storm Quartz carry spendable effects. Burrow Sliver or Burrow-tailings scrip trades toward a particular institution-legible outcome.
These are different promises. A real chip is not a universal key. Quartz is not unlimited power. A recognizable stamp does not grant sovereign authority. Deep Burrow Core is too valuable to function as ordinary raw money; contaminated tailings circulate as stamped slivers. Using them can leave a trace as well as buy an exception.
Dregbone fakes can soften after the seller has gone. A valid key-chip can fail at another threshold. A material may be genuine and still be wrong for the buyer's intended job. Repair circles use demonstrations and witnesses, but one successful test proves only what happened there.
The rest of the price
Food, fuel, water, repair, childcare, queue holding, night watch, passage, introductions, and information can pay a debt. In managed tiers, ration chits, shift stamps, clinic tokens, and recognized accounts make work and access legible. Higher wealth buys speed, discretion, stable storage, and outcomes.
A household keeps several balances at once: what can be eaten, what can be repaired, whose body can still work, which favor remains available, and what must stay dry. Trading repair stock for a clinic crossing can leave the home exposed. A permission received instead of promised food may be valid but unusable before hunger.
Who remembers the bargain
Debt may be kept in a person's memory, a shop mark, a witnessed promise, or a formal record. The custodian affects how repayment can be demanded. Material, labor, route, and witness debts are not automatically supernatural contracts.
An honest bargain can end. A lender can forgive, a seller can replace a failed wrapping, a repairer can refuse unsuitable stock, and a gift can remain a gift. Predatory debt changes its measure after payment or claims relationships and bodies as collateral. People also spend on music, buttons, sweets, scent, flowers, and toys. Survival does not erase taste.
