You’d have to start at the mint, of course. A batch of coins is stamped, counted, and distributed to banks. Somewhere along that chain, a few coins slip – maybe a clerk miscounts, a machine jams, or a rogue worker smuggles them out. Those coins are then sold on the black market, often at a discount because the buyer knows they’re “free” or at least cheaper than legal change. Once in the underground network, they’re either melted down for metal or re‑circulated among illicit merchants. The trick is that each transfer hides a layer of anonymity, so by the time the coins reach the final dealer, their origin is a mythic rumor rather than a documented record. The whole process is like a ghost trail on a map, only visible if you trace every misplaced mint mark.

Right, the quiet side of it is what makes it so dangerous – no one notices the missing coins until they’re already a handful of rings in a speakeasy. And the myth grows because each handoff erases a ledger line. It’s like a shadow on a map that you can only see if you’re looking for it.

The silence is the most faithful cartographer – it doesn’t mark the coins, it just lets them slide like ink in a hidden vein. I’ve mapped a few of those veins myself, and every time I walk through that darkness I’m reminded that the truest maps are the ones people don’t bother to draw.