“He wants someone who can actually make decisions?”
At Haitie Society headquarters, Theodore—who had finally received word from the middleman—came to the conference room. Upon entering, he heard the middleman’s account. His tone expressed anger and surprise quite fittingly, but the corners of his mouth were practically impossible to suppress.
Several officers who already disliked Edwin, a civilian staff member, giving orders directly burst into laughter.
Edwin forcibly stabilized his expression using his expression management module, suppressing his rage and humiliation as he frowned:
“Compared to the mockery of ignorant Trash District barbarians, you’d better think about who is fit to go if I don’t!”
“Of course, me!” Chariot stood up without hesitation. “Since he only respects fists, then it should naturally be me—the one with the biggest fists after the Chairman!”
“Hah, if word got out that we sent a man who handles street brawls to conduct recruitment, we’d turn reason into unreason!”
Gold Tooth let out a slightly helpless sigh:
“We’re laying a trap. Though it’s destined to be humiliating, we at least need a passable lining. The Boss isn’t here; the Staff Officer proposes recruitment, but the other side doesn’t agree, a fight breaks out—that’s explainable. But if we send you… others might say that our Haitie Society intended for the talks to collapse from the start. Otherwise, how could we fail to find even a single proper negotiator?”
The officers debated over who could bear the weight of the term “making decisions” while also earning John’s approval, but Theodore thought to himself that his turn to enter the stage had finally come. He immediately spoke up:
“I wonder if I count as someone who can make decisions?”
“No…” Before the words could leave his mouth, Edwin swallowed them back down himself. At the same time, he gave Philentina a look. As an intelligence operative, Philentina immediately understood Edwin’s predicament, and she also understood that the Young Lord shouldn’t be allowed to take risks here. She returned a look that said, “You owe me a favor,” and spoke:
“Young Lord, shouldn’t you still be grounded?”
“The hell—if it weren’t for that, I’d have been out on the town long ago!” Theodore cursed inwardly, but he knew he had to maintain appearances. He immediately said:
“I’m the Young Lord. No matter how stupid the Trash District is, they won’t take issue with this status. Moreover, Iron Hammer and Scorpion are both my men; it’s more fitting for me to step forward. And I’m not a weakling without any strength. His crossbow is touted as miraculous, but didn’t Iron Mask dodge it? My bodyguard is equipped with a Sandevistan! If even Iron Mask could dodge it, do you think he can injure me?”
“…”
Objectively speaking, sending Theodore to appear was absolutely a bad move. But given the current situation, Edwin truly couldn’t speak up. If the Chairman were here—or even if he wasn’t, as long as he hadn’t handed over gang affairs to Edwin—then he could speak freely. But unfortunately, right now Edwin was the one calling the shots. This meant that as soon as he opposed Theodore, it would give rise to suspicions of “grabbing power” or “suppressing the Young Lord.”
Therefore, when he looked around the room, they were either muscleheads who fundamentally couldn’t read the room, or Theodore’s die-hard loyalists, or else fence-sitters who didn’t want to offend Theodore or who simply disliked him.
You couldn’t blame the Haitie Society for being a makeshift crew, because this kind of gang hadn’t risen by competing with peers of the same caliber in the first place. It relied on the boss’s strength and background. Now that the boss was absent, naturally there was no unified voice.
Did the boss know? Of course he knew. But he wouldn’t change it either, because the boss’s interests weren’t in the gang’s meager profits. Having no unified voice besides himself was actually the best situation for him…
“Sigh…”
Edwin felt utterly exhausted. He took out his communicator and made one last struggle—
“We should still ask the Chairman for instructions.”
Theodore wanted to stop him but had no reason. He could only pray inwardly. Fortunately…
“[Beep—]”
The busy tone indicating a powered-off device sounded from the communicator. Edwin looked at Theodore’s overjoyed face and finally sighed in resignation—
“Then let’s proceed according to the Young Lord’s idea. However, the on-site layout must be adjusted to guarantee the Young Lord’s absolute safety!”
…
“There’s a response!” Sal, who had been under John’s gun for quite some time, finally breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly said:
“Theodore! It’s Theodore, the Young Lord of the Haitie Society. He can absolutely make the decisions! Even his father couldn’t go back on a promise he made! Even if he wanted to push another bastard son up, he still wouldn’t!”
“Now that’s more like it.” John whistled. “Specific location? Don’t tell me it’s in the West District!”
“That’d be impossible!” Sal shook his head vigorously, then said:
“The Wildfire Bar, west of Warehouse Three in the old harbor district of Feiyun Harbor, ten o’clock the night after next,” Sal said. “Feiyun Harbor is, in principle, Ligong Society territory, but that refers to the new harbor. The old harbor, as a necessary gateway for the smuggling business, counts as a neutral zone. It concerns everyone’s business, so you needn’t worry about an ambush—after all, opening fire in that place is equivalent to offending everyone.”
John smiled. It was a cold, utterly mirthless smile:
“Sal, do you think I’d believe a place like that has no ambush?”
“Honestly? No.” Sal shrugged. “But that’s the rule of negotiations. They know you know there might be an ambush; you know they know you know. The key is whether both sides genuinely want to reach an agreement, or just want an excuse to start a war. The Haitie Society has a massive enterprise, the Chairman has heaven-reaching backing and top-tier strength. If they really wanted to deal with a killer whose residence they could find so easily, they wouldn’t need to use this kind of method.”
“Provided the Chairman has his hands free!”
John thought inwardly. When he received the reply that Theodore would appear, he could basically confirm that Carlos was indeed tied up by something.
And this was precisely what John wanted to bring about. With Blast Arm, Golden Cicada Escape, and Abomination, he was confident he could secure a first-encounter kill against any enemy incapable of defending against a hundred-thousand-ton-level grip strength. But if he killed Carlos first, it would inevitably draw the attention of Saint Lotan’s upper echelons. Wanting to continue moving against the Haitie Society members who had scattered like birds and beasts would be very troublesome.
As the saying goes, a family should be neat and whole—how could he possibly let the Haitie Society off?
Now, Carlos wasn’t around. Whether because he was being targeted by some other bigshot and called in by his backers for questioning, or because he was entangled in certain people’s tentacles and unable to break free, it was the perfect opportunity to wipe out the Haitie Society!
“Tell Theodore I’ll be there.” John suppressed the joy in his heart and looked at Sal coldly. “But you’d best not give me a chance to come looking for trouble with you!”
“Rest assured, I won’t!”
Sal was thankful his synthetic skin didn’t possess a sweating function. He forced himself to look at John calmly and added:
“Going after Theodore is a bad move. Compared to Edwin, who became Staff Officer through ability, a second-generation heir who gained power through bloodline—you can’t guarantee when he’ll go mad!”
“Oh, is that so?”
John merely waved his hand indifferently, but Sal only felt an intense killing intent erupt.
A great white shark selecting its prey to devour seemed to have been awakened by his inadvertent words…