Chapter 996
‘What I learned last time was barely scratching the surface. I almost ended up in a body bag because I underestimated them.
Every single fraud compound here is backed by a fully mechanized private army. They aren’t street thugs; they are heavily armed and highly trained mercenaries.
Don’t rush it. We want the same thing. Give me a few days to crack their patrol routes, and then we burn them down together p>
Hank replied.
Putting the phone away, Mira and Owen exchanged a look before heading straight for the front desk.
“Could you arrange a meeting with your boss for us?” Mira asked the receptionist with a polite smile.
“Well p>
The clerk hesitated, clearly reluctant. Without missing a beat, Mira slid two crisp hundred-dollar bills across the counter. “Please. We just have a few questions for
him p>
The moment her fingers brushed the bills, Mira subtly smeared a fast-acting, time- delayed sedative onto the paper.
The local economy thrived on Mavarian cash, making the bribe universally irresistible, and practically everyone understood the language.
The receptionist’s eyes lit up with greed. She snatched the cash, shoving it into her pocket before frantically dialing her desk phone.
In this impoverished, blood-soaked economy, that amount of money could buy a ridiculous amount of luxury.
Naturally, a motel clerk’s salary was basically pennies.
The tourist rate for their room was barely twenty bucks a night, and the locals paid half that.
Room service was decent but demanded cash upfront for every single plate.
The clerk rattled off a string of rapid-fire local dialect into the receiver, though she had spoken perfect Mavarian to Mira.
Slamming the phone down, she flashed them a plastic smile. “Right this way p>
The motel was only six stories high. The clerk led them up to the penthouse suite on the top floor-easily the most lavishly decorated room in the entire building.
The moment Mira and Owen stepped onto the plush carpet, the clerk bowed her head and slipped out, closing the heavy oak door behind her.
The owner was surprisingly young, somewhere in his early thirties. He was dressed in traditional Balkana attire—a rich blue sarong paired with a matching collarless linen shirt.
His hair, however, was styled in a sleek, vintage Western part, giving him the polished, dangerous air of an old-world mafia don.
He remained seated on his leather sofa, barely acknowledging their entrance with a slight tilt of his chin, gesturing toward the empty chairs across from him.
“Good evening,” Owen started smoothly. “We’re just tourists, entirely new to the
area. We were hoping you could provide us with some… local guidelines p>
Owen said.
The boss blinked, momentarily caught off guard. Before he could speak, Mira dropped thick stacks of
of thousands of *
cash easily tens of thousands
cagi bgsity tens of
tens
dollars onto the glass coffee table. “Consider this a consultation fee for your hospitality p>
Seeing the insane amount of money for a simple conversation, the man’s cold demeanor melted into a wolfish grin we didn’t even pretend decline the bribe Mira a
Owen
mentally exhaled, knowing they had him hooked.
The boss pulled out a laminated city map from a drawer, grabbed a red marker, and started aggressively circling different blocks.
A minute later, he slid the map over to Owen. “Do not step foot in the red zones. Minimize your time in the yellow zones. Anywhere else is fair game for sightseeing p>
“Thank you. Mind telling us what makes the red zones so special p>
The boss shook his head, his smile fading. “Just follow the map, and you keep breathing.
And one more thing. When the sun goes down, you make damn sure you aren’t standing on the street p>
“Understood. Can we get a direct number for you p>
Seeing the boss frown in suspicion, Mira quickly added, “Just in case we run into trouble outside and need some immediate advice.
Don’t worry. We pay handsomely. A hundred dollars for every question you answer p>
At the mention of more money, the tension in his shoulders vanished, and he rattled off his private cell number. “You two are the smartest tourists I’ve ever had in my lobby.
You have the right mindset. All the money in the world is useless if you don’t have a pulse to spend it p>
Mira and Owen shared a polite smile, thanked him for his time, and walked out.
The second the lock clicked shut in their own room, Mira whipped out her encrypted
laptop and immediately hacked into the motel’s mainframe p>
In truth, asking the boss to mark the cartel territories on a map was just a charade Dominic and Master Ellis’s intelligence network had already provided them with the exact same data.