The Highest Bounty

In a room that had been emptied within the Golden Eagle, Gu Ding and Lilliath sat opposite Tricke.

“Tell us, why did you hire Bregen to abduct Lili?” Gu Ding asked with a grim expression on his face. Even though Gu Ding usually had a sunny demeanor about him on normal days, he looked pretty scary when he was serious. His expression alone was enough to get Lilliath to sit quietly at the side. She did not dare say a word.

“It really wasn"t my idea. It was our little young master"s idea… No, I mean, it was the idea of the Childe family"s little young master.” After what Tricke experienced at the Old George tavern, he was not willing to step on Gu Ding"s tail. That was because each and every member of Gu Ding"s crew was scarier than the last. Being in their midst, Tricke felt that he could lose his life at any time. That was why he did not dare to lie.

“It"s said that the Childe family"s little young master was p.r.o.nounced a genius from a very young age. He is extremely intelligent and very good at devising schemes. Each time he hands out missions to his subordinates, he prepares at least two sets of plans. This time, he wanted to invite you to his rites of pa.s.sage, but all he told me was to think of a plan myself. I had no idea what other plans he had in mind until I got in touch with Bregen. That was when I found out that his second plan was to kidnap Lilliath. However, it had been carried out already. He wanted me to make the trade with Bregen and prepare a s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p to take Lilliath away as soon as possible. He also instructed me to kill Bregen,” Tricke explained as he revealed the little young master of the Childe family to be quite the schemer.

“What you mean to say is that there is no other reason as to why you abducted Lilliath except to invite me to his rites of pa.s.sage? That was why he wanted to take Lilliath hostage?” Gu Ding continued to ask.

“I have no idea if he has other reasons, I was only tasked to invite you to attend his rites of pa.s.sage. As far as I know, it"s the only reason why we kidnapped Lilliath. From the information we"ve gathered, she"s the weakest in your team and the easiest to get our hands on. Moreover, gunners are fairly easy to capture in close proximity.” To be honest, Tricke had no idea why Lilliath had been kidnapped. He was only making a deduction based on the missions he had conducted before.

“Gu Ding, I have a few questions as well.” Lilliath poked Gu Ding on the arm with her finger.

Gu Ding nodded. “Go ahead.”

“Is the Childe family involved with any industry that has to do with media? In other words, are they planning to step foot into the media industry?” Lilliath had her own family"s influence in mind.

“The Childe family started out in the banking industry. However, they"re now involved in almost every industry. They have the most influence in the finance and energy industry. They do play a part in the media industry but aren"t profiting from it. It has to be said that they aren"t losing money in it though. That"s because the Harris family has the entire information industry of every 3-star and above Cosmic Nation within Cosmic Sea under them. That includes the industries that deal with news and media. Faye Cosmic Nation is a 5-star Cosmic Nation, which means it is completely under them as well.” Tricke had an understanding of the different industry markets.

“The Childe family started their business in Faye Cosmic Nation, am I right? What is their family conglomerate"s current ranking in regards to wealth?” Lilliath"s question was straight to the point.

“Yes, the Childe family"s business dates back to more than ten thousand years ago. Their business was started by one of their ancient ancestors who was a demiG.o.d; every generation of their family was born and bred in Faye Cosmic Nation. The family conglomerate"s wealth ranking in Faye Cosmic Nation is currently second, and they are not far from number one.” Tricke was quite knowledgeable about Childe family"s background.

Lilliath raised an eyebrow as she continued to question, “It should mean that they really want to be number one. The Childe family is a huge financial group. They should have many new projects each year, right? Do you have a list of those projects?”

“The projects are decided on by our superiors in the headquarters. I"m just a minor supervisor of a division and don"t have much decision-making power. I only receive instructions after such projects have been confirmed. Most of them differ according to the division they"re under. Each sector has different focuses, which is why the final plans of a project are not the same for all of us. Moreover, plans concerning projects of the following year are only distributed to us at the end of each year. Any additional plans never make their way to us. If you"d like to have a look at this year"s projects, I can only show you the ones that were given to me at the end of last year.” Tricke had no idea why Lilliath was asking about such things.

“Give me all the files concerning your company"s plans throughout the last ten years,” Lilliath made a strange request. Nevertheless, Tricke complied.

Tricke was locked up within the Golden Eagle. Even though signals from the outside world were blocked, signals could be transmitted to and fro within the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p.

Lilliath immediately started looking through the projects after receiving their files from Tricke. She did not ask any more questions.

Biggie took Tricke away once Gu Ding was done interrogating him and then brought in the other two one after the other.

After putting together information from interrogating all three of them, Gu Ding realized that they were still in the dark.

The bodyguard clad in black, for example, worked as a bodyguard for the Childe family. He knew almost nothing about the Childe family"s business. All he did was simply complete missions given to him without any question. When he had no missions to work on, he would resume his position as a bodyguard for the Childe family.

As for Bregen, he had received his job at the last minute and had never dealt with the Childe family before this. It was the little young master of the Childe family that had gotten in touch with him, and the little young master was the one who had taken the initiative in their deal. All Bregen knew was that his job was to kidnap Lilliath. As for the reason behind that, the little young master had never told him.

Lilliath could not find even a single clue despite having gone through the Childe family"s list of projects over the last ten years. However, after getting Neptune to hack into the Childe family"s headquarter network, Lilliath found that someone had suggested them to expand their influence into the media industry three years ago. Nevertheless, the person that had made the suggestion could not be identified. Additionally, the project was put aside without any execution. As for the reason why it was being stalled, only the four words "Project To be Decided!" were written. The halted plan had been placed in a highly cla.s.sified file which only those of the highest clearance could access.

Lilliath smelled something fishy as it hinted to a conspiracy of some sort. Lilliath began to think that the little young master of the Childe family was not as he seemed. She even went as far as to guess that inviting Gu Ding to his rites of pa.s.sage was just a cover-up. His true target had to be her.

The sky had darkened by the time the interrogation was done.

Elsa finally woke up from her drunken stupor. Biggie had carried her back from the tavern. Hence, when she exited her room, she was surprised to see Tricke and the others. “What are they doing here? And who"s that man with the gla.s.ses?”

Lilliath gave her a summary of what had happened.

Elsa immediately gave the three of them an unfriendly look. “So, that means these people here are enemies? Gu Ding, since you"re done interrogating them, it would be pointless to keep them here, right? Do you need me to finish them off?”

Else was angered by the fact that they had attempted to kidnap Lilliath.

“I think it"d be better for me to do that.” Biggie wanted to take up the responsibility of killing them. After all, it would not be nice for such a young girl to do such a thing.

The hearts of the three men immediately sunk to their stomachs. It looked like all three of them would not be able to escape from the evil clutches of Gu Ding"s crew.

“Lili, what do you think we should do with them?” Gu Ding looked at Lilliath. Lilliath was the victim after all. She had the right to make the decision.

“Forget about it. Just let them go. They were only doing their jobs. If we"re going to take revenge, we should look for that little young master.” Lilliath had no intention of taking it out on them.

“Lili, there"s no reason to be kind toward them. If they managed to kidnap you today, they would"ve probably ended up kidnapping others in the future.” Elsa stared at three of them angrily.

Lilliath looked at Gu Ding. “Gu Ding, let them go…”

Gu Ding fell silent for a moment before he nodded. “Since Lili wants to let this matter go, I"ll let you all off. However, there is still one thing I need before you leave…”

Gu Ding"s gaze fell on Tricke. “I want to talk to your little young master.”

“That…” There was an uneasy look on Tricke"s face. It was bad enough that he had failed his mission. It would have been bearable if he managed to quietly lay low for a while. However, now, Gu Ding wanted to talk to his little young master through his communicator. It would be the equivalent of slapping his little young master in the face, with he himself playing a part in it.

“You can choose to reject my request, but think about the consequences.” Gu Ding"s words were clearly threatening him.

Tricke naturally understood his situation. He took a deep breath and nodded vigorously. “Fine!”

Tricke quickly found the little young master"s number in his communicator"s call history and dialed it.

The call rang less than two times before a young man"s voice was heard over the speaker. “Tricke, is the deal done?”

“h.e.l.lo, little young master of the Childe family.” Gu Ding smiled as he greeted the young man.

“You are… Gu Ding?” Unexpectedly, the voice on the other end immediately recognized Gu Ding"s voice.

“That"s right, I"m Gu Ding!” Gu Ding said his name out loud, slowly but clearly.

“I guess this isn"t a simple greeting since you"re calling my number,” the young man"s voice was quite calm and collected.

Gu Ding smiled widely. “Of course it isn"t. Aren"t you trying to get me to attend your rites of pa.s.sage? I"m here to tell you a piece of good news. It so happens that I have the time to pay you a visit.”

The other side of the communicator fell silent. The young man seemed to have come to an understanding after a while when he said, “That does sound like good news. In that case, I"ll await your arrival!”

Everyone was stunned when they heard the conversation that took place between the two.