Chapter 76: Everything has a price.

Angus blinked in confusion but didn’t dare ask questions. He bowed rapidly and scurried out to do as told. When the Mayor was in such a condition, it was best to do as he asked.

Left alone, Logan paced around his office, his face twisted in a dark scowl. He thought back to Trinity and Julia, those two arrogant women who had just treated him like absolute garbage.

"They only act polite when they want to use me to manage the capital’s taxes or supply lines," he muttered to himself, his voice shaking with rage. "How dare they treat me like their obedient hound? Do they forget who keeps this Capital running? One day... one day, I will have all of them groveling under my feet!"

But right now, his curiosity was eating him alive. Whatever happened at that dungeon had to be big. If it involved any dungeons, then it had to be important. As the Mayor, he refused to be kept in the dark. He had a right to know!

The office door clicked open, and Angus rushed back in, trembling as he handed over a slip of paper. "H-here is the private transmission number for the Starise Ground Master, sir."

"Get out!" Logan snapped, waving his hand as if chasing away a dirty stray cat. Angus practically leaped backward out of the room and shut the door.

Logan grabbed his phone and dialed the number.

Ring....

The call connected almost instantly. "Ground master of....."

"This is Logan, Mayor of the Capital," Logan cut in, putting on his most commanding, powerful voice. "Tell me immediately: what exactly just happened at the Starise Dungeon?"

On the other end of the line, the Ground Master’s voice sounded perfectly calm, almost bored. "Oh, your honor. Greetings. To answer your question... nothing happened. Everything is perfectly normal here."

Logan bit his lower lip so hard that the sharp taste of copper flooded his mouth. His veins bulged on his forehead. "Don’t play games with me! I want the exact information you just sent to the Divine Soul Maiden!"

The Ground Master feigned ignorance, letting out a heavy sigh. "Ah, your honor, you know the rules. That information is strictly on a need-to-know basis. If you want to know so badly, you should probably ask the Divine Soul Maiden yourself."

CRACK!

The expensive ink pen in Logan’s hand snapped completely in half, spilling dark ink all over his fingers. He didn’t care. He leaned closer to the device, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous whisper. "How much?"

There was a sudden pause on the other end. "Sir?" the Ground Master asked, trying to sound innocent, though he secretly felt like he had just hit the grand lottery jackpot.

"You heard me," Logan growled, wiping the ink on his shirt. "Name your price to sell me that information, and keep your mouth shut about this call."

Silence stretched across the line for a few agonizing seconds. Then, the Ground Master’s greedy voice came through. "Five hundred thousand high-grade stones."

"What?!" Logan almost choked on his own spit. "Are you insane? That’s a robbery! I will give you two hundred thousand, not a single stone more!"

The Ground Master clicked his tongue in disappointment. "Six hundred thousand."

"Hey you thief! Why did the price go up?!" Logan bellowed.

"Because every single time you bargain with me, your honor, the price increases by another hundred thousand," the Ground Master said with a sneaky chuckle. "You have to understand, I am risking my neck here by leaking confidential secrets to you. If the divine Soul Maiden finds out, she will either have my head on a platter or throw me into the dungeon to be eaten by the very beasts I raise here. The information you seek is worth a lot more that what I am asking for. Take it or leave it."

Logan gripped the desk, his knuckles turning white. He calculated rapidly in his head. He wasn’t in a position to bargain. If Trinity had gone so far as to kick him out of the audience hall, this news was worth millions.

"Fine! It’s a deal," Logan hissed, his heart bleeding at the loss of so many stones. "But you aren’t just sending me a verbal report. You are going to send me the direct recording of any footage you have too. A greedy bastard like you definitely made a secret copy of the dungeon records before sending them to the Mystic Sanctum."

The Ground Master laughed out loud, completely unbothered by the insult. "Ah, it is truly a pleasure doing business with a rich man like you, your honor. Check your phone in three minutes. Good day!"

The call went dead.

Back in the grand audience hall of the Mystic Sanctum, the atmosphere was incredibly tense.

Trinity and Julia were hovering over a large, glowing projection screen, carefully analyzing the surveillance footage of every single hunter who had entered the Starise Dungeon on the day the new hidden dungeon was discovered. The reason for the analysis was because of Julia’s question. What were the odds of Zyra Scorpion vanishing in the wild lands near a jungle and a new dungeon layout being discovered only days later? So, they were analyzing very carefully.

The footage was a total mess. Because many hunters carried illegal gear or wanted to keep their hunting means secret, they intentionally wore deep hoods, masks, or cloaks some even avoided the cameras at the entrance.

Trinity let out a long, frustrated sigh, rubbing her temples as a headache began to form. "This is completely useless," she muttered angrily. "Look at this! There are at least one hundred hunters in this video who are small, short, and slender....just like Zyra Scorpion’s build. There is absolutely no visual confirmation that it was her who triggered the new dungeon layout."

Julia stared intently at the screen, her eyes narrowing as she watched a hooded figure slip past a stone archway with a masked man. She didn’t have solid proof, but a strange, heavy feeling was pressing down on her chest.

"My Lady, my gut is telling me it has to be Zyra Scorpion," Julia said softly but firmly. "There is no such thing as a coincidence. The girl took something Zena left in a safety deposit box, under a false name. And now, a dungeon has been discovered! The Starise dungeon was declared dead over a decade ago and turned into a mutated beast farm. Every inch of it has been combed thoroughly over the years. This discovery is suspicious, someone knew exactly where to look. It has to be Zyra Scorpion."

Trinity closed her eyes, the golden light of her soul energy flickering weakly around her. When she opened them, she locked her sharp, piercing eyes directly onto Julia.

"Let’s hope your gut is right," Trinity whispered, her voice dark and dangerous. "Because we are running out of time. I need Zena’s secret. Even if I have to kill her daughter to get her hands on it."

Actually, there was no if. As soon as she got her hands on Zena’s legacy, she would have her daughter killed. She would not wait for whispers to circulate about Zyra being the next or promised Divine Soul maiden.