Chapter 328: The Bail Out

The doors of Solomon’s containment cell hissed open, and two armored officers walked inside.

Solomon was done pretending to be asleep, as that tactic had failed to produce any useful results during the first meeting and only wasted his time. He sat up on the floor, rattling his chains slightly, and looked at the two officers.

"Where did the party clown go?" Solomon asked, casually referring to Chief Kurt.

The officers didn’t say a single word. They grabbed him by the arms, hauled him to his feet, and gestured for him to follow them out of the cell.

Solomon glanced around the sterile corridors, watching the officers’ backs as they marched him toward the heavy cargo elevator. ’They are most likely taking me to some secluded black-site facility or a hidden basement where they will try to torture a confession out of me,’ Solomon thought to himself, feeling a surge of dark anticipation.

’Which is exactly what I want. I will definitely meet more of my high-value targets there. Maybe I can even find an excuse to kill them in the form of self-defence?.’

They stepped into the elevator. Solomon flexed his fingers, preparing to strike.

But then he paused, reconsidering his position. ’If I kill them and escape from this facility right now, I will officially be labeled a fugitive. I would have an entire city’s police force hunting me down.’

He let out a quiet breath. ’I wouldn’t have cared about being a fugitive three years ago, since I had absolutely nothing to lose and nowhere to go or so I kept thinning since I was blinded by revenge. But that is not the case anymore. I have my parents, Jasmine, my friends at the academy... I have to be smart about this. I need to deal with these corrupt officials my way.’

Solomon noticed the elevator did not go down to a hidden black-site. Instead, it went all the way up to the top floor.

The doors slid open, and the officers marched him through the bustling station, eventually stopping in front of the Commissioner’s executive office.

’Is the City Commissioner also involved in this conspiracy too?’ Solomon wondered, furrowing his brow. ’I didn’t find any direct evidence linking him to the dungeon tragedy, but maybe he is just incredibly good at covering his tracks.’

The officers opened the doors and gestured for Solomon to go inside.

He stepped over the threshold.

Commissioner Vane sat behind his large desk, casually sorting through a stack of paperwork. Another man was sitting in the plush visitor’s chair opposite the desk, his back turned entirely toward the door.

Solomon looked at the back of the stranger’s head. ’They must have brought in a specialized Awakened interrogator with some kind of mental-break or truth-serum talent to torture me.’

Vane looked up from his paperwork, noticed Solomon standing in the doorway, and offered a surprisingly polite smile. "Ah, he is here."

The man sitting in the visitor’s chair slowly turned his head. He stood up, turned completely around, and revealed himself.

It was Professor Balzac.

Solomon stared at the messy-haired professor for several long seconds, his face entirely blank and deadpan. Slowly, his upper lip curled, and his nose crinkled in absolute, unfiltered disgust.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Solomon asked, his voice dripping with profound disappointment.

The epic, highly anticipated showdown with a corrupt police force had just been entirely derailed by the sudden appearance of his lazy, perpetually sleepy professor. The situation was incredibly jarring. Balzac wasn’t even wearing his usual wrinkled academy robes. Now, he was dressed in an intimidating dark trench coat, looking like a hardened noir detective.

Balzac offered a lazy smile. "That is not the way a student should greet his favorite professor."

Solomon was even more confused now, and the sheer bewilderment was clearly evident on his face. He looked at Commissioner Vane, who was still smiling politely, and then looked back at Balzac’s uncharacteristically professional attire.

"Seriously, what is actually going on here?" Solomon demanded, crossing his cuffed arms.

"You do not need to worry about a single thing, kid," Balzac reassured him, patting Solomon on the shoulder. "I have officially proven that you are innocent of all charges. You are completely free to leave this place right now."

"Say what?" Solomon exclaimed in sheer disbelief.

All of his meticulous plotting, his deliberate capture, and his grand plan to assassinate the corrupt officials during a rigged trial went entirely down the drain in the span of a single sentence.

After a brief, highly confusing interaction, Commissioner Vane handed a stack of release papers over to Balzac.

"Although Solomon is legally allowed to leave our custody today, he is still considered a person of interest in the ongoing bombing investigation," Vane clarified, maintaining his bureaucratic tone.

"Normally, suspects are strictly forbidden from leaving the city limits or participating in dangerous dungeon raids. However, since Solomon is an enrolled student at the Live Streaming Academy, and according to the inter-dimensional treaties regarding student jurisdiction, he is permitted to return to the academy grounds. But this is granted on the strict condition that he must resume his twenty-four-seven live broadcast immediately, so our cyber division can monitor his whereabouts."

Balzac nodded, taking the paperwork. "As he should. He will be receiving his replacement broadcasting owl the second we step foot back on the academy campus."

With the legalities settled, the two of them were escorted out of the Commissioner’s office and down to the main lobby.

Solomon walked out of the doors, still utterly dumbfounded. He simply could not believe it. He had tried and worked so incredibly hard to get arrested. He had literally put on an embarrassing, humiliating act while getting tackled by SWAT teams, and everything was completely ruined just because this lazy professor decided to walk into the building.

’I do not understand why the academy would actually send someone to bail me out,’ Solomon thought, rubbing his wrists where the cuffs used to be. He quickly corrected himself. ’Actually, I know exactly why they sent him. I am a VIP student now. But I did not expect them to act this fast. I was arrested past midnight, and it is barely eight in the morning. I am already out.’

He was about to ask Balzac how he managed to clear the charges so quickly, but a black luxury car honked twice behind them and pulled up to the curb. The tinted window rolled down smoothly.

Rudy Redwood leaned over from the driver’s seat. "It is going to be incredibly difficult to find a taxi or a civilian ride-share from this sector of the city, unless you called someone to come pick you up. Would you two like me to drop you off?"

Solomon stared at the detective. He absolutely did not want to deal with any more cops today. Rudy was the same interrogator who had questioned him in the basement, and Solomon did not trust the man at all.

"No, we are fi—"

Before Solomon could even finish turning the offer down, Balzac casually opened the rear door and slid into the backseat without saying a single word.

A nerve cracked in Solomon’s forehead. He clenched his jaw, unable to do anything else, and angrily climbed into the back seat beside the professor.