Chapter 162: Danitz: Why Did You Kill Him?
Somewhere on a calm stretch of sea.
Aboard an armed merchant ship whose understated furnishings still exuded luxury.
Victor, a maritime information broker and black market merchant, leaned back behind his broad desk of rare wood, irritably leafing through a stack of intelligence his men had just gathered.
He had just finished resupplying the Golden Dream. According to his original schedule, his fleet should already have set sail for another stretch of sea to trade with another important client.
Instead, those lunatics from the Church of Storms had whipped themselves into a frenzy and thrown the entire region into chaos.
Their patrol ships were everywhere, charging about without any regard for reason and severely disrupting normal shipping. To avoid unnecessary trouble, he had been forced to suspend all his subsequent arrangements.
Damn the Church of Storms-a bunch of idiots who think with their muscles, Victor grumbled inwardly, tossing aside a report on the shipping lane blockade.
He picked up the next report and casually skimmed it. Then his fingers stopped.
"A bounty notice from the Ailment Maiden?" he muttered, a flicker of interest entering his eyes.
He read its contents carefully.
"Wanted-Monkey Brando-alive-ten thousand."
Ten thousand...
"Tsk." Victor clicked his tongue, tapping his fingers rhythmically against the desk, his eyes gleaming with a merchant's shrewdness.
Of course he knew the Ailment Maiden, Tracy, the female pirate famed for her diseases and beauty. But he was more curious about just who this Monkey Brando was, to make Tracy offer such an astronomical private bounty.
Outside official bounties, private rewards exceeding ten thousand pounds were exceedingly rare. Years could pass without a single one.
And the name Monkey Brando rang a bell.
He picked up several more documents from his desk.
One was a