"Damn it, there's a traffic jam."
Raven looked at the long convoy in front of her with seven parts dissatisfaction and three parts road rage.
"That's the bad thing about big cities—traffic jams every morning, noon, and evening."
However, no one around her paid attention to Raven's complaints.
"I'm increasingly suspicious that letting them tag along was a mistake."
Raven looked with great displeasure at the others who were minding their own business.
There were exactly four people in the car, excluding Tian Shi and her, making this four-seater supercar completely full.
It was truly rare for her car to be this full.
"Can you give me some reaction?"
"What is your desired response, Miss Ciora?"
Rita, who was in the co-pilot's seat, looked at Raven.
"Do you want us to complain about the traffic jam with you? Or would you prefer us to find a way to solve it?"
"If traffic jams could be easily solved, there wouldn't be traffic jams."
"Or should I call Schicksal's transport ship?"
"Well, I can't afford to ride in your Schicksal transport ship."
Raven looked away boredly, but at that moment, the traffic in front of her began to move slowly.
"Fortunately, I'm lucky today."
...
"We're here, get out."
Raven shooed everyone away with a look of disgust.
"I'll open the door for you later."
"Well... if you mean opening the door, Miss Ciora... it might not be necessary."
Mei got out of the back of the car and tapped Raven's door, then pointed to the half-demolished bungalow door in front of her.
"Did the children run away by themselves?"
"Do your children remove the door when they leave?"
Raven immediately turned off the engine and got out of the car, looking a little gloomy.
"There is an intruder... two people."
Raven sighted footprints on the sandy path.
"Well... this footprint is..."
Rita naturally spotted the footprints Raven could find, and the expression on her face couldn't help but be a little strange.
"Fu Hua, or the Herrscher of Sentience, and Kiana."
Mei adjusted her glasses and revealed the visitor's identity.
"I recognized Senior Sister Hua's footprints from my previous civilization, and I remembered Kiana's footprints when I reviewed the information yesterday."
"Yes, it is indeed the two of them," Rita nodded.
"Them...?"
Raven's expression softened a little, but it gave way to a bewildered look.
"What are they doing here? No, how did they know about this place?"
"Who knows?"
Rita spread her hands.
Not even she cared about this place, alright?
"But then again... Miss Raven, are you really okay with letting the children live in a house like this?"
Rita looked at the "quaint" house in front of her with a subtle expression.
"Can't you just rent a house?"
"I don't feel safe."
Raven looked at Rita.
"And I'm very short on money lately. Don't talk to me about the car. I bought it when I was richest. I also bought the island... well, it sank, so now I'm poor."
"That sounds quite miserable."
"So, theoretically, that girl, Kiana, owes me nearly ten million."
Raven told a joke that wasn't very funny.
It should be a joke, right?
"It was thanks to Miss Ciora's good temper that these two people didn't fight..."
Mei couldn't help but think that.
"No, actually, I feel like sticking the Seven Thunders of Purgatory in that white-haired girl's mouth and shooting her, but there's no point in doing it."
Raven seemed to catch the expression on Mei's face and corrected her.
"So, Miss Mei, are you going to repay your friend's money?"
"I don't have money either. Our Far East Valkyries are not under Schicksal Headquarters' jurisdiction. I was still a student last year."
Mei spread her hands.
"I mean the ME Company. A young woman like you would receive invitations from various small companies every year for her birthday, wouldn't she?"
"Where did this misunderstanding about high school students come from?"
Mei twitched her mouth.
"If it's money from the ME Club, Miss Raven, you should talk to Sister Edison. Last century, Sister Edison spent 13 billion to buy Schicksal's North American branch. Now, let alone nearly 10 million, even tens of millions is not a problem at all."
"I know, the European Recovery Program, right? If inflation is taken into account, the real value of that contract is ten times higher."
Raven curled her lips and said.
"Forget it, I don't think I should deal with this old fox."
Repaying the money was just a joke, and Raven didn't expect others to actually give it to her; after all, other people's families don't do charity.
"Well... if that's the case, I can try."
Tian Shi spoke.
"If you can buy Raven for about 10 million and set aside your prejudices against Kiana, I think it's worth it."
"Seriously?"
Raven suddenly felt like she had been given a cake.
"Although this may sound a little pretentious, do not underestimate Nancy's power... Let's put it this way: in an emergency, the first person responsible is the president, the second is Nancy, and the third is Planck..."
Speaking of this, Tian Shi's expression is a bit strange.
If it weren't for the Honkai Organization, Nancy's scenario would simply be a model boss.
"So, in Nancy's eyes, your 'nearly 10 million' is just the price she would pay for a bottle of mineral water."
Tian Shi scratched his face and said.
"Although I am the pet alliance leader, I believe I can still make decisions on matters of this magnitude."
"..."
Raven wanted to point out that the nearly 10 million she was talking about was in euros, but then she thought again that the other party seemed to be talking about US dollars.
Looking back, all my efforts for so long seem so empty.
"Tsk, I suddenly want to rob the rich and give to the poor."
"Just tell me if you want it or not."
"I want it."
Trying her best to suppress the joy of being hit by the cake, Raven immediately nodded.
"Mei, lend me your phone."
"Here, Brother Tian."
Mei handed the phone to Tian Shi, and then Tian Shi quickly called Nancy's phone.
"Yes, it's me, Tian Shi... Yes, I'm back... I won't leave... Yes, I'll go see Einstein first... I want to talk to you about something specific this time..."
As Tian Shi spoke, he extended his hand towards Raven.
Raven immediately understood what he meant and took her bank card out of her purse and handed it to him.
"Yes, I need money... The card number is... Well, I'll be back as soon as I can..."
After a while, Raven's phone rang with a reminder.
"Ding Dong ~"
Raven took a deep breath and tremblingly reached out to open her phone.
"They arrived... They arrived... One... Hundred million?"
Wait, wait, wait. Those zeros?
1, 2, 3, 4...7, 8... eight zeros, with a 1 in front.
That's right, one hundred million.
Unit... Unit... USD.
"Miss Ciora?"
Mei quickly helped Raven, who was about to fall to the ground.
"I'm fine."
Raven grabbed Mei's arm and stood up.
"Is this what it feels like to be kept?"
She finally understood why some people degenerated and ended up being kept by others.
Although it may be a bit inappropriate to say this, but it really... it really feels good.
It turns out that I wasn't distant before; no one was just willing to hit me this generously.
Is it so easy to make money if you have a good boss?
To earn money, she even created a small account to hire the first and second mercenaries on the Charon List, i.e., assassins.
Besides, the World Serpent's salary was not low.
After several years of hard work, she only earned tens of millions. In the process, she even faced extremely dangerous people like Otto.
But there is a good boss who can get you 100 million with just a few words?
"I feel like Miss Ciora is starting to exude an aura of decadence..."
Mei looked at Raven, who stood up and crouched in the corner, with a strange expression.
"The money temporarily overwhelmed her. When I participated in large-scale experiments and faced the impressive variety of materials and the huge amount of funding, I felt the same way she does, but that feeling did not last long."
MEI adjusted her glasses.
"Because you have an extraordinary character?"
Rita asked tentatively.
"While that was a factor, the main problem was that, in a short time, I myself approved the funding and materials."
Damn it, I'm being treated like Versailles.
Rita quietly turned her head, but she understood what was being said.
This is probably the same as a normal person winning the lottery, right?
Fortunately, I am a woman with hundreds of millions in savings, so I don't have to feel as embarrassed as the person in front of me.
Soon, Raven regained some of her sanity.
"Eh... Sir, why is it 100 million? Could it be that Miss Edison added an extra zero?"
"No."
Tian Shi's expression was a little subtle.
"In Nancy's words: 'Spending ten million to buy the heart of someone with the combat power of an S-rank Valkyrie is petty. I'll give you ten times more, and if it's not enough, ask for more'."
"So that's how it is..."
Raven breathed a sigh of relief, as long as it wasn't the wrong number.
Besides... aren't these words "ask for more if it's not enough" a bit too arrogant?
I've already decided.
I'll block Grey Snake right now.
Grey Snake, please don't look for me anymore; I'm afraid Mr. Tian Shi will misunderstand me.
Some people are more likely to die than others.
As for Edison, although Raven really wanted to meet this great and dominant inventor, she also knew that she was able to get this money largely thanks to Tian Shi's influence.
Raven can still clearly distinguish these things; she admitted that the other party's plan to win her heart truly succeeded.
Wait, I already have the money, is it necessary to keep it...?
Well, it is necessary.
Raven silently put aside her somewhat wandering thoughts.
The greatest taboo for mercenaries is taking money without performing any work.
People like this generally die a miserable death or are on their way to a miserable death.
She was able to leave the World Serpent that year because she had worked enough and was on good terms with the World Serpent; besides, Grey Snake had a very open mind.
If I had been replaced by someone less open-minded, perhaps I would be floating in the trench now.
Besides, she is not ruthless.
Since she took 100 million dollars from someone, she should do 100 million dollars worth of work for that person before leaving.
That way, she can leave happily.
But then again, it's 100 million dollars.
How long will it take me to pay them back?
Not counting the sporadic jobs I did as a child, I earned about 10 million in four or five years. There is no difference between euros and US dollars.
In that case... oh, forty or fifty years would be enough.
What a ghost! That's a whole lifetime, alright?
"Okay, get up and take it easy. We have important things to do."
Tian Shi pointed to the demolished door in front.
"So, how did Kiana and that kid Senti suddenly get here?"
"The name 'Senti' is truly subtle,"
Rita complained.
Raven, who was next to them, began to quickly think at that moment.
"It should be Grey Snake."
Raven analyzed very calmly.
"The only person in all of Sky City who could have noticed this place was Grey Snake, and both of them managed to find it... but I don't know why they came here."
"Forget it, let it be. At worst, I'll be the first to run to the front and take a few more hits."
Raven sighed internally.
Besides, the people around her... including the most annoying Rita, are much better than Jackal.
She and Jackal have completely different values.
If they weren't colleagues, Raven would have turned against him a long time ago.
She and Rita simply have different personalities.
Apart from Rita, Raven gets along well with Durandal, Mei, and MEI, who are by her side now.
So Raven genuinely likes the environment around Tian Shi now.
"What is Grey Snake trying to achieve by throwing them here?"
Tian Shi complained.
"Could he want Kiana to challenge you to a training match?"
"That's... fine, barely acceptable."
After receiving the money, Raven stopped expressing her dissatisfaction with Kiana.
"But I always feel that things won't be that simple: a mercenary's intuition for trouble."
"No matter how troublesome it is, let's go in first. I haven't seen Kiana in a long time."
Mei reached out and pulled Tian Shi, who was possessed by the doll, into her arms and entered first.
"Keep going; it should be in the backyard."
Raven followed closely behind her.
"Although it looks deserted, there's enough space; otherwise, the children wouldn't fit. Let me guide you."
This time, Raven went ahead.
After a while, Tian Shi and his group heard the noises of Kiana, Senti, and a group of children.
"Throw, throw, throw the handkerchief, put it gently behind the child, don't tell him, hurry up and catch it, hurry up and catch it..."
"It's fun in there."
Hearing the voices inside, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
"It sounds like it involves Shenzhou children's games."
"It's not like it; it's exactly it."
A glimpse of nostalgia crossed Tian Shi's face.
"Let's go in and take a look."
"Yes."
Mei nodded and quietly walked toward the backyard, just in time to see Kiana sitting on the ground with the children, clapping and singing together.
Kiana also felt Mei's gaze at that moment and unconsciously looked up.
"Mei!?"
Kiana jumped up in ecstasy and immediately ran to Mei's side.
"Mei, what are you doing here? What do you have in your hand... huh? What is this?"
Kiana then saw the Tian Shi doll in Mei's hand.
At that moment, some bad memories flooded her.
"I don't know what the situation is, but I'm sorry, Miss Kiana, I already have a lover."