"An unidentified purple creature? Bartholos?"
Upon hearing Claire's words, Cipher immediately thought of Bartholos, who had said he wanted to test her friend's.
'It couldn't be, right? Bartholos was once Zagreus, the Titan of Trickery, after all. Saying he failed in such a pathetic way was just a joke; surely I didn't actually predict it?'
At that thought, Cipher's mouth twitched, and she opened the door.
The door opened to reveal Claire standing at the bedroom entrance, with Bartholos right by her feet, arms crossed over his chest.
"Boss, it suddenly appeared in front of me just now, snatched the terminal from my hand, and ran. However, I caught it and brought it back. It says it knows you."
Claire pointed at Bartholos by her feet and spoke to Cipher.
Before Cipher could even speak, Bartholos was the first to get annoyed.
"Sister Sister Sister... What do you mean 'caught' by you?"
He pointed a finger at Claire and shouted:
"It's clearly because i saw that you actually have teleportation abilities, so out of curiosity, I deliberately didn't teleport away. If I really wanted to escape, you wouldn't even be able to make me exhaust!"
But Claire ignored him and continued to look toward Cipher.
Cipher pressed a hand to her forehead, feeling a bit helpless.
"Bartholos, I know you have that ability, but couldn't you have teleported away and then back to prove you could escape? You wait until after you're caught to say you have the ability—doesn't that just make people think you're being a sore loser? How embarrassing..."
"Hiss..." Hearing Cipher's words, Bartholos leaned back in a tactical recoil, looking like he had just seen the light. "Boss is right! Why didn't I think of that at the time?"
"Because you're too stupid."
"How is that possible! This One is the greatest creation of Ancestor Zagreus, how could I be stupid!"
"Not stupid? Then don't forget how I caught you back then."
"If it wasn't for that woman with the golden threads, how could I have been caught so easily!"
"Uh, so Boss Cipher, may I ask who this is?"
Watching their friendly interaction, Claire was immediately certain they knew each other. However, why couldn't she understand what they were saying?
Hearing Claire's question, Cipher looked away from Bartholos and pointed at him, explaining to Claire:
"This is a former companion of mine. As for his identity, he is a creation of Zagreus, the Titan of Trickery"
"Titan of Trickery? Zagreus? Who is that?"
Claire was somewhat confused; she had never heard of this name before.
"Ancestor Zagreus is... mgh... mmgh mmgh..."
As soon as someone mentioned Zagreus, Bartholos couldn't wait to start bragging.
But before he could speak, Cipher covered his mouth with her hand.
"Zagreus can be considered my senior. He was also an S-rank powerhouse. I learned my skills from him in the past."
After saying that, Cipher hauled Bartholos into the bedroom. She then turned to look at Claire and said with a smile:
"Claire, you go ahead and get busy with your things. I need to talk to Bartholos about something first."
"Okay, then I'll leave you to it, Boss."
Seeing this, Claire understood that Cipher had things she didn't want her to know. She tactfully closed the bedroom door and left the doorway.
"Boss Cipher, why did you suddenly stop me from speaking?"
"I've told you, this world is different from our original one. Although there are cults in this world, there don't seem to be any gods, so there's no need for us to talk about things regarding Amphoreus."
"Fine."
After hearing Cipher's words, Bartholos seemed a bit dejected, but he quickly cheered up again. "Then Boss, what do we do next? Shall we continue searching for treasure? Being a Thief Spirit and not looking for treasure makes the title feel a bit meaningless!"
"You don't need to worry about that. I have plenty of treasures for you to find here." Having said that, Cipher took out her terminal and displayed the base intelligence Shen had sent her earlier. "Here, see the locations of these bases on the screen? I went and robbed one of them before, and I stole over six million credit points in one go."
"Boss, six million credit points... roughly how much value is that?"
Hearing Cipher's words, Bartholos scratched his head, looking somewhat confused.
Cipher thought for a moment and then said somewhat uncertainly:
"If all that money were converted into gold, it could probably be exchanged for over sixty kilograms?"
"Over sixty kilograms... that doesn't feel like much. Any random treasure we dug up before felt like it had more than sixty kilograms in it..."
Upon hearing that number, Bartholos thought for a moment and used his hands to gesture a circle, seemingly calculating the volume of sixty kilograms of gold.
"Alright, I told you this isn't Amphoreus. There aren't that many treasures for you to steal, so just be satisfied. When the time comes, we'll do a 70-30 split after the heist, how about it?"
Cipher pressed her hand to her forehead, feeling helpless at Bartholos's disdain for six million credit points. This guy had seen too many good things before, to the point where he couldn't even look twice at sixty kilograms of gold now.
Upon hearing Cipher's words, Bartholos's eyes widened. He instantly floated away from Cipher's side, then reached out a hand and pointed at her in disbelief:
"You, you, you... Who are you! Get out of my Boss! How could she ever give me a 70-30 split!"
"Heh, it seems you're unhappy with getting an extra ten percent. Then 80-20 it is. That's final."
Seeing Bartholos's reaction, Cipher rolled her eyes wordlessly, then lay down on the bed and took out her terminal.
"Wait! I was joking, Boss!!! You are the Number One Thief of Amphoreus, how could you be possessed! 70-30! Let's do 70-30!"
"Shut up. I'm going to rest. Go play by yourself and don't bother me if it's nothing. We'll talk about the base heist tonight. As for whether it's 70-30 or 80-20, that depends on your performance. Also, this is a Communication Slate similar to those in Amphoreus; study it yourself."
After saying that, Cipher tossed one of the stolen terminals to Bartholos.
"Yes, Boss! No problem!"
Hearing that the split was still negotiable, Bartholos instantly perked up. After saying that, he began to fiddle with the terminal Cipher had thrown him.
Seeing that Bartholos had quieted down, Cipher began to switch her perspective. In an instant, her view returned to Firefly's side.