Luke's soft voice echoed over the abandoned warehouse: "And this is also the purpose of our group."
"We accept anything you leave here, but don't try to take anything from us."
"Since he took our dignity from us, then he must pay a sufficient price to repay it."
Luke glanced at the faces of the troupe members.
Every one of them had a calm expression, as if nothing had happened.
Even…
In fact… they all felt it was long overdue.
Crack! Crack!
Phinks clenched his fists hard, creating a crisp crackling sound.
Feitan said nothing, but a faint bloodlust began to linger around him.
This was a tacit understanding formed between the two of them after more than a year of training outside.
Franklin's face was as gloomy as water, and Shalnark stopped laughing.
As for Pakunoda, she had been waiting for these words.
Machi wore an expressionless face and plucked at the invisible threads in her hands, seemingly testing the feel in advance.
Nobunaga scratched his scalp with one hand while the other hand firmly rested on the katana handle at his waist.
No one was too worried.
Most of them did not show extreme reactions, except for…
"I've been waiting for this day for so long, captain!!!"
Uvogin's excited cry echoed throughout the abandoned warehouse: "I'm going to kill all those bastards!!!"
"I'm so fired up I could die!"
He gritted his teeth, trying his best to suppress the surging emotions within him.
Uvogin wanted revenge so badly that it bordered on madness.
If Luke hadn't earlier insisted on waiting for the right moment to act, he might have already gone berserk and charged out recklessly to stir up trouble for the Mom's Help Foundation.
But that kind of rough vengeance through brute force would only provide coarse satisfaction and risk alerting the enemy, preventing them from addressing the root cause of this incident.
It might also prevent them from finding Risnorth, the chairman of the Mom's Help Foundation, who might have reacted and gone into hiding.
This would only complicate their revenge.
That's why Uvogin resisted the urge to do anything reckless.
He waited for this day, the day the troupe was established.
Nothing could be a more fitting celebratory gift for the establishment of their troupe than a foundation like this, a perfect target for their revenge!!
"Now, everyone in the Phantom Troupe has mastered Nen and possesses the strength to protect themselves."
"Chrollo has also managed Meteor City to a considerable degree. Now, we only wait for this incident to validate what we proclaim to the outside."
"Elder Veyron is also waiting for our response."
"Now, all the threads of fate converge here."
"This is the best opportunity we have!"
Luke's eyes gleamed.
He had a firm grasp on the trajectory of Meteor City's development in the current era!
Meteor City, a marginal zone where society did not recognize its denizens, was originally formed as the result of a dictator's racial segregation policies and became the area with the most diverse populations in the world.
After a long period of change, it has become a gray area, completely free from political interference.
Nearly ten million residents survive on discarded waste.
They know they are abandoned, and almost all of them consider themselves the walking dead.
Despite Chrollo's propaganda efforts over the past three years, not much has changed.
No matter how loud the slogans, they ultimately come down to concrete action.
"These are some materials about the Mom's Help Foundation and basic information on their chairman, Risnorth."
After determining the target of this operation, Chrollo produced the materials he had prepared long ago.
"Although there isn't much information here, it's what Elder Veyron and I obtained through cooperation with mafias and the elder's own secret channels."
Over the years, under Chrollo's leadership and facilitation, Meteor City has begun to collaborate with the mafia.
The mafia that came here began providing weapons and precious metals to the people of Meteor City under the guise of garbage disposal.
In return, Meteor City provided the mafia with some so-called elite members.
Because these members are not part of society, even if they commit crimes, there's no information to investigate.
It was precisely under this mutually beneficial, win-win cooperation that everything began to steadily improve.
Luke carefully reviewed the information Chrollo handed him.
As the saying goes, know yourself and know your enemy, and you will never be defeated.
Still, the information Chrollo and the others had gathered was ultimately limited.
A foundation that large would certainly have surface-level information released to the public.
Those publicly displayed pieces of information are only the most basic, mainstream facts.
Therefore, the more comprehensive internal materials were all hidden by that foundation.
However, this wasn't a problem for Luke.
"I've reviewed all this information."
Luke returned the information Chrollo had collected to him and, along with it, a new copy.
"Take a look at this one."
"Hmm?"
Chrollo took it, and what came into his view was a photo of the Mom's Help Foundation's chairman, Risnorth.
The following information also made Chrollo's eyes suddenly become serious.
"This… Is intelligence that can't be found outside!"
Chrollo grew increasingly astonished as he read.
The materials Luke produced were extremely detailed, on a completely different level from what he had.
It was as if someone had secretly placed a spy right beside Chairman Risnorth inside the Mom's Help Foundation and directly collected all this information.
"It's very comprehensive… Even down to the daily schedule!!"
Chrollo thought: if these detailed materials were authentic, then taking him out didn't seem all that complicated.
"Killing him isn't hard; there are plenty of assassination methods."
Luke said calmly: "The difficulty lies in uncovering his illegal and criminal activities."
"You know, everything we're doing this time is primarily to raise Meteor City's profile."
"Let everyone outside know what kind of existence Meteor City is."
"That a place like Meteor City exists in this world and cannot be ignored.
"But letting the outside world know is one thing; the image we present externally must not be that of wanton slaughterers and truly heinous criminals."
"Rather, everything we do is purely out of revenge."
"If no one offends me, I won't offend them. But if someone offends me, this is the outcome."
"This is the truest interpretation of Meteor City's purpose."
[We accept anything you leave here, but don't try to take anything from us!]
This was a statement that could both tolerate everything and yet exact extreme retribution for harm done, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
To put it bluntly, it's like being calm and composed under normal circumstances, but if harmed, they'll transform into mad dogs determined to exact revenge.
According to the original timeline, this operation would have been simply the Phantom Troupe's revenge for Sarasa.
It had nothing to do with Meteor City, and it would still mark the beginning of the Phantom Troupe's rise to world-famous criminal status.
Now, Luke was standing at a strategic high ground and represented Meteor City, which was demanding justice for the children who had been kidnapped.
In other words, they have a legitimate reason.
If it could trigger a shock across the world, it would become a landmark event that changes the world's perception of Meteor City and would be recorded in world history.
Like the future case where a homeless person from Meteor City is wrongly sentenced to death, and Meteor City's residents retaliate.
"So, his latest schedule..."
Chrollo flipped to the last page of the information: "Is he heading to Yorknew City to discuss business with a local company?"
"In that case, it's indeed an opportunity for us."
Chrollo didn't doubt the authenticity of Luke's information, even though he didn't know its source.
But since Luke had shared it, it proved to be reliable and trustworthy.
Well, this was all the information Luke had obtained from Ickshonpe before returning to Meteor City.
It wasn't particularly private information.
It was simply information about the business activities of the Mom's Help Foundation and the schedule of Chairman Risnorth.
This information was publicly available, yet rarely found.
Ickshonpe had located them through his information-gathering ability in the networked world because Luke had asked him to.
Of course, if Ickshonpe wanted deeper confidential files and intelligence, he could possibly find those too.
[It's not impossible to find that kind of information.]
Ickshonpe said: [But I won't do that.]
[The moment I entered the network world, I swore an oath that I would never use the power of the internet to commit any crime.]
[You can also consider this my Vows and Limitations.]
[Furthermore, if I really did use the power of the network world to do something…]
[It would be like opening Pandora's box, impossible to close.]
[Furthermore, V5 and every organization in this world would never allow such a thing to exist. They would absolutely not let even the slightest possibility of probing their secrets persist in this world.]
Ickshonpe understood thoroughly: once he crossed that forbidden threshold, the outcome for him would be terrible.
Thus, he used Vows and Limitations to completely block any possibility of committing any crime.
Even minor acts like stealing others' privacy were a definite no-go.
Providing Luke with these business activities and travel schedules was the limit of what he could do.
And for Luke, that was more than enough.
"As long as we know the general location and the next steps, that's all that matters."
At the outskirts of Meteor City, Luke and others stood at the road leading outside.
"Are we finally leaving this place?!"
Franklin gazed at the garbage dump and buildings behind him, momentarily lost in thought.
"This is our first time leaving here."
Pakunoda said softly as she gazed in the same direction.
"It's fine, it's not like we're never coming back."
Shalnark said, hands behind his head, the most carefree of them all.
"When we get tired of playing outside, we can always come back here."
"That's right."
Machi commented briefly, then turned her gaze toward Luke in front of them.
Click!
Boom!
Without hesitation, Luke once again pulled out his universal capsule and brought out the RV.
As a puff of purple smoke dissipated, the same RV they had used before reappeared before everyone's eyes.
"Whoa!"
Shalnark whistled in amazement.
"No matter how many times I look at it..."
He looked back and forth at the RV that Luke had suddenly pulled out: "I still think the captain's inventions are absolutely incredible."
He praised it sincerely, loving that sense of convenience and how their needs could always be met.
Besides, it wasn't just convenient; it made everything much more comfortable.
Although they could have easily traversed this desert on foot, with their strength, if they could ride in an RV, eat hotpot, and sing songs along the way, given the choice, who would want to camp out in the cold desert, with cold wind blowing on them and the dust all over their faces?
Of course, sitting in a cozy RV, shielded from the elements, was far better!
"Everyone, get in."
Luke opened the door first and stepped in, followed by Nobunaga and Feitan with familiarity.
Phinks, naturally, took the driver's seat with ease.
Seeing this, the others followed suit.
However, due to Franklin and Uvogin's rather large size, they nearly made the RV tilt to one side when they entered.
Thankfully, the interior was spacious enough to accommodate everyone comfortably.
"To get to Yorknew City, we will head to the nearest city outside and take an airship. We will be there soon."
Luke explained as he checked their identification papers.
"Yorknew City is a world-famous metropolis, so there are plenty of flights."
He finished inspecting each ID and nodded after noticing nothing was wrong.
"Yeah, these IDs look perfectly authentic, no different from normal citizens."
He had prepared a few blank IDs just in case, but now it seemed they wouldn't be needed.
"These were specially made for us by Father Lisores."
Chrollo said softly.
"A farewell gift to help us leave Meteor City."
"So, Father Lisores is in the Kirimori Valley now, praying there?"
Luke asked while looking at Machi.
This time, when Luke returned to Meteor City, he didn't meet Father Lisores.
After Machi's return, he learned that Father Lisores had gone to Kirimori Valley.
Well, gone might not be the right word, more like working there.
Perhaps that's how he obtained these identification documents from Kirimori Valley.
"It's fine. We can see him next time we come back."
Before Chrollo could respond, Luke continued: "As long as we get things done perfectly and make Meteor City's name known, that's the best way to repay Father Lisores."
Such a result was far more meaningful than meeting him ten thousand times!