Chapter 47: Chapter 47: The Bait Operation
At the thought, Bella gritted her teeth and muttered, "No way. Joseph and Justin have huge potential with their Talents. I’m locking them down. I’ll keep them on a tight leash and make them follow my orders."
She shifted her tone, her face turning cold. "But I can’t let Kevin and Keston off the hook either. I’ll give them just enough hope to keep chasing me. Let them be my dogs."
She opened the chat channel and immediately sent a message to Keston. "Honey, you did so well. You killed so many Survivors last night. Did you get hurt? I was so worried, so I made you a bandage out of my black stockings. Don’t mind it."
Bella grabbed a crumpled pair of black stockings from the trash. They were full of holes Joseph had ripped off during sex, and stained with clumps of unknown fluid.
She snipped it into shape with some scissors and scraped the blade against it twice to make it look worn. Then, she sent a trade request to Keston.
At the same time, out in a sea painted with blood and water.
Keston sat on a pile of Survivor corpses, calmly chewing on a chunk of blue cheese.
His clothes were torn in many places, and he had a gunshot wound on his shoulder. Blood dripped down his arm.
Just then, a girl who wasn’t dead yet slowly opened her eyes. Looking at the blood-soaked Keston, she asked in total despair, "Why did you kill me? We’re on the same boat, right?"
Keston swallowed the cheese, clapped his hands, and snorted, "Sorry, I can’t stay on a boat with other women for too long. Bella would get mad."
Hearing that reason, the girl completely broke down. She never expected to die at the hands of a teammate over something so stupid.
Keston glanced down at the girl, grabbed a dagger, and slashed it across her face. "You’re too pretty. I was afraid Bella would get jealous."
The dagger was sharp. The girl died quickly, but her eyes still burned with frustration and hate.
Right then, a system chime rang in Keston’s ear. He saw Bella’s message and trade request, a slight smile pulling at his lips. "I knew it. Bella has a place for me in her heart. She loves me."
He wrapped the black stocking around his head like a bandage, snapped a quick photo, and sent it to Stephanie. "Will Bella like it wrapped like this?"
Stephanie was actually sweeping the deck at Kevin’s ship when she saw the photo. She stumbled and nearly fell. "Keston, what are you doing? Trying to play a pirate?"
Keston read her reply and looked genuinely confused. "Doesn’t it look good on my head?"
Stephanie rolled her eyes and brushed it off with a joke. "You should tie it into a bow..."
Keston’s eyes went wide when he read that. He slapped his thigh. "Right! How did I miss that!"
He ignored Stephanie, tied the stocking bandage into a big lace bow, and sent the new picture to Bella.
Bella saw the new picture and her lip twitched awkwardly. She replied, "You’re... really thoughtful. Remember to take good care of Stephanie for me."
Without another word, Bella cut off her connection with Keston.
At the same time, she kept her eyes on the Global Channel, trying to find Kevin’s contact info.
But Kevin had vanished without a trace, never showing up on the Global Channel. This made Bella feel a wave of frustration. "Damn it, Kevin got so many rewards. Doesn’t he need to trade some of them for supplies?"
Just as Bella was struggling to find Kevin, Kevin had already changed clothes and was having breakfast with his crew.
Right now, the table was set with fresh hot bread, sturgeon caviar, blue cheese, and seared A5 Wagyu.
Each place setting also had a glass of ’82 Lafite and a bottle of Holy Spring.
The three girls, Nova, Celula, and Monchhichi, hadn’t had a proper meal for three days straight.
Seeing such a lavish breakfast, their eyes widened in disbelief.
Celula didn’t care about any of that. She immediately cut off a piece of steak, put it in her mouth, chewed, closed her eyes in pleasure, and said, "This is amazing! Long live the captain!"
[Affection +5]
Monchhichi and Nova exchanged a glance, then turned to Kevin. "This must be the reward you two got the day before yesterday, right? Are you sure it’s okay to eat such expensive food and wine all at once?"
[Affection +5]
Amelia smiled and waved her hand. "Don’t worry. From now on, our meals will always be at this standard."
Hearing that, Nova was stunned. "Always at this standard? Well, besides the captain keeping the top spot, only Amelia is in the top ten on the leaderboard right now. The competition for the rankings will definitely get tougher from now on. Are you sure you can handle it?"
[Affection +5]
Just then, Kevin gently wiped his mouth and smiled. "Give it three days, and you’ll all make it to the top ten on the leaderboard."
Celula nearly choked on her drink after hearing Kevin’s words. "Cough, cough, Captain, you really know how to brag. How is that even possible?"
Kevin didn’t answer Celula directly. Instead, he turned to look out the window and muttered, "Not long now, and a storm will hit. That’ll be the perfect time to grind kills."
Luna and Amelia knew Kevin well enough. Ever since the Eldritch arrived, everything Kevin had said came true.
So they knew something big was coming, and both kept their heads down to eat.
Seeing that Kevin wasn’t in the mood to explain, Nova, Celula, and Monchhichi also stopped asking questions and focused on eating the feast in front of them.
Only Stephanie sat in the corner. Her pupils trembled as she looked at the food, her face full of disbelief as she asked, "Can I... really eat this stuff too?"
Kevin didn’t turn around. He just softly confirmed, "Of course. You’re part of this crew too."
Hearing Kevin’s reply, Stephanie’s eyes instantly welled up with tears.
She covered her mouth, saw that the other girls didn’t object, and choked out, "Captain, thank you."
After speaking, Stephanie gratefully picked up the wine in front of her. She secretly took a photo using the system interface and sent it to Bella. "Good morning, sis. This is the breakfast Kevin gave me. There’s too much, I can’t even finish it."
After sending the message, Stephanie no longer cared about her image and started devouring the food.
Kevin caught a glimpse of Stephanie from the corner of his eye, and the corner of his mouth lifted almost imperceptibly.
This woman really was in contact with the outside world after all.
An average person might not have noticed what Stephanie was doing just now, but Kevin spotted it right away. He knew she was secretly taking a picture using the system.
That’s because at the moment you take a picture, the image flashes in your pupils and freezes for a split second.
Even in his past life, only a few Survivors knew that little rule.
Actually, Kevin had started suspecting Stephanie ever since Leo brought George here.
But Kevin didn’t mind Stephanie teaming up with outsiders to take him down.
On the contrary, Kevin actually hoped Stephanie would find Bella for him as soon as possible.
With Stephanie’s vain personality, she had probably already sent those photos to her close friends.
He just hoped Stephanie had sent the photos to Bella.
Kevin silently hoped so.
After breakfast, the girls returned to their own boats, raised their sails, and set course for the island Celula had mentioned.
Kevin and Amelia stayed on the bridge of the schooner.
While Kevin steered and scanned various weapons, Amelia handled the sale of supplies.
Thanks to Amelia’s high rank on the leaderboard, the moment she posted on the Global Channel, it drew countless questions from other Survivors.
Amelia stared at the flood of private messages piling up and froze. "There’s way too many."
Seeing Amelia looking so overwhelmed, Kevin smiled and said, "You don’t need to reply to them one by one.
Everyone already knows we’re selling top-tier gear. Just set a fixed price and don’t bother with discounts."
Amelia sighed at Kevin’s advice. "That’s all we can do. I’ll focus on keeping an eye out for rare items like silicon blocks and gunpowder."
With that, she glanced at the supplies almost piling up over half the bridge, and quickly got to work.
You had to admit, George and Strange’s ship had quite a bit of good loot.
Besides food and water, they also had a large stock of weapons.
The guns and ammo were way more than Kevin and the others could ever use.
After setting aside two handguns, two grenades, and a hundred rounds for each girl, Amelia listed most of the remaining weapons and ammo on the Global Channel.
This time, Kevin set the prices directly in resources.
One bullet for one kilogram of resources. Any kind would work, like iron ingots, copper blocks, wood, rubber, or gunpowder.
One grenade for fifteen kilograms of resources.
One handgun for twenty-five kilograms of resources.
During the trades, Amelia followed Kevin’s orders and deliberately bought small amounts of each resource, ranging from one to twenty-five kilograms per item.
Even though each individual trade brought back a limited amount of weight, after the twelve-fold return, the total resources landing in Kevin’s hands were impressive.
Especially after a morning of trading, Kevin got his hands on two more scarce supplies: twelve kilograms of gunpowder and twelve kilograms of TNT.
Now Kevin had collected the last two pieces of the puzzle to craft bullets and grenades.
After all, a single handgun bullet only needed one gram of gunpowder, and one grenade just required forty-five grams of TNT.
That meant Kevin could now hand-craft over ten thousand bullets and nearly three hundred grenades, enough to fully equip a fifty-man counter-terrorist squad.
At that thought, Kevin turned his head and locked his gaze on the RPG rocket launcher.
He figured he’d scan this thing too. Once he killed Bella and Joseph, he could use the rockets as fireworks to celebrate.
