Finley stared at me with a frown as he blinked a few times. It looked like he hadn’t managed to hear me. Maybe he was a bit too shaken up from the beating I just gave him.
I waved right in front of his eyes a couple of times. “Hey! I. Need. To. Meet. With. Your. Boss.”
I made sure to utter every single very clearly so that he would grasp every single one of them. However, his frown was only accentuated.
Did I make him deaf or something?
I swear…I didn’t hit him that hard.
“Can you hear me?”
I went with a simpler question just to see if he could hear the words that were coming out of my mouth, and he moved his head up and down.
Good news! He wasn’t deaf. Bad news! He wasn’t speaking.
“So, can I meet him?” I asked very politely while roughing him up a little.
Ava gave me a few glares as I did so. She was probably wondering what was on my mind since I was asking a criminal to meet his boss. All kinds of thoughts must have been running through her mind.
Still, I couldn’t explain to her what was happening. She would panic, especially since her husband had died from demons. There was no way to tell what her reaction would be like. I didn’t know to what point she had been affected by his death.
I stopped looking at her when I heard the voice of the Fishman.
“You.” He barely raised one of his fingers. “Who the hell are you?”
It did give me a slight laugh as this was a question that I had been hearing more and more ever since I had arrived at the Royal Academy.
“I’m a professor at the Royal Academy. That’s about it. I was a soldier before; there’s really not much to know about me, to be honest.”
He shook his head. “Your strength…how are you so powerful?”
I shrugged. “Who knows, really? So, can I meet with your boss?”
Finley looked to the side. “I-I don’t know. I don’t have a lot of contact with my boss. Those idiots earlier were just lying to you. I’m part of the Ocean Outlaws, but I’m far from being a high-ranking member.”
I nodded. That was kind of easy to figure out. There was no way that someone with his strength was so respected around here, or else they had a serious problem. Ever since I had met him, I knew that Finley was just a small-time gangster.
“You’d have to come with me to their secret base. You might be able to meet him there.”
He seemed serious and was saying everything I wanted without even the need to torture him or anything like that. It felt even a little too easy for my taste, but well, I wouldn’t complain.
“Can we go right now?”
“No, he won’t be there right now. He’s preparing for the tournament that’s starting tomorrow. He has a few fishman who are going to participate.”
I rubbed my chin. “He’s taking part in the tournament?”
Finley shook his head. “No, he’s looking over some members of the gang who are going to participate. After all, he’s too old to participate. The tournament is only for people under twenty-one years old.”
“So, he’ll be there tomorrow?”
He nodded fervently. “Yes, there’s no way he’ll miss it.”
I nodded. It seemed that I would have to make my students participate in that tournament after all. But I still didn’t think that it would start tomorrow. I might have to sign up my students right away.
I was pretty sure that Finley hadn’t lied to me since all the answers he had given me were coming out of his mouth almost instantly without the slightest amount of thinking. So, either he was the greatest liar I had ever met in my life, or he was so scared of us that he was telling us everything without thinking.
My bet was on the latter, but I couldn’t be 100% sure.
“If I find out that everything that you said is a lie, then when we meet again. Getting tied up witll be the least of your worries, I’m telling you.”
I gave him a little threat before removing the rope and restraining him. I wanted to see his reaction. However, he swore to me that everything he had just said was the truth and only the truth. So, I went with it. He didn’t even have a reason to lie.
“Then, you better stick close to your boss tomorrow because I want to know what he looks like.”
Finley shook his head. “Don’t worry. You’ll know who he is with a single glance. Everyone in Atlantis is scared of him. Even authorities won’t do anything against him.”
I nodded again and untied him. “Alright, thank you for your help.”
“S-Sure…” He muttered those words and started running as far away as possible from the alley. He was scared that we would do other things to him.
Seeing him run away, both Ava and I laughed as we hadn’t expected something like that. Still, she quickly stopped laughing and started asking me a few questions that she wanted the answer to.
“Why do you want to meet his boss?” She asked with a dubious look.
I just shrugged. I wasn’t going to tell her now. I needed to know more about her past with the demons and the war. I knew that she had suffered enough, and I didn’t want to put more onto her shoulders.
“I have a couple of questions for him. Don’t worry too much about it.”
However, that didn’t cut it as she got closer to me.
“Tell me why.”
She got closer to me, holding onto my right hand and looking at me dead in the eyes.
Her glare was intense. It was as if she wanted more from me. Her body leaned forward against mine, even causing her breasts to squeeze against my body.
