The Provocation

The next afternoon, Jorgen stood in the abandoned building that had been hiding for the past few days, waiting for Elin. This was not the best time of day for action, but he had no choice, as he had to finish many things before eight o'clock.

The news that Silversnap was meeting with Brego was not unexpected. Judging from the wording of the invitation relayed by Elin, they had not met before. The goblin merchant would sooner or later find the orc who cut down his future army leader - no matter the facts, at least for the thousands of spectators, the ending of the gladiatorial story they passed on would inevitably be: "Orc Brego ended Broken Tooth Vossuva with one blow". Vossuva's legend would gradually die out and be replaced by Brego Bloodthroat's gladiatorial miracle. Barring accidents, this would be the truth left behind in history. The most reasonable and direct deduction in Jorgen's mind was that in order to end the mess after the game and salvage his dream of an army, Silversnap intended to win over Brego to replace Vossuva's position.

That would be just fine.

What surprised Jorgen was Glocara's statement that Idoli had met with Vossuva. In Glocara's words, they were "arguing violently". This was intelligence that could not be handled alone, and Jorgen hoped to find a solution before eight o'clock.

Yesterday's events had frightened Glocara deeply, and her back was visibly frostbitten. When she returned home and lay on her sickbed with Tusa applying hot water bottles to her back, Jorgen wanted to ask in detail about Idoli's meeting with Vossuva. She turned her head away without a word. After all, being accustomed to handling corpses was one thing, but crouching for several minutes under a hail of bullets was another. Familiarity with death did not imply familiarity with the anticipation of death. This deepened Jorgen's guilt.

Later, Tusa and Jorgen left the house together, closed the door and let Glocara rest. Tusa began to complain, waving the pliers in his hand as usual:

"Brother Jorgen, I heard you work for the laws of Stormwind City, of course I dare not meddle in your affairs. But it's not very good to keep causing trouble for Miss Glocara, is it? Many people are lining up waiting for her to take care of them, the living lined up vertically, the dead lined up horizontally. I'd like to take it all on myself, but some jobs only Miss Glocara's delicate fingers can do..."

"Listen, Tusa. Can we not talk about this now?" Jorgen still couldn't bare his regret honestly before the loquacious ogre.

Tusa narrowed his eyes. "You and Mr. Elin, I see, actually work for Military Intelligence Section 7. Such secretive humans, working for the law, what other agency could it be?"

"Be careful what you say."

"It's okay, because most people born in the lower layers of Booty Bay have never heard of Section 7, and Miss Glocara is no exception. But she has a right to know who brought her trouble, doesn't she?"

"Don't beat around the bush endlessly. I have a question to ask you. When Vossuva was stabbed, as the on-site doctor, you examined the corpse first. Apart from the stab wound, did you notice any other wounds on the neck?"

"I didn't notice that. But even if there were, what of it? There were more on-site doctors than just me, and our joint conclusion was that Vossuva's heart had stopped beating. We reported this to the referee, collected our reward, and were done. The tycoon, the audience, the piles of gold coins on the gambling tables, weren't they all staring wide-eyed at whose heart would stop beating first? As long as Vossuva's soul was no longer attached to the flesh, everything was over. All the applause, cheers and cries were worthless. Am I right, Brother Jorgen?"

Although Tusa's words made sense, Jorgen knew in his heart: there were other wounds. His fingers felt it, his eyes caught it.

"But I really suspect that someone who betrayed his tribe like him had long been abandoned by his own soul." Tusa said.

Now, Jorgen sat in the corner of the room, carving a small piece of wood into toothpick-like shapes with his dagger. When Elin appeared in the doorway, Jorgen put the carved toothpick into his shirt pocket.

"Elin, you're fifteen minutes late. Didn't I give you the exact address yesterday?"

"It was hard to find. Since it's the hiding place you chose, I was prepared to not find it for a while. Alright, we can make up for lost time now, can't we?"

Jorgen swallowed the "Have you forgotten the rules of team action?" that was about to come out of his mouth. He was too lazy to evaluate Elin's absent-mindedness. If this was the result after three years of training alone in Auberdine, then there was nothing to say. After all, the one who could decide Elin's future work and fate was not Jorgen.

"Let's go." Jorgen stood up.

The weather was not good. Thick rainclouds gathered, and the air was humid and uncomfortable. This reminded Jorgen of the rainy night eight hours before chasing Idoli, the situation was exactly the same. In the last rainy night, he saw typhometrodon tear humans apart and eat them. Today, he had a premonition that there would be a similarly bloody scene.

They hurried through the crowd to the fish bait shop where they had last met Banjay. Jorgen had instructed him to investigate Keener Marando's betting situation, and today was the scheduled meeting time. Very timely, Jorgen felt lucky to have chosen the right day - assuming Banjay showed up as promised.

"Banjay... have I met him?" Elin asked on the way.

"You haven't. He was an informant I developed last year."

"Lying in ambush in such a ghostly place must have been miserable."

"Everyone here is miserable. It's different from Auberdine."

"Jorgen, are you mocking me? I wasn't that leisurely there either... No, that doesn't sound like the truth. You miss that place, don't you?"

"How do you know I'm not mocking you?"

"Because you look very tired. Exhausted."

"We're here." Jorgen said.

At that moment, Jorgen understood that his premonition of the smell of blood had become a reality.

Banjay was lying face down, an axe stuck in his spine. Fresh blood stained his entire midsection, and there was blood on the rock wall next to him. The axe that nailed him down seemed to draw Banjay's already frighteningly thin body into its whirlpool center, eventually disappearing into the pool of blood.

"So this is Banjay." Elin said.

Jorgen ignored him, squatted down, flipped Banjay's face over and looked at it, then closed his eyelids for him. Judging from the coldness and stiffness of the skin, death had not been long, perhaps just before they arrived. The short axe in his back was engraved with Silversnap's fleet emblem: a luxury merchant ship and sea waves splashing up to form a gold coin pattern.

This imitated the way Jorgen killed the Goblin in the arena. The same axe, the same stuck in the spine. Only by tracking Banjay would it have been possible to know he would stop here. Killing Banjay after he reached the meeting place was clearly to ensure that Jorgen saw the corpse.

He's provoking me.

"How many times?" Jorgen said.

"What?"

"How many times have we promised informants a stable life and ended up like this?"

"I don't remember." Elin said. "All I remember is this: 'Whether alive or dead, make sure they provide value to the completion of the mission.' Sir Hackman's first sentence in his lecture on dealing with informants is still in my classroom notes."

"You're right." Jorgen pinched Banjay's fake thumb and took out the toothpick he had carved in the abandoned building, inserted it into the joint of the fake finger, twisted it, and removed it. From the interface of the fake finger, he slowly and carefully clamped out a folded paper strip. "This is the value he left behind."

He unfolded the paper strip and read it carefully, then put it back in his pocket with the fake finger. He looked at Banjay's corpse, thinking about how to handle it. The thought of "asking the expert Glocara for help" floated up and sank down again. He told himself that even if Banjay did not die this time, he would soon die of "dinner overload". But he soon realized that the source of these two deaths was actually the same. It seemed the corpse could only be left in this corner for now, and dealt with after everything was over.

"Jorgen, I have something I want to ask you." Elin broke the silence.

"Speak."

"Although I was in Auberdine, I didn't have no news of you at all. I heard you got promoted."

"That's right."

"Your current position is... Panthonia Shawl's direct subordinate detective. The highest rank among detectives in the MI7."

"What, do you think he had to get rid of me?"

"No, I didn't mean to question how you got this position. I don't intend to inquire what has happened in these three years either. I just want to ask: would the old man let his direct investigator come to Booty Bay for only five hundred gold coins, and without providing manpower?"

"Why ask that?"

"Because... you seem to be doing some things I can't understand. For example, yesterday Glocara wanted to talk to you, you sent me away. And this Banjay, you only just told me now..."

Jorgen stood up, facing Elin, with Banjay's blood on his fingers.

"Elin Tias, recite the rules for sharing intelligence among Section 7 investigators."

"What's wrong with you?"

"This is an order from me, direct investigator under Tydernashal. Do you decide to disobey?"

At this moment, Elin was convinced that what he saw in Jorgen's eyes was not just a layer of ice. He could see Jorgen desperately trying to hide his inextinguishable fatigue. For whatever reason, you've pushed yourself too far... Jorgen. And I don't intend to make things difficult for you.

Elin spoke: "Investigator A must meet two conditions to share intelligence with Investigator B: One, A and B are handling the same case, and want to share direct intelligence about the case. Two, A's rank is higher than or equal to B's."

"You still remember. If so, you shouldn't have said those words."

"Then I want to ask something unrelated to the case, not really 'intelligence' either."

"No one has ever been able to shut you up."

"Are we still friends?"

"Whether we are or not," Jorgen paused for a moment, but suddenly spat out these words hastily, "as long as we are still on a mission, we need to cooperate. Now we need to capture someone alive, not an easy character to deal with."

"Who?"

"Keener Marando."