"You suspect 'Admiral Disease''s fleet is hidden there?" Upon hearing Danitz's words, Anderson posed the question back thoughtfully.
Danitz answered with considerable excitement:
"The odds are very high! Wasn't the Black Death sailing westward away from Seluros Island when it disappeared?"
Anderson curled his lips and let out a chuckle:
"If Admiral Disease's whereabouts were that easy for you to find, why would she even bother hiding?
"A place even you could get wind of — how could it possibly be considered secretive enough?"
"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?" Danitz felt he was being mocked.
Anderson spread his hands:
"I didn't mean anything by it. I'm just using my brain to analyze.
"That island probably does exist, but it's either the kind that plenty of people around here already know about, or it's information someone deliberately leaked.
"If it's the former, Admiral Disease Tracey's fleet would absolutely never hide there. If it's the latter, then things get interesting — who would be the one leaking that information?"
Danitz was initially a bit angry, but gradually followed Anderson's train of thought and began analyzing:
"A trap set by some pirates or adventurers? But an island with no resources wouldn't attract anyone to explore.
"Admiral Disease herself? To figure out who's been tracking her down?"
Anderson smiled:
"Not bad — with my guidance, you've already made considerable progress. Otherwise, I suspect that even after drinking the Conspirator potion, you wouldn't have improved your brain at all. You'd just mutate to gain the ability to make your enemies stupid and drag them into your familiar territory to defeat them.
"That's not my line — it's something Emperor Roselle said."
Over this period of gathering information, Anderson had already helped Danitz obtain one main ingredient for the Conspirator potion and nearly all the auxiliary materials — just one final step from success.
"I suspect you actually have that kind of ability..." Danitz muttered under his breath in response.
Anderson ignored him and continued on his own:
"If Admiral Disease herself had someone leak the information, then that secret island is definitely a trap. Maybe there's nothing there at all — just mirrors monitoring the ships and people approaching the island. Or maybe it's exactly what Gehrman Sparrow mentioned — a major stronghold of the Witch Cult."
"Then what should we do next?" Danitz asked instinctively.
Hearing this, Anderson let out a "heh":
"You can't even figure out something this simple?
"Whoever you got this information from, we'll naturally go find them, figure out their intelligence source, and keep tracing it up the chain. Sooner or later, we'll uncover something."
That was true... Danitz had been about to nod in agreement, but the words caught in his throat and came out as a "heh" instead.
Near midnight, on the second floor of a gambling den.
Baz, the brown-haired man, yawned as he walked into his room.
Before he could even light a candle by the moonlight streaming through the window, a blinding white flame suddenly flared before his eyes, so brilliant he could barely see for a moment.
Baz's heart clenched. He threw himself to the side and rolled across the floor.
After barely two rolls, his movement froze abruptly, as if someone had cast a petrification spell on him.
This was because a bone-piercing chill and a slight stinging pain had appeared at his neck. He had no doubt that if he moved even a fraction further forward, blood would spray across the ceiling.
"What... what do you want?" By now Baz's vision had recovered, and he saw a blond man standing beside him — one hand in his pocket, the other holding a pitch-black short sword — while a figure in a black cloak, with a hood obscuring most of their face, guarded the window.
Danitz didn't answer Baz's question. Instead, he looked toward Anderson with a slightly surprised tone:
"Why aren't you wearing a disguise?"
"How would anyone know who to hate if I wore a disguise?" Anderson replied with an indifferent expression.
"..." Danitz let out a breath. "Thankfully, I haven't caught that terrible habit of yours yet."
"No matter," Anderson said with a smile. "Pull anyone on Sill Island aside and they'll know who I've been spending time with lately."
"Shit!" Danitz cursed out loud.
Baz, with Anderson's short sword pressed against his neck, didn't dare move. He could only listen quietly, struck by the bizarre sensation that he was back in Trier watching some absurd comedy.
What exactly were these two here for...? The intelligence dealer sank into deep confusion.
At that moment, Anderson withdrew his gaze and looked down at Baz:
"Who told you about that hidden island off the main shipping route, to the southwest?"
A sudden realization struck Baz, and he looked toward Danitz at the window:
"It was you!"
Over the past few days, he had sold this intelligence to only one person!
...Recognized so quickly? For a moment, Danitz didn't know how to respond.
Anderson pressed the pitch-black short sword slightly downward, making the stinging sensation even more vivid: