"I'm good," he said when he noticed the serious look from William, "I can walk these few blocks at least without falling."
"Cool," William didn't know why, but he felt if Ibra was here, he'd ask this annoying dude to lend this youth his glaive, to use it as a walking stick.
It'd be funny to tease Ibra a little. And as he recalled him, William couldn't help but sigh over the fate of his team.
He missed them. Even if he decided deep down in his mind to teach them a proper lesson, teaching them how to properly keep their mouths shut in front of strangers, he still missed their company.
"What the hell is that?!!"
And just as the two of them walked out from the place, and even before the gate would close behind, William stopped as he was welcomed with a grand scene.
Lots of people were standing there. They were close from the prosperity of his. They formed an arc, surrounding the territory, filling the street with tens of metres of distance between them and the gate.
They were standing there, not walking, not passing by, just standing and watching, as if they were waiting for something grand to happen.
"This… It seems the news just spread," Thomas was more informative than William regarding anything related to the fort and its people.
"And?" William raised an eyebrow while not knowing what that was supposed to mean.
When he came here in the first place, the entire street was looking like a desert! It was clear to him that this place was cursed, and everyone was trying their best to not get their clothes stained by walking here.
And now? The entire street was blocked in every direction, like a festival or something grand was going to happen here.
"They got out!"
"They didn't clear it!"
"Damn! And here I expected to see something bloody at last!"
"Come on! Go in there, clear the traps as we heard, do it!"
"Yes! Do it! Do it!"
Out of the blue, and just before Thomas would explain things to William, many started to chatter before many started to shout like this.
And that made William frown.
"Someone must have leaked the news on purpose…" William moved his eyes around, without feeling any pressure at all from all these shouts. Instead, his mind was calmly thinking about who that rat was who told everyone about his business here.
He heard it before from Alfonso. It seemed that all the owners of this place tried to do something about it and yet failed. But they all covered up their tracks, didn't let a single soul hear about any of what they suffered.
And now? Seeing this grand gathering of people here made William slightly enraged.
As he became angry, he decided to take out his anger over the folks here.
"I want to clear it, but without anything encouraging, how come I do it?"
William suddenly raised his voice; spoke like he was the overlord of this fort or something.
And when his words landed, everyone else got silenced. They all looked at each other, before someone asked while laughing:
"What do you want then? A dancing lady? Or a cheer?"
"Let's applaud to him folks, least he'll give us the proper show we wanted!"
Just as one spoke, many joined in adding their pieces of mocking William. The latter stood in his place, seemingly unfazed by any of that.
"I want you to go at once to the Refos group and ask them to send a group of people experienced at betting."
Out of anyone's expectations, William didn't even say a single word to them, didn't respond to any of the taunts many issued at him. William simply took out a piece of paper, a Bullet, and spoke these words calmly and without a speck of rage in his voice.
[I'm not that far away actually from there. Give me ten minutes, and I'll return with their answer]
The Bullet belonged to Trevor, and William got it when he hired this dude before to stand in the line. And now William just asked him to do something for him, something that would be his retaliation against such trap and scheme.
"Tell them that out of the overall profit, they'll get thirty-five percent," William knew how the minds of these folks worked. And so, he made sure to give them an offer they wouldn't refuse.
To him, he'd get sixty-five percent out of the profit, not to mention the overall profit he'd claim out of this play.
[Well… I'll deliver this to them. But where do you want these dudes?]
"At the fox place, where else?" William put away the Bullet after stressing over Trevor to haste in his actions.
And then William turned to face the endless faces here. "As you heard, I've already called over for experienced and trusted folks from the Refos group. They'll come, start and supervise a huge betting event over this…"
William just waved his hands over the place behind, making everyone here had an instant change in face.
"What do you mean by that?"
"We don't want any of this cursed place!"
"Keep it for yourself, I'm leaving!"
"Yes, I came here to watch something fun, not to end up getting part of this damn place. Keep it, I'm leaving!"
"The bet isn't over this place," William's smile got broader as he simply touched one of his rings, and then lots of crystals appeared.
They were the ones he got inside his ring, the one he got from the dark spirit masters. He got around one million before, and just gained four extra millions. And that meant he had five million in his possession.
"These are five million spirit crystals," William waved his hands, pointed towards the small hill of spirit crystals that appeared in front of him, "I also got five spirit gems, and that made the wager of this bet is ten million spirit crystals."
William's words, coupled with his extravagant actions, made all of spirit masters around fix their eyes over the hill of spirit crystals he just got out.