Chapter 96: Mortgage: Body Flicker
The next morning.
"That outfit of yours... If we called Kai’Sa, Ahri, and Evelynn over, you could form K/DA."
Orion Cross looked at Akali’s trendy outfit and felt that it drew even more attention than her original ninja clothes.
"Is something wrong with it? This outfit is very convenient for assassinations."
Akali took off her face mask, picked up a steamed bun, and stuffed it into her mouth.
"Nothing. Do whatever you want."
Orion Cross shook his head and said no more.
"Um, I looked up some things yesterday on that thing called a computer."
Akali wiped her mouth, put down her tableware, and took out a stack of documents from behind her, handing them to Orion Cross. "I want to open a convenience store."
"Huh? Where did that idea come from?"
Orion Cross took the documents and glanced through them, then looked at Akali in confusion, finding it very strange.
"I said I would support myself. I can’t freeload."
As she spoke, Akali picked up another steamed bun.
"I told her this entire street belongs to you, so she’s planning to borrow a place from you and open a convenience store. After she earns money, she’ll slowly pay you back," Natasha explained from the side.
"But the problem is, you said you would only work for me for one year, right? In one year, there’s a high chance the money you make won’t even be enough to cover rent."
After doing a simple calculation, Orion Cross kindly reminded her.
"Then extend it. I don’t mind."
Akali said this decisively.
"You’re the one suggesting this. You won’t regret it?"
"A word once spoken is harder to chase than a galloping horse!"
"Straightforward. Then I agree."
Orion Cross snapped his fingers and said.
The so-called contract was clearly written by Akali herself. Rather than calling it a contract, it was more like a pledge. What surprised Orion Cross was that Akali had chosen to "take a loan" and directly obtain ownership of the storefront rather than rent it. That meant the bulk of her repayment would not be the initial storefront rent or the cost of stocking goods, but the mortgage.
As for how long the mortgage would take to repay, Orion Cross had not calculated it, but he estimated that if Akali was not allowed to break the contract, half her life would probably be tied to this place.
"You’re lucky. There’s a convenience store right at the corner of this street. I heard its business was pretty good before. Now you can take it over directly."
Orion Cross took out the property deeds that had been pressed under the sofa for who knew how long, flipped through a few pages, and pulled one out.
"Good. I’ll go take a look later. I’ll aim to have my Black Gold Shop open within three days!"
Akali glanced at the sample photo Orion Cross handed her, waved her fist, and looked full of enthusiasm.
"Black Gold? You might as well call it the Black-Hearted Shop."
Orion Cross could not help complaining. He had just looked at Akali’s convenience store plan. Leaving everything else aside, the marketing section alone made his scalp tingle. A tiny convenience store actually had cyclical discount schemes like 20% off and 5% off. He had no idea whether she had looked up information on Google or Steam yesterday.
"So tired!"
Skye, wearing women’s fitness sportswear, returned from outside drenched in sweat and immediately threw herself onto the sofa, no longer moving.
In order to train her body, Skye had finished making breakfast early, then immediately gone out for a run. After running a lap around Queens, she came back completely exhausted.
"Keep training hard. I guarantee that after the Ascension Ritual, you’ll become the Whitebeard of the new era."
Orion Cross looked at Skye’s exhausted appearance and encouraged her casually.
"What is Whitebeard... Why would I want to become a beard..."
Skye buried her head in the sofa pillow and asked in a muffled voice.
"Um, are you trying to train your body? I do happen to have a set of body-tempering methods from the Kinkou Order’s ninjas."
Akali looked at Skye lying on the sofa and asked.
"Teach me."
Skye immediately raised her head to look at Akali and weakly spat out two words.
"You teach me how to make these, and I’ll teach you."
Akali pointed at the breakfast on the table and said seriously.
"Deal!"
After the two reached an agreement, Skye also struggled to sit up and began eating breakfast to recover her strength.
"You’re living in Natasha’s house, right? Later, go to my room and take your weapons back."
Orion Cross said this to Akali.
Akali’s kama, along with a pile of kunai and shuriken, had all been disarmed and confiscated by Orion Cross earlier. They were now piled outside his wardrobe.
"You’re not worried that I’ll use ninjutsu? I might run away."
Akali said this in a joking tone.
"What you use can’t really be called ninjutsu."
Orion Cross suddenly appeared behind Akali and placed one hand on her shoulder.
"Hm?!"
Akali was startled and turned her head in shock. "How did you get here?"
A second ago, Orion Cross had clearly still been sitting diagonally across from her. She had only blinked, yet Orion Cross had appeared behind her.
"Ninjutsu."
Orion Cross glanced at the Flying Thunder God mark he had permanently engraved on Akali’s shoulder with natural energy and answered with a smile.
During the Ionian Series Mission, Orion Cross had defeated a total of four people: Lillia, Akali, Shen, and Yasuo. The reward from Akali’s mission was the space-time ninjutsu from Naruto, the Flying Thunder God Technique.
Flying Thunder God Technique.
Description: I, the Fourth Hokage, only want to be an ordinary delivery worker.
Details: Instantly move to the location of a Flying Thunder God mark.
Compared to Kamar-Taj’s portals, Orion Cross’s initial version of the Flying Thunder God could not bring other people along for teleportation. However, as long as there was a mark, he could easily complete spatial movement at relatively low cost. At the very least, Orion Cross no longer needed to worry about his Sling Ring being destroyed during combat, or about not using the Sling Ring and consuming far too much energy.
Before Akali could react, Orion Cross had already returned to his own seat.
Since the consumption was not high, and ordinary people could not sense it, Orion Cross would naturally leave marks anywhere he could. This might also be one area where portal magic was superior to the Flying Thunder God. Portals automatically recorded the coordinates of places one had been to, while the Flying Thunder God required Orion Cross to actively leave a mark representing the coordinates.
"Stop staring. Work hard and pay off your mortgage."
Orion Cross smiled and put away the contract Akali had written herself into his storage space. From now on, even if she wanted to deny it, she would not be able to.
Ring, ring, ring.
At that moment, Orion Cross’s phone suddenly rang.
"You’re calling me this early in the morning. Looks like it’s urgent?"
Orion Cross answered the phone, his tone very casual.
"Last night, a strange wavelength appeared in New Mexico. After that, we received several images. I can send them to you shortly, or you can come take a look."
Nick Fury’s voice came from the other end of the phone.
"Get to the point!"
"I think it might be Thor’s hammer from Norse mythology."
Nick Fury took a deep breath and spoke.
If not for the fact that he knew Orion Cross’s past and had once seen Hela, the Goddess of Death, Nick Fury would never have made such an absurd guess.
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