It was already 9:30 PM by the time Hawke got home.
The time was pretty much the same as yesterday.
However, Lorna was diligently studying at a classmate's house tonight and wasn't waiting for Hawke at the door.
Half an hour later.
Hawke, who had changed into his pajamas, carried the clothes he had just taken off to the backyard, found the grill, opened it, lit the Fire, threw the discarded clothes in one by one, and then took out a steak and placed it on the grill.
Before long, the aroma of the steak filled the air.
Hawke watched the steak on the grill expressionlessly, then extended his arm, frowned, and looked at a green spot left on his arm.
He hadn't heard that Skrulls' blood was poisonous.
He was a Skrull, not an Alien.
Just now in the bathroom, Hawke almost used a steel wool pad to see if he could scrub off the green spot, but the green spot was like pigment; his arm was almost red from scrubbing, and the color hadn't faded at all.
Nothing will go wrong, right?
Hawke thought to himself.
Just then.
Ring, ring!
Hawke snapped back to reality and looked at his phone placed next to the grill.
It was Yekaterina.
He answered.
"Hello."
"The Butcher is dead."
"I know."
"You killed him?"
"What do you think?"
Yekaterina, who had just left the beauty salon and arrived at the Continental Hotel in New York, heard the news as soon as she arrived.
She booked a very secure private room and, listening to Hawke's voice on the phone, first frowned, then shook her head: "You should know, it's useless even if you kill the Butcher."
As long as Gwen Stacy's name remains on the Continental Hotel's bounty board, and is not taken down for a single day, then if one Butcher dies, there will be a second, and a third Butcher.
The 100,000 U.S. dollar commission was no longer appealing to Hawke, but it was undeniable that this 100,000 U.S. dollar commission was still very popular among some newly debuted assassin rookies.
Not to mention that the Butcher was now dead.
For those rookie assassins, the Butcher paid with his life to complete this order, but if they could complete this order, it would undoubtedly be an opportunity to make a name for themselves.
For any assassin, reputation and money are equally important.
With fame comes money.
So...
The Butcher's death would not make these assassins wary; on the contrary, it would make those rookie assassins eager to act.
Undoubtedly.
What Yekaterina really wanted to say was another sentence.
"You shouldn't have been so impulsive."
"Heh."
Standing in front of the grill, Hawke, who was flipping the charred steak, heard this sentence, chuckled, looked up at the night sky, and then, holding his phone, said, "What if I told you I wasn't impulsive?"
"..."
Yekaterina's brows furrowed, and she fell silent upon hearing this: "What?"
Hawke's mouth curved slightly upwards as he watched the charcoal in the grill burn brighter and brighter: "What if I told you I did it on purpose?"
Yekaterina: "..."
It was actually a very difficult task to earn a small goal of one hundred million in literal blood money within a year.
Hawke's current order price is basically around 300,000 to 400,000 per order, and after deducting a 30% commission for the agent, the most he gets per order is about 320,000.
Even if he takes one order every day, it would still take 312 days to earn that 100 million in blood money.
But is that possible?
Hawke had been thinking about how to speed up this process.
The simplest way was to raise his name in the assassin world, just like those little rookies now who wanted to make a name for themselves by completing the order that resulted in the Butcher's death.
The higher the reputation, the higher the commission!
Within the assassin world, the income gap is enormous.
The more famous you are, the higher your income.
The lower your fame, the closer your income is to Zero.
Baba Yaga, known as No. 1, has a starting fee of 1.5 million U.S. dollars.
The second-ranked Mechanic's starting fee per order is only a little over 1 million U.S. dollars.
The income gap between the first and second place is already so significant; further down, the gap between the ninety-eighth and ninety-ninth places is almost like a chasm.
And how do assassins make a name for themselves?
Completed orders?
No, no, no!
It depends on the number of lives they take, and also on their speed, accuracy, and ruthlessness.
Baba Yaga, ranked first, became famous because he once killed about 500 targets in a single night at an estate.
So...
To make big money, he could only increase his fame, and to increase his name, he needed to boost his record of taking lives.
But, orders aren't available every day.
Since orders weren't coming, Hawke could only go find orders himself.
Anyway, the increase in an assassin's fame only depends on the record of taking lives; there's no rule that these lives taken must be mission targets.
Employers.
Other assassins!
And by taking the lives of other assassins, the increase in one's own fame is even more beneficial than taking the lives of mission targets.
After all, the fame you gain by killing ordinary people certainly cannot be compared to the fame you gain by killing professionals.
There's also one more thing.
[Current Stage: "Second Stage" (Growth Period)]
[Current Stage Additional Attribute: "Loot! "]
[Loot: "Whenever you successfully kill a living target, the target will randomly drop an attribute, skill, or treasure that the target is most proficient in, which will be applied to you: Strength, Speed, Constitution, Knowledge, Stance..."]
[Current Three-Dimensional Attributes:]
[Strength: "Ninety-One"]
[Speed: "Seventy-Six"]
[Constitution: "Ninety"]
The more lives he took, the stronger his three-dimensional attributes would become.
In this way, even if he couldn't achieve his small goal of one hundred million within a year, if he could max out his three-dimensional attributes to four digits within a year, even without upgrading to the third stage, he would likely have a certain degree of initial self-preservation ability.
Hawke lowered his gaze, blinked, closed his cheat interface, used tongs to place the grilled steak on a plate, turned off the grill, and then, holding the plate in one hand and the phone in the other, walked towards the house.
"Don't worry, I know what I'm doing. Remember to send me the client's information."
"...Wait a moment."
Yekaterina on the other end heard the disconnect tone in Hawke's voice and quickly said, "There's one more thing."
"Oh, what is it?"
"...The client just contacted me again and added an urgent target: George Stacy!"
"..."