Building My Empire in the Frozen Apocalypse (Riley Carter) novel Chapter 83

Chapter 83 Setting the Trap

Chapter 83 Setting the Trap

“Why didn’t you guys ever use that back in the compound?”

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“No clue. The leader hands things out whenever he feels like it. And we gotta turn over whatever we find on the regular anyway.”

Good thing she’d gone out scouting today and picked this guy up for intel. If she’d just waited around for them to toss that potion into her camp, she’d be dead without even seeing it coming.

“Anything else, besides that potion?”

“N–no… that’s really it. Swear.” Rat made a pitiful face. “Our crew only got one, and the squad leader’s holding onto it.”

Riley nodded, her mind already racing.

Now that she knew what they were packing, things got simpler. But she’d still have to stay sharp.

Turn their own game against them.

“How many more in your squad? What’re they carrying? How long till they get here?” Riley switched tracks, digging for tactical details.

By now, Rat was completely broken. He spilled everything to save his own skin.

“Four more. They were gearing up when I left. My guess… thirty minutes tops before they’re close.”

Riley listened, running the numbers in her head.

A standard five–man fireteam. But against her, once they lost the element of surprise, these guys were just walking loot bags.

“Very well, seeing how obliging you’ve been,” she said, lifting her boot from his chest and stepping back, “stay put, and I shall release you once I’ve calmed down.”

Rat looked like he’d just been handed a stay of execution. He scrambled up and curled into the corner. “Thank you, ma’am! Thank you for not killing me! I won’t move an inch, I promise!” .

He kept his head down, putting on a show of being terrified and meek.

Riley seemed to drop her guard too. She turned toward Neeko like she was figuring out what to do with all the coal they’d hauled.

The moment Riley turned away, Rat’s eyes slid upward from beneath his lowered brow. Nasty. Vicious.

Dumb bitch… still wet behind the ears.

He was cursing her out in his head.

Sure, Riley had blocked him from pulling up his interface. She’d watched his hands the whole time.

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Chapter 83 Setting the Trap

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But he didn’t need the screen.

His right hand was tucked inside his oversized leather sleeve, fingers clamped around something hard in a hidden pocket.

An emergency crystal.

You didn’t need the interface for this thing. Just crush it, and it would send a pulse to every guild member within a mile, along with a live location marker.

“Crick.”

A faint, almost silent snap, buried under the steady drip of water somewhere deeper in the mine.

The crystal broke.

An invisible signal shot out into the dark.

And through it all, Rat kept that same scared, pleading look on his face. He was even shivering a little.

Got her.

Rat was screaming inside.

His squad was already on the way. Once they got the signal, they’d move even faster. And the beacon would tag the area as “high–risk, high–value“.

All he had to do was keep this woman busy for a few more minutes…

A few minutes, and the team would be here. They’d use the potion. And this bitch would have nowhere to

run.

“What’s so funny?”

A cold voice came from right above him.

Rat froze. His head jerked up.

There was Riley–who’d supposedly turned away just seconds ago–now facing him again, looking down.

But there wasn’t any anger in her eyes over being tricked. Instead, there was something else… amusement, like she was watching a bad actor fumble his lines.

“I… I wasn’t smiling…” Rat stammered.

Riley didn’t call him out. Instead, her eyes dropped to his right hand, still hidden in his sleeve.

“That little snap just now was pretty cute.”

Riley’s mouth curled into a thin, playful smile. “What’d you break? A beacon? Or a tracker?”

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