Chapter 120: Senior Collection Officer Morton

Amber didn’t waste a second.

Pulling out her communication slate, she contacted the emergency dispatch desk at the Imperial Sanatorium. With a single transfer from Evren’s account, the admission deposit upfront and leased the facility’s entire fourth-floor private recovery wing was paid for.

Money moved faster than anything in the Imperial Capital.

Within ten minutes, the sanatorium dispatched four medical transports to collect the wounded.

First, the vehicles arrived beneath the Grand Colosseum, picking up Guild Master Walter and the six hunters who had hobbled on crutches. From there, the convoy headed toward the southern rail yards.

Inside the damp, windowless freight storage locker, the remaining eight hunters were found lying on stained canvas cots.

They had been holed up in the dark for days simply because Iron-Thistle was completely broke. Without money, no clinic in the Capital would even open its doors to them.

The air in the room was foul and smelled strongly of decay. Shivering with fever, the eight men had swollen shins covered in dark, oozing veins.

Sanatorium orderlies in sterile white coats carefully transferred each man onto anti-gravity stretchers and loaded them into the heated transports.

Within half an hour, all fourteen hunters were brought to the Imperial Sanatorium on the west side of the city.

The fourth-floor private recovery wing was quiet, clean, and completely secured. It had fourteen private suites, soft lighting, fresh linen, and modern mana-filtering ventilation. Attendants brought out clean cotton robes and bowls of warm meat broth.

For the first time in months, the Iron-Thistle hunters ate hot food in a clean, heated room.

In the primary examination suite, Chief Physician Dr. Orson removed the soiled bandages from a young hunter’s leg.

The doctor’s expression darkened as he ran a diagnostic crystal over the blackened wound.

"Gods above," Dr. Orson muttered, shaking his head in disgust. "This isn’t ordinary battle necrosis."

Walter leaned forward on his crutches. "What is it, Doctor?"

"The wound was poisoned by cheap, adulterated medicine," Dr. Orson explained, pointing to the dark sludge coating the torn muscle. "Whoever brewed this used volcanic sulfur slag and industrial binders to mimic the clotting effect of pure lotus resin."

"It closed the skin temporarily," the doctor continued, "but the toxic slag seeped directly into the bone marrow."

"Can you purge it?" Amber asked, her sharp gaze fixed on the diagnostic monitor.

"Standard imperial potions won’t touch this," Dr. Orson sighed, washing his gloved hands in a basin. "The binders have bonded directly to their mana flow."

"If we try to cut them out," the doctor added grimly, "the tissue will simply disintegrate."

He looked at Walter with genuine sympathy.

"Without a high-grade celestial neutralizing elixir," Dr. Orson said quietly, "their legs will have to be amputated above the knee within forty-eight hours to save their lives."

Silence fell over the room. Several junior hunters in the hallway bowed their heads, their shoulders shaking with quiet sobs.

Before Walter could speak, the elevator doors at the end of the corridor opened with a sharp chime. Footsteps echoed down the polished tile floor.

"Out of my way!" a harsh voice barked.

The double doors of the recovery wing swung open violently.

Five men strode into the corridor. The leader wore a gray suit over a gold-trimmed vest, his hair slicked back with aromatic oil. Behind him walked four burly enforcers in reinforced leather armor, carrying crackling stun batons.

Walter turned around, and his face went completely pale.

"Morton..." Walter breathed in horror.

Senior Collection Officer Morton from Aethelgard Pharmaceutical Finance sneered as he looked around the spacious medical floor.

"Well, well, Walter," Morton chuckled coldly, tapping a silver-tipped cane against his palm. "You old rat. You told our collectors you didn’t have a single credit, yet here you are lounging in a luxury sanatorium."

He gestured to the four thugs behind him.

"You thought you could slip away to the Capital and hide behind the Colosseum crowd?" Morton asked, stepping closer. "You owe us forty-five million imperial credits. Your payment was due yesterday at noon."

"We don’t have that kind of money, Morton," Walter pleaded. "The High Council just assigned us to Zone One! If you take our gear, my boys won’t even survive the transit!"

"That sounds like a ’you’ problem, old man," Morton sneered. "Under imperial commercial law, defaulted medical debt permits immediate collateral seizure."

He pointed his cane at the bedridden hunters in the adjacent rooms.

"Seize their weapons, their armor, and their spatial rings," Morton ordered his men. "Then haul the ones who can walk down to the debtor’s detention pen."

The four enforcers smirked, stepping forward with their stun batons humming.

"Touch one of them, and you won’t leave this hallway on two legs." A calm, unbothered voice echoed from the doorway of the examination suite.

Morton stopped, frowning in irritation as Evren stepped into the corridor.

Evren was in his dark combat coat with his hands casually resting in his pockets. His eyes were relaxed, but they carried a stillness that made the temperature in the hallway drop several degrees.

Behind him, Amber and Zephyra stepped out.

Morton looked Evren up and down, taking in his plain jacket and lack of flashy jewelry. "And who the hell are you supposed to be?" he laughed mockingly. "Their provincial lawyer?"

"Get lost, kid," Morton added, glaring at Evren. "Unless you have forty-five million credits in your coat, mind your own business."

"Show me the ledger," Evren said smoothly, completely ignoring the insult. "Let me see the debt contract."

Morton smirked, clearly amused by the younger man’s audacity. He pulled a rolled parchment stamped with the golden serpent crest of the Aethelgard Cartel from his pocket.

"Read it and weep, country boy," Morton sneered, thrusting the parchment forward.

"Forty-five million principal, plus five million in penalty interest," he gloated. "Fifty million credits total, signed and sealed by Walter himself."

Evren glanced down at the contract. The interest rate was calculated at ten percent compounding weekly... a blatant extortion trap designed to ensure the guild could never repay it.

"Fifty million," Evren repeated quietly.

"That’s right, fifty million," Morton sneered, barking out a harsh laugh. "What, did you think it was fifty copper coins, brat?"