Chomp chomp

Aejaz was sitting in the nearby watchtower as he stared out at the ocean with a bucket of popcorn he stole from the shop earlier as he was leaving. He stopped chewing on the goods to check his watch, which he'd also stolen from the C.E.O, before leaving and figured it was about time for the fight to end as it had gone on for long enough now. The guard had returned from shooting fish in a barrel, killing off the remaining Fins, but seemed a bit anxious about this whole situation as chasing Fin into the water seemed like a bad idea to him. Still, if Ares' own brother wasn't looking too fussed then maybe it was fine? At the very least, based on the various stories about Ares' performance at the international, he should be able to ensure his life remained safe regardless of what happened. The guard was tempted to peek his head underwater and see if he could catch a glimpse of what was going on but, before he could entertain that idea and make a move, a massive blast of air tore through the water and hollowed out the sky, leaving a vacuum wherever it travelled as it sailed off into the sky while blasting aside some clouds hat had been minding their own business.

Whatever this attack was, it carried a hint of gold in it up until its final moments where it detonated just before reaching the transition point to the next domain, creating a subtle, light gold firework explosion roughly the size of a small ship. It was sizeable but far away so not particularly dangerous or loud but it could definitely still be seen by anyone on the Federation provided they were looking in that direction for whatever reason. It was fairly indicative that Ares had probably just won his fight as that gold tinge was pretty symbolic of his machinations and had become a very clear identifier of his general presence. Also, just in case there was ever any doubt, Fin's dead body floated up to the surface of the water a short distance away... Or what was left of it anyway. It was mostly just his mushy head and a few of his detached limbs. The meat of a majority of his body had simply vanished from existence after suffering that previous blow at point blank range. He was deader than dead and had been dismembered into a head and a few small remaining chunks of giblets by an explosive pulse that rocked his body's core. It was honestly a miracle his head was even remotely intact but it would be helpful for identification purposes when Ares handed it over to the Federation for his reward later.

Speaking of the winner, Ares emerged from the water soon after and stood atop it with Voidwalk. He'd seen better days but he was still able to move around, Voidwalk through the air, and generally move his limbs in whatever way he wanted without massively impaired functionality. He had a giant sword wound in his stomach, and he was leaking blood rather profusely, but he was in the process of swallowing a healing pill, one of Allie's, to help his revenant regeneration take care of the more severe stuff first. In, give or take, five minutes, anything that might have been lethal for an ordinary cultivator at his level would be reverted back to a state that was simply damaged and inconvenient. His injuries were bordering on lethal but a quick fix up would put them firmly back in 'live but it hurts like a motherfucker' territory. It's not like his regeneration had suddenly spiked and could keep him alive through deadly beatings or anything, no, he was just in a position where he could save himself with relative ease. Of course none of that changed the fact that he'd been beaten up and rough-housed to a degree that rare for him...

Though it did raise the question of what he planned on doing next. The Fins were still committing various acts of skulduggery around the Federation and, though he didn't need to, he could very well go aid the Federation some more to earn a bit of extra stardust. Killing Fin was worth a lot but that didn't mean more wasn't up for grabs if he could, well, stomach it! Chances are, based on the direction he was looking, over towards other parts of the Federation, he was interested in doing as such. In fairness, even a human in a coma could accidentally kill an ant and that logic was applicable to Ares should he want to deal with the weaker sharkin. Nobody amongst his crew even came close to Fin's level and power so some annihilation enhancement, telekinesis, and well aimed destruction magic, that avoided buildings and businesses so as not to incur extra costs, would do the job handily. As long as Ares wasn't going to collapse in the middle of doing it then, aside from extreme laziness, there was no reason he could think of not to. Relaxing after a hard fight was an option, sure, but he might as well finish what he started and clean up the rest of the mess. Additionally, and this was a relatively minor thing but did matter given his current state, showing up in front of the Fins with Fin's head would kill any and all morale they had in the moment, making them easier to slaughter, if need be, amidst the wretched despair filling their guts!... Putting it that way did make Ares look like he was the evil villain, running around with a severed head to discourage people and make them fearful, but he was the good guy here! Really!

Anyway, another valid question, or rather the same question as before just with different context, was 'what came after even that?'. Would Ares go back home for the day and go see Hunter tomorrow or would he power through and arrive at the guy's shop with a hole in his chest?... Knowing how Artes operated, he'd probably think the latter was funny and go ahead with it for no reason other than that... He would be stable enough by that point but he should really consider resting not just for his own sake, but for everyone else's too. The sooner he rested up, the sooner he would be able to help the Federation with any other issues that cropped up. So far, Ares had only dealt with minor problems that the Federation kinda sorta had means to deal with quick and cleanly... Relatively, the Fin were a bit more of a hassle than the seagulls, for instance, but they weren't as big a deal as some of the other problems this country faced. As Astraeus stated, there were almost definitely major issues on the horizon, lurking just out of view and ready to strike when the opportunity arose. These threats were a much bigger deal and Ares should really prepare himself for them by allowing his body to recuperate back to 100%... And yet, Ares was Ares so the chances of him stopping here and now were slim. It was likely he would soldier on and go meet Hunter... Ah well, maybe the guy had some healing resources for sale in his shop?

Regardless, though nothing was set in stone right now, Ares took to the skies with Voidwalk to go terrorise the rest of the Fins with a severed head as that was certainly going to happen no matter what came after! As he left, he did have one more thought in his mind, though, and that was that he really needed to practice with pressure and annihilation enhancement underwater. Surprisingly, this was one thing the pagoda hadn't prepared him for and must have been somewhat of an oversight. That or they just assumed that it wouldn't matter because it was an issue pertaining to duration and not the actual effectiveness of the pressure. True enough, Ares could do it flawlessly on his first try, and staying underwater at all wasn't a problem... It just took a lot of practice and time to extend the duration which was also true of regular enhancement and pressure usage. Perhaps that was taken into account and the general idea was that this was something that should be worked on individually by pressure learners outside of the pagoda because it was a waste of time to teach it inside. You weren't expected to race through the pagoda as quick as Ares had and, after many countless years of training, maybe then you could put up a fight against Veteran. By then, you would have already increased the duration of pressure usage underwater via training anyway. Ares was the exception to this and so his lack in that specific situation wasn't actually much of a surprise.

That was fair but, if one day someone cheated in the pagoda by flooding it with water, his pagoda clone was going to be in for a rude awakening! Granted, at that point, pagoda Ares could cheat as well and just destroy whatever was ailing with his own magic, as his cultivation could be risen to absurd degrees and a God-level Grand Annihilation would have no issue obliterating an ocean, but it would mean the clone technically still had something to work on if it was bored! That was some good news as just sitting around all the time must have been making it want to get out and stretch its legs a bit. Also, a bunch of challengers must have shown up by now so it wasn't all bad! Ares still figured he could try and give it some kind of freedom in the future but that wasn't something he'd concern himself with for a VERY long period of time. Hell, just at a base level, the pagoda was something that even Gods struggled to interact with so what chance did Ares have at his current power level? His rule-breaking destruction pillar made up for that but it wasn't going to solve every and any problem at his current level, that was asking too much of it right now. It wasn't worth thinking about in any significant capacity so Ares put that thought to the back of his head as he finally arrived at the nearest site wherein the Fins were causing trouble.

This place was near the fish restaurant he'd eaten at before so he felt inclined to deal with this and protect the good food! Contrary to what he'd said earlier, Ares did want to return to this place at some point because it was a really wonderful experience that he wished to enjoy in PEACE next time. He didn't want some creepy crony staring at the back of his head throughout his entire meal so, after the Firestarters were dealt with, this place was back on the menu! Not that Ares was in the mood for food right now as the head he was dangling in front of the sharkin, who were running amok and terrorising the innocent, was pretty disgusting and off-putting... Unless you felt peckish for shark brains? Anyway, if the Fin's reactions were any indicator, they clearly agreed that this was incredibly disgusting! They'd all stopped running about like headless chicken or troublesome children on a sugar high and were staring in disbelief at the somewhat recognisable face. It had been torn in a variety of places, and almost split straight down the middle with a few cave ins and dents, but, nonetheless, Fin was Fin. He was their leader for many years now and everyone knew the guy well enough to spot a few of his remaining features... Apart from everything below the neck because that stuff was all gone...

It took the Fins a second to realise what was happening. They were so shocked their first thought wasn't even 'oh, he's dead', it was 'where's his body gone?' As if this guy could somehow live on as nothing but a head; they would have preferred to believe that than admit to themselves that some random kid had just shown up with their freshly murdered leader and brother in arms. He wasn't just any comrade, Fin was the one that kept their pirate crew together and working like a well-oiled machine by preventing quarrelling and disorder. He called the shots and they were all feeling incredibly lost right now. Directionless and unsure of what their next move should be. Before they could even figure it out, they were then hit by a wave of sadness at having lost someone who was important to them before feeling lost yet again. Would bawling and shedding tears even help? Should they try and run? Where too? Should they try and call the others? How? Would everyone heed the call of anyone who wasn't Fin? What should they do with their life now? Were they going to die here? Would they be jailed for the rest of their lives? Forced to work as labourer slaves? What about this? What about that? Yadda yadda. Their whole life was crumbling down around them and every time they tried to bend over and pick up a piece of it another three pieces fell off. They were just aimlessly looking around them as if a solution to this problem would hopefully materialise out of thin air to cure their confusion and solve the predicaments that ailed them.

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The first sharkin to break was one who'd been closer to Fin than the others as he'd regularly held talks with him about strategies to assault the Federation. The death hit him the hardest but that was also why he was able to recuperate the fastest. To everyone else, it was like they were being repeatedly pinched awake and it was taking a while to kick in. This guy had been awoken by a hammer blow to the cranium and his first and only response was rage so it was only natural he was looking to pick a fight. He wanted to speak, ask one question, and then act on the result. He wanted to ask Ares who was responsible and then go kill them in cold blood like the cold blooded killer he was! Simple as! Even though Ares was wounded, and clearly not a sharkin so obviously not on side, this Fin refused to believe some sensory enhancement kid was able to take down Fin. Both Ares' and Fin's head were wet so the fight had clearly gone underwater at some point and there was absolutely no way for Fin to lose in the water to any normal cultivator let alone this kid here. The sharkin assumed Ares was acting as a messenger for someone who was in a far worse state and wanted to pretend otherwise. As in, the real culprit was wounded but wanted to scare off the other sharkin without confronting them face to face and was doing it this way instead through a mouthpiece. Unfortunately for this sharkin pirate's sanity, Ares beat him to the punch and made what happened abundantly clear.

"Alright you lot, your snarky sharky malarky is over and done with now that I've dealt with the lynchpin of your sharkin hierarchy. Be good little fishies now and stop your resistance or I'll have to lay the hurt on and lay it on thick. I got other squads of sharkin I need to go and calm down so I'm not gonna waste too much time with you lot. Go along with the Federation guards and sailors quietly or you can join Fin in hell and have fun swimming through pits of lava... Actually, hell sharks sound pretty cool. You could be like magma twisted or something... Though none of you are actually sharks so scrap that idea... I'm getting distracted! Take your fishy antics and can it like tuna or I'll make sure to change your tune-a with these knuckles!"

Puns and general demeanour aside... Actually, scratch that, Ares' behaviour couldn't be ignored! The claim that he offed Fin was one thing but his ego, arrogance, and the casualness of his remarks and declaration, like this was all one big joke to him, was making the atmosphere terrible! Read the room! All the Fins were glaring at Ares and wanted to bite his head off!... Actually, Fin had wanted to as well. Ares seemed to just have that affect on sharkin. Maybe even Hark, the pred on the Bhorashka team from the nationals, wanted to bite Ares' head off at some point given how much he messed with Ramsey... But that wasn't the point, the point was that, right now, the sharkin who'd been close to Fin was gnashing his teeth and foaming at the mouth as he advanced towards Ares. This guy was not going to listen to reason anymore and had effectively devolved into a wild animal in need of putting down. Ares had given them their choice and felt no reason to be lenient given the kind of people they were. To that end, Ares figured he would make an example of this one guy to sober up the other Fins who were watching. After this, they better not deign to fight Ares otherwise he would seriously blow them all up with no remorse!

The feral, foaming Fin flung a fishy fist at Ares who did not give a single fuck. This guy was barely even in the transition realm and was nowhere near as powerful as his now-deceased captain so Ares could effortlessly defuse the attack with a deflect. And so he did! Ares swatted the fist aside and reached forward with his empty hand to grab the Fin's face, slowly lifting him up and off the ground without breaking a sweat. This sight boggled the minds of everyone present, even those who knew of Ares, because this was crazy! A sensory enhancement kid lifting up a transition realm cultivator with one hand while the victim squirmed helplessly? This was a sight that should never existed and, yet, here they were witnessing it in person. Ares wriggled the Fin from side to side once or twice before twisting his wrist and, by association, the sharkin's neck, snapping it with a loud crack. It went a bit further than that, though, as Ares used his annihilation enhancement to really keep twisting and, eventually, the head popped off and the body fell to the floor with a slump.

Now Ares was dual wielding heads!... He was so unbelievably tempted to make them smooch each other but that would seriously escalate the situation again. He'd just calmed these sharkin down and if he did this they would all throw themselves at Ares, clambering over one another in a bid to throttle the bastard for disrespecting their war dead... Not that the one-sided beatdown could realistically be considered a 'war'. Anyway, Ares didn't do it because he knew it was a bad idea that would only inconvenience literally everyone... But man was he tempted to... No! He wanted the stardust! If these lot were taken in alive, Ares was willing to bet they would be turned into slaves for the Federation and Ares would earn more this way. The Federation gained more out of free labourers than they did corpses for disposal and so Ares preferred it if he didn't have to kill anyone. That likely wasn't going to be possible when dealing with the sheer amount of sharkin across the Federation, as some would just attack him on sight like the one that just died, but if he only had to execute one Fin per group to get the point across then his earnings would be pretty sweet by the time he was done!... Although it was seeming like he might need a break after this after all because he'd have had too much action for one day... He really wanted to arrive at Hunter's shop, point to his wounded stomach, and tell the guy he was interested in making 'hole-sale' purchases though... Ares was truly a moron. The lengths he would go to in order to make a stupid joke was undeniably the greatest indicator of his revenant bloodline, though, so there was definitely no mistake about his origins at least...

Disheartened though he was about internally having given up on messing with Hunter, Ares took off again, once he saw the sharkin pirates co-operating, and took a few more trips around the Federation to lend aid as many times as he could. There were some instances in which the issues had already been dealt with but he made good headway in securing his position as 'the guy that helped and we now need to reward for his good deeds'. He even occasionally swooped in to finish fights the guards were already in the middle of fighting for the sake of their 'safety'... And for the sake of making his wallet fatter, more like! Still, they didn't know that and were grateful for the assist. Ares showing Fin's head generally made the whole process a lot smoother and, about five hours later, he was informed that the Federation was completely safe again, maybe even for good this time. This process took a lot longer than he expected and he was hungry... Though how he was supposed to eat with a hole in his stomach was something he actually hadn't considered! Would it all just fall out? Would he not feel hungry even though he'd eaten? Could he just put food in the hole? Ares decided it was probably for the best if he either let his revenant regeneration fully close it before he ate or he should just go seek medical aid on the Federation... Though they'd probably charge him an arm and a leg for the procedure and so it wasn't worth it! Who knows how much of his reward they would deduct for medical costs?! It was honestly better to just die!... Ok, not really, but Ares wasn't in any real rush to heal so he would just let his regeneration do the trick.

He walked up to an official who'd come from the Federation HQ specifically to award Ares his earnings and it was a whopping 500 high grade he received! Not bad at all. Fin himself was worth around 300 on his own and the extra aid another 200. The Fins, without any leadership, were mostly just an annoying bunch of rag tag cultivators and so the few riff raff that escaped would never really bother the Federation to the same scale ever again. The real issue was that they would cause a massive distraction while Fin, when he was actually alive, wreaked real havoc in the background so, by technicality, they were worth less after Fin was dealt with... So the Federation used this excuse to justify paying Ares less for dealing with the extra sharkin. Even though Ares was the one that dealt with Fin! If he'd done it in the other order they wouldn't have had this excuse and been forced to pay him a better price... Ah whatever, at least this way Ares; high grade stardust total was sitting at 950 and could basically be rounded up to 1000! This was a nice sum and he was basically a mini rich man in Sheryashka.

An average cultivator would be extremely jealous of Ares' wealth and maybe even try to kill him on the spot for money like that. He'd earned more than even Yulo had in his long time serving as sect master, let alone the elders working under him. It was still nothing compared to the big shots residing on the Federation but that comparison was just flat out unnecessary! Ares didn't care about them. This was a good start to build the rest of his wealth off of by investing in ways to improve himself further as then he could explore more dangerous locations and find rarer treasures worth more. It was a cycle wherein Ares very rarely kept actual money for long periods of time because it was always spent on something extremely valuable. Basically, he was going to primarily be asset rich... And his main asset was himself! That counted for something, right? Anyway, Ares knew what he wanted to spend some of this money on so he went back to the shop after meeting up with Aejaz and the guard who were playing old maid with one another.... At least they weren't gambling? Why didn't they just go back to the shop? Ares was thankful for them waiting but this wasn't needed. At least they were having fun in their own way? Anyway, the trio returned to the C.E.O's room and met up with the man himself. Ares expressed his desire to purchase some body tempering resources, to go along with the stuff he already had, but was gifted a bundle of them for free for his help during this debacle. After sorting out the resources, discussing the auction matter one final time to solidify their plans, and then re-confirming various issues regarding up and moving this shop, Ares was satisfied with his trip to this place and it was time to head back home and go to sleep for today. As he did so, more developments were occurring outside the Primordial Blade's barrier as some more fun faces were showing up to his clone's doorstep!