Back on the Federation, Ares was lying on his stomach and experiencing pure bliss as a smile of contentment drifted across his face. The back massager he bought from Bea's place before leaving Red Sun was doing wonders and easing all the tension and stress out of his body after yesterday's brawl with Fin. He still had a pretty decently sized hole running through him but there were no more major injuries inside his body and so he felt right as rain. Throw in the massager and he was having a wonderful time despite how he looked thanks to the hole. Honestly, the massager kinda reminded him of Enyo. He could almost feel the sensation of her hands running over him, like phantom vibration syndrome... Phantom Enyo syndrome? It made sense he would recall her when using a massager, after all, but he was really enjoying this thing. Money well spent! He was never going to leave home without it! Comfort aside, it also had he benefit of preparing his body for the body tempering that Ares was planning on doing later. After he returned from his trip to Hunter's place, finally getting around to his various resources and making use of them was next on the good ol' to-do list. Maybe if his body wasn't so high strung it would be a more tolerable process? It was already going to be somewhat of a pain considering his body wasn't at 100% but that was fine.
If anything, the real issue was that he wouldn't be able to simultaneously keep an eye out on the fish restaurant from yesterday. He couldn't just take his eyes off it and let the thing burn because he was busy with his own cultivation, that was selfish. He was the reason it had a target on his back so he was going to have to watch on properly. Currently he had his divine sense resting above the Federation and keeping a watchful gaze trained on the place but doing that for long periods of time wasn't really feasible and so he had another plan. Rox! All Ares had to do was put a little patch of nothingness on the mimic's arm or something and, when he saw the Firestarters show up and try to do their thing, he could tap it and alert Ares. It was also a good idea because this way Rox could stall the Firestarters for as long as it took Ares, the real one, to arrive. Rox could blend in incredibly well too thanks to his mimicry powers which he hadn't made use of much recently. In fact, if it weren't for his inability to speak, Ares would have sent him on a spy mission to infiltrate the Firestarters' ranks. That was something Ares was kinda sad about because it was an incredibly useful ability Rox possessed that was going to waste somewhat... If only he could wield it properly. Oh well, this would do for now and Ares could worry about upgrading his mimic' skillset later. Anyway, the Firestarters wouldn't take longer than a day or two to cause trouble there so Rox would be fine to have a sleepless night or two as Ares would let him rest after. Worker's rights and what not.
Ares couldn't enjoy his back relief forever though and did eventually have to turn off the massager, get up, and wake his lazy ass brother up! Why was this guy always asleep all the damn time? Ares figured he should really buy this shmuck an alarm clock... Although, realistically, Aejaz would just ignore it and go back to sleep anyway... Some battles just couldn't be won so Ares gave up on trying to find ways of getting his brother awake without having to do it manually. This was clearly just a burden he was going to have to bear whenever he went adventuring with this fool. After Aejaz fell out of bed, literally, both he and Ares ate a quick breakfast because Aejaz would be reluctant to go anywhere if he wasn't fed... Was this guy and the eagle from Adaptive Shot related!? Regardless, one food bribery later and the duo where Voidwalking over to Hunter's shop after having dropped off Rox. The good thing about travelling in such a fashion was that everybody could see them unless the person in question was borderline blind. They weren't exactly subtle 'flying' through the air above the heads of normal civilians.
People on the boats below assumed it was just Ares and Aejaz showing off and / or trying to get to their destination quicker and, to some extent, those were both true but there were two main reasons the brothers were actually Voidwalking today. One was that they'd already done the walking before and checked everything out yesterday; they didn't have any reason to be slow and parse through all the shops on ground level, or boat level more like, so skipping over them like this was fine as they were already familiar with the area. The main reason, however, was that it lent believability to the claim that they weren't going back to the restaurant. Sure the Firestarters were likely to believe the ruse anyway but fully showcasing Ares heading anywhere else in such a brazen fashion would lend credence to his claims that he wasn't interested in the restaurant anymore. He even dropped Rox off in an alley near the area of the restaurant instead of landing directly next to it. He was being extremely cautious about how he appeared to others now that he knew his every action was being watched by the Firestarters as they saw him as an important problem. Especially now that he'd killed Fin, these lot would be hyper wary of his strength and increasingly vigilant to make doubly sure he wasn't around when going about their work.
Ares kept that in the back of his mind as he Voidwalked past the two bickering shops his journey came to an end at yesterday. Their fighting had kicked off again and it seemed like, despite the fact one of them would be leaving soon, they really couldn't just put the animosity down for even five minutes and live in peace. It was probably the other guy who started it out of jealousy after having heard that the C.E.O Ares talked to was successful in his endeavour. These were just petty attempts at making one last dent in their profits. If they could scuff each other's buildings before leaving, and force the C.E.O to pay out of their own earnings just to fix it, then they were genuinely small enough minded people to count that as a win in their books. Then again, with how infrequently they actually managed to do literally anything of note to one another, each 'victory, no matter how small, could actually make the difference in the final tally. Still, the fact that they were keeping score just to flaunt it at one another was childish beyond belief! Again, they really should have just killed one another and been done with it! Ares would have stormed into the building opposite and sunk the damn thing with the C.E.O unconscious and tied to his own desk. Alas, Ares the C.E.Os were not and so their playground level back and forth never really escalated in a way that would ever end the conflict. It would sort of just fizzle out and die when Ares returned here later to pick up the shop.
What a dull ending!
Ares was almost tempted to blow up the other ship just for fun but he had no stake in this feud and didn't much care about dealing the finishing blow for no good reason. He didn't know why they were even this annoyed with each other so blindly taking sides, and potentially killing innocent people that had done basically nothing wrong, wasn't his style. He could be fast and loose with his morals sometimes, he had the power and status to afford him some freebies here and there regarding such actions occasionally, but Ares still had a stronger alignment to justice than pointless evil. If nothing else, he would disappoint Enyo and that just felt wrong. He had no inclination to do such a thing anyway! Why upset his own wife with his behaviour!? Just to have fun sinking a ship with explosives? Not worth it... Even if the thought of blowing up a ship was titillating... Now Ares was kinda wishing the fins had their own pirate ship he could have laid into. Unfortunately they all swam faster than a ship could travel so it was pointless for them to buy, or commandeer, such a thing in the first place. You could argue it would be good for helping them haul their stolen goods but it was slow and made for an easy target so the Fins, back when they were still capable of operating, kept their raids light and mostly stocked up on jewellery, watches, and other such small items that were valuable while also being easy to carry in spades.
The Fins had basically gone out of business now that Ares had his way with them, though, so no more pirates! Or no more sharkin pirates, anyway. There were definitely other pirate groups roaming the waters of Sheryashka but they were somewhat more trivial in comparison and did not possess a peak transition realm cultivator at the helm of their operations. Though the other pirate groups raided smaller ships frequently they would never dare attack the Federation as they weren't that brazen. The size of their groups were tiny in comparison to the Fins and they lacked the power to fight or the speed to be a nuisance without getting caught. All in all, the Federation's piracy problem had been all but completely solved for the foreseeable future. Unless a new group formed and developed, over the course of however many years, this was yet another group of aggressive foes that would never be bothering them again. Throughout the duration of this journey thus far, they'd been rid of all three of their current assaulters permanently so the higher ups would no doubt be celebrating in jubilation over the pennies they could pinch on security after this! Hooray for firing redundant employees!... Maybe Ares really was the bad guy here after all what with creating job sparsity? Who would have thunk a few undead dolphins and rowdy seagulls with bowel issues could generate so many jobs...
As the duo passed by the two shops, Ares was incredibly tempted to land and go down the middle route but that was just a waste of time and, besides, Aejaz looked like he'd run away on the spot if he even tried. It was a shame but Ares wouldn't get a chance to experience walking the proverbial plank situated in no man's land and so he continued over the top of the war raging on below him. A cannonball passing by very nearly hit him but Ares just kicked the thing with a pressure deflect and sent it spiralling off into the ocean where it sank like a stone and could go on to act like a ball for a twisted or something. Living dolphins pretty frequently played a sort of mock baseball with leftover cannonballs by swatting them with their tails and playing catch with other dolphins. It was cute but also potentially very deadly if they accidentally nailed one and sent it flying into nearby ships. They didn't mean to do it, so it was hard to look them in the eye and scold them when their heads were half bobbing out the water with a sad look on their face, but that didn't change the fact that many ships throughout the year had to have giant holes in them fixed thanks to the antics of the fishy friends out at sea.
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Now that Ares and Aejaz had safely crossed by the warring businesses they were treading new ground but, really, they weren't that far from Hunter's shop so there was little point in landing and taking the scenic route. Plus Ares had promised Aejaz this would only take one day... Yesterday... He'd already taken up more of Aejaz' time than he'd allotted himself but, in all fairness, he couldn't have predicted the shark attack. It's not like Ares needed Aejaz there at Hunter's shop with him or anything but this was all mostly just a bid to reduce the amount of thieving his brother did before leaving this place. That and having him around would make the Firestarters less suspicious about his actions. If they broke up and went about their own things it would give the Firestarters two people to track which sounded like a good thing, and probably could be, but Ares didn't want Aejaz to get into any hot water just because of him. There was no reason to direct their attention towards his own brother when Ares had already taken various measures to deal with them sooner or later. Aejaz could walk around freely after the restaurant bait was triggered at least so, until then, he was being dragged along for the ride!
Eventually the duo finally found the shop in question. It wasn't small but it wasn't particularly large either, sitting somewhere comfortably in the middle of the size spectrum with a ground floor, second floor, basement presumably based on the look of the place, and a back garden-esque area where customers could likely go and trial out the gadgets that were for sale here. It was like some kind of firing range / faux jungle hybrid which made sense. Hunter primarily sold trap or trap-adjacent gadgets and so getting a feel for how they operated in non-urban environments was probably for the best. He must have gone to great lengths just to get that back area built in a place like this but it proved, to Ares' inexperienced self at least, that the guy was a dedicated professional and spared no effort in making sure he built the perfect environment for rigorous testing. It could also be safely assumed that the basement of this place was where Hunter worked on new gadgets so he had everything he needed all in one place. Sleep on the second floor at night, sell during the day on the ground floor, close up and build in the basement in the evening. Rinse and repeat until his new gadget was built and then replace the building time slot with trial and error in the back and, hey presto, you had Hunter's daily life out at sea sorted.
Ares could piece this together just solely based on how he lived his own life back a the sect because busy people were a universal breed and almost always possessed similar efficiency related traits. There was a sort of kinsman ship for having spent a lengthy amount of time just building, testing, building, testing on repeat over and over. Ares with his artifacts and Shock Beads for the sect and Hunter with his gadgets for the Federation. Of course this rinse and repeat cycle would change when the Federation docked and Hunter was hired to take out dangerous animals and monsters. He would leave the comfort of his shop and go on a week or two long hunting spree, only returning when he'd bagged and tagged the heads of the creatures who were his targets. Sometimes the requester would want the corpse, or some kind of body part it dropped, but for the most part Hunter was hired by people who just wanted a dangerous foe dealt with. It wasn't hydra deer or buzzbladers, typically, that hunter went after. The level of foe he was frequently pit against was closer to that of a mecha dryad so he definitely meant business.
Hunter did spend all his life learning about and chasing down such creatures, though, so he had a pretty hefty advantage as this was his field of expertise. If you pit Hunter against a human who was equally as strong as a mecha-dryad then he would struggle way more against them than the metal abomination, that was just how he wanted to live his life. It wasn't a means to make money to him or anything, he just really got a kick out of assassinating monsters specifically. There was no real rhyme or reason to his actions other than just pure satisfaction and so Are wasn't surprised he was supposedly as skilled as he was. There were two types of people that really went all out in most endeavours and that was either A; those who had a monumentally important reason to do so, like Armageddon, or, B; people who were the exact opposite and ironically had absolutely zero reason to do it. The former was self-explanatory as there was no lengths to which they wouldn't go to complete their task. The latter category, though, were typically aficionados who had a passion, and thus intricate knowledge, for whatever it was they were doing. Boredom may have even been a driving factor but this group of people actively chose to embark on whatever it was they were doing out of choice even if they almost never stood to gain much of anything. It was a very different kind of motivation but, in some cases, equally as prominent as a person who's life was on the line. Sometimes maybe even more because these lot had been doing said activity for longer than even the person who had no choice but to. It wasn't some passing requirement to achieve a goal, it was their entire life's goal.
Ares could understand this, strange though it was, because he himself was actually a person like that when it came to destruction and explosions in general. He sill waned to generate bigger and bigger explosions for no reason other than that he thought they were cool and made him feel all fuzzy inside whenever they went off in style. Him being the only person that could effectively summon world ending explosions at will may have played a part in understanding his psychology on the matter but he didn't care to do some kind of psychiatric deep dive as he only needed to know he had a preference for it and that was good enough. That was all he cared about and so he would do it regardless of whatever motivation might have been subconsciously driving him.
Ares looked up at the name of the shop, 'Tools Of The Trade', one last time before heading inside with his brother, who was keeping an eye out for things to steal, in tow. Ares opened the door, which had a string attached to it and triggered a small finger sized bell, causing it to ring a ding ding and alert the store owner, Hunter, that somebody had entered. He wasn't present right now, and appeared to be in the back garden doing something, so Ares was going to just have to wait... But he wasn't going to wait alone as there was a strange blue little creature making a beeline for him! Ares didn't know what this thing was but it was definitely on the higher end of the cute spectrum!
Sharkdog!
It had the cute paws of a dog but its legs were stubby and so it kinda waddled back and forth, causing the fin on its blue back to wriggle with every step! Adorable! Ares leant down and let the animal jump into his face, giving him a lick before chewing on his ear with a loud chomp. "Ow! That hurts! It's a good thing you're cute!..." Ares had said his exact phrase before! If he wasn't mistaken, the last time he spoke it was when Appa froze him? Or it was something along those lines. Ares decided to ignore this minor infraction and keep cuddling the barking sharkdog but it chomped him again! This one was a biter!... And yet, Ares couldn't help but keep going back for more! The little fella was too soft to put down and Ares was having a blast between chomps because he was receiving all kinds of licks and greetings in the form of small howl growls. The sharkdog's tail was wagging and there was a tiny smile on its face and Ares wanted to take thing home with him! He'd never seen anything like this before, not even in all the books he'd read, so this must have been some kind of rare crossbreed that belonged to Hunter. He must have found it during his Freeride travels and monster hunting expeditions and felt similarly to Ares regarding how sweet it was. Chomp. Well that was as slight problem but one that could be ignored if the owner was patient enough! It's not like the sharkdog was trying to be mean, he probably saw it as a friendly gesture. Ares could deal with a little biting!... Ares caught sight of a sign in the corner of the room, behind the counter, and it was both a small warning as well as a non-formal introduction to the creature shaking happily in his hands.
Please don't feed Nibbler snacks and / or human flesh. He has a hankering for the latter and, once he gets started, will not stop.
...
Whoops! Though Ares wanted to keep hugging the tiny animal, it was for the best if he didn't let it keep chomping on him as he might then go and bother other customers too or go on some kind of chewing spree throughout the Federation. Nibbler was put gently down on the floor and Ares watched him do a few laps around the store, as chewing on Ares' skin had likely given him the zoomies, before the sharkdog took his leave and headed to the back garden to go play with this owner. While that was happening, Ares took a gander around the room and realised there were only two other customers present and both were staring straight at him...
Were they silently judging him for playing with the fishy pooch? Was it because he fed the creature flesh accidentally? Actually, they just started waving! Were they just being polite? Why did it feel like Ares recognised them in some capacity? Were these two the the ones he'd heard were helping out the Federation in various places? Ares had so many questions but, in the end, he decided not to ask. He just politely waved back and nodded his head with a fake smile. He didn't want to ask them questions only to find out he'd gotten the wrong people or something as that would be rather embarrassing. Even if they were the people he'd heard about then it didn't really matter as it's not like they were close acquaintances or anything. He'd already come across Esme and Onno and so the only people left aboard the Federation that he knew personally was the monk, Massai, who he'd yet to locate. Maybe if these guys looked strong then Ares could be convinced an attempt to recruit them to the sect as worthwhile but, as individual cultivators, Ares was not impressed at all. They barely warranted any attention as Ares could beat them with his eyes closed if he wanted to. They must have just been taking out the riff raff here and there but done a decent enough job of it to get recognition from the mortals they helped. That was probably the correct answer to the reason behind their rising fame so Ares just left it at that and proceeded to ignore them. If they wanted to speak to him about anything then they could be the ones to initiate the conversation. That being said, Hunter was finally making his way into the store so Ares was going to be busy for now and the two guys could talk to him some other time if that was what they wanted. Right now, it was time to shop for some gadgets!