A new day, a new dawn. Ares was feeling refreshed and ready to go! Nowhere! What a waste of all the energy bubbling inside him! Though he didn't gain anything after tempering his body, as Garmr had basically devoured everything, the greedy bastard, Ares' body felt like it could run a marathon right now. This was a common occurrence after body tempering as in, if you weren't dead after absorbing the resource, you'd feel like a stallion jacked up on steroids for a while. A common tip was to release all that pent up energy in the bedroom but alas that was impossible right now. Supposedly doing so made it easier to dual cultivate if you were into that as all the extra energy made it really easy to maintain focus while doing the deed. It's a large part of why most dual cultivators also regularly tempered their bodies. It wasn't the only reason but it was a pretty helpful method to improving their overall efficiency and the results of their 'hard work' after.

As for currently-partnerless Ares? He could run around in circles for a while like Nibbler... He really had nothing to do which should have made him feel pretty great considering this was a holiday and what not but, really, he kinda craved a bit of action. The Firestarters yesterday were not enough to even act as a warm up. Ares figured he could go and relax, maybe take in the sights a bit more and chill with a cocktail somewhere while wearing his brand new shades or something. The auction wasn't until tomorrow so his schedule was completely open! He considered inviting Aejaz to join him on his stroll but figured that was entirely pointless as the guy would inevitably much rather run around stealing all day... Ares no longer felt like dragging him around was all too important as the Firestarter issue he wanted to get an understanding of first had been dealt with. Based on the results, Aejaz would just really not be on their radar at all because he wasn't intentionally running around and obstructing them like Ares was. He'd probably get a free pass and not get attacked while out and minding his own business. It didn't matter much, as Aejaz could defend himself, but better safe than sorry.

For once, Ares didn't have to wake his brother up! Hallelujah! He'd been promoted from walking alarm clock to independent human being! How kind of his brother to sleep in like royalty instead of demanding his manservant wake him up and serve him a hand crafted breakfast! Punk! Ares kicked one of the legs of Aejaz' bed, causing it to rumble and make the lazy bones fidget around on it in his sleep. Have a nightmare about falling out of a tree, bastard! Ares had no idea if his pettiness would be successful or not but he didn't worry about it, instead taking off and leaving his brother to figure out what he was going to do for breakfast on his own. Ares was not some live in chef and wasn't going to prep a meal for him when he woke up! Aejaz was not one of his wives! Only they got that kind of treatment. Speaking of, they must have been having a tough time without Ares cooking...

Ares was being a bit immodest with that thought but it was true! His food could genuinely ruin palates after a while because the expectations of the person gorging on his stuff would rise quite drastically. Ordinary and below average food would suddenly become off-putting and hard to stomach. There were probably plenty of great restaurants in the Grecian lands, though, and those two were going to be treated as high-value guests so it ought to be fine. The real issue was the journey there as they'd be eating home-made stuff instead... Toasted pitas and bubble tea galore... And honeycomb... Lots and lots of honeycomb. Ares had made multiple batches for Enyo before leaving otherwise she would have become some honeycomb starved beast, terrorising civilians everywhere as she went mad in search of the sugary treat. A honeycomb-less Enyo was a very real threat to society! She might even swim across the ocean to demand Ares make more... Ok, maybe not, and maybe Ares was exaggerating but she was definitely addicted, that much couldn't be denied. It might honestly be to the point that Ares was going to have to learn how to create a clone that could create the stuff for her when he was away for longer periods of time. Or maybe Rox could learn it or something... Actually, Transmit existed! Ares nearly forgot about them but they would prove invaluable for restocking Enyo from a distance. There would probably be a Transmit in Xasca and he could send a small care package of sweets and food to them that way! He wouldn't send them their gifts early though, he wanted to hand them over in person... Especially Enyo's swimsuit as Ares knew exactly what that would lead to. If he was going to be gone for a long while, then he might as well have some fun when he returns! Not that Enyo would let him escape such a fate even if he wanted to...

Ares took off from the abode and just started Voidwalking in a random direction. There was no goal nor any real intention behind his actions, he was just enjoying the fresh air and the peace and quiet. He did occasionally spot a few thugs, because crime was everywhere in the world and the Federation having a unique structure wouldn't change that, so he beat them up and dragged them to the nearest guards via the Puny Prisoner. He'd only bought this thing recently and it had already come in handy multiple times! Very worth it indeed.

Ares was about to find a place to eat when he noticed three familiar faces and decided to go check in on them first. Onno, Esme, and Massai were all standing around and chatting with one another... Well not Massai, obviously, he was still doing the whole vow of silence thing. Ares landed with a thud and Massai jumped in fright yet again.

"Shit!"

...

...

This guy was not a monk! How many times was he going to keep breaking his vow of silence around Ares?! His mere presence was enough to single-handedly wipe out any mysticism this 'monk' had in him?! Was there something on Ares' face!? Ares wanted to slap his bald head from here to Red Sun! With a kiss of his teeth, and a narrow glare directed at Massai, Ares gave the guy a powerful middle finger. It thrust through the air with conviction and purpose! That flipped bird came from the heart so he felt considerably better afterwards, like a weight had been lifted off his shoulder. Ares had probably just experienced a form of nirvana unlike anything this fake ever had! He decided to ignore the monk for now, not that the guy would have much to say now that his surprise speech session was over and done with, and turned to Onno and Esme instead. "Yo, how are you guys doing? Out shopping?"

Esme clicked her tongue. "Yeah, kinda. I would have gone on my own but Onno wouldn't let me play with his wallet anymore. Kept mumbling something about black holes and digging for gold... Don't look at me like that! I am a high class lady with monetary needs!"

"... Sure..." Ares figured it was for the best if he didn't dig any deeper... Otherwise he might end up on Esme's level... "So... What, Onno here is acting like a chaperone? I can't imagine it's easy walking around this place given, you know, the whole 'who your father is' thing..."

Onno's face twisted as it tried to form both a frown and a smile at the same time. He clearly wanted to outright say yes but his inner businessman knew that going on a rant in public would be disastrous in so many ways and so he kept his pent up rage bottled up. "It's... Not... Easy..." Onno spoke through gritted teeth while maintaining that pained smile. It seemed like maybe there had been some developments regarding his father that had soured his mood...

"Should I even ask?" Ares politely gave Onno the opportunity to either dismiss this conversation or speak more on the matter, depending on if he wanted to get this off his chest here and now, and it seemed like Onno leant towards the latter. That being said, it was not something he could talk about openly like this so he sent Ares a mental message instead.

[You will not believe the audacity of that fucker Cash!]

[Just for clarification, because I hadn't actually heard this up until now, but your father's name is literally 'Cash'?] Ares almost couldn't believe his ears... Though, then again, the message was transmitted directly to his brain and not believing anything that came directly out of Stupidville made a lot more sense. Unfortunately, Onno confirmed that Ares wasn't imagining things or going crazy.

[Yes... You think that's ironic? You should see his eyes... He has a mutation, sort of like Mako actually. Don't ever let anyone tell you he wasn't born for the life he's lived... Anyway, not relevant. That fucker Cash basically just looked me in the eye and told me to go die in a ditch!]

[Not that I'd put it past him, based on what I know, but surely he didn't actually ask you to go die in a hole somewhere right?]

[Tsk, obviously not, but I'm not the next in charge for HMTG should anything happen to him anymore. I was shuffled about in the will. I was originally moved up because Hunter dipped and one of my other brothers failed in his business after Cash's direct intervention and sabotage... Now though? Now I'm second!]

[Did you fail at something? Did one of your other brothers succeed at something? What's the reasoning?]

[Oh, that's the best part! The reasoning? The reasoning is that the brother who's in first now has gone missing! Or been missing for a while now, I guess. About a month ago was the last time that specific brother was seen and yet Cash put him first on the will! He told me he was doing it to bait him out of hiding although I have no idea why that would even work. The worst part is that, when I asked him, he also said that he wouldn't be changing it again and putting me back where I belong regardless of what happens! He doesn't actually want the missing brother to inherit everything, he's just too lazy to change it again after the brother gets found, IF HE EVEN GETS FOUND! He's been missing on this Federation FOR A MONTH! THE FUCKER IS DEAD!... I think... Would be weird if he wasn't... BUT THAT'S NOT THE POINT! I'VE BEEN SCREWED!]

Ares chuckled to himself and couldn't help but poke at Onno a bit. [Heir apparent? More like heir apparently not! Hehehehe Ouch!] Ares' toe was stomped on by a mad Onno who gave him a death glare. Good joke, bad timing! [Ok ok, no more bad jokes. But seriously though, if that other brother doesn't show up then surely the inheritance would just go to you anyway?]

[Pft, I wish. He said it would all disappear and be sold at auction. Every last thing he owned would be thrown to the wind... What an asshole... So yes, I'm mad! I played by his damn rules this whole time and he just randomly disqualified me while I was winning! If it weren't for the whole Red Sun thing we've got going on, I might have honestly joined the Firestarters! What an unscrupulous bastard my cursed father is... Whatever, I should just treat this the same way Hunter did and not care. I swear our misery just makes that bastard happy and the only real way to get back at him is to distance ourselves from him and his stupid antics. Hunter left, I'm going to leave, the one that failed has decided to live a normal life away from the Federation and will commit to it soon, and one other brother has gone missing. That's four of us that have given up or abandoned Cash and I think it bothers him a little.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

The wince I saw on his face when I told him I was leaving Sheryashka was so incredibly satisfying. He thinks of us as competition so, when we leave voluntarily and stop playing with him, he gets annoyed. He thinks of us as tools to further his own legacy and nothing more. He wants us to be opposition, to be the antagonists of his hero's journey. He wants his biography to be an epic tale of overcoming the adversity his own children bogged him down with in the business world and he wants to lay claim to everything we've all done at the end of the story, putting all the pieces on the board together under his thumb and completing the grandest business empire the world has ever seen. It's Basically the only reason mother even exists in his life, to make us little villains... Not that we pretend she exists in our lives either. Do you have any idea how embarrassing it is to have a glorified whore as a mother?! I've never heard the end of that one and probably never will. I would honestly rather just not have any association with either of them and, thankfully, I'll be getting exactly what I want soon enough! Our departure from Sheryashka can't come soon enough and I'm looking forward to a new chapter. I'll miss Hunter, I guess, as him and Nibbler are the only people in this family I actually like. Oh well, knowing he'll be here safe and sound doing his own thing is good enough. He's happy with the life he lives and, though it took me a while to realise it, he really did strike the jackpot long before we did.]

[Well, uh, good for you for getting that out of your system...] Ares felt like he just had the yellow pages read out to him in full... This was the second time Onno had gone on a rant to him like Ares was some kind of psychiatrist that could help him! Sure he said he could talk about it freely but Ares wasn't expecting his whole life story! Ah well, Onno was going to be an important friend going forward so hearing him out wasn't an issue. Not that Ares wouldn't have done it if he wasn't important, he just wouldn't have cared half as much. Was that selfish? Perhaps but it was also incredibly normal behaviour that more people adhered to than not even if they didn't ever openly admit it! Especially in cultivation society, everyone was selfish and the people that weren't typically had a reason or a screw loose, there was no in-between. [Speaking of Hunter, I met him and Nibbler yesterday. Good people. Also good gadgets. I can see why you'd get along with him. Or, rather, I think almost anyone could as he's really personable... Unlike a certain monk who I have endless distrust for! What's Massai up to anyway? Or do you even not know? This guy has a real bad habit of pretending he isn't capable of talking!]

"Ah, him..," Onno spoke out loud now that the Cash stuff was over and done with. Plus, this way, he could have Massai nod and shake his head in response to what he was saying so he could affirm or deny the truth of his comments on the go. "It took a while to figure out but I actually first found him near Hunter's shop wherein my brother was having the exact same conundrum of how to speak to this guy. After some time, Massai eventually just showed us the letter that I'm guessing you've already seen. Turns out, Hunter was also hired by Oasis to go help them with a similar but different problem. The quarry in Xasca is in a precarious spot and there are a lot of things that could really set shit off and make things go kablooey if not handled carefully and, according to Hunter, there's a big ol' monster lurking around and threatening to cause trouble. Massai's job is to purify while Hunter was hired to fend off the creature until everything was safe, killing the monster if possible as that would be preferable. Basically Massai was just dropping in to say 'hi' as he and Hunter were going to be working together in the future even if not directly. As for why he's here with us now, we were chasing some Firestarter hooligan that Massai caught out and we just finished handing him to the guards for interrogation. We were about to go our separate ways when you popped up." In the background, Massai nodded along the entire time so the mystery of why he was monk-eying around here was basically solved... Ares was still not sold on him though!

"Ok, well, questionable monk aside, there was something I'd actually been meaning to ask of you regarding something that happened with the Firestarters yesterday. I take it you've heard the news already?"

Onno gave a brief nod. "The two attacked businesses. You were at one location and helped apprehend the previous head of security."

"That's the incident in question, yes... I found an interesting letter... Ok, I'm lying, the letter was boring and insufferable to read through. I would sooner have parsed the Necronomicon and had my soul drained from my body than go through that letter even once. Anyway, the person responsible for the incident outed themself by name and I was wondering if you know who they are. You have connections in this place and know anyone of any import whatsoever right? I tried asking some guards but they didn't respond and seemed to be really sensitive about the issue. It didn't seem like they were unaware of the name but that they'd rather I just stopped asking..."

"Hmmm..." Onno scratched his head for a moment. "In that case, send me a mental message and don't say it out loud. There are a few people throughout the history of the Federation that have become rather notorious and if any of them have returned for vengeance it would spark disorder and unease in people. Of courser that might not be the reason but it's better to take the appropriate precautionary measures regardless. For what it's worth, although the guards follow orders, they aren't dumb and generally know what's best for the security of everyone. They get paid well enough to actually care about their duty, considering how valuable sea-dwelling races are, so they're usually on the ball when it comes to dealing with matters in a way that everyone can agree was the best possible solution. They aren't afraid of extra effort if it means doing the job correctly and keeping their neighbourhood safe so if they were trying to keep things on the down low with the name then I trust them to have had a valid reason."

Ares shrugged as he didn't much care. None of the Federation's history really mattered to him so no boating boogeyman was going to make him feel even remotely uncomfortable. It was more of a 'when in Rome' kind of situation so he obliged and sent Onno another mental message. [The guy in question is called 'Jebben'.]

"WHAT!?"

Cough

Ahem

Onno had spat his saliva everywhere as he shouted in public, making Ares have to dodge so as not to get hit in the splash zone. The businessman quickly regained composure, outwardly at least, and coughed to himself while tidying the tie he was currently wearing and glancing around at everyone who'd stopped to stare at him. It was an indicator that they should mind their own business and keep walking as he wasn't going to speak again until they'd taken their leave. He was at fault for his outburst but they were being equally rude by trying to stare at him and eavesdrop on the conversation. It wasn't even subtle because everyone was doing it! Nearly fifty people all sopped walking and turned to face him at the same time! Onno wasn't blind or stupid! At least try and do it one by one next time! Or better yet, maybe don't do it at all?! Of Course Onno couldn't expect such a thing out of these people. Pretty much everyone knew who he was and any gossip on Cash's children was worth a lot to the elites of this country. They would pay the prettiest of pennies for any such gossip and mortals sometimes even occasionally stalked Cash's children just to get any kind of scoop. This was a major part of why Onno had to grin and bear his displeasure earlier and why he constantly had to mind his image in public. It was honestly tiring... But none of that explained why he had such a visceral reaction to the name Jebben. It was evidently a good thing Ares sent a mental message though because Onno's reaction indicated this was not a small matter.

[Ares, are you certain?!] Onno looked at Ares with a piercing gaze because this was something apparently worth taking very seriously for him.

[Yes. I still have the letter if you want to see it.]

[Give it to me.] Onno barely even let Ares mental message sink in before he demanded to see the letter. Ares gave it over, even if Onno had been a bit rude, and waited while the guy skimmed through it. "Oh Jebben, you dumb fucking son of a bitch..." Onno kept mumbling over and over under his breath. Despite having read the letter three times already, Onno went over it again before finally looking up at Ares with tired eyes. [Jebben is my missing brother.]

Ah, that explains a lot. And Ares really meant it because suddenly a lot of missing context became clear basically instantly. Not just from his perspective but from everybody's. First of all, the missing brother incident was solved already. Hooray! Unfortunately, he'd become a terrorist. Boo! Then there was the matter with Onno's father, cash, changing around the will to try and drag Jebben out of hiding. Jebben must not have been anywhere near the top of the list in terms of priority for the will and become a Firestarter, maybe even the leader of them, specifically to spite Cash. Years of neglect, push back at every turn, in-fighting, and being ignored in the will must have driven Jebben mad with anger and led to this. As for Cash not changing the will after luring Jebben out with this change... He really was probably just lazy and that had nothing to do with this... Anyway, it also made sense why the guards wanted Ares to shut up about this as it would become a national incident and Cash, one of the higher ups, would become a laughing stock. His own ambitions, involving stifling his own children for self-gain, had led to one of the greatest potential threats the Federation had ever seen. Some people had already lost their lives because of this so it wasn't something that could be swept under the rug and treated as a non-issue. The guards were just trying to prevent public chaos because anything regarding this was above their paygrade.

Of course Onno now understood the actions of his father but that didn't mean he agreed with them. Fuck Jebben! Onno never liked him anyway so losing the inheritance to that guy because he was throwing a hissy fit was horse crap! But that wasn't the only thing Onno now understood. It had now become apparent how the Firestarters were individually mobilised and contacted. In order to know precisely who'd been screwed over by the Federation, and have a record of basically everyone handy, the person orchestrating this had to have extensive knowledge of every business operating within the confines of the country or access to such information. Word of mouth would help gather people but the letters being sent directly to relevant parties, any that had been screwed over specifically in this country, was something that could only be done if you were in a respectable position. Being the son of Cash meant Jebben could check the dismissal records of people who were forced to leave the Federation.

Jebben basically had a list of angry people with resentment bubbling away and, combined with the way his father disregarded him almost entirely, made him an easy target to approach to start an organisation like the Firestarters in the first place. The Federation had been in talks with Neo Gear for some time now regarding the spread of technology in Sheryashka... Their last meeting was a month ago... Jebben had, in fact, been in Neo Gear back then which would have likely resulted in him meeting the torchbearer, or his representative anyway, and then he was convinced this was the right thing to do. He was likely sold all sorts of nonsense about claiming his right to the inheritance, or paying his father back or whatever, and that led to this. He returned to the Federation, checked the list, and sent out the letters before going AWOL.

It also explained why Barb didn't get a letter inviting her to join the Firestarters, she had never stepped foot on the Federation to begin with so there wouldn't be a record of her. Cash screwed her over on land... And probably on a table and some beds too... Ahem. Anyway, the point was that only those whose vendettas originated on the Federation could be easily learnt about by Jebben. Also also, no wonder Jebben knew the Federation's weakness all too well. He'd grown up here! He had an excellent understanding of how the Federation was lacking, how the security operated, and where best to strike to cause maximum damage. It was all a perfect storm but at least there were answers to a lot of previously unanswered questions now. As for Jebben, he didn't really have a reason to hide his goals or pretend to not be involved so he was just openly displaying his resentment to his father. It was likely only a matter of time until he made some kind of public declaration just to really screw over his father as much as possible. Long story short, Jebben had screwed the pooch for the entire rest of his family and burnt every single bridge he possibly could. A real fire starter, this one was.