The Assassin's Seven Principles of Manipulation

Chapter 341: Chapter 336 — Deal

The world around him seemed to have changed. Zephyrion could feel his body moving, but it carried a rhythm that was entirely alien to him. The metal song rang through his mind, and through it, Zephyrion experienced the deepest connection with the worldpulse he’d ever felt in his life.

The world around him stretched out like an endless expanse of darkness, where he could feel every thrum of metal within the worldpulse. It was as though his usual senses had been replaced entirely, a metallic sense layered over reality. And as he sang, he felt the metal thrum in response, followed by an instinctive urge to move.

Every single movement Arcturus and now Cassian had made flowed through his mind, and move he did.

Slash! Slash! Slash!

The first blade sliced violently through the air, the next unleashed enough force to send dust billowing around him, while another caused the ground to crack beneath his feet. Zephyrion flowed seamlessly through the movements, each attack landing harder than the last.

”Wh-what? How...?” Cassian felt like he was living in a dream. A truly, disturbingly impossible dream. It had to be a dream, right? Otherwise, that would mean an eighteen-year-old had just copied a dynasty-level art after seeing it once.

Cassian rubbed his eyes thoroughly, then stared again. Nothing changed. He pinched himself next, but unfortunately, the little bastard was still there, casually defiling entire generations of hard work.

Then, Zephyrion’s voice suddenly rang out.

”Metal Dance: Living Arsenal.”

”Oh, fuck off...” Cassian’s eyes widened in disbelief.

Zephyrion’s movements had shifted, and along with them, his weapon flowed seamlessly from one form into another.

A spear, hammer, axe...

It wasn’t just Momentum. He’d learned the next movements too!?

The Eryndor rune art was, in simple terms, a song that enabled the user to enter the rhythm of metal through the worldpulse. A trance, essentially. Within it, metal stopped feeling like something separate from the user and instead became another sense layered over reality.

And the Metal Dance was simply a way of interacting with that metal aside from the use of runes, a set of rhythmic motions that caused it to react through that connection.

Each style was essentially a different rhythm, and over the course of generations, the Eryndor house had developed a total of three dances, well, the ones known to the public anyway, each with its own effect.

Momentum stacked motion and power with every movement. Living Arsenal caused weapons to shift according to the dance, constantly changing form to confuse the opponent. And Domain allowed all metal within the user’s perception to become part of the dance, essentially extending their body across the battlefield.

Each had its own set of motions that had to be completed, which only made the situation even more mind-boggling.

’I didn’t even perform the movements properly.’

He’d intentionally remained rooted in place, only satisfying the conditions by subtly twitching his body in the right ways. For Zephyrion to be using the dances so flawlessly, there was only one other place he could have gotten the movements from.

’Arcturus...’

Cassian slowly shook his head in disbelief. During a fight that intense, this little monster had actually been memorizing Arcturus’ movements!?

”Metal Dance: Domain.”

”Oh, you fucking little—”

The roaring winds around Zephyrion suddenly burst apart, leaving a sleek sheet of metal spread across the ground in their wake.

Zephyrion swept his sword aside and released a deep breath. Slowly, his pupils returned to normal as he emerged from the trance. He could still hear the song lingering at the back of his mind, could still feel the rhythm of metal around him, but as the seconds passed, both gradually began to fade.

”Hm... not bad.”

Nodding to himself, Zephyrion finally turned towards Cassian. The king looked like he’d aged several decades in the few minutes since they started. His confident smile had completely disappeared, his face pale as he stared blankly ahead and absentmindedly muttered to himself.

”What the fuck even is this kid? No, seriously, what the fuck is he? Is something like this even supposed to exist? Eighteen years old... fucking eighteen...”

Then, as though something had suddenly occurred to him, Cassian’s expression changed.

”Ah, fuck! That bastard Garrick knew! Of course he fucking knew! That’s why he made that bet!” The king grabbed fistfuls of his hair and tugged in frustration. ”Ahhhh! Why the fuck did I agree to that stupid bet!? My wife is going to fucking kill me!”

His wife was the Queen of the Ferran Empire and a trueblood descendant of the Eryndor lineage of heroes. Zephyrion had heard several rumors about her being devious and cunning, though he himself had only met her briefly a few times during his childhood.

It was quite understandable why she would be pissed though. After all, Cassian had basically handed her house’s secret rune art to someone who didn’t share their blood.

After a long moment of deliberation, Cassian finally turned towards him. His eyes suddenly lit up as an idea seemed to occur to him, and he quickly approached Zephyrion with the most pleasant smile he could muster.

”Hey, little monster, you know I’ve been pretty good to you, right? I mean, think about it. Without me, you wouldn’t have learned the art in the first place, so technically... you kind of owe me.”

”...”

Cassian leaned closer, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, ”Why don’t we just... say you learned the art from Arcturus?”

’He’s throwing his own son under the bus. How shameless.’

Zephyrion simply continued staring at him.

Cassian eventually scowled and backed away.

”Ah, don’t look at me like that! You don’t know my wife. That woman is fucking terrifying! A witch, I tell you, an actual fucking witch. You have no idea what she’ll do to me.”

He visibly shuddered, then looked at Zephyrion with even more desperation.

”But Arcturus? She adores that little bastard. She won’t even touch him. So everybody wins! Come on, just help this senior out this once, huh?”

Seeing a Dominion rank beg so desperately was not something Zephyrion had ever expected to witness in his lifetime. Still, at the end of the day, Dominion rank or not, they were still human.

’I can’t pass on this opportunity.’

After all, Garrick had already hinted that Cassian was a possible sucker.

Zephyrion tilted his head.

”...what do I get?”

Cassian’s pleasant expression immediately collapsed. ”What do you get!? Come on, little monster, look at you! Handsome face, disgusting talent, everything you fucking see somehow becomes yours. What more could you possibly want!?”

Zephyrion only stared.

”Ahh, fine, fine! Um... how about this? We become great friends! And I don’t mean to brag, but people fucking love being my friend. You’d be getting a great deal here.”

”...”

Cassian sighed deeply and grumbled something under his breath. ”It seems those exploitative tendencies really do run in your blood. Your uncle has corrupted you. That bastard has taught you terrible things.”

If Garrick had taught him this, Zephyrion would be nothing but grateful to his uncle.

”Fine, fine. Just tell me what you want and we’ll go from there.”

’Good.’

Zephyrion pretended to think it over, but in truth, he already knew exactly what he wanted. A moment later, he said,

”At any point in the future, if I’m ever in danger, I want you to protect me.”

Cassian frowned at the strange request, mulling it over for a moment. But as expected, he found nothing particularly wrong with it, and soon, his expression relaxed into a smile.

”Deal!”