Chapter 16: Chapter 14

Of course, Arthur was bluffing when he said there was a team behind him. As a matter of fact, there was no link that would tie Piers Spencer and Peter Ruell together.

Arthur’s information of Piers was simply because he’s the author and Piers played a bit of a role in the story. In a couple of years from now, Piers had actually become the shadow leader of the underworld market, and his progress as a Maven had reached Green-ranked.

Because of his status, he had met with Max, the protagonist, and tried framing him and his friends of a conspiracy that involves millions of UNV after Max had offended Piers. Fortunately, the conspiracy was brought to light by their efforts and Piers went to jail.

Unfortunately, the invaluable assets that belonged to Piers were confiscated, never to be seen again, and Max didn’t receive a single reward aside from a few words of praise, which was stupidly enough to satisfy Max.

So, Arthur’s plan was to have Piers be on his side so that he could have access to the assets that were to come in the future. Instead of Piers being the shadow leader, he will instead take on that role.

However, even if that plan doesn’t work out, it was entirely fine for him, since that plan was just a scenario that could happen so he doesn’t have to do the work.

‘But honestly.’ Arthur looked at Piers closely. ‘His character right now is a major disappointment. In the novel, he was ruthless when it comes to his ambition; doing anything to get rid of anything and anyone in his way. But it seems like in his early years, he was a cowards who would only pick on those who are overall weaker than himself, but it kind of makes sense since his ambition to become the shadow leader was simply because he wanted to live off the many income streams and be feared among others.

‘Anyway, despite his character, he knows how to operate a business, so his business has now gained some traction and he knows it too, so his choice should be obvious. He will pick the lesser of two evils.’

And sure enough, Piers took a deep breath, calming himself down, and said, “Fine, what do you want?”

“Alright!” Arthur clapped his hands together then held up a finger. “First, I obviously want what I came here for and because you tried to scam me, I want it free of charge.”

‘That’s a reasonable demand,’ Piers thought. “Alright, what else do you want?”

“Second.” Arthur held up another finger. “I want you to sell me shares worth 60% of your business. I want it sold to me at 50% off the market price.”

‘What?!’ Piers was shocked. “T-that’s a bit… much, don’t you think?”

Arthur snickered, “Right now, you only have a bit of fame to your name and business. In these times, do you have any idea how many businesses are similar to yours? As a matter of fact, your business isn’t any different from others. So, in time, your business will crumble and your hard work will go to waste.”

‘Except that it won’t, but that’s only because I know the future.’ Arthur thought to himself. ‘But he doesn’t know that, so I might as well use the opportunity to bring him on my side.’

Meanwhile, Piers was having another internal struggle. Since, he doesn’t know that in the future, he had achieved his ambitions, what Arthur said might as well be true.

He had spent years building up his business just to get a bit of recognition in the underworld market. Despite the hard work he put in his business, he barely had any loyal customers nor a solid backing.

Although selling the shares at a lower price isn’t something he wants to do, it’s better than having none at all.

“…Alright, I agree.” Piers begrudgingly said.

“Lastly.” Arthur held up the third finger. “We’ll be in a cooperation from here on out.”

“What do you mean by that?” Piers asked, wanting to know the extent of the cooperation.

“Basically, you supply me with everything I want, relics and artifacts included, and I’ll supply you with all the money you need for your current business. Sounds fair, don’t you think?”

‘Fair, my ass,’ Piers snickered inwardly. Although he thought that, he processed in his mind if accepting it would be beneficial to his business.

After contemplating for a bit, although he doesn’t want to, he accepted Arthur’s demand. Besides, even though he had no choice in this matter, it was better than being left with nothing.

“Good.” Although, Arthur knew that Piers couldn’t see through his mask, he still smiled wonderfully. “Now, I want you to do all that here. For my last demand, we can form a heavenly contract.”

“Heavenly contract?!” Piers was stunned that Arthur was willing to form that kind of contract.

“That’s right.”

Heavenly contracts are a kind of contracts that are only accessible to both Fragmentary and Total Mavens.

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Usually, they are used to create abilities using mana by creating a set of conditions that a user has to follow if they wish to manifest their abilities. Just like Piers’s <Metamorphosis>, which has two conditions he created: one, he has to touch or have his mana cover the target object, and two, if he wants it to also affect the senses of his victims, then it needs to be done without the knowledge of said victim.

So, if Piers wants to use <Metamorphosis> or at least, the full capabilities of it, then he has to abide with the conditions he set.

With the basic concept of heavenly contracts in mind, they can also, albeit rarely, be used to create an effective work relationship between individuals.

However, it’s uncommon to use it in that way, because heavenly contracts are long-lasting and inflexible until the one who has initiated the contract invalidates the contract or a condition is broken by the other party.

However, the main reason why it’s uncommon to use it that way was because if the other party had failed to meet a condition set by themselves or the other party, then they would immediately be killed by the ‘heavens’ by having their hearts ruptured, no matter what.

With that said, Arthur proposing to use a heavenly contract would mean that he is serious about the cooperation and he would follow through with what he said, so Piers gladly accepted.

Piers brought the suitcase to Arthur, opened it, and went back to his original position.

Arthur saw the Desert Eagle and a few hexagonal prism, which were the retracted body armor, inside. There was also magazines with different customized bullets.

He caressed them and inspected every surface area, making sure that there’s no trickery involved.

After finding no problems, he took the Deagle and load it with a magazine.

Arthur then aimed it towards Piers, making him dumbfounded, before aiming it instead towards one of his ‘guards’ and fired it. The bullet easily went through the guard, dispersing the illusion as if it were mist, which revealed a scarecrow with a hole in its center.

Satisfied, he then grabbed a body armor to wear.

But first, he pressed on its center, condensing the full armor, then shot at it a few times to test its durability. After confirming that it can indeed stop bullets, he put back the Deagle in the suitcase and retracted the armor by double tapping it.

One of the benefits of having a retractable body armor, aside from its portability, was its adaptability to the user’s body, so Arthur doesn’t need to wear the armor to see if it fits.

“Alright.” Arthur closed the suitcase after putting everything back. “Next.”

“…Haa, fine.” Piers contacted his people to sell the 60% of shares to Arthur at the price he wanted. Although there was a bit of resistance from the other side, they still followed through with his wishes.

“Now, for the last part.” After receiving a notification from MERLIN that he has the shares and now had no money, he chanted, “I swear by the heavens to supply Piers Spencer with all the money he needs for his current line of business for as long as he follows through with his duty.”

After finishing his end of the bargain, he beckoned Piers to do the same.

“And I swear by the heavens to supply him with whatever products he desires for as long as he follows through with his duty too,” Piers chanted.

After he too had finished chanting, although there were no explicit phenomenon to confirm whether the heavenly contract was truly formed, they both knew in their bones that it was successfully formed.

“Alright.” Arthur clapped his hands together. “With this, I hope we have a wonderful cooperation from her on out.”

Piers sighed, “Haa, I hope so too…”

Arthur then started to walk away. He was some distance away, until—

“Freeze!” A SWAT team appeared from the forest and surrounded Piers. “Piers Spencer, don’t move! We have you surrounded!”

“What?! Y-you!” Piers looked at Arthur with hatred. "We had a deal! Are you not afraid of death?!”

“…What?”