With his blade firmly pressed on my skin, Ares questioned my sanity, looking at me as if I had long gone crazy.
But honestly, I had long gone the extent of crazy.
"Are you screwing with me? You want me to help you? And as if that weren't crazy enough..."
He took off his glasses, revealing a cold gleam in his narrow eyes.
"You know exactly who I am, my story, power and likely my reasons for laying low."
"Wrong.."
I jumped before he could misunderstand further.
I did know who Ares Pearl was, but his story? How the fuck would I know when past me never mentioned it and just summarized ways on how to avoid him no matter what.
I probably did know though, but in knowing it. I most definitely gained nothing from it and erased it from memory.
Why would I say avoid this certain individual no matter what' after all? I had the ability to regress, wouldn't I have tried to recruit him in my cause?
Yet despite me having the ability to regress. The past me never once said 'You have to recruit Ares Pearl no matter what!' and only to avoid him.
Which in turn meant...It wasn't worth getting involved with him in the least bit.
It was a large dam of wasted water.
So, knowing nothing about Ares, how could I convince him?
What could a regressor that regressed his own memories once every 920 years to avoid insanity's grasp give to this man?
Well, there was something I could give to him.
While my memories have been reset, I still had lived a solid little over 400 years in total. Not that it mattered of course. But, I knew enough to get me a spot as a scamming prophet.
As the world resumed and the clock ticked forward, my mind chilled, frozen with a tone just as chilly.
"I know about you, but only your name and strength. Nothing else."
I revealed what I knew, which was enough here.
'He's not buying it...'
Ares seemed to believe that I was lying however, as evident from his contorting expression that twisted like my stomach.
I spoke again, voice booming louder and clearer this time, echoing off the glossy wood surfaces in the room that crawled with long shadows.
"This isn't me asking for help just for free, nor is it blackmail. I wish to give and get something in return, in my case, your help."
He didn't stop pressing his blade firmly against my flesh at my words, in fact it seemed he pressed it forward more. Cautious as his voice soon rebelled, asking the critical question that would be on anyone's mind.
"What. Will. You. Give?"
"...."
Good.
That was the only word in my limited vocabulary that could describe the situation as of this moment.
Ares was musing over my proposition, considering it with an open mind despite the many risks he'd face as a retired hand.
Finally, with growing unease settling, I give my worth.
"Information."
Yes, that was all I could give.
Information.
A regressor's biggest weapon is one or two things usually: wealth and information, in rarer cases even experience.
Wealth is something that not only did I not have, but wouldn't even be good to the table to bring. Experience, while I had it, would still not be useful since this was not a rare case.
Information, that's what I could bring, hard, raw and fresh information accumulated through many centuries.
At my goods. Ares scoffed. Clear disdain in his voice which flowed seamlessly out and rebuked my arrogance to the root.
"Information? Ha! I wanted to see at which peak would your arrogance truly stop, but instead, you tell an assassin that you'd pay them, not with money but information? Quite audacious of you to say, even for you sir Eliot who struggled to squabble with a mere troupe."
His insults didn't register, they didn't matter in the grand scheme of things after all. What mattered was getting him on board my airship.
So I spoke assertively, drawing my head away from the blade loose over my Adam's apple.
With a shrug, I continue, ignoring his scorning words and adding my own defense to the court he mentally set with his values as the scales.
"Is it though? After all I know many things since I'm of the [Prophet]."
"...."
For the briefest of the brief moments, the wind stopped blowing so hard in the office, Ares froze before furrowing his brows into hooked 2d ladles.
He didn't believe me, made sense, who would believe that the holy blessing of the legendary prophet would be passed down to me.
No one really, but technically, I did have it.
...Actually, telling someone that I lost the blessing would be harder to believe wouldn't it?
"Well I'm only an apprentice so my abilities are lacki—"
Shatter!
Glass like brittle bones splintered and shattered on the desk, cutting my words short as my eyes slowly widen into narrow slits over the broken item wasted by the owner, it was a glass cup of water I had thought of drinking since coming into Are's office.
Ares, settling his punctured hand in his pocket, took out a bandage to mend to it. His blade already gone from his grasp.
He soon addressed my stone-like face.
"You didn't react...Guess you're telling the truth?" He said curtly, but there was unmistakably a sliver of doubt spilled into his tone like milk.
It seemed he had mistaken my lack of reaction as my use of prophecy. Not that I'd correct him on that.
Obviously taking full advantage of his misunderstanding, my fingers brush away the cold shards away, which dampened my sleeve. My voice boomed with confidence as I rocked back on the chair.
"Well, yeah pretty much." I watched him in scrutiny, specifically his hands that picked off the glass shards one by one from his flesh without so much as a flinch from him.
'How desensitized he is to pain. What are the chances he'll just ask how he'll die and show no emotion?'
Ares seemed to want to test me further, as further evident in his next sentence.
"How do I die then?"
"....."
'I was kidding you bastard!'
To his words, my eyes narrowed further, astonished slightly from his unnaturally moving with words.
However, there was no way I could tell him.
This time, I had an actual good reason in doing so.
"....You know well enough that disciples of the prophet can't speak of anyone's 'far' fate, regardless of how inexperienced I am."
Unlike last time where I spouted off my hat anything that seemed reasonable, there was a good reason to the why the mumblings of the far future wouldn't leave my lips.
Since words in this world...Held power, unimaginable power.
That power was most prominent within the blessing of prophecies that can only be passed down to those the world itself deemed worthy.
And it's even prominent in my regression blessing that I once had. Which was essentially the same, just differently executed.
Because, speaking of the far future when you know of it....Has many, many repercussions.
One of them being, the solidification of fate and destiny.
Speaking of a future death that would happen in the far future to anyone in order to prevent in turn solidifies it. Transforming you, and anyone who attempts to cheat death as the reason for the bouquets of flowers to fall soberly six feet under the soil to hug a casket.
This man essentially asked, "Yo, can you kill me real quick?". What kind of prophet would just say "sure" to that?
A scammer maybe?
As realization that he wanted to live in ignorance after all dawned on him, he waved his hands in dismissal.
"Actually forget it, don't mind my words."
He coughed several times, clearing his throat in the process. I watched with empty eyes at the scene.
'Is he...Blushing?'
It was an interesting reaction to embarrassment that wasn't something daily seen, not that it mattered as he brought his hand forward. It seemed he realized that having a prophet predict the 'near' future instead of the 'far,' would in fact be useful to have instead of needing it and not having it.
"Do I take this as acceptance?" I asked, tilting to the side my eyes before locking directly with his yellowish gaze that glinted sharply.
"Yes..." He nodded, caution still tugging him.
Without hesitation, I sprang to my feet, shaking his hand.
A smile that reached my eyes shatters through my stone hard expression.
"You won't regret it sir!"
Excitement slipped through my tongue with a jump, jetting forward with annoyance to the class next to the office.
'Now, it's time to go to phase 2!'
My smile deepened as my knew S-rank walked willingly into slavery.