Chapter 251 - In That Case, Very Well

“You arrogant...!”

Maia roared, glaring at Limon as a thick aura of murderous intent poured from her.

“However strong you may be, do you think you can face our entire clan alone?”

“Yes.”

Watching her eyes widen at his immediate answer, as clean and decisive as a sword stroke, Limon continued languidly.

“Before asking me, answer this yourself, mistress. Is it truly possible for you to kill me with your power?”

GRIND.

Limon asked calmly, as though challenging her to say whether she was confident she could kill him. Maia clenched her teeth.

Her seething resentment screamed that she could kill him easily enough. She was the princess of the Green Dragon Clan, the only one in the world capable of poisoning even a Sword Master.

But her cool reason acknowledged that it was impossible. Immune to every poison, Limon was a Sword Master who embodied the Green Dragon Clan’s natural enemy.

“... Even if I cannot win, I can at least ensure that we both lose.”

“Well, if you stake your life on it, perhaps you could.”

Limon readily conceded the point. This was Quetzalcoatl headquarters: a fortress to rival Leviathan Hotel, and a perilous den where hundreds of Green Dragon Clan experts lay in wait. If they attacked alongside Maia with everything they had, he would have a difficult time of it himself.

Knowing that all too well, Limon asked with a gentle smile,

“Would you like to put it to the test?”

“...”

If they succeeded, they would avenge their grudge, but all of them would die. If they failed, she and her clan would die meaningless deaths without even obtaining revenge.

For a long while, Maia stared fiercely at Limon as he smilingly asked whether she would take a gamble that ended in death either way. Then she closed her eyes.

The Green Dragon Clan never forgot a kindness or a grudge. But she could not let an old grudge blind her and lead her clan to ruin. Especially when she had yet to prepare the next generation.

“Get out at once.”

That was why Maia had no choice but to let Limon, her clan’s sworn enemy, leave unchallenged.

“I shall take this matter up with Li Qingyu myself later. Never show yourself before me again.”

She glared at him with venomous resentment as she spoke. She was letting him go only because she lacked the strength. She had not forgotten her grudge against him, and she would have her revenge, even if it took hundreds of years.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

The problem was that Limon had no intention of obeying her order to leave.

“... What do you mean?”

“The sculptor’s treatment isn’t finished yet, is it?”

“Are you telling me to finish treating that man?”

“More or less.”

“What an amusing joke.”

Maia sneered as though she found it laughable. Yet there was not a trace of amusement in her icy eyes.

“Do you think I will willingly treat someone you brought here?”

“Under our contract, you should.”

“I entered that contract because I did not know who you were. Now that I know it was all a fraud, I have neither the obligation nor the inclination to honor such a contract.”

Maia spoke in categorical terms.

Anyone else might have been another matter, but the idea that Limon Aspelder could wield psionics was absurd. That made it clear that the intelligence obtained from London was itself a scheme by Li Qingyu to deceive the other clans of the Seven Dragons Society.

“Sometimes you have to honor a contract, no matter how much you dislike it.”

“Do you intend to threaten me?”

“No.”

Limon was not disappointed. He merely raised one hand with a mischievous smile.

“Instead, I’ll do this.”

“...?”

Maia, who had frowned at his cryptic words, soon stiffened. A soft starlight flowed from Limon’s hand and drifted through the air. The moment it began to take the shape of a balance scale, a strange oppressive force bore down on her.

Holding the antique balance—a long beam with a pan suspended at either end, the kind seen on statues of Tyche, goddess of law and justice—Limon asked leisurely,

“What do you think forms the foundation of every law in the world?”

“Are you proposing a game of riddles?”

“Don’t be so prickly. Give me your opinion. Then I can either leave quietly or explain what these scales can do.”

Maia glared briefly at his glib manner. At last, as though deciding to see what trick he was playing, she snorted and answered cynically.

“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. That is the foundation and the entirety of all law.”

“I’m fond of that reasoning myself, but I’m talking about something more important.”

“What could be more important than that?”

As Maia’s expression chilled at his chuckling over how fitting her answer was for the Green Dragon Clan, Limon spoke meaningfully.

“That a law is a promise that must be fulfilled fairly.”

“What contemptible nonsense.”

“You think so?”

“Of course.”

An undisguised sneer curled Maia’s lips.

“Even those who make, uphold, and adjudicate the law care nothing for fairness. Who, then, could possibly carry it out fairly?”

“Well, I agree that it’s almost impossible for people.”

Having lived a long life, Limon knew how preposterous the fairness and absoluteness of the law really were. Gods and spirits were no different. It was hardly unusual for spirits to value spirit mages who could communicate with them, or for gods to favor their own believers. In that sense, Maia’s cynical outlook was not wrong.

“But what about a tool with no will of its own?”

FLASH!

The scales in Limon’s hand trembled. Then they turned into white and black light, split to either side, and seeped into Limon’s and Maia’s wrists. Maia’s eyes widened at the white balance-scale tattoo etched into her wrist, despite her efforts to block it with her psionics.

“What have you done?”

“Oh, nothing much. I just tried out an interesting little trick I picked up recently.”

“A trick for tattooing other people’s bodies without their permission?”

“That would be entertaining too, but this is more interesting. It’s a trick that enforces contracts and compels people to keep their promises.”

Limon chuckled. He had acquired this ability by cutting down the Stern Judge of the Law, the constellation of Bellows, the fifth-ranked ghost of the Liberation Brigade. To Limon, it was certainly a mere trick—but an exceedingly useful one.

Without these scales, he would have had to examine the terms much more carefully when helping Ainsha or bargaining with Cir. Of course, since both women had willingly kept their promises on their own, he had never actually needed to use it until now.

“... A Sword Master resorting to such vile sorcery. The Sword Emperor must be laughing at you in the afterlife.”

Maia glared at Limon with hatred in her eyes. She had realized that this tattoo was his means of making her honor a contract no matter how much she disliked it.

“Don’t say things that might give people the wrong idea. This sorcery is reasonably fair.”

“You impose this trick on me without permission, and you call it fair?”

“What if both the person subjected to it and the person who cast it have to pay the price if they fail to fulfill their contract?”

Limon grinned, showing her the black balance-scale tattoo on his own wrist.

The tattoos’ effect was simple. When the two parties made a promise or contract, weights accumulated on these black-and-white scales according to how faithfully each fulfilled it. The more weights one possessed, the greater the power one could exert to compel the other tattooed party. This could mean something as simple as urging them to keep their promise—or, with enough weights, compelling them to do anything at all.

“... Did you say you could compel anything?”

“Yes. For example, punishing a slave who displeases you...”

Maia’s brow twitched. Watching her, Limon gave a meaningful smile.

“Or taking his life outright.”

“...!”

At the answer she had anticipated but scarcely dared believe, Maia clenched her fists without realizing it. But only for a moment. Recognizing how plainly she had revealed her agitation, she settled her wavering heart and gave an icy snort.

“Hmph. Do not play word games. Turn that around, and it means you can do anything you like to me as well.”

“That won’t be a problem as long as you keep your promises.”

“How am I supposed to believe that?”

Maia made no attempt to hide her suspicion. If any part of his explanation was a lie, she could end up being exploited with no recourse—or suffer something worse.

But his next words could not help unsettling her.

“What if I swear on my sword that everything I just explained was true?”

“...!”

Her green eyes wavered. Had anyone else said such a thing, she would simply have sneered and asked why she should believe a paltry oath. But even Maia could not do that now. An oath sworn on the sword of a Sword Master who had staked his life on it—and by none other than the Sword Lord—carried that much weight.

“Now, what will you do?”

That was why Maia could only fall silent at Limon’s next question.

“Will you believe me and seize your chance? Or will you simply become an automatic healing machine?”

Now that the tattoo was in place, breaching the contract was no longer an option. All that remained was a choice between two paths: sit idly by until the scales compelled her to provide treatment, or actively provide it and gain a chance to avenge her grudge. Which she chose, he said, was entirely up to Maia.

Like a faithful slave asking his mistress whether she would prefer steak or venomous-spider soup for dinner, Limon spoke with the utmost courtesy and an unfailing smile. Maia narrowed her eyes as she glared at him.

‘What an outrageous ability.’

Maia could tell. He spoke as though it were fair to both parties, but these terms were not fair at all; they were outrageously unjust. The mere fact that he had forced this tattoo onto her without her consent proved it. Limon could reap enormous benefits simply by leaving the scales unused when they disadvantaged him, then invoking them only when they favored him. Just as those with the power to make and adjudicate laws always used them to monopolize the benefits.

‘What a shameless fraud.’

Besides, Limon had sworn only that his explanation contained no lies. He had not said he had left nothing out. If he was hiding some additional risk or a secret means of voiding the contract, Maia would ultimately be the only one at a disadvantage.

‘But...’

She might be able to kill the Sword Lord, whom they had failed to defeat for hundreds of years. That possibility was so alluring, so enticing, like a devil’s temptation. After closing her eyes and deliberating for a long while, Maia finally opened them and spoke.

“If what you say is true, you will have no choice but to perform your duties as a slave to perfection, if only to stay alive.”

“So long as you don’t give up on treating the sculptor, mistress, that’s about right.”

“In that case, very well.”

Maia slowly raised her hand. Looking at the five white and five black weights resting on the white balance-scale tattoo on her wrist, she gave an icy sneer.

Deception? A devil’s temptation? The risks if something went wrong? None of that mattered. Those were all concerns only if she failed to treat Hermann, so she had no particular reason to reject this bargain.

Above all, there was one reason that mattered.

“I shall put it to the test and see how many more of these weights I need to kill you.”

He was the enemy who had ruined her clan and killed even her. If she could avenge herself on Limon, what did it matter if she joined hands with a mere devil? True to her station as princess of the Green Dragon Clan, which never forgot a kindness or a grudge, Maia spoke with a piercing glare. Limon answered with a meaningful smile.

“If you’re confident that the treatment you provide can surpass the service you receive from me, by all means.”

One would pit her medical skill against the other’s skill as a slave. And so began an unprecedented duel, each staking their own expertise against a clan’s grudge and a Sword Master’s life.