Chapter 423: The line between Assault and Murder is called a pulse

<So in the span of a minute, back to back of one another, the kaijin had assaulted someone with electricity and rendered them unconcious, while our lord here straight up murdered someone with brute force...not going to lie, I’m more used to the other way around.>

=Hold on Pathos, hold on, our lord still needs to check for a pulse. If this guy is still alive, then it’s just two cases for assault tonight instead of one and a homicide, although, I think this might actually be manslaughter?=

<That guy did attack first though...>

________________________________________________

At the exact time as the kaijin were needlessly arguing out of boredom...

"Oh! Good evening, Master Zhen Liu. I didn’t expect you to be walking about at night like this. Couldn’t sleep?"

"Yup. Accidentally drank too much coffee back at the port."

"Ah, been there before. Wish you luck in burning off all of that excess energy."

"Thanks."

Zhen Liu was making his way over to Second Uncle’s cabin in a surprisingly open manner, literally walking across the deck through the hallways and greetings sailor and family members alike who were taking in the evening air, given what he was planning to do.

’You ready for your first possession experience, Razorstella?’

[Hell yeah, director! I was getting antsy seeing everyone else do it and exclude me! Now it’s my turn to scramble someone’s insides! For the better of course.]

’That didn’t sound right...’

The main reason why he was able to get away with just openly walking around with nobody questioning why he was doing so was due to the simple fact that this entire ship was being rented out by the Zhen Clan.

There were no third parties that would assume the worst about him, there were no enemy factions sharing the same boat as them and there were no insidious beasts waiting to kill everyone like it was a horror movie(, anymore). Granted, there was still a small bit of disagreement between the side branch and main branch members of the Zhen Clan on the ship, but it wasn’t antagonistic enough to warrant one side openly attacking the other for no reason...or so Zhen Liu thought at least.

’Okay, one last turn up ahead and we’ll be at-.’

[Director, stop. I sense...killing intent.]

’Huh?’

<Strong desire detected. Condensing into [Core], now.>

’Oh, that’s not good.’

Once the announcement was made, Zhen Liu pocketed his left hand out of habit to prevent any passerby sailors or clansmen from seeing it glowing like a fucking torch.

With the core condensation underway, Zhen Liu had to adjust his plans accordingly. Namely, figuring out why this was occurring now of all times.

’The originator of this core is probably just around this corner,’ Zhen Liu concluded as he changed his approach from openly walking in the halls to pressing himself against the walls, ’now I can probably guess what kind of core is about to form given Razorstella’s warning, but...who is the cause and why?’

Cautiously, Zhen Liu peeked his head around the corner to see who or what was causing this core condensation to occur.

’Who the fuck is that guy?, Zhen Liu asked himself.

From around the corner at his hiding spot, Zhen Liu could see a disgruntled looking young man walking around in a circle, with a broken bottle in one of his hands. Judging by the way he was dressed, Zhen Liu could reasonably conclude that this man was from the "main" branch of the Zhen Clan, but the smell indicated that he was as drunk as a skunk in a brewery.

’Okay, so I have the "who", but now I need the "why"...," Zhen Liu thought to himself as he tried to focus his hearing on this drunkard. What he heard didn’t sit well with him.

"Fucking side branch. I’ll show them the meaning of respect. Remind them of their place," the young man of the main branch growled, "once I...I figure out which door that injured guy is behind...then I’ll prove my point..."

’Oh that’s not good.’

<Core condensation complete. [Core of Zealotry] has been added. Please use at your earliest convenience.>

’Oh that’s really not good.’

Based on context clues alone, Zhen Liu could conclude that this drunk guy was definitely a main branch member who was probably miffed over all of the good fortune that had been occuring for the "side" branch as of late. As such, and probably due to having more alcohol than blood in his system right now, this main branch guy was looking to shank Zhen Liu’s injured uncle as a show of force, presumably.

Drunken rampages/murders rarely had any good reasoning behind them.

’This guy is only an Acolyte, and yet he wants to try and murder an Aether Master with a broken wine bottle for the sake of familial pride...a zealot for any other cause is still fucking stupid.’

[Shall I show this reprobate the business end of my claws, director?,] Razorstella chimed in, [I’ll make sure it’s quick and painless...or incredibly painful, up to you.]

’No need for that, I can handle this myself,’ Zhen Liu replied. He had briefly thought to send in the zakos to knock the guy out for him, but dismissed when he took numbers into account.

’Two people meeting in a hallway is coincidence. Six people meeting in a hall way is a conspiracy.’

Besides, it was only one guy.

What the worst that could happen.

________________________________________________

"Fucking...doors...denying me my justice," Zhen Gou grumbled as he tried to remember which door the injured side elder was sleeping behind.

Zhen Gou might have been drunk enough to start seeing double, but he wasn’t stupid.

He understood he only had one shot, one chance of getting into the correct room and stabbing his target to death before anybody else could react.

If he chose the wrong door however, he’d probably get his ass wasted by the uninjured occupants inside. The absolute worst case scenario of this being him accidentally opening the door that had one of the Grandmaster elders behind it.

"One chance...six doors...let’s go with..."

"Hey."

"Wha-!"

Before Zhen Gou could choose the door to which to gamble his fate upon, he was suddenly interrupted by the arrival of a young man around his age. He didn’t know who this guy was exactly, but Zhen Gou knew he had to lie.

"What are you doing in front of my uncle’s cabin?"

"I was just...wait..."

Zhen Gou had initially thought to lie in order to escape from the predicament he had found himself in, but then he heard the young man referred to the guy he was about to kill as "uncle".

Despite the alcohol making it hard for him think, he vaguely recalled that the side branch had several young scions running around, at least one for each of their detestable elders.

From what he could recall about these young masters was that at least two to three out of seven were at the Aether Master stage, which was above him, but that the rest were Aether Acolytes.

Significantly easier to stab, Aether Acolytes.

A wicked idea formed in his head, prompting Zhen Gou to readjust his story and his plans in a drunken, rapid manner.

"You okay?," the young master asked, "you kinda stop mid sentence over there."

A strange tension had filled the air since Zhen Gou had stopped talking all of a sudden, which prompted the young master to try and break it with a somewhat obvious question.

In response, Zhen Gou gave the young man a strange smile.

"Oh no, it’s no big deal," Zhen Gou said in a fake jovial voice as he began to stumble in the young man’s direction, "I just wanted to show your uncle something interesting I found."

"Something interesting?," the young master asked in an incredulous tone.

"Yes, yes, very interesting! Just something of a...get well gift, to help him alleviate the pain."

"Alleviate the pain? How?"

"Like...this!"

As quickly as he could manage, Zhen Goh lunged at the young master with the shattered bottle in hand, aiming to gut the bastard in a single motion. He even made sure to infuse it with a bit of his aether to make sure it pierced through any armor the boy was wearing.

A manical glee overtook Zhen Gou’s mind as he imagine the blood and guts being spilt upon the deck from his improvised assassination...

*Crack! Shatter!*

"Huh?"

...only for said glee to suddenly shatter into pieces like the broken booze bottle breaking against the young master’s stomach.

Zhen Gou stood there, frozen in place as it slowly dawned on him that he probably fucked up.

A sigh of contempt resounded above his head.

"This was my favorite shirt," he heard the young master say.

That was the last thing Zhen Gou heard, before a blunt force fell upon his head.

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*Bonk*

"Well, that was easy."

As soon as the would-be killer’s attack failed to do anything, Zhen Liu promptly brought one of his fists down on the man’s head in the same manner one would smash a bug on a desk.

The would-be killer then proceeded to flop onto the ground as if he suddenly had no bones.

Unphased by the flopping, Zhen Liu shifted his focus to his main task for the evening.

’Well, with that out of the way, let’s go and-"

[Uh...director? You wanted to just knock this guy out, right?,] Razorstella suddenly asked.

’Yeah. Why?’

[There’s kind of a lot of blood coming out of him...]

’Huh?’

As Zhen Liu redirected his focus back to the recently neutralized threat, he saw that there was indeed a river of blood pooling around the man’s head.

’Oh...fuck.’