"Zarek, you're here. I've been looking forward to your visit," Marx smiled, ushering Zarek in and letting him take a seat. "I was planning on sending someone to ask you when you were free, but I'm glad that you chose to come on your own. I honestly think that our collaboration could be helpful to the both of us."
Zarek smiled. "There's no need to be so rough around the edges, old man. I still prefer when things are more casual. I'm not going to randomly start killing people."
Marx chuckled and shook his head.
"I know too little about what you did last night, but the things that I am aware of require a bit of self-awareness on my part, don't you think? I don't know how you grew so powerful, and I don't know how the likes of Van Hollen did either, but what I do know is that there are depths to this world that I don't understand. I'm honestly hoping that we can open a dialogue about this, I just don't know what I can offer you."
Zarek's head tilted to the side. Honestly speaking, he didn't expect such open candor from the Occams. But it wasn't enough to leave him floored or surprised.
The Occams were nouveau riche in the most obvious of senses. Their preparation for such things would be among the weakest. They were a family that just so happened to forge two exceptional talents in the same generation.
Before the apocalypse, they managed to build up this multi-million-dollar empire, and now they were on the verge of doing the same here.
Marx had thought that maybe everyone would be at the same starting line and it would give their Occam family a chance to flip the script and change everything, setting up their next generations to be on a level playing field with the other powerful families of the world.
But now he was finding out that he was still too naive.
The methods of building a foundation in this respect were too many. Many families didn't need to have known the apocalypse was coming to just be far better prepared than others would be.
For example, Van Hollen's strength mostly came from a martial arts and meditation background. These were things that were on the fringe of medicine in the modern day and often treated as pseudoscience by the common educated man, when in reality they were just monopolized by the most powerful until they had progressed far enough along to allow it to become common knowledge.
Zarek actually had some of his own speculations about this as well.
It was very possible that the playing field was much more level during the first round of Rebirths. But as more and more Pillars died and returned to live out their lives again, they began to test out various methods of improving.
Many Rebirthers were far older than Zarek, the oldest of which he knew of being in their 60s by the time the apocalypse descended. Being too old was just as much of a disadvantage as being too young, so obviously these Rebirthers would do their very best to mitigate these weaknesses.
Such things often couldn't be tested on their own, so as more returned… the limits of human ingenuity became more and more science fiction than it had otherwise been.
Now, Marx was experiencing those changes firsthand. Van Hollen was just one of the two heads of a mere pawn of the attorney general, who was to say what the Dalton half of the Sakks and Dalton Firm was capable of, let alone those much closer to the attorney general on the totem pole.
With all of this considered, Marx was definitely making the smart choice. But honestly… Zarek was only interested in this brother duo because of their connection to his third Talent.
Now that it was likely that he had given the opportunity that should have been theirs to Priya instead, he didn't know if he should continue to invest in them anymore. That was actually why he was here right now, to decide exactly that.
Plus, he would need a method of reaching D Class faster as well now that he had wasted his chance. The best opportunity to do that would definitely be with what Godsfall Tears and Hubs had appeared within the Occams' territory.
"If I'm going to be honest with you, too," Zarek started, "I don't know what you can offer me either. But what I can say is that I respect the attitude of both you and your brother. There is no reason why we can't be friends even if we cannot come to a mutual understanding."
Marx nodded, expecting an answer similar to this, but this was because he assumed that whatever Zarek was looking for from them, he had ended up getting last night.
All things considered, Zarek had already helped them quite a bit. Because of him, they had only lost one of their three choke points instead of all of them, and Van Hollen's death had also dealt a blow to their enemies—not to mention the death of the elite squad led by Wyatt.
"How about this. If you can help us clear those dungeons, you can keep whatever you get. We only want help ensuring that we don't get overrun by them. I won't ask you for anything else."
Zarek raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure about that? Even I wouldn't demand that of you."
What Marx was offering right now was quite exceptional. All things considered, Zarek wouldn't be able to command so much territory as a duo anyway.
"I'm certain that it will be worth it."
Zarek fell into his thoughts for a moment. He was sure that Marx didn't know what he was offering right now. The chance to clear so many Godsfall Tears while not having to worry about being overrun by Turned was an exceptional chance.
"Tell you what, I'll help you out. But I'm also only one person. I'll take what I need, and you can have the rest."
Zarek held out a hand.
Marx brightened, then didn't hesitate to shake it.