Beyond that however he also noticed the black corruption that was locked into equilibrium with the lifeforce throughout her body. appearance wise salem was actually fairly pretty if you ignored her eyes that were black as she had pale skin and silver hair. she had a lovely face and curvy body , even the black stripes on her skin didn't look bad at all. salem however didn't have the sharingan so she couldn't see the energy inside leon but she had been cursed long enough to recognize the energy she had in herself.
Leon's eyes interested her the most as she felt her grim instincts being drawn to them and their strange design had her curious. honestly speaking the faunus features looked really good on leon as they gave his handsomeness an extra devilish air. "so , how are we starting this rather unplanned negotiation?" leon asked no one in particular after he was done examining salem. "i would like to have the artifact from atlas in exchange i can offer two hundred years without my interference." salem said calmly but ironwood heavily frowned at this offer. "no deal , the artifact gave us many more years of peace than that." he said firmly.
Salem didn't look bothered by this since she was expecting as much and her first offer was merely the opening bid. "the artifact and leon for two thousand years." she said slightly more serious this time. "nope , i'll surpass you in power within a couple decades at most anyways so that's just a bad deal no matter how you look at it." leon said while shaking his head in disagreement. salem felt her eye twitch slightly when leon mentioned surpassing her but remained calm. "four thousand years and a promise not to use the artifact against mankind in exchange for the artifact and a week of my time in which i am at your service save any attempts on my life." leon said calmly.
Ironwood was surprised by leon's willingness to add himself into the deal , but beyond that didn't see any reason why he should object to the offer since no one was supposed to use the artifact in atlas anyways so losing it merely hurt ozpins agenda instead. salem frowned at the counter offer leon made since it was clear that he was trying to take advantage of her.
"Four years of your time but the rest was acceptable." she said with a small smile. leon frowned however since he assumed that she had some sort of plan for mentioning that amount of time. "a month." , "three years six months". the two of them went back and forth spouting amounts of time to try and bring the other closer to their hoped number. in the end leon reluctantly agreed on a year spent with her on her terms so long as his life wasn't in danger. ironwood was just quietly sitting there watching this trade off since he had technically gotten what he wanted regardless of what they settled on.
Honestly speaking ironwood felt this was by far the easiest negotiation he had ever been a part of since it was pretty clear that both parties involved knew exactly what they wanted from the get go and didn't need much work to haggle out details. most of the time neither side has an actual end goal in mind and is just trying to fleece the other until they both feel agreeable. it didn't make much sense from a logical stand point but then again politics rarely do.
"Four thousand years and a promise not to use the artifact against humanity in exchange for the artifact and a year of my time during which i am at your service save in the case my life was in danger , is this correct?" leon reiterated calmly and salem nodded. "very well then , shake my hand and the deal is sealed." he said seriously as he held out his hand. salem shook it and [devil's due] enforced the deal making it so that neither side could break faith without suffering greatly for it.
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