Chapter 19

Chapter 19
## Chapter 19

Vampire (3)

“Kreuk……”

Out from the pitch-black void of the basement, a muffled groan leaked, sounding as though it were being choked by the bottomless dark.

Thud!

“Ugh!”

Directly after, following the impact of a heavy strike, the resonating lamentation gradually dissolved into absolute quiet.

“Confound it, has another one croaked? And here I thought I was exercising restraint. These frail human trash truly irritate me.”

Tiafoll, a true aristocrat among pureblood vampires, cracked his whip in sheer irritation.

As the leather coil writhed across the stone floor, the crimson pools that had gathered around it sprayed outward in every direction.

“I figured this vessel would expire shortly. What exactly has Vyrrak been occupied with to let matters deteriorate to this degree? Incompetent idiot. Once I make my return, I will make absolutely certain to report this failure directly to the Clan Lord.”

He seethed in silence for a brief interval before clapping his palms together in annoyance.

“Did you summon me?”

A retainer who had crept up completely undetected bent low with a bowed countenance.

“Dispose of that trash and fetch a pristine replacement by nightfall. Ensure it possesses a sturdier constitution this time.”

“Understood, milord.”

The retainer melted back into the shadows to cast away the corpse, a task that was entirely standard for the servants and thralls posted at this sanctuary to feast upon the discarded remnants.

Tiafoll proceeded further into the subterranean depths.

“I ought to have deployed beyond the city gates rather than playing the role of a sentry for Pyrita.”

He muttered beneath his breath for a moment, fully aware that such a path was never truly viable.

His constant presence was mandatory to sustain the intricate blood magic that blanketed this entire safehouse.

Had they been alternating guard duties it might have been manageable, but departing for any prolonged duration demanded his personal presence to preserve the protective wards.

“Curse it all! It has been an eternity since I last stepped outside. What a miserable, rodent-like existence this has turned into.”

Stepping forward, Tiafoll unlatched the heavy door to the innermost vault and crossed the threshold.

“Ugh, haaa……”

The moment he breached the doorway, he drew a deep breath, inhaling the heavy, concentrated aroma of lifeforce.

The floorboards of the vault, alongside the surrounding masonry and the ceiling overhead, were entirely blanketed in radiating crimson glyphs that throbbed rhythmically like major vessels bound to a central heart.

And positioned directly in the absolute midpoint of it all, a dark chest sat squarely at the nucleus of the runic design.

“…Everything appears stable. There is no current requirement to replenish the lifeblood. Perhaps I shall close my eyes for a brief spell.”

Upon verifying the status of the confined relic, he made his way back up to the upper floors.

This exact monotony had repeated itself every single day since he first arrived within this metropolis.

“Exceedingly monotonous. I desperately wish to depart from this settlement without delay.”

Stepping into his private quarters, Tiafoll stretched out upon the mattress and let his eyelids fall.

As a highborn pureblood, he possessed the stamina to endure days on end without slumber, yet he routinely claimed a few hours of rest simply to keep his faculties at peak performance.

With absolutely nothing to occupy his time within this isolated dwelling, what purpose did it serve to remain awake?

‘The little plaything I used to kill time just expired,’ he mused, silently wishing the upcoming specimen would prove more resilient.

Just as he was slipping into unconsciousness, his eyes snapped wide open and he bolted upright from the frame.

“Necromancy?! From what quarter did that manifest so abruptly?”

Creak!

Simultaneous with the arrival of that corrupted sorcery, the protective blood magic reinforcing the sanctuary collapsed into nothingness all at once.

Grubbing with the realization that an intruder had breached the perimeter, Tiafoll rapidly descended back toward the basement.

[Kyeeek!]

Clang, clang!

Intertwined with the foul sorcery, the unmistakable essence of the walking dead filled the air, and they began pouring into the grand estate.

“A death mage? By what means did they uncover this location? No, with our kind dispersed across every corner of the metropolis, how did they manage to infiltrate this deep?”

It defied all reason that not a single soul had detected the adversary’s advance right into the very core of the city and this specific refuge.

Quaaang!

Answering the abrupt onslaught of the animated corpses, the retainers and thralls garrisoned within the hideout initiated a desperate counteroffensive.

“How dare you wretched, rotting abominations barge into our domain!” shouted the retainers, their voices warped by a distinctly vampiric bloodlust.

With crimson-tinted gazes, elongated fangs, and razor-sharp talons, they stalked within the gloom, striking at the invading forces.

“Kyaah!”

Concurrently, the thralls, having abandoned all logic and embracing every physical degradation in exchange for amplified martial capability, shrieked madly as they lunged forward, hacking the skeletal invaders to pieces.

As the opposing factions collided and skirmishes erupted throughout the corridors, Tiafoll paid zero heed to the localized brawls.

Who could afford to watch such trivialities when he was fully occupied dodging the obsidian beams hurtling directly toward his person?

“Gah, identify yourself! How did you unearth this sanctuary?”

Zzap!

The obsidian spikes seemed poised to impale him entirely, while at the exact same instant, dark conflagrations barred his path forward.

“Ugh!”

With a sharp snap of his wrist, ribbons of crimson erupted from Tiafoll’s fingertips, cloaking his form in a protective ruby radiance.

He shifted his weight fluidly while in that state, consistently slipping past the unrelenting volleys.

“Show your face!”

Swish!

Gouts of vital fluid sprayed from his sweeping digits, fusing together into a razor-sharp edge of compressed blood.

It soared directly toward the origin point of the assault, cleaving cleanly through a cluster of animated dead before dissolving into nothingness.

Thud!

“You miserable dog! I shall not falter!”

Once more, the obsidian conflagrations surged violently in his direction.

Laboring heavily just to stay ahead of the unyielding bombardment, Tiafoll strained his eyes to unmask the true nature of his foe.

Following several furious volleys, he was struck with utter bewilderment when he finally perceived the exact horror confronting him.

“A Demilich?! How could such an entity possibly manifest here!”

Even if it had been a mortal practitioner of the dark arts skilled at masking their spiritual signature, it would have been at least somewhat comprehensible.

Naturally, whoever allowed it would still face severe condemnation for sheer negligence.

However, the dilemma far exceeded simple incompetence, given that an entity comparable to a high demon, a Demilich, had successfully penetrated the absolute center of the municipality without triggering a single alarm.

How could anyone fail to sense the suffocating frequency of mortality radiating throughout the streets?

“Were the rest of our kind in this city nothing but blundering fools? What in the world has Vyrrak been doing!”

It was exhausting merely to deflect the rival’s necrotic sorcery, let alone formulate a proper counterstrike.

The sheer sophistication of the spells was daunting enough, but the staggering volume of negative energy bearing down on his position was entirely overwhelming.

Spike arrays constructed from solid shadows seemed to blanket every available surface.

Ebon talons materialized out of nowhere to snare his ankles.

Sudden detonations of dark light flared continuously, as every imaginable manifestation of shadow magic rained down without pause.

Quaang!

“What manner of dark art is this! Yet there is absolutely no way the others won’t detect an uproar of this magnitude. I merely need to hold my ground until the vanguard arrives!”

While the Demilich had indeed deployed a masking barrier upon making its entry, it could not veil an anomaly at the center of the metropolis indefinitely.

“No, reviewing the events up to this point breeds nothing but dread, but for the time being, I have no alternative but to endure and maintain faith.”

Given his strict specialization in blood arts, his arsenal was poorly suited for combating the animated dead.

Even if he possessed a grander reservoir of essence at his immediate disposal, he wouldn’t have dared to provoke a Demilich under normal circumstances, though it certainly would have been a preferable scenario to his current plight.

Mercifully, owing to the restricted confines of the corridor, the retainers were successfully clogging the advance of the walking dead, and Tiafoll deduced he would not fall immediately.

He gripped that singular strand of optimism fiercely as the duel raged on.

“Tiafoll!”

Thud!

Carving a path directly through the swarming animated corpses, a fellow vampire hurried forward.

It was a vampire of the half blood lineage, one who had not been stationed within the hideout previously.

To put it another way, an outside savior had arrived.

“Ah! Have you arrived to reinforce me? Did you transmit word of this crisis to the outer sectors?”

“Indeed! Most assuredly. I caught scent of the magical disturbance from the streets and instantly raised the alarm. I breached the perimeter specifically to stand by your side, Tiafoll!”

“Excellently executed! We possess only a brief window to endure now!”

Though it felt as though he had been surviving this siege for an eternity, in reality, only a fraction of time had ticked by.

Tiafoll, encountering a positive turn of events for the first time in what felt like ages, lowered his guard slightly and locked his gaze onto the Demilich positioned across from them.

The entity appeared to halt its spellcasting, merely studying the duo as if caught off guard by the sudden materialization of reinforcements.

“That Demilich is an absolute aberration. Its pool of negative energy defies logic. Banish all thoughts of an outright victory; simply obstruct its advance until the main force arrives and guard my flank!”

“Understood, it shall be done!”

The tactical outlook had shifted drastically for the better.

The skeletal grunts were being successfully bottlenecked by the loyal retainers, and with the added presence of the half blood, Tiafoll found himself handling the pressure with far greater ease.

“Once our main force arrives, your destruction is guaranteed!”

Zzap!

While redirecting a javelin of pure bone hurled by the adversary using the lifeforce harvested from nearby retainers, Tiafoll suddenly registered that the auxiliary half blood had vanished from his immediate vicinity.

“Has he attempted a stealth flank against that creature? It stands little chance of success, but if it grants me even a fleeting moment to catch my breath, that will suffice nicely…”

Woosh!

A violent shockwave brought his mental processing to a grinding halt.

Staring downward toward the source of the agony, he witnessed crimson-drenched fingers tipped with elongated claws tearing straight through the center of his ribcage from behind.

“Ugh… Cough!”

“A betrayal? By the half blood? For what purpose? By what means…? We are of identical lineage… Violating the sacred armistice?”

Before his intellect could fully process the treachery, a cold grip clamped onto his locks and yanked his skull sharply to the flank.

He could feel cold fangs puncturing the flesh of his bared throat.

‘Preying upon your own blood…! Is this degenerate suggesting we perish together in this madness!’

This was hardly a scenario where he could afford to contend with a traitor right on his back while facing a supreme foe.

Panic-stricken, Tiafoll strained to assemble his draining essence to execute an emergency blood art to break free from the vice.

Thud!

The watchful Demilich, however, gave him no room to breathe, impaling his entire frame with a flurry of bone lances forged from dark sorcery.

Though he clung to life courtesy of the legendary resilience inherent to a highborn vampire, the match was effectively decided.

‘Curse it… meeting my demise due to the actions of a single lunatic… ‘

As his awareness began to slip away into twilight, he directed his silent vitriol at the half blood, whom he assumed was dying right along with him.

“Squelch… Squelch!”

Yet he could still feel his vital fluids being methodically drained through the fangs rooted deep in his neck.

‘Is this bastard still feasting even in the midst of this destruction…? No, hold on. Something is amiss.’

Marshaling his fading perceptions, he soon detected the true anomaly of the situation.

‘The magical barrage completely avoided striking that degenerate… A mere stroke of luck? Or did he deliberately evade the trajectory?’

The parasite anchored to his spine was gleefully siphoning his essence with an entirely unblemished form.

Furthermore, the Demilich had completely ceased its offensive routine, merely standing back to observe the spectacle.

It was almost as if the lich possessed an implicit understanding with the half blood clinging to his torso, draining him dry.

‘No, quite the contrary. It is actively using him to feed upon my strength!’

The moment the realization struck, he perceived that the bone javelins pinning him to the spot were arranged specifically to maximize the creature’s access to his flesh.

No, there was no doubt remaining.

Even at this very instant, it felt as though the lich was channeling negative energy directly through the entry wounds, systematically blocking his capacity to mold blood magic.

‘For what reason? What pact exists between this half blood and a Demilich… Could it be that the monster escorted him into this sanctuary?’

Amidst the dissolution of his cognitive faculties, Tiafoll failed to arrive at any sensible resolution and shortly let his chin drop.

Even as the spark of life departed, the vampire attached to his shoulders simply continued to drink his lifeblood with ravenous intensity.

—

[The entity has successfully inherited the lineage and attained higher understanding. You have unlocked the active ability ‘Blood Magic.’]

Heinz slowly disengaged his fangs from Tiafoll’s throat.

The drained, withered husk of the highborn began to fracture and ultimately dissolved into fine ash.

‘I am entirely spared from the risk of psychological degradation typically born from preying on my own kind. Magnificent efficiency.’

The maddening craving that he had suppressed with the utmost discipline until this moment had completely abated, and the subsequent surge in physical power was without equal.

The primary hazard of preying on fellow vampires lay in the psychic pollution that accumulated with every feeding.

Because the wellspring of a vampire’s authority resides directly within the lifeblood, the residual ego of the original host remains exceptionally potent.

Feasting upon that carelessly could easily induce psychological fracturing as severe as a splintered consciousness.

Even when dealing with an individual of lesser standing than oneself, it posed a significant threat of mental restraint, to say nothing of the essence of a superior caste that had amassed power over centuries of existence.

‘Phew… the execution of the plan proved remarkably smooth.’

The moment Hans was manifested directly outside the perimeter of the safehouse, he had immediately erected a veil of concealment and slipped into the interior layout.

Tiafoll, despite his pureblood heritage, proved far less formidable than initial estimates suggested. At the very least, he commanded twice the raw magical output of the shadow sorcerer Malcolm.

Yet given the urgency of the clock, he still possessed enough leverage to act as a significant bottleneck.

With a far greater concentration of retainers and thralls garrisoned inside than calculated, and the standard undead unable to easily breach the threshold, they had continued to obstruct and stall, counting down the minutes until reinforcements materialized.

The moment the confrontation threatened to stall out into a war of attrition, Heinz, who had been lingering in ambush nearby, was signaled to advance.

Closing the distance to Tiafoll, he feigned an engagement with the rampaging undead before executing the perfect backstab.

It was a rudimentary stratagem, yet its overall performance exceeded all calculations.

‘It succeeded entirely because he fully lowered his guard when facing a member of his own species. He likely experienced a profound wave of relief upon hearing the fabrication regarding incoming reinforcements.’

Naturally, the entire report was a fiction.

Up until the moment Heinz chose to reveal himself, the local vampire network remained completely oblivious to the intrusion.

‘However, it is strictly a matter of time before the broader network registers the disturbance. I must accelerate my movements to the absolute limit.’

The instant Tiafoll’s heart ceased its functions, Hans assisted in wiping out the remaining vampiric thralls utilizing the mass of the undead horde, before setting a direct course for the inner sanctum.

Heinz trailed closely behind his counterpart, stepping into a chamber littered with shattered masonry.

“My word… quite a sight, isn’t it?”

An energetic wall sustained by advanced blood arts was deployed across the entirety of the room.

It appeared to be an obstacle that could be unraveled utilizing the specialized data from the newly mastered “Blood Magic,” however…

‘Time is a luxury we lack, so I shall have to bypass it through brute force.’

Heinz quickly mapped out the structural flaws within the energy wall using his inherited insights.

And without a moment’s hesitation, Hans bombarded the localized vulnerability with an overwhelming concentration of negative energy.

Creak…

The exact instant the energetic wall buckled under the kinetic stress, Heinz applied his blood arts to seize temporary authority over the frequency, punching a narrow aperture through the field.

‘Elementary enough.’

Hans stepped through the breach without a hint of haste and confidently unlatched the dark chest resting at the epicenter.

Deposited within the cavity, the obsidian crystal he had observed on a prior occasion sat securely bound.

‘Ah… it appears they were hunting the relics of the shadow sorcerers for a specific purpose.’

If the fragments retained by the practitioners of the dark arts, known as the ‘Oath of the Reversal,’ suffered from structural instability due to a fragile binding spell, these particular specimens were remarkably dense and rigidly anchored.

‘If I merge the matured fragment with this pristine specimen, the stabilization should achieve a far higher state of perfection.’

While a fully matured relic was not physically in my possession, my current vessel was fundamentally indistinguishable from being completely bonded with the shard itself.

Hans extended his hand without a shred of doubt, closing his grip around the relic housed within the compartment to initiate the synchronization sequence.

‘The concentration is highly dense, meaning the integration process may demand more time than initially calculated… Oh, have they already detected us?’

A detachment of vampires, commanded by the highborn pureblood Vyrrak, was detected breaching the grand barrier that insulated the perimeter of the estate.

Yet before the vanguard could secure entry into the main structure, the undead legion, Malcolm included, swarmed out from the shadows to engage them directly beneath the open sun.

‘With Malcolm and the elite undead holding the line, we possess more than enough leverage to check Vyrrak’s advance.’

Though Malcolm’s individual output had deteriorated relative to his living peak, beneath the rays of daylight, he would hardly find himself at a disadvantage against Vyrrak.

‘I’ shut my eyelids and channeled the entirety of my cognitive reserves toward mastering the synchronization with the relic.

This effort extended not merely to Hans, who maintained physical contact, and Heinz II stationed directly beside him, but bridged all the way back to the primary avatar anchored on Earth.

I consolidated every ounce of processing power distributed among the individual vessels and funneled the entirety of my mental fortitude into Hans.

This marked the maiden trial of the “Avatar” functionality on such a scale, yet the final outcome was profoundly gratifying.

[The entity has fulfilled the necessary benchmarks for ascension. Unlocked the unique capability ‘Forbidden Knowledge’.]

[The entity’s standard convalescence attributes have rendered themselves redundant. The ability ‘Regeneration’ has mutated into the legendary capability ‘Immortality’.]

Hans successfully completed the consumption of the Fragment of the Immortal King, ascending to the rank of an ‘Arch-Lich’.