Chapter 71

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They were in a clearing some distance from the city. Dry grass grew around them, and crickets chirped. The moon in the night sky gazed silently down at Ricard and his companions, as though it were their only witness.

Beside a blazing campfire, a man bound hand and foot pleaded through streaming tears and snot.

"I-I have a family. They've been taken hostage. I had no choice, no choice. Please..."

The man begging for mercy was none other than the one who had betrayed Reckard. Like a sort of double agent, he had warned the vampire of Reckard's approach.

His story certainly sounded pitiful, but Reckard said nothing. He merely held his silver dagger in the campfire, heating it.

Ricard and Ice looked equally indifferent to the pleading man's tragic circumstances. None of the three was susceptible to sentimental appeals.

More importantly, he was lying. He had no family. They could tell that much readily enough without special abilities or interrogation.

One thing was genuine: his terror. That was all. And that was enough.

"You have two choices, Marley. A painful death or a quick one. Tell us everything you know. Where the other vampires hide, whether there are any more traitors. Everything."

Flames danced wildly in Reckard's intelligent eyes, but the resolve behind them was as solid as stone.

The traitor named Marley looked from the heated dagger to Reckard with trembling eyes. Then he suddenly began to chuckle. There was no telling where a person's emotions might go when driven into a corner by fear. Had he given up on living, or had he accepted death? It was impossible to say.

They said you could fathom a thousand depths of water but not the depths of a single human heart. Yet a man trembling with fear readily exposed his innermost self.

"Heh heh heh, heheheheh, kh-kh-kh..."

Ricard, Ice, and Reckard simply watched him laugh like a madman, their faces devoid of emotion.

"Reckard, Reckard, old friend. What do you get out of this? You kill vampires, and then you kill some more. A hundred, a thousand—who's going to thank you? Do you think vampires will disappear from the world? In the end, it's all pointless, Reckard."

"Why do you think that?"

The question came from Ricard, who had been watching quietly, seemingly without much interest. Marley answered with a lingering smile.

"Because living hurts too much. Will paradise descend if the vampires disappear? Do you think there'll be salvation? Not a chance. It isn't vampires who torment humans in the most devilish ways. It's other humans. One man like me working for vampires won't make the world any worse. What's wrong with making a little money along the way? That's all there is to it. Fuck. Fuuuck! That's all there is to it! Why are you all so fucking serious!? A traitor to humanity!? Fuck off! Fuck!"

Marley's chin shook, perhaps from the intensity of his emotions. But the three men neither agreed with him nor contradicted him. Somehow, that made them all the more frightening.

"You don't know anything, do you, Marley?"

Reckard spoke calmly. He stood and approached Marley with the red-hot blade. Now Marley began trembling with fear again.

"H-hey, wait. Money, I'll give you money. I've saved some up. Reckard, old friend. Just hear me out."

Bound all over, Marley writhed like a worm. He scraped along the ground, trying to get away, but he could not escape Reckard's slow approach.

Reckard pinned his head under one knee, then drove the dagger into his throat and cut it open. The heated blade sizzled briefly before cooling.

"Hrk! Kh! Hrk! Grrrgh..."

Marley convulsed, then quickly died. Reckard rolled the corpse aside with his foot. Blood spilled onto the earth in a long trail.

After roughly concealing the body in the grass, he returned to the campfire.

A quiet night, chirping crickets, a blazing fire, stars and moon overhead, and the smell of blood. That was all that remained.

"Corrupted by money. Unbelievable. Most become vampires' slaves in the hope of eternal life."

He spoke bitterly as he wiped his dagger. Now that they had disposed of an ordinary vampire, all that remained was to explain High Vampires.

Ricard and Ice stayed silent, not pressing him. Reckard gazed into the campfire for a while, apparently lost in thought, before speaking.

"As you saw today, ordinary vampires mostly live alone. Creating another vampire diminishes their own strength. That's why they're extremely cautious about making 'children.' Recklessly increasing their offspring seems to be considered a crime among them. The punishment is to be nailed inside a coffin and buried deep underground. Then they spend eternity there, starving and unable to die."

"So those things have rules of their own?"

"They do, but fundamentally, they have no interest in one another. Don't expect them to maintain any real discipline. In any case, vampires grow weaker with each generation. Their lifespan is only a little longer than a human's, roughly eighty to a hundred years."

"They have a lifespan? Aren't they immortal?"

At Ricard's question, Reckard tapped his head with his forefinger.

"That's about how long their minds last. Their bodies are immortal, but their minds can't endure it, and eventually they become nothing more than monsters. We call those ghouls. Have you heard of them?"

"Only that they're monsters that eat people."

"They're ferocious and savage, but without intelligence, they're not particularly hard to kill. They roam the forests until animals or werewolves kill them, or peasants gather in a mob and tear them apart with farm tools."

Their weaknesses seemed as pronounced as their strengths. Of course, otherwise they would have had no need to hide.

What people commonly called witch hunts occasionally swept through the countryside, and vampires sometimes died in them too. Besides, everyone in a rural village knew who their neighbors were and how they lived. If a sinister creature like a vampire drifted in, they noticed immediately.

That was why vampires mainly lived in large cities. Places where no one cared who died in the slums.

"There are always exceptions, though. Vampires close to the Progenitor live well beyond a century, and the power in their blood is immense. They form extremely insular families. These are called vampire houses, and their members are commonly known as 'High Vampires.' They are fundamentally different from ordinary vampires. Well-known houses include Draken, Fasania, and Bahnstein."

Bahnstein was the family name of both the client behind this Special-Grade Commission and the vampire it targeted.

"I understand the Bahnsteins are a comital house. Did vampires become nobles?"

"I don't know either. Perhaps one of their ancestors was human and became a vampire, or perhaps a vampire house was granted a title. There's no way to tell. But no one touches a house of that stature. Not the Emperor, not the Pontiff. They simply leave it alone. Pretend it doesn't exist."

"How is that possible? I don't understand."

"Apparently they investigate every so often, just when everyone has nearly forgotten, but I've heard they never find any evidence. So they leave them out on some worthless frontier and forget about them. People like me don't go out of our way to bother them either."

The Emperor and the Pontiff faced greater, more pressing threats than vampires: provincial nobles, cardinals, and secular houses.

One wrong move could cost them their power or even their thrones. They saw no reason to devote manpower and money to such a matter.

Even so, Ricard found it hard to understand. And yet, in a way, he did understand.

It was more that it left an unpleasant taste. He felt as though he had learned a secret of the world he would have been better off not knowing.

"The most important thing when dealing with vampires is to keep your heart steady. What truly makes those abominations terrifying is how they creep into the emptiness inside you and corrupt you. Remember that."

Reckard stood as he spoke. He seemed ready to leave.

"Truthfully, I don't know much about High Vampires myself. But it seems I didn't know much about you two, either. I don't know why you intend to kill a High Vampire, but I wish you fortune in battle."

Then he simply left. His footfalls grew steadily fainter until he disappeared into the darkness.

"That wasn't as useful as I'd hoped."

Ricard looked at Ice as he spoke. Ice seemed to ponder for a moment, then said,

"What do you want to do? Go back and report to Volka? Or..."

"Go straight to the client?"

"Yeah."

"Hmm. Should we at least send a letter?"

"Let's do that."

Originally, they had agreed to return and consult Volka before deciding, but they could just as easily go straight to meet the client.

It might seem rather headstrong, but that was how adventurers were. Every Clan Leader's greatest headache was keeping willful adventurers in line. Ricard and Ice were much the same.

Still, wasn't this better than killing people indiscriminately and causing trouble? The world had no shortage of truly troublesome adventurers. Given the nature of their work, the line between their profession and crime was blurred.

Ricard stamped out the campfire and left. Only the corpse in the nearby grass remained.

But had vampires really been responsible for that man's corruption? Everyone had some greed for money.

Ricard sent Volka a letter from Gates. He wrote that they had easily dispatched a vampire and that, after hearing Reckard out, there seemed little cause for concern. Volka shouldn't worry too much; he and Ice were heading to a place called Bahnstein.

Bahnstein was a domain in the kingdom of Nedersland, far to the west of Ehrenberg. According to the locals, the journey would take about a week with stops at towns and villages along the way.

Ricard gathered the supplies they needed in the city and set off with Ice. This was their first adventure with just the two of them.

Autumn had fully settled in, and the wind was rather cold. Mornings and evenings were chilly enough to require care in how they dressed.

Ricard wore his red cloak, while Ice wore a black one. Ice carried the bag. He was a little older, after all, and he could use mana.

No one recognized Ricard at once simply because of his red cloak. His fame had made red cloaks something of a fashion.

But cloth dyed red with the mineral cinnabar was expensive, so most people wore cloaks colored with dye extracted from flower petals. After a few washes, the color soon faded to pink.

Ricard and Ice had once held the first and second ranks at the academy. Few could match even the two of them alone. They had little concern for their safety, but there was nothing they could do about the weather.

Autumn rain began falling on their very first day of travel, making the journey thoroughly miserable. Night fell earlier than expected, forcing them to shelter in an abandoned house. Others, however, were already taking refuge there.

There were about fifteen men and women. Judging by their cheap fabrics and trinkets, they appeared to be a group of itinerant prostitutes and a pimp.

"Welcome, young strangers. Have you come to lose your virginity?"

The pimp was plainly teasing them, and sure enough, the prostitutes snickered.

Ricard and Ice settled in a corner without answering. They were about to light a fire with the dry tinder they had brought when the pimp offered them a burning log.

"Use this, young travelers."

"Thank you."

Ricard lowered his hood as he thanked him. The prostitutes' eyes widened at his cute, handsome face.

"Oh? Aren't you adorable?"

"Are you lost? Where's your mother?"

"Want a cuddle from me?"

Ricard merely smiled awkwardly at their teasing. The trouble began when Ice lowered his hood.

"Oh!"

"Ah!"

Every last one of the prostitutes gasped at the sight of his face.

His moonlight-silver hair hung wet against skin like white jade. That alone was enough to stir pity and heartache. His nose was as straight as though drawn with a ruler, his face perfectly proportioned. Above all, his eyes held a profound sadness even when he did nothing.

His looks stirred both a woman's maternal instincts and her desire to be held.

Even these women, who normally poured out vulgar jokes whenever they opened their mouths, seemed at a loss for words. Silence fell over the room.

"This won't do. Put your hood back on."

"Sure. Just let me dry my hair first."

"All right."

Ricard lit a fire in the corner and sat with his back against the wall. He kept his sword close, cradling it across his knees or between his legs.

"A-are you swordsmen? I thought you were princes or something."

While the women stole glances at Ice and fidgeted for no reason, at least the pimp managed to speak. His tone had changed.

"Adventurers, to be precise. We're on our way to the kingdom of Nedersland."

"Ah, so you're heading west. How very kind of you."

Kind? How? They hadn't done anything, yet the pimp called them kind. Apparently Ice's looks were an act of kindness in themselves.

Since Ice had carried the bag, Ricard rummaged through it to prepare their meal. He wanted to use up the potatoes and sweet potatoes first, since the damp might make them sprout.

Just then, one of the prostitutes snatched the pot off their fire and hurried outside. She returned with rainwater and began cooking something in it.

Before long, a savory aroma drifted over. It seemed to be corn soup. After adding a few pieces of salted meat to season it, she ladled it into bowls and brought them to Ricard and Ice.

"Please, try some."

She could barely meet his eyes. She must have fallen hard. Life certainly seemed easy for Ice. Or perhaps it was a nuisance, looked at the other way.

"Thank you."

Ricard accepted the bowls and passed one to Ice. Together with the roasted potatoes and sweet potatoes, the soup made a filling meal.

The autumn rain had made the air quite cold, but not inside the abandoned house. Though its owner was gone, travelers had happened to meet and fill it, bringing warmth and a quiet lift to everyone's spirits. Even if an awkward silence hung over them.

Meeting strangers was an inevitable part of traveling. Unless swords were drawn, they were simply people whose paths briefly crossed. Yet that had its own charm.

The faces and wrinkled hands of the pimp and the prostitutes seemed to tell of lives filled with hardship. But they showed no sign of shrinking or cowering. The way they used coarse, vulgar jokes as a remedy for life's fever reminded Ricard of the soldiers on the eastern expeditionary front long ago.

Those soldiers and these people were all fighting fiercely on the battlefield of life.

Even if most days were bad, they were content to laugh on the occasional good day. Ice's beauty was making this a good day for them.

But happiness and misery were two sides of the same coin. They could flip with astonishing speed.

Footsteps drew closer outside, and more travelers entered the abandoned house. No, they were not travelers.

The men looked rough at a glance. Once inside, they looked at the pimp and the prostitutes and spoke.

"There you are, you fucking bitches. Did you think we'd just say, 'Sure, off you go,' if you ran without paying your turf fees?"

"You must think we're worth less than a dog's cock."

"Try not to hit them. We can't sell them if you do. You lot are going to work those bodies until you've paid what you owe."

Happiness was like a thin glass. It shattered so easily.

Ricard and Ice stayed quietly in their corner, but the thugs spotted Ice.

"Whoa, what have we here?"

"Pennant, are you selling men now? This one's a real prize."

"N-no, those gentlemen have nothing to do with me."

"Shut up. We decide whether they do or not."

Ricard turned to Ice.

"Let's finish this quickly and get some rest."

"Yeah."

"You first?"

"I'll take the left of the door. Riki, you take the right."

"Got it."

While Ricard and Ice spoke, the thugs grabbed the prostitutes by their hair and tried to drag them out.

"Aah! W-wait! I'll go! I'll go!"

"No! Don't touch me!"

"Have you lost your fucking mind, bitch?"

CRASH!

They kicked the pot over the fire, creating an uproar. The fragrant corn soup spilled across the floor.

Then Ice drew his sword and stood.

"W-what? You want a fight?"

The sight of the well-maintained blade sent a chill through the thugs. But to Ice, their momentary hesitation was an opening that lasted an eternity. He had no need to display any real skill.

SWISH! THWACK! WHOOSH! SWISH!

THUD. THUD-THUD.

Steel flashed, and the arms gripping the women's hair fell severed to the floor. Having freed the prostitutes, Ice went straight for the heads. His sword swept horizontally, slicing cleanly through necks.

Meanwhile, Ricard stopped a startled thug from drawing the weapon at his waist with one hand and simply plunged his dagger into the man's throat.

He kicked him over, then tripped another man who had finally turned to flee, his hair standing on end with terror. Ricard pressed his dagger to the back of the fallen man's neck and sliced with all his strength.

The thug's spine was severed in a single stroke, and his body flopped like a fish.

It was over in the blink of an eye. No pointless grabbing of collars, no shouted arguments, not even time for a scream. That was all it took for five brawny men to die.

Blood pooled across the floor. Everything had happened so quickly that the pimp and the prostitutes could not yet take it in. The pimp merely blinked rapidly, his eyes wide.

"Uh, ah, ahhh..."

The pimp and the prostitutes trembled uncontrollably. Their bodies shook regardless of their will.

Meanwhile, Ricard and Ice calmly tossed the severed body parts out of the house. Ricard turned to the pimp.

"Let's move the remaining bodies together."

"No, I'll do it."

Ice activated his Mana Drive, easily hoisted the corpses of the burly grown men, and threw them outside. Only the blood on the floor and walls remained.

Ricard scraped his foot across the floor, roughly covering the blood with dirt.

With the cleanup finished, the two returned to their corner, sat down, and relaxed as though absolutely nothing had happened.

To ordinary people, the whole thing was utterly uncanny. Their supernatural swordsmanship was one thing, but how could they remain so calm?

In the end, the pimp and the prostitutes left the abandoned house that night, braving the rain. The two were simply too frightening to spend the night with.

To them, Ricard and Ice were far more terrifying than vampires they might never encounter in their entire lives.

And so the two monsters spent the night with the abandoned house all to themselves. The sound of rain lulled them nicely to sleep.

They had not acted to set themselves up as champions of justice anyway. It made no difference whether others feared them or found them unsettling.

The smell of blood was a little bothersome, but the autumn rain soon washed it away.