Chapter 185: Red Trail III
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A grandmother tried to hide under a table with two shaking girls. Natasha found them because the girls could not stop crying. She did not speak. She did not smile. She ended it quickly, as if speed could somehow count as mercy after the fact.
The dog ran. It made it farther than most of the people did.
By the time the moon reached the broken top of the western fence, the village had fallen completely silent.
Not quiet in the peaceful sense. It was quiet in the aftermath of someone just stopping bombing after they won the war.
The kind of quiet made of cooling blood, dying flames, and bodies settling into stillness.
One roof had caught. Fire climbed it slowly, sending sparks upward. A cart wheel turned lazily where someone had knocked it loose.
The child Alex had left alive earlier had stopped crying.
Not because it had become brave. Because Sofia found it while circling back and decided unfinished sounds annoyed her.
Now there was only the crackle of fire and the wet rhythm of feeding.
Sofia stood near the well, one boot planted on the stones, wiping blood from her mouth with two fingers and then licking those fingers clean like a bored noblewoman tasting sauce.
Natasha crouched beside three bodies near the shrine, selecting carefully, finishing what she began with the neatness of someone sorting documents.
Alex walked between the dead, not hurried, inspecting, choosing only the richest blood and leaving the rest as if this were quality control rather than massacre.
A long moment passed.
Then Sofia exhaled in satisfaction.
"Small," she said. "But not worthless."
Natasha straightened and looked over the village. Her dark hair moved lightly in the smoke-thick wind.
"They had enough bodies to keep the edge off," she replied.
Alex stopped near the center of the square where the dirt had become mud under too much blood.
He looked toward the south. Toward Slik City.
The red resonance line formed again between his fingers, thin as a vein of living light. It trembled more clearly now.
Closer.... But not close enough too. Yet closer.
Sofia noticed and smiled.
"Still there," she said.
Alex nodded once.
"The source remains in the same region."
Natasha wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, though the motion was habit more than necessity.
"Then we are done here," she said.
Sofia tilted her head, surveying the ruined village with faint amusement.
"You know," she murmured, "mortals always say the same thing about places like this. Quiet village. No enemies. Just hard work and weather."
Natasha’s gaze flicked over the bodies.
"Quiet makes people lazy."
Sofia’s smile sharpened.
"Quiet makes them easy."
Alex closed his hand, and the resonance thread vanished. The glow on his fingers faded. He looked at the burning roof, then at the road stretching away into dark fields.
"We are ready," he said.
Natasha nodded immediately.
Sofia pushed off the well.
"At last," she said. "I am tired of chewing on mortal villages."
"You enjoy it," Natasha replied.
Sofia’s smile turned bright for a moment, cruel and elegant all at once.
"I enjoy hunting," she said. "I enjoy winning. Tonight was only maintenance."
Alex stepped toward the southern road.
"Slik City next," he said.
Not loudly. Not dramatically. But the sentence settled over the ruined village like a verdict.
Sofia fell into step on his left.
Natasha took the right.
Behind them, the flames grew stronger. Soon the village would be a black mark on the land and a rumor by morning, another story travelers would whisper at posts and gates: a place found dead, drained, broken, without any clear sign of who came in the night.
Ahead of them, the road cut through the lower domain like a scar. Slik waited at the far end of it. The source of the blood ripple waited.
And after feeding, after killing, after reminding themselves what they were, the three half-god vampires no longer moved like hunters on a journey.
They moved like an answer already coming.
(Back to Sekhmet...)
After Lily left, the mansion felt larger. Not emptier. Larger.
As if her presence always carried a kind of noise that made walls feel closer, rooms feel warmer, and silence feel less sharp. When she was gone, Dawn House returned to being what it truly was beneath the conversation and pastry boxes.
A fortress under pressure.
Sekhmet remained in his study for several long breaths after the door closed behind her. He did not move immediately. He let the quiet settle, let the afterimage of her stubborn smile fade from the room, and then he forced his mind back into order.
Emotion later.
Structure first.
He reopened the ledger, then called for Mira.
She arrived quickly, notebook already in hand, posture straight, expression composed. Mira had the kind of face that became more useful the longer chaos lasted. She was not dramatic. She did not make situations bigger than they were. She did not panic and called that honesty.
She stepped into the room and bowed once.
"Young master."
Sekhmet nodded.
"Mira," he said, "the auction host position."
Her eyes sharpened immediately. She did not interrupt, but her shoulders changed slightly, the subtle shift of a mind preparing for responsibility before the words finished.
Sekhmet continued.
"You will take it."
Mira blinked once. That was the only visible sign that the assignment surprised her. Then she answered, calm and controlled.
"Yes."
Not Can I.
Not, Are you sure.
Just yes. She just said yes.
Sekhmet respected that more than flattery.
"The host is not a decoration," he said. "You will not stand there and smile while someone else carries the room. You will control pacing, read buyers, watch tension, and keep the floor moving. If bidders stall, you push. If nobles posture, you cut through it politely. If disruption begins, you do not freeze."
Mira listened without moving. Her notebook remained closed. She was not writing because she was already memorizing.
"I understand," she replied.
Sekhmet narrowed his eyes slightly.
"Say it back."