Chapter 253
A bronze-cast Venus de Milo stood at the center of a room filled with other priceless decorations, making the room look more vulgar than antique.
“I commend your labor,” said a handsome man with red hair and eyes, staring at the statue.
“T-thank you very much!” shouted Peter Geraghty, bowing his head repeatedly. “I did not expect you to grace us with your presence, Viscount Motusch Rabies, member of the seven almighty bloodlines!”
Motusch was an aristocrat belonging to the Rabies of Madness bloodline, one of the Seven Purebloods. He turned from the Venus statue and stared with disdain at the fat man rubbing his hands so hard that his fingerprints might burn off from friction. Peter, a lump of fat wearing a white dress shirt, black overalls, and cowboy boots, smiled moronically as he sweated profusely.
Tsk, why must I deal with this undignified swine? Motusch thought.
The matter was beneath what a noble member of the Rabies bloodline had to deal with. Still, he felt more comfortable dealing with it personally, considering the importance of the matter.
“Deliver the casks as soon as the Blood Castle opens tomorrow. A portion of them must be used immediately, so bring them to the Palace of Madness,” Motusch said.
“Yes, my Lord!”
“The wine will be used from the first day of the festival to the last. They had better be of the highest quality.”
“T-they most certainly are! All of them are aged between twenty and thirty years, the perfect amount of time! They have not been damaged in any way!”
Motusch nodded and said proudly, “This is the first Night of the Full Moon since Marquis Demens has become a World Ranker. Our opening ceremony must be incomparably more extravagant than that of the other bloodlines.”
Demens Rabies, the Madblood Marquis, had taken one of the two vacant spots in the world ranking alongside the centaur Chiron after the fall of the dwarf High Ranker Hadafu, the Ten Thousand Arms, and the naga High Ranker Lasapi. Although he had been number 100, the recent deaths of Lee Kang-San and Biphatogenes brought him up to ninety-eight.
“We will prepare the perfect opening ceremony!” Peter shouted.
“As you should,” Motusch remarked as he turned around once his business was complete.
Just then, Peter called, “M-my Lord! May I ask you for a favor?”
“A favor?”
“To celebrate Marquis Demens Rabies’s entry into the world ranking, I have prepared a special cask as an offering to him.”
“Oh? A special cask?” Motusch asked, smiling for the first time. “Have you acquired a wine that the marquis has not tasted before?”
“I have. It is the only cask that exists in this world! I am highly confident that it will make the marquis’s opening ceremony shine even brighter!”
Motusch laughed, finding Peter’s certainty commendable. “Ahaha! Very well. I will take it to the marquis personally.”
Yes! Peter shouted inwardly, clenching his fists with an expression filled with ecstasy.
He managed to offer wine to the Madblood Marquis himself, a feat he had accomplished after combing through the Mirror World’s outer zones. He would not have dared to ask for such a favor if not for the series of fortunate events.
“Haha... HAHAHAHA! Hurgh!”
Peter laughed his heart out a while after Motusch left the room, but clenched his chest from the sudden pain in his heart. His heart beat crazily fast, and it felt like someone was squeezing it tightly.
Peter groaned agonizingly as he trailed off in his thoughts, This is...
He was familiar with the heartache because it had saved his life many times over. It had saved him from the Californian police back when he was a smuggler on Earth, and had warned him to escape from the Union’s pursuers and the Dark Human Hunters in the Mirror World.
You want me to run away?
Every time Peter felt this heartache, he dropped everything and lay low underground. It was the secret to his survival all this time.
But... I can’t!
The circumstances were different this time because his cherished dreams would come true tomorrow. Demens Rabies would undoubtedly reward him once he was presented with the wine. Considering the rarity of the special wine cask, Peter could become a Daywalker at the very least, and if he were lucky, be granted noble status.
“Hehehe, I’m looking forward to it. Yeah, the pounding of my heart must be from anticipation,” Peter mumbled, ignoring his heartache for the first time.
***
“This must be the place,” Seong-Hwi said as he quickly scanned the vast site thinly covered by fog, where people were running around busily.
“Hey! Move your asses!”
“The delivery is eight hours from now!”
“Stop fucking around!”
The site was like a warehouse. Over a hundred carriages that resembled container trailers, similar to what the Speed Racer party had been using, were on standby. However, unlike the Speed Racer party’s carriages, these were made of gold.
“This is the place?” Tae-Jin asked as he tilted his head.
“This is a warehouse. There are hundreds like this in Lunatic. Everything in those warehouses will be delivered to the Blood Castle tomorrow,” Gerard explained. “Lunatic may be large, but everything is focused around the Blood Castle because that is where the aristocrats reside.”
“Since it opens only once a year, they replenish their supplies for the entire year all at once,” Seong-Hwi remarked as he nodded, understanding the sheer number of such warehouses throughout Lunatic. “In that case, let’s test whether we’re really in the right place.”
[Activating Unique Skill: Borrowing Destiny.]
[Macedonia’s King of Conquerors]
[Activating Unique Skill: Symbol Embodiment.]
[Knot-severing Sword]
A flashy sword with golden decorations appeared in Seong-Hwi’s hand, and he immediately activated a skill.
[Activating Exclusive Skill: Rule Breaker.]
The Knot-severing Sword shone with a brilliant golden light, enveloped by the energy of the skill that could nullify all rules. Once a portion of the fog made contact with the sword, it rapidly vanished as if being unraveled. Seong-Hwi smiled and canceled the Knot-severing Sword’s embodiment.
“As I’d thought, it was no ordinary fog. This is a skill—perhaps a sleep-inducing scent.”
“Sleep-inducing? Then... Inside those carriages must be...” Tae-Jin trailed off.
“I’ve been inside one of those carriages, so I know it can fit around a hundred people at most,” Seong-Hwi answered.
Tae-Jin’s expression hardened. Each carriage could fit a hundred people, and there were around a hundred carriages. The expressions of the five people who had been hunting down the black clan together were filled with rage.
“Ten... Thousand,” Hee-Gyeong mumbled.
“Growl, what a delivery,” Tigrinus said.
“T-those fucking inhuman bastards!” Hector shouted.
“The best means is using any means necessary... is it?” Wang Chen remarked.
Seong-Hwi stared at the group and remarked apathetically, “Wait here.”
“What? We found their base. The missing people who we’ve been searching for are in those carriages!” Tae-Jin retorted.
“I know.”
“Then we should be saving them!”
Seong-Hwi’s serene black eyes momentarily shone translucently.
“Growl?” Tigrinus expressed, his fur raising from the sudden chilling sensation.
“We will, later,” Seong-Hwi replied.
“Later? What are you talking about?” Tae-Jin asked.
“We’ll use everything we can to our advantage. If everything goes according to plan, things will become much easier,” Seong-Hwi said incomprehensibly as he smiled widely. He then turned to Wang Chen and said, “Just you, follow me.”
“Just me?” Wang Chen asked.
“I will keep my promise.”
Wang Chen gulped, recalling the note Seong-Hwi had handed him before they separated in Manaus. His eyes, which had carried sympathy for the humans imprisoned in the carriages, began to be dyed by the same goal-oriented gaze as Seong-Hwi.
“Gerard. I’ll leave them to you so they don’t do anything rash,” Seong-Hwi said to Gerard as he vanished into the fog with Wang Chen.
Hector stared at the two men’s backs as he mumbled, “Saving our fellow humans is... rash? Is he really humanity’s Second Sun?”
***
“Hm, hm, hm, Kehehe!” Peter hummed bizarrely as he wiped the bronze-cast Venus de Milo with a dry cloth. “Mm, hm, hm, stupid humans have their uses, too~ They can become beautiful wine~.”
Vampires periodically drank blood to either maintain or strengthen their secondary force, Blood Force. Among the races, vampires preferred the blood of humans the most.
“The beastfolk stink~ The merfolk are fishy~ And the undead smell rotten!” Peter swayed his fat body to the beat of his hums, reaching the song’s climax. “Ohhh~! But human wine is easy to get~ and tastes amazing~! Just like Spanish wine!”
Of course, there were other races whose blood tasted better than that of humans. High-quality angel, demon, and dragon blood was so rare that it was equivalent to the Romanée-Conti, of which only six hundred bottles had been made in 1945. Although not as good, elf blood also had a market for its aromatic and faint herbal scent.
However, the blood of superior races was naturally difficult to acquire, and the intermediate elves rarely came out of Forestis, so their blood was just as difficult to acquire. Peter had heard that blood collectors like him had been lurking around Viridis after the elves became independent from Sefirot, but they lacked the resources to secure a supply.
In comparison, the population of the inferior humans had skyrocketed thanks to the Lost-All a year ago, and the quality of the wine made from their blood was decent. They were equivalent to Spanish wine of reasonable prices that one saw in the wine corner of a supermarket.
“Piece of cake~ Piece of cake! Kurgh!”
Peter’s heart ached again as he sang vulgarly. He dropped the dry cloth and clenched his chest
“Urgh... Dammit. Is my heart starting to fail? Maybe I should get checked by a healer.” He then smiled and shook his head. “Hehehe, it’s fine. What’s the problem when I’ll become a Daywalker of the Rabies bloodline tomorrow?!”
The only reason Peter had not become a Canis, even when he had the chance to, was that it meant he would have to fear the sun. Unless one planned to live in Lunatic for the rest of their lives, becoming a Canis was highly disadvantageous, no matter how much it heightened one’s caliber. However, becoming a Daywalker was a different story entirely. As one could guess from the name, they wouldn’t have to fear the sun.
There was only one way that a Canis could become a Daywalker: to drink the blood of the one who turned them into a Canis. However, a vampire sharing their blood meant that they were sharing their power, so vampire aristocrats didn’t make just anyone into Daywalkers. They either shared their blood with those who had fulfilled extraordinary accomplishments or loyal subordinates who would never betray them.
“Kehehe! With the cask I offered, I could become a Daywalker of a viscount—no, a count or above!”
It meant he would become a Dhampir, a half-breed vampire that couldn’t use Blood Force, but it was leagues better than staying as a human. His lifespan would lengthen, and he would gain immense power alongside heightened caliber.
“Gaha! Gahaha! I’m sick and tired of this shitty human life! I will be reborn as an aristocrat of the night!”
As Peter was shouting ecstatically, two of his subordinates who had been standing guard outside were sent flying into the room through the door.
“Kurgh!”
“Gurghhh...”
“W-what the hell?!” Peter yelled as he summoned his D Weapon, Dressage Whip.
An expressionless Asian man with black hair and eyes entered the room and remarked, “You’re sick of your human life? You’re already inhuman enough as you are, you mound of fat.”
“Die!” Peter said once he was sure the man was an intruder and swung the Dressage Whip as he activated a skill without asking questions.
[Activating Unique Skill: Horse #1.]
A horse made of blue mana whinnied as it charged toward the intruder, stepping on and killing the two guards in its way. However, Seong-Hwi did not even glance at the blue horse and observed Peter’s actions behind the horse—he had opened a hole in the ground and jumped into it.
Seong-Hwi tapped his hoodie pocket and said, “Catch him.”
Pwoooo!
Bulgasal’s trunk shot out of his pocket and transformed into the Performing Chain Whip. Seong-Hwi punched the blue horse with a fist enveloped with mana, destroying it in one blow. Bulgasal’s chain whip shot across the vacant space and entered the hole like a winged serpent.
“Ahhhhh! What the hell is this?! Goddammit! Let go! Let go of me!” a panicked voice sounded from the hole.
Pwoo~!
Bulgasal pulled Peter out of the hole so hard that he was momentarily airborne, then slammed into the floor.
“Gurggghhh! W-who are you?! I-if it’s Coins you want, I’ll give you as many as you want!” Peter begged Seong-Hwi, his fat jiggling as he trembled.
Just then, Wang Chen entered the room with a horror-inducing expression, covered in blood.
“Are you done?” Seong-Hwi asked.
“Huuu. Thanks for your consideration. I should be able to get the Thousand-Man Killer trait soon,” Wang Chen replied.
“It was nothing. Consider it an advance payment. I’ll be counting on you for what’s ahead as well.”
“Is he Peter Geraghty?”
“Yeah, he’s so large that you could kill him with ten thousand cuts.”
Wang Chen and Seong-Hwi turned to Peter, who was shaking due to being the focus of two killers’ gazes. He decided to mention the name of the most terrifying individual he knew.
“I-I work for the Madblood Marquis, Lord Demens Rabies! I-if you lay even a finger on me, he will not stand for it!” It was obviously a lie, but the flinching of his opponent instilled confidence in him. “T-the ninety-eighth World Ranker has my back! If you value your lives, you would be wise to—”
Just then, the conversation between the two men took Peter completely by surprise.
“Hah, you were right again. How did you know that Blood Cross was doing business with the Rabies bloodline?” Wang Chen asked.
“Because this is the second time,” Seong-Hwi answered.
“I have no idea what you mean,” Wang Chen remarked as he shook his head.
He couldn’t fathom how wide and impressive Seong-Hwi’s information network was. Seong-Hwi knew more about Blood Cross than Wang Chen, who had been tracking them for months.
“W-what in the world are you...” Peter trailed off.
Seong-Hwi smiled as he turned to Peter and said, “It’s the second time.”