"So, it is the clan lord, after all."
Heinz glanced at the severed arm in Mullo's hand, then shifted his gaze back to his face.
Apparently, by focusing all the power of the barrier on himself, he seemed to have surpassed his limits in all abilities, including strength, speed, perception, and stealth.
Seeing that blood magic was ineffective against Heinz, this must have been the strategy he came up with.
'It seems like a method that places a great burden on the body.'
However, with the vitality of a Pureblood Vampire, he should be able to withstand the aftermath for quite some time.
It was exceedingly troublesome.
'Did I act too hastily? ...No, this was indeed the best course of action. The level of the lord was just beyond what I expected.'
No matter how well one disguises, the abnormalities among the bloodline would inevitably be discovered.
He had involved Frizia to delay this as much as possible, but that too was merely a temporary solution.
'I thought it would be more efficient to strike in a surprise attack before the opponent could sense any precursor or expect anything...'
Thanks to that, he was able to reach right in front of Mullo without any interference.
However, the problem was that, based only on Frizia's explanation of his fighting style, his level in his normal state far exceeded expectations.
"Huff Huff I'll finish you off as quickly as possible."
Whoosh
The severed arm in Mullo's hand was enveloped in red flames.
He nonchalantly threw it to the ground.
Before the burning arm even hit the floor.
Swoosh
The sound of the air being sliced through was heard.
But perhaps because he never took his eyes off him, this time he was able to react immediately to his disappearance.
He narrowly avoided the five claw-like blades coming at him from the front using "Acceleration."
He thrust his left hand into an opening he detected with his heightened senses without hesitation, but...
Crack!
He could only spark without penetrating that hard body.
'So tough. Is this what those who faced Heinz felt?'
Ignoring Heinz's attack, Mullo's right hand swung again, tearing through space.
Though primarily a mage, Mullo was a vampire who had lived for hundreds of years.
His movements were not ordinary, even if not on par with Frizia or Obor.
Just as Heinz tried to dodge again, his movement suddenly halted.
'What?!'
Red thorny vines wrapped around his legs from the floor.
They were instantly severed by Heinz's power, but by then, Mullo's hand had already reached him.
"Ugh!"
He swung his left hand, densely packed with blood magic, to deflect the opponent's wrist and alter its trajectory.
Before he could recover from his bloodied left arm, Mullo's sharply extended left hand stabbed towards his heart.
In a critical moment where he couldn't dodge due to his disrupted stance...
Heinz twisted his body to protect his heart as much as possible and, as a last resort, extended his 'right hand' to take the attack instead.
Splash!
His right arm was torn off by the sharp claws tearing through it.
Thus, his right arm was once again grasped in Mullo's left hand.
"Huff Huff Huh? What's this?"
In a moment of hesitation, Mullo took deep breaths, looking at the severed arm in his hand with a grimace.
It was dj vu.
"Your... arm?"
He grotesquely distorted his face, which was not only streaming with bloody tears but also bleeding from the nose, as he compared the arm in his hand with another that was still burning on the floor.
Both were undoubtedly his right arms.
But it didn't end there.
"Hm? Ah Are you talking about this?"
Heinz confidently extended his right hand toward him and wiggled his fingers, as if to show off his smoothly regenerated new limb through "Rapid Regeneration."
Mullo, alternating his gaze between the old arm of Heinz in his hand and the newly grown one, just pursed his lips.
Of course, as a Pureblood, regenerating a lost body part was within his capabilities, but never to this extent.
How could a severed part regrow so quickly if he wasn't a slime?
"What kind of bloodline have you inherited to possess such abilities? A distant branch of Brokolak? Such nonsense...!"
Mullo gnashed his teeth and brought his nose close to smell the severed surface of Heinz's arm.
Indeed, though altered, it was discernible that the base belonged to the Brokolak bloodline.
It seemed the things Frizia had said earlier weren't entirely nonsense.
"Something's odd?"
But he felt a tremendous sense of alienation from that blood.
While the foundation felt familiar to him, that was it.
Everything else was something he couldn't comprehend, an 'unknown.'
'Can a distant bloodline be altered to this extent? Even if one of another clan were to cannibalize their kind, it wouldn't result in this'
The essence was fundamentally different.
It was a series of contradictions, an incomprehensible situation.
Frustration was an understatement.
He glared at Heinz, still in a standoff, and slightly licked the blood flowing from the severed arm.
For someone of pureblood or higher, tasting a small amount of blood to analyze the opponent was common practice.
For him, a Pureblood, this was no issue.
Or at least, it shouldn't have been.
But it became one.
"Cough?! Ptui! Kehuk Kwoeuk!"
Plop! Splatter!
Mullo spat it out immediately, but then vomited a bucket's worth of blood.
"What in the world is this?"
The small amount of blood he consumed rapidly affected and spread through his bloodstream.
That alone would have been manageable, but the problem was the tremendous amount of resentment condensed in that blood.
[My deepest desire...]
[The blood oath...]
[The power...]
[......]
Because of it, he had to vomit all the blood affected by Heinz's blood.
'Dozens? Hundreds? How can he be fine with such toxic blood?'
This blood was practically poison to vampires.
He had never imagined such blood could exist.
It was only a moment, but it was shocking enough to destabilize his abilities, which had explosively increased by concentrating the power of the barrier.
'Ah, shoot!'
And when his senses had recovered from their disarray, he realized his mistake.
Thud!
"Cough!"
"Have you lost your edge from being cooped up for so long? Distracted by other thoughts during battle?"
Of course, by their standards.
His lapse in concentration had lasted at most 3 seconds.
But at their level, that was enough time for life and death to be decided dozens of times over.
It was enough time for Heinz, who had approached swiftly and stealthily, to drive the edge of his hand into Mullo's heart, catching him off guard.
"Lord! Move aside, Frizia!"
"Just stay with me for a moment."
Frizia, who had already subdued all the other vampires, intercepted Obor, who was rushing in hastily.
Catching up to his speed, that of an assassin type, had been unthinkable before, but now, enhanced by the "Refined Blood Essence," it was possible.
"Grr You scum!"
Swoosh!
As Mullo's heart was destroyed, he swung his claws wildly, but Heinz smartly created distance between them.
He had seized the moment of weakened abilities to penetrate the defenses, but with Mullo regaining his senses, getting close would do no good.
As Heinz stepped back, the hole in Mullo's chest rapidly healed with his transcendent regeneration powers.
That didn't mean there were no gains.
"Kuhuk Cough! Huff Huff"
Eyes, nose, mouth, ears.
The sight of Mullo gasping for air, bleeding from all seven orifices, indicated that his time was running short.
***
Slurp
"Urgh! You, you bastard...!"
The two severed right arms melted into blood and transformed into two streams of blood chains, binding Mullo's entire body.
Thanks to Heinz's tenacious vitality, even one arm that had been burning for a while only suffered some external damage.
"Huff... This is the end."
Heinz sighed lightly and looked down.
Mullo, having exhausted all his strength and with the barrier spell broken, seemed to have no energy left to resist, merely gasping for breath.
Boom!
Just then, the fight between Frizia and Obor, which had been raging on one side, also came to an end.
The victor was, of course, Frizia.
The difference in specs, amplified by the "Refined Blood Essence," was significant, not to mention the advantage in the matchup between a warrior and an assassin.
Drag
She grabbed the limp boy by the nape and approached Heinz.
"It seems you've finished as well. I've just wrapped things up on my end."
Frizia smiled at Heinz with a proud face.
She seemed very satisfied with her own abilities, having experienced them firsthand.
"Ah! And I didn't kill the other vampires, just subdued them. It wasn't too difficult after the effects of the barrier were gone."
Perhaps there was a reluctance to kill her own kind, but anyway, I would need all the hands I could get for the work ahead, so the more, the merrier.
Nodding at her, Heinz looked down at Mullo again, who had been subdued.
He was worried whether it would be okay to inject him with the "Refined Blood Essence."
Frizia might have been a clearly weaker opponent in terms of both blood magic and physical power, but...
Mullo was not such an easy opponent.
On the contrary, the amount of blood magic he possessed was even greater.
"Hmm, then let's try that."
After pondering for a moment what to do with him, Heinz made his decision and pulled on the chains to lift him up.
Then he brought his mouth to his neck.
"What are you... doing?"
"I'm inheriting the lordship."
Thud
Sharp teeth sank into Mullo's neck.
***
Deep underground, a chamber buried.
In the sealed darkness, where not even air could circulate, lay a figure.
Twitch!
A slight change occurred to the one lying there like a corpse in that silent space.
Starting with the fingertips twitching slightly, the tightly closed lips trembled and slowly opened.
"...Ah..."
A rough voice echoed through the sealed chamber.
"Ah..."
After making several sounds as if clearing its throat, the voice finally began to produce normal sounds.
And then, in the pitch darkness where not a single ray of light existed, a pair of red lights slowly flickered.
"What's this?"
The being muttered softly.
Something felt off, but it couldn't pinpoint what it was.
Sleep continued to pour over, preventing any coherent thought.
"Ah, sleepy..."
Having awakened much earlier than planned, it couldn't break free from the hibernation state immediately.
The eyes that had barely opened now heavily closed again.
"Let's sleep a bit more and then get up."
Thus, the pair of red lights that had illuminated the darkness gently closed, and the chamber was once again buried in tranquil darkness.
***
It had been several days since Harris and the elves followed the 'Forest Path.'
As they moved, they continued to parallel education and training, when their guide, Laphory, looked back at the group with a smile on his face.
"We should be arriving soon. Just a bit further."
That didn't mean there was any immediate change in their surroundings.
The same dreamlike forest path they had been seeing for days continued on.
"Wow! Really? Does that mean we'll soon meet the World Tree?"
Cecily, who had been burning with competitive spirit towards Harris and focusing on her training, asked with sparkling eyes.
Being from the Ion continent, where she had never seen the World Tree, the prospect of meeting it seemed to fill her with new emotions.
'And that means, Cecily will soon become a High Elf.'
Reaching the World Tree in front of a qualified High Elf candidate was the last condition.
"Of course. The World Tree will surely welcome Miss Cecily."
Knowing this, Laphory too smiled warmly at her, pleased with the fruition of their long journey.
Afterward, the group walked the forest path for a few more hours, unable to hide their excitement.
And finally.
The path they were walking on gradually changed into a regular forest...
"Wow~!"
Against the backdrop of Cecily's exclamation, Harris looked up blankly.
A tree of immense size, defying perspective, stood before him.
"Unless it's quite urgent, it's not good to head directly to the World Tree through the Forest Path. Moreover, for Miss Cecily, it's also a journey to become a High Elf."
The path to the World Tree was a kind of pilgrimage.
It was part of the process to approach that gigantic tree with reverence and a composed heart.
'To have to look up this much, and it's still a long way off...'
He felt a sense of awe unknowingly.
Although a little more time was needed to reach the World Tree, that seemed like a minor issue compared to the emotion he was feeling now.
Finally, it was the moment when Harris landed in the Elven Kingdom of the Enamel Continent.