Forest of the Dead
「Carla……」
The one who suddenly appeared just before I departed was Carla Lester.
「I wonder if I can also come with you? It’s not as good as the black ops, but I myself have my own information source, so I’ve been waiting thinking that if it’s you Aria, you will definitely move.」
「…………」
The combat strength of Carla who possessed all elements was approaching rank 5 even though she was only rank 4. She had equal combat strength with me who possessed close quarter combat ability and multiple sorcery skills.
But, Carla’s stamina value was only at the level of a child because she had all those elements. Even that low stamina got capped at half and couldn’t recover higher than that. I guessed that it was because the magic strengthening Gift that Carla obtained was continuing to shave off her life.
She was able to move well as could be seen with how she dodged my throwing knife and counterattacked, and she was able to converse normally. But Carla’s body was far from healthy. Her complexion was white like paper, and the life force that was radiated from her body was so thin as though she was a ghost.
But, the vast mana and presence that were radiated from her whole body were inversely proportional to the transience of her life. They were surpassing even the mythical beast Coeurl.
Most likely her body was already unable to move properly, but she was forcefully moving it with her mana and sorcery. Carla should be aware herself that doing something like that was shaving down even more of her life, and yet she didn’t stop moving.
「I’m asking one more time. What are you planning?」
In the deepest part of that dungeon, Carla wished not for an extension of her life but the power to destroy this country. Our path had separated there.
The path that Carla walked would one day clash with Elena who was concerned over this country. That path was also a blood soaked path where she and I would try to kill each other until one of us died.
Carla absolutely wouldn’t change her feeling.
I too wouldn’t bend my conviction.
That was why I knew that one day we would try to kill each other.
Most likely she knew that I was going to settle my dispute with Grave and waited until I made my move. I didn’t know what Carla’s intention for going there, nor was I interested.
What I wanted to know was her reason for showing herself brazenly in front of me like this despite our destiny of fighting to the death in the future.
「Do you feel like dying here?」
「That will be lovely too……but, this time your princess will be troubled if you go without me you know?」
Carla spoke with an informal tone that was unbecoming for a noble lady. She took a step forward until her forehead touched the tip of my knife. Red blood trickled down her pallid face in a line. Her deep red tongue licked it off.
I can kill her right now……. I watched her stamina silently starting to decrease as both of us glared at each other for several seconds, then she spoke up first.
「I’m going to clean up the “garbage” that I brought in when I was still a weakling. I don’t need them anymore but, it’ll be troublesome if they get in the way.」
「Even if being they’re being together with my enemy?」
「Even if it’s something that I already discarded, it’s still not a good feeling seeing some other fool making use of it as they please.」
「Do as you like.」
I said that and pulled the knife back. Carla smiled sweetly, while Nero who got into a deathly fight with her last time was growling in discontent. I patted Nero’s neck while exhaling softly.
「You must be dissatisfied but let her come with us, Nero. This girl will snatch even our prey if we just leave her out of sight.」
『Gururuu……』
「I’m not that hungry that I’m going to steal your prey though?」
「Liar.」
I jumped on Nero’s back before Nero shook its whiskers reluctantly to signal to Carla to get on too. She was someone who had tried to kill it and vice versa, but Nero too must have conflicted feeling for Carla.
I too almost sighed, but I held it back while offering my hand to the approaching Carla.
「Carla, can I take it that your enemy is “those guys”?」
「……Come to think of it, have you ever heard about this Aria? Apparently there was a small village at the west that didn’t even get listed on map suddenly vanishing. Fufu.」
Carla took my hand and got on Nero’s back. She put on a twisted and cruel smile while suspiciously avoiding my question.
.
Carla would go off on her own to kill them anyway even if I left her behind. I didn’t think that this girl would die that easily but, it would be troublesome if Grave got away because of her, so I could only accept her coming with us.
Perhaps it would be better for Elena’s sake if I killed her here. Even so she was the crown prince’s fiancée and it would trouble Elena if I killed her.
Either way it would be troublesome…….
If it was just for travelling then Carla should be able to use teleport type sorcery. Even so she said that she wanted to come with us……I didn’t understand her. Even I could only say 『This is Carla we’re talking about』 to explain it.
Several days had passed since our departure. Riding on Nero’s back was completely unlike riding a noble’s carriage. Ordinary person who did such thing would be risking their life. It made me amazed how Carla could still live even now.
It would take one week with Nero’s legs until we arrived at the territory of Marquis Kendras. Naturally we didn’t stop by at city and cut through forests and mountains, so at night we were camping inside the forest.
「We will camp here.」
After I made that decision, Nero went to hunt for prey like boar or bear. It gave me one leg that hadn’t even gotten the blood drained out. And then I grilled it together with the wild plants that I picked up around here while starting to eat it. Carla too used a knife to cut the grilled meat without asking, then she brought the piece of meat that was stinking of blood into her mouth without any complain.
Food was just to replenish nutrition. As long as you didn’t mind the taste, eating meat without draining the blood would be far more nutritional. Carla who often explored dungeon on her own seemed to have the same opinion. But rather than something like that, I felt the sight of Carla eating like human looked out of place for some reason. Was it a problem with her humanity?
Sometimes Carla’s stamina would become one digit while we were continuing to do such forced march, even so I really couldn’t imagine Carla dying other than getting killed.
「Even I am a human you know?」
「You’re the only one who think so.」
「Then we are a kindred aren’t we.」
Kindred huh…….
.
If my estimation was right, we should arrive at Kendras territory in three days at this rate. It was midnight. I wrapped myself in my cloak and closed my eyes beside the bonfire, but then I suddenly opened my eyes. Nero’s whiskers twitched, while Carla lifted up her face and looked toward the forest.
「There was a scream.」
「If I remember right……there is a viscount territory that is a dependent of Marquis Dans ahead of the valley at the other side from here. There might be a village too there……are you going?」
「I’ll just check.」
I put away the cloak while standing up. Carla looked up at me while staying sitting down.
I wouldn’t care if it was just a quarrel between villagers or adventurers but, if it was bandit or monster attacking, I couldn’t possible ignore it after hearing the scream.
I recalled Carla mentioning about a village disappearing before we departed. I turned my gaze at her and she smiled softly with half of her face illuminated by fire.
「Aren’t you going to learn to enjoy human blood soon?」
「Don’t group me together with you.」
「My, how mean.」
Carla stood up while putting on her cloak. The smile that she turned toward me deepened happily.
「I prefer my meat well done rather than rare you know.」
「……I’m going ahead.」
It seemed Carla also felt like going now, but Nero looked like it would keep sleeping, so I went ahead by myself.
I decided the general direction from where the scream came and rushed into the pitch dark forest. Even pitch dark forest wasn’t that different from noon for me who had night vision level 2 that could see the color of magic particle.
The deep forest absorbed sound. But human’s scream could unexpectedly carry far away through forest at night.
『──────』
There was another one. I was sure of the direction now. I continued running through the forest in full speed. From the gaps of trees, I could see the valley just like in the map and silhouette of what seemed to be a female getting cornered by male silhouette.
The man lifted up a weapon in his hand that looked like a hatchet.
The woman held her head and screamed. I felt the “unpleasant sign” from that man and switched mentality to combat state.
「──Iron Rose──」
My pink hair that was fluttering in the wind changed color to grayish iron blue like a burning iron. The light remnants that scattered from it formed a trail behind me like a comet while I used the speed that was three times faster than ordinary human to jump over the valley’s cliff that must have been around fifty steps wide.
──*Byuuuu!*
「Go sleep for a while.」
「Gugyah!」
I used my jumping momentum to kick the head of the man who was about to swing down his bloody hatchet. The impact helped reducing my speed.
「……Are you alright?」
I landed on the ground and dispelled Iron Rose while calling out to the woman who was covering her head. That woman whose teeth were clattering noisily looked toward me with a face that was obviously pale even under the faint moonlight.
「H-help……」
「What happened?」
「T-the village……attacked……」
*Gasa──*
「──AaA……!!」
I heard a sound and voice from behind. The man who I should have defeated just now stood up with his neck still twisted. He ran through thickets and looked toward me with muddy yellow eyes and long fangs.
This overflowing unpleasant presence and smell…….
He wasn’t human……this guy-!
「UGAaaAAAAH!」
The thing that was “human” before brandished its hatchet and swung at me. But……
「Gah!?」
If it had human shape then it could be killed.
I parried the coming down hatchet and stepped forward while driving my elbow hard between its eyebrows until it left a dent.
「Ga, AGAaA」
Even so it didn’t die. Most likely it couldn’t be killed using usual method.
「Undead huh……」
A monster that kept moving even after losing their life. But, even though they were undead, they weren’t “immortal”. If you didn’t fear them then they were no different than any other monster.
I cut the tendon of the man, broke its bone, peeled off its muscle. I dismantled it and swept its leg when it became unbalanced. Then I planted my black dagger until the hilt into its heart when it fell down.
「Ah, ga……」
The weakness of undead was the “magic stone” inside their heart.
Magic stone was dregs of soul that melted into blood and magic particles that gradually hardened into a stone. Master also taught me how skeleton and zombie that didn’t have blood flowing inside their body also had magic stone because polluted magic particle……miasma turned human with magic stone into undead.
This man seemed to be a villager based on his appearance, but it wouldn’t be strange that there was also villager who could use sorcery and had magic stone forming inside their body. But, why was an undead villager appearing in this kind of place?
「……M-miss adventurer?」
The female villager approached me after I destroyed the magic stone in the heart of the undead.
*Hyun!*
「Hih!?」
「Can you use sorcery?」
I pointed my black knife toward the approaching woman. The man just now was wearing [normal villager attire]. In other words, he wasn’t revived by miasma after he died, it was possible that he got turned into undead while still alive.
The woman who was shaking in fear from looking at the blade that was pointed at her was shaking hard with her teeth clattering noisily……
「Miiisss addveenturrerr!!」
She cried and attacked while baring her long fangs.
I dodged the arm of the woman who tried to grab me with her sharp claws. Then I circled behind her and stabbed her from the side using my black dagger, breaking her neck. Then I slid my knife’s blade over that dagger’s blade, lopping off the woman’s head.
「…………」
She was definitely “human” just a moment ago.
But this woman suddenly became “undead” and attacked me.
What was going on over there? It was a fact that a village got attacked. If there was still survivor at the village then I needed to do something in hurry. I focused my eyes and checked the direction toward the village from the snapped branches, then I started running to that direction.
.
I dashed through the dark forest that was illuminated by the hazy moonlight. Then I stopped my legs when I smell blood faintly in the air.
Perhaps because I had gotten close to the village, there were a lot of stumps inside the forest around here. When I turned my eyes toward a part of the forest that had been cleared, I could see a lot of human silhouettes lying on the ground. I guessed that they were villagers who ran out of strength, but I could only see magic particles of darkness from their body.
The magic particles drifting around a living creature were mostly non-elemental, but as long as something was alive, there would be all the other elements contained in there too although only slightly. The magic particle of fire adjusted body temperature, water for blood flow, wind for breathing, earth for bone and flesh, and light magic particle was for life force and dark magic particle was affecting the mind.
These people were already dead. It was easy for dark magic particles to remain in corpse because it was easy for thought to remain until the end, and it also could easily adapt to the dead.
「……u…a…」
One of them groaned and breathed while stirring. It seemed to be a young man at his late teenage. Perhaps he had just gotten of age. He kept lying face down while reaching out with his hand to look for help.
「…………」
I stared at that wordlessly. From what my “eyes” could see, I could feel other magic particles than darkness slightly from him, so he must be still in the verge of death.
Perhaps he sensed my presence that was unmoving from my spot, the man extended his arm toward me and lifted up his face. The moment he showed me his eyes, I pulled a knife from my thigh and threw it on the man’s forehead. The knife pierced him.
「Guaaah」
The man jumped on his feet. His eyes that were looking at me looked like animal. I threw more knifes that pierced the man’s eyes, then I tore his throat horizontally with the blade of the slashing pendulum. With that the man finally understood that he was dead and slowly crumpled down.
「You’re merciless even against the “defective”, Aria.」
Carla’s voice teased at me from behind. I glanced at her only for an instant. So she had caught up already.
「……Vampire huh……」
Vampire was famous but they were monster that was rarely seen.
They were well known for their weakness against sunlight that would kill them, how they increased their number by sucking human blood which caused the damage to increase exponentially, but that perception wasn’t accurate.
Not all people would become vampire just from getting their blood sucked. According to master’s lesson, human turned into vampire because they lost the strength of soul that was mixed in their blood, and they turned into monster in order to regain their lost soul.
The majority of the victims that got their blood sucked would die normally. Only very small fraction would become vampire. They also had weaknesses like sunlight and the like, but they were still not an opponent that could be underestimated despite that.
Their body’s regeneration power was high and they wouldn’t die from ordinary wound. With that regenerative power, they wouldn’t care even if their muscles got torn and they could move using their maximum physical strength. They were one of the worst type of undead that possessed high physical ability.
Carla called the man [defective] because he was literally a defective vampire.
There were people with large mana capacity even though they never learned sorcery and didn’t have magic stone. For example, someone who had learned multiple daily life magic or warrior who had learned body strengthening and Battle Skill which were non-elemental magic.
They wouldn’t turn into undead even if they died. But rarely, there was also people with a lot of mana who called low ranked spirit and got possessed to become [Zombie].
Similar like that, some of the victims who got attacked by vampire could also have a lot of mana. Although they couldn’t become vampire, their soul would get dirtied and they would be reduced as the vampire’s servant while keeping their human appearance.
The defective vampire would seek blood, but their invulnerability wasn’t as high as vampire.
They weren’t human anymore. Even though they could live under sunlight like living human, their body wasn’t alive, they also had lost their intelligence and sanity from when they were alive. They were nothing more than slave puppet of vampire that was their superior species.
「He might still be “human” you know?」
「Are you going to call something that doesn’t struggle to live a “human”?」
Could something that didn’t live with their own will and attacked their fellow human because of their hatred for the living and thirst for blood be called [human]?
The victim wasn’t at fault. But, there were few ways to save the victim after they had gotten their blood sucked. After all unless they were human with very high stamina value, the only way to save the soul of the victim who had lost the majority of their blood in the countryside like this was only with “death”.
「Your way of living is so “strict” Aria. But, I like those chilling eyes of yours.」
Carla’s white fingertip softly traced my cheek while I was looking at the murdered “victims” with a grim face. I strongly grabbed her slender wrist.
「Carla, what do you know?」
Carla said that she wanted to come along in this trip. When I asked her reason for that, she dodged the question by mentioning that a small village had vanished.
Carla knew “something” that even the black ops didn’t know about. When I asked her that, Carla smiled thinly and turned her gaze toward the direction where the village seemed to be.
「In that case let’s head to the village. I think it will be easier to understand if you see it directly rather than from talking here.」
「……Got it.」
.
Carla and I went through the dark forest side by side. She was able to keep up with my speed even deep inside the forest without getting left behind. Perhaps it was the work of her original sorcery.
A bit of time passed……what seemed to be the fence around the village came into view. We jumped over it and went even further inside. There the smell of blood became stronger and Carla smiled slightly at the corner of my eye.
We saw human corpses here and there the further we went in. I didn’t hear any loud sound, so perhaps what happened here was already over, but the number of corpses seemed few for that to be the case.
Even a village in a mountain that didn’t even show in the map would still have several hundred populace. If it was just for living then it was possible to do by gathering only several households, but human wouldn’t be able to deal with the threat of monster without number. But, the number of corpses that I had found until now didn’t even reach a hundred. The remaining villagers should be somewhere else whether alive or dead.
「I can see light over there.」
「Right.」
We saw the light of something like watch fire at a place that seemed to be the center of the village after moving even further.
We ran toward there. What we saw there were dozens of scared villager who were still alive, surrounded by a lot of corpses. All of them were surrounded by “undead” and “defectives”.
There were still survivors. And even more dead people. While I was groping for a way to save the villagers who were grouped into one at the center of the village and could only wait for death, a voice that sounded like a bell rang through the night suddenly.
「Who……?」
A pitch black silhouette that was looking toward the villagers asked our identity with word that had odd pronunciation.
That person easily found us out in the darkness even taking into account that Carla who didn’t have Stealth skill was with me.
That silhouette slowly turned around. That girl’s side profile stood in the dark background from the faint light of the watch fire.
Glossy black skin that was like polished obsidian. Silver hair and long ears. Reddish golden eyes that were reflecting our figure. That person’s true identity was……
「……Dark elf.」
「”Evil Race” eh.」
That girl was a dark elf like master. And dark elf was known as [Evil Race] that was hostile against human, forest elf, dwarf, and beastman in this continent.
「You two……from that time」
The dark elf girl’s eyes widened slightly when she saw us.
There was very few dark elf who knew us. The duo wearing all black who ran away that time. One of them had traces of burn, while the other one had black skin.
「One of the two who killed Gilgan huh.」
At that time Gilgan said that there were multiple people behind the attack on the crown prince. One of them was this girl……the evil race was involved.
「……H-help!」
「Please, help-!」
The surviving villagers who were gathered up raised their voices with urgency in their tone seeing us suddenly appearing. But in that moment──
「Noisy.」
The girl’s right hand was swung without any time for us to stop her. The black iron chain in her hand blew away the head of the man who raised his voice first. The surrounding villagers screamed when his blood and piece of meat showered them.
「──Tsu!」
I was about to rush forward seeing that, but the dark elf swung her chain once more and struck the ground near the villagers. The sound stopped the villagers’ scream and my movement.
「Why? Are you here」
「……You yourself, what is a dark elf doing here?」
「Odd?」
The dark elf girl tilted her head at my question with a clumsy speech. Elf race had long lifespan so surely she wasn’t as young as she looked but, for some reason I got the impression that she lacked the worldly sense even more than that.
「Sarara and others, killing humans, are natural, right?」
「……I see.」
*Zasu!*
I drew out a throwing knife that was painted black and threw it at the same time when I muttered that. The girl──Sarara’s golden right eye was pierced. It seemed she had the strength of rank 4, but she was full of opening. Perhaps she wasn’t used to her weapon.
Sarara’s body swayed from the attack.
*Za-!*
But, Sarara who looked like she was going to crumple down for a moment planted her feet on the ground. She then glared at me with her remaining eye while pulling out the knife from her other eye. Her wound was visibly regenerating.
This girl was an evil race, but that wasn’t all.
「……So you’re the vampire who attacked the village huh.」
「That’s right.」
.
▼ Sarara Race : Dark Elf – Vampire♀ – Assumed Rank 4
【Magic Power : 243/285】【Stamina : 265/265】
【Overall Combat Strength : 940×2 (1880)】
.
Sarara tossed away the bloody knife while affirming my muttering.
She wasn’t simply an evil race. Sarara was none other than the vampire who attacked this village.
Even an elf was no different than an ordinary person if they didn’t put themselves in battle. Elf could live for a long time but their sense of time was different from human, so their rate of growth was slow.
But, dark elf was feared as evil race because they were considered as enemy by the holy church and so they fought constantly as warrior like master.
I once heard from master that evil race’s number was few compared to human race, so in order to increase their number, they accepted even monster with intelligence as citizen. The evil race was already a powerful enemy from the start, but it seemed their side also had no intention to dispatch normal soldiers to enemy country…….
Sarara still looked composed even after appraising Carla and my combat strength. Was it because of her haughtiness as the strong? Her lack of worldly sense and her composure must be also because she had lived far longer than her appearance as an elf girl suggested.
The adventurer girl assigned threat rank 3 to normal vampire, but a vampire that had lived for more than a hundred years would get called greater vampire with threat rank 6.
Even though it didn’t feel like Sarara’s rank was that high from her atmosphere, it would be better if I considered her combat strength as twice of what I could see if she was a high ranked vampire.
A vampire with combat strength that was nearly 2000. Furthermore I didn’t know what kind of trump card the evil race could have.
「The leader of our vampire clan, told Sarara and others to increase subordinate. Sarara will make you two be subordinate. Leader, happy.」
*Bam*, Sarara clapped her hands and four villagers who became vampire and ten-odd villagers who became defectives started moving with bloodshot eyes like animal.
The evil race’s vampire clan huh……. For people like them to be in this country……perhaps Carla’s objective was these guys. I turned my gaze just for an instant toward her and Carla grinned as though to confirm my thought.
I too quickly grabbed my knives and held them in both hands. It would be troublesome to defeat four vampires but, the defectives were just harder to kill. They weren’t immortal, they only hadn’t noticed that they had died and they would die properly if they were killed.
But there, a young voice rang out from among the surviving villagers.
「Daaaaaaaad! Stopppp!」
A small boy yelled that while crying. A woman who seemed to be her mother hurriedly hugged him in her arms and blocked his mouth.
「………」
So that boy’s father was among these vampires or defectives…….
The appearances of the defectives weren’t any different from human. But, a servant of vampire was no different than monster. An adult would be able to understand the circumstance in their mind even if their heart couldn’t, but a child who lost their parent absolutely wouldn’t accept it.
The vampires and defectives attacked. The eyes of the boy who were watching that happening reminded me of my kind father and mother at the back of my mind just for a moment.
But──
*GOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!*
A pillar of flame tore through the night and burned two of the rushing vampires. Only their lower body remained after that and they took several steps forward before crumpling down.
The villagers screamed seeing the things that had the forms of their acquaintances getting burned to death. The vampires and defectives sensed the danger with their instinct and hesitated, while Sarara’s eyes widened.
「Are you going to let yourself get killed for that boy’s sake? I can kill them in your place you know? They’re originally my leftover anyway.」
Carla cheerfully stepped forward with flame and vast mana burning in both her hands.
Those flame and words seemed to remind Sarara of something. Her eyes widened like saucers.
「……I see. That flame. Black haired female sorcerer……you are I see!」
Sarara’s yell rang out through the night. She looked at Carla with hatred.
「Human woman, who betrayed us, killed our comrades!」
「I’m happy that you remember me.」
Carla spoke nonchalantly even toward Sarara’s words of resentment.
Most likely Carla had contacted the evil race for the sake of her objective, then they became a hindrance after she finished using them and killed them.
Sarara emitted killing intent while Carla made her flame whirled up. With undead as the opponent, Carla would be able to fight better than me with her ability to control flame. I understood that……but──
「Carla……」
I held back Carla who was going to move forward and stepped in front of Sarara myself.
There was still weakness inside me. Even though I had decided to become strong at heart, that I wouldn’t lose at heart even if my technique and strength weren’t a match against my opponent, there was still naivety inside me.
My enemy was still “ahead” from here.
I wouldn’t stop still until everything was settled.
This was one of them. I turned my gaze just for an instant toward Carla who was giving me an odd consideration before swinging my knife to the side to sever my childish naivety.
「I’ll face these guys myself.」
After I declared that, Carla smiled faintly like usual while lightly shrugging her shoulders.
I turned my back toward her and took a step forward while still holding my knives in the ready. The evil race vampire who called herself Sarara turned the focus of her fury from Clara toward me.
「……Lowly human, don’t get in my way」
*Bashin!* Sarara struck the ground with her black iron chain. With that the vampire and defective villagers suddenly bared their fang like animal as though they had switched mind.
Sarara narrowed her golden eyes in displeasure because she had to take harder rein over her subordinates, exposing her thin and long uneven teeth.
Sarara’s golden eyes were still fixed on Carla.
She must be unable to forgive Clara who betrayed them and killed some of their men, but she must also be thinking that a scout and close range fighter like me wasn’t any threat against her.
「You guys, teach this girl some manner! The sorcerer woman, kill her painfully!」
『oOOOOOOOOOOO!!』
The vampires and defectives let out a war cry by the order of Sarara their master.
First two vampire villagers went forward in order to remove me who was in their way. The boy’s voice rang out once more.
「Daaaaaad!」
It seemed that one of them was the boy’s father. The instant the boy’s voice rang out, the large vampire armed with an axe and looked like a hunter turned his gaze toward the boy.
「D-dad……」
Scared and sad voice slipped out from the boy’s mouth. But, that man wasn’t human anymore.
The nature of vampire who had been liberated from their reason sought blood of their blood relative because of guilty pleasure. His face wore a twisted smile like an animal.
Human was merely an animal without their reason.
「aAAAAA……!」
His master’s order was overwritten by his hunger and desire. He was ready to move toward his own scared son and wife who was protecting him. In that moment──
*Zashu!!*
「GAAAAAAAAAAAA!?」
I leaped forward faster than he could and my dagger stabbed through the man’s skull until the inside of his mouth. Fresh blood spurted up.
But, vampire wouldn’t perish even when they were killed. The man reached out with his squirming hand even after his head was pierced. I pulled out the dagger while slipping through that hand, then I tore his neck with black knife and stabbed his heart where I felt strong mana with my black dagger.
「………a?」
The vampire father crumpled down without understanding what was happening to him. His transient life expired and he returned to be a mere corpse. The boy who was showered with blood spray stared at his father in a daze……
「Da……d……?」
The boy whose father was killed right in front of his eyes spoke with hoarse voice.
「GAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!」
The next moment, the last vampire and the defectives leaped toward me.
They had no mind even though they were being controlled, that was exactly why small fear could be seen in their eyes that were looking at me who had just slaughtered a vampire in front of a child.
You guys weren’t at fault. You all were just pitiful victims.
Even so……you guys were my “enemy”.
「Gah──」
The slashing pendulum’s blade horizontally tore the throat of the defective that leaped at me. Then I planted my black dagger between his eyes.
My skirt fluttered while I threw my throwing knives to stab the eyes of the man behind him.
I made full use of my level 4 body strengthening and broke the man’s neck with a jump kick. Then I swung my legs midair to rotate while slashing the man’s carotid artery with my black knife.
I threw the weight pendulum above my head just before I landed. It drew an arc and swung down at the same time of my landing. The black iron weight smashed the head of a woman who was some distance away.
Even though they had changed into vampire and defective, it just made them harder to kill while there wasn’t much change with their combat strength. Lower ranked vampire at best only got stronger by thirty percent. That inability to die easily was really a great threat but, the biggest threat was the living’s instinctual fear toward the undead.
But I wasn’t scared. It didn’t matter if they were undead or whatever, as long as they existed under this world’s principle, they would die sooner or later if I continued to kill them.
Black blade hummed inside the night’s darkness and killed the defectives.
Even knowing that these things weren’t human anymore, the surviving villagers screamed seeing their acquaintances getting murdered. When I broke the neck bone of the last remaining vampire villager while beheading him with my black knife, the villagers were holding their breath and stopped making any more sound.
***
(……Is that woman really a human?)
She asked that question not because of the matter of strength. Even Sarara who was living as monster instead as human felt abnormal mental strength from that girl who was expressionless slaughtering the defectives that had the appearance of villagers.
She couldn’t be underestimated……. Even the minions that she created were getting destroyed in an instant although they were only disposable pawns.
Killing the black haired female sorcerer who used her comrades and killed them was also important, but now she understood that this pink haired woman who was hated by that woman called Tabatha who appeared as an envoy of a new collaborator also wasn’t an opponent that she could let her guard down against. Sarara tightened her grip on her black iron chain.
The evil race and human nations had continued to quarrel for hundreds of years until now. There had been no large fighting in the last few decades, but small skirmishes still continued to occur. The evil race was also continuing to secretly maneuver by sending spies to every nation in order to prepare for the next major war.
Human race was weak and short lived compared to evil race, but they had warlike disposition and their number was overwhelming compared to other races.
And even among all the human nations, there were four nations that the evil race couldn’t ignore. Those four were Carlfan Empire that was a country of warrior located near the evil race country, United Kingdom of Ganzal that possessed tremendous wealth, Fandora Country where the holy church that was hostile toward the evil race was based on, and then Claydale Kingdom that possessed powerful army and strong national power.
They would be killed if they didn’t kill. They could only kill in order to live. Those were the obvious facts in this world where human life was cheap. Those who criticized that were only the ignorant people who had never felt that their life was in danger ever since their birth.
Sarara and others of vampire clan had also to fight in order to live.
The evil race country’s population was absolutely few. In there not only dark elf, even people who turned into monster with intelligence like vampire and werewolf got treated as citizen without getting hunted down.
But, it was difficult to completely believe monster that hungered for blood even if said monster was originally a dark elf. And the vampire clan’s number was only around 100, too few even compared with the other clans. Because of that they had to continue proving themselves as necessary existence to their comrades the other clans.
That was the reason why only some ten-odd experts got sent to this Claydale Kingdom that was far away from the evil race country.
Looking at it another way, only the vampire clan that could be expected to gain large result even with just a few people could possibly sneak into this country and obtain result.
But vampire couldn’t walk under sunlight. Their appearance also differed too much from human so they couldn’t approach human settlement. But there were people who came to contact them who were in such state. One of them was that black haired female sorcerer.
The evil race took her offered hand. And then they got horribly betrayed.
It was extremely infuriating to be betrayed like that, but it would be very difficult for them to find one girl in this vast country by themselves.
And so the vampires gave up on taking revenge on the female sorcerer for the moment. Using the information that they received as advance payment, they constructed a base and feeding ground to be used as their foothold in Claydale Kingdom.
One of their schemes, kidnapping the princess failed because it ran in conflict with the noble faction’s plan.
But, from the start they had no intention of achieving their plan with other people’s help. Sarara who headed out as lookout was also in the middle of making minions in order to move their plan forward with their own hand, where she ran into these two.
These two girls possessed abnormal combat strength. Why were these two appearing in this kind of place? Was there information leak? Was there a traitor?
There was someone else who came into contact with them after the black haired sorcerer betrayed them. The more people who knew about them, the bigger the possibility of information leaking out became, but seeing that only these two were here meant that the information about Sarara and others still hadn’t been spread accurately.
In that case, she would deal with these two here. She thought that it was the black haired girl who betrayed and killed her comrades that she should be wary against, but Sarara changed her recognition.
The vampire clan joined hand with Tabatha because they sympathized with her hatred. The target of that hatred was here……she felt bad for Tabatha but, Sarara thought that she should crush this pink haired girl while the black haired girl showed no sign of moving for now.
.
「Woman……say your name」
「Aria」
*Gakin!*
In that instant, with either side not showing any sign of moving beforehand, Sarara’s chain attacked like a snake while Aria parried it with her black dagger.
Sarara was a whip user before she became a vampire. She trained her whip’s speed and sharpness in order to compensate for her weak strength and reached rank 4. But then the whip’s affinity with her vampire ability wasn’t good. Seeing that Tabatha told her about the weapon that would be a good fit for her vampiric strength and the way to use it.
Sarara’s ear caught the sound of something whistling through the air from the side. Most likely it was the black weapon that was attached at the end of a string that she saw before this. There would be opening created if she didn’t dodge that attack. But a vampire had a vampire’s way of fighting.
*Dashu!*
The black iron weight flew in an arc. Sarara blocked it with her left arm. Her flesh burst and her bone broke but, Sarara rushed forward without hesitation and swung her chain.
Aria jumped back to dodge the tip of that chain. Although her combat strength was below Sarara, Aria’s speed was slightly faster than her.
Even so Sarara didn’t panic. A wound that would take low ranked vampire dozens of seconds to heal would only take several seconds for high ranked vampire to go back to normal. Poison also didn’t work to her undead body and it also didn’t feel fatigue like the living.
「It’s your loss, Aria!」
There was no way she would lose the battle even though she lost in speed. Aria’s blade didn’t move into defense and cut Sarara over and over, but even the wounds from that regenerated in the blink of eye.
(Pointless!)
Sarara thought that while swinging her chain. Aria dodged and slashed at Sarara. But, her single attack became twice, and then each attack became consisting of three slashes. There Sarara noticed the strangeness.
(Aria’s slashing speed is increasing!?)
Aria’s breathing was getting harder with fatigue appearing on her face. Sweat flew from her skin. The girl who was swinging her blades as though she was dancing looked like she had silver wings made from dregs of light flapping on her back.
Before she realized it Aria was unleashing continuous attacks like surging waves using weapons in both hands. A black knife severed Sarara’s tendon and muscle, a black dagger pierced her eye and broke her bone.
「──tsu!?」
Her regeneration couldn’t keep up with the injuries. No, that wasn’t the case. Sarara was starting to run out of mana from regenerating so many injuries in a short time.
Mana was required for regeneration. She would be killed at this rate. Sarara changed her girl face into animal and rushed forward while discarding her chain in order to slurp Aria’s blood and mana.
Even if she received nearly lethal wound, she would be able to kill her opponent first as long as she didn’t die. Sarara threw even her pride to the winds and made her last gamble──but.
「Gah!?」
Sarara’s knee joint broke when she stepped forward. Her posture crumpled and she fell on her knee.
Sarara had taken too many attacks defenselessly. She noticed that too slow.
Before her eyes Aria pulled her knife behind her with a movement that even looked lax. For the first time since she became a vampire, the word “death” that had never crossed her mind for almost a hundred years surfaced to the forefront.
「──Critical Edge──」
Vampire wasn’t immortal. The only ways to destroy vampire was with sunlight, or destroying the magic stone in their heart……or beheading them.
And then the last thing that Sarara saw the ground beside her eyes, and her own body that had lost its head and spurting black blood.
***
The vampires that attacked the mountain village were exterminated. Why were these guys who were suspected to be involved with the attack to the crown prince were here? What were they trying to do by creating minions here?
Originally I should capture them but, I might be the one who lost here if I didn’t fight with the intent to kill against something like vampire. The culprit was actually a vampire from evil race, but the corpse that could serve as evidence would become ash when morning came and only the magic stone would remain.
Even so, if I brought that magic stone to the adventurer guild to be appraised, it should come to light that the culprit this time was a vampire and an evil race. And then if that magic stone was sold, it would also help with “their” living expenses for the time being…….
Only ten-odd villagers survived.
The acting village chief said that they wouldn’t stay in the village and head to a city where the feudal lord stayed. The number of survivors was few, but that was exactly why they could all ride in carriage to move. They would be able to reach other human settlement before dark.
──*Hyu*
A rock flew at me from behind at that time. I wordlessly slapped it down and turned around. The mother hurriedly restrained the boy who threw rock at me in her arms.
「Why……why did you kill dad-!」
The boy yelled that while her mother hugged him. That pained scream made the other villagers looked down too from the unbearable pain of losing their close people. But……I didn’t say any comforting word.
「Because you and I are weak.」
「Wha-……」
I walked toward the speechless boy and looked down on him coldly while continuing to speak.
「I’m weak, so I had no way to save your father other than killing him. You are weak, so your father had to face the vampire in order to protect you and your mother.」
Hearing me talked made the villagers who were hanging down their head to lift their faces and turned their gazes at me.
「Become strong if you don’t want to be victim. Your father faced a vampire in order to protect his family right? If you’re bitter than become strong enough to kill me. So that you won’t lose anything else again.」
「…………」
The boy looked down while biting his lower lip. Some of the villagers shut their eyes and averted their gaze from me.
The words that I said to this boy were also directed to myself.
The only way to not lose anything was to be strong. After all you would lose everything and became a corpse if you were weak.
The villagers who finished loading their luggage on the carriage were leaving the village where they were born and raised.
But just before that, several villagers including that boy’s mother bowed their head to me. The boy himself never looked back even once and simply stared straight ahead.
And then──.
「Carla.」
「As I thought, being covered with blood really suit you Aria.」
Carla spoke at me who was covered with the enemy’s blood and approached me with an intoxicated expression. She used her finger to wipe the blood on my cheek.
「What do you know?」
When I asked her that, Carla smiled like a mischievous kid. The morning wind carried her words away.
.
「You already know right? I am the “culprit” of this incident.」
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