Ch.451Episode 17 – The Blood-Drinking Tree

If you suspect a grave of a deceased family member or friend has been desecrated, consider grave robbery.

If someone knocks at your door late at night without identifying themselves, it may be a restless spirit of someone close to you. Endure and wait until dawn, then immediately seek a priest.

However, if they respond with a clear voice and speak in the voice of someone you know…

Immediately lock all doors, hold a sacred icon to your chest, and pray until the sun illuminates all things.

Never open the door.

Admitting uninvited guests invites danger, and an uninvited person knocking is a grave discourtesy. If you expect visitors tonight, explain the situation and advise them to seek shelter at a church. Even if they plead for entry, firmly refuse.

Remember that church doors are open to all, it is natural for travelers to spend a night there, and priests will not turn away visitors even late at night.

If you are a traveler in deep darkness, follow priests or monks carrying lanterns. If you are a good citizen, they will guide you to a safe church; if you are a poor soul seeking rest, they will lead you to a ferry crossing.

Whatever horrors or temptations may bewitch you, neither look nor listen.

Even if you hear livestock screaming, even if a fiercely barking dog falls silent, even if neighbors knock asking for help.

You must first ensure the safety of yourself and your family.

What knocks at your door now is neither your kin, nor friend, nor neighbor.

…This passage is excerpted from the introduction of “Vampires, Vampyres, and Nosferatu,” a novel written by Friedrich von Ligne (918-979). Friedrich, renowned as the greatest writer and stylist of his time, made his literary debut with a novel about vampires.

Ironically, Friedrich’s death bore many similarities to the victims described in his novel. He died at the hands of an intruder while writing letters to his children with a friend.

The cause of death: excessive blood loss.

As it was dawn when everyone was in deep sleep, there were no witnesses. The only witness, his friend, refused to testify due to what appeared to be aphasia and entered a monastery. His subsequent whereabouts cannot be found in any articles or documents.

The investigator who conducted Friedrich’s autopsy later recalled, “In all my life, I have never seen such a horrific corpse.”

– Book report, “History of the Undead Through Literature” / Part of academy records submitted at the time of application.

[Teacher’s comment: Miss Aila Nostrim. While reading books from various fields is commendable, if your goal is university admission, please read books related to your major. Nevertheless, as your Kiyen language teacher, I am very proud that you read foreign books in their original language. A new edition of “Introduction to Elements” has been published in the Kiyen Empire since your submission in April, so please read it again and write a new book report. – Expected to have excellent language skills. Will assess level by asking current affairs questions related to the Kiyen language and empire during the upcoming interview.]

Episode 17 – The Blood-Drinking Tree

If you’ve served in the military, you’ve probably heard this often: security is something intelligence agencies emphasize to their employees until it’s hammered into their ears. That’s because they produce and distribute state secrets.

Like all gloomy and closed organizations, the company’s obsession with security borders on madness, even showing a hint of perversion.

That company headquartered in Seoul was like that, as were the companies that moved to Gwacheon and Anyang, and the company in Seongnam, where Pangyo, the center of the IT industry, is located.

But they say even mountains change in ten years. It seems that even the most stuffy companies couldn’t resist the flow of time.

I don’t remember exactly when, but I clearly recall what a junior colleague who had just completed training told me about his experience at the intelligence school. His classmate was looking at his smartphone late at night when an instructor burst in and gave him a severe scolding.

When I was in training, they confiscated all our phones, but at some point, whether the world changed or regulations shifted, trainees were allowed to use smartphones during their training period.

According to my junior colleague, the guy who got caught was reading a novel. Specifically, a web novel.

“Everyone knew he read novels until dawn, but… his roommates never reported him, so I still wonder how the instructor found out.”

“That smartphone. Was it his own? Or was it provided by the company?”

“It was given to us by the instructors.”

“That’s why he got caught. A smartphone that can’t even be brought into the secure communications room—why do you think the company gave it to you? Didn’t you find that strange while using it?”

“Ah.”

“…You’re going to have a tough time. Hang in there.”

At first, I worried about how to make a proper person out of this kid, but as time passed, I remembered the junior who got caught reading a novel.

I wondered what was so interesting that he read until dawn.

So I tried reading some myself.

From works published by major companies like Naver or Kakao, to those serialized on platforms with mascots eating tteokbokki on servers. Sometimes when I came across a familiar company in a novel, I’d share it with acquaintances and laugh.

Yes.

There was definitely a time when we laughed and chatted while looking at the text on our screens.

“……”

But this time, I couldn’t laugh at all.

*

Steel frames supported the bedrock, and concrete absorbed the light emitted from sharp illumination.

In the bosom of the Earth Mother, whom Al-Yabud worshipped so devotedly. People gathered in the vast underground cave.

Though dazzling lights attacked from all directions, the subtly undulating shadows flickered their tongues like hungry vipers. Looking at the darkness pulsating along the edges felt like peering into a well of unfathomable depth.

In the end, I had to avert my gaze and turn away.

“To think that vampires, which I’d only seen in literature, still exist… It’s unbelievable.”

I turned my head as I spoke, and our eyes met in midair.

Camouflage-patterned shirt and combat boots. Ibrahim maintained a style that anyone would recognize as military. I asked him:

“Weren’t vampires extinct?”

Ibrahim, arms crossed, carefully received my question.

“That’s correct. They became extinct after the Vatican’s final vampire extermination order against ‘Countess Erzsébet’ in 1614. Both officially and unofficially.”

I gestured with my chin toward the coffin.

“Then what is that?”

“……”

The coffin was there, illuminated by lights arranged along the steel frame.

A coffin made of red cedar. A reddish glow followed its smooth luster, and angular corners joined hands to form a hexagon, while the subtle fragrance of cedar wafted on a breeze.

Though perhaps less sturdy than sandalwood, cedar’s exquisite fragrance is its pride.

Considering that the coffins of past popes were all made of cedar, one could easily imagine its reputation, making it a premium material worthy of soothing the deceased in their rest.

However,

The statue of an archangel trampling a serpent’s head and raising a sword, pages of scripture covering even the smallest gaps,

The thick ring of coarse salt surrounding the coffin and lights suppressing the darkness,

The magical devices filled with large quantities of holy water and the grim-faced religious figures.

Anyone seeing these things would think the same:

A monster sleeps in that coffin.

“……”

Ibrahim avoided my gaze.

“…We’re doing our best to understand the situation. With many religious figures.”

Shortly after reports came in that a vampire’s sealed coffin had been discovered in the Necropolis, the Vatican made a swift decision.

The Holy Knights stationed at the Lateran moved, and specialists including inquisitors, exorcist priests, and scholars were dispatched urgently. They didn’t stop there and informed Al-Yabud, asking for help in resolving the vampire issue.

The fact that they accepted the proposal without hesitation showed how seriously both the Church and Al-Yabud, who normally regarded each other like cattle, chickens, and pigs, were taking this situation.

I looked around the facility provided by Al-Yabud and bowed my head.

“…I thought it would end once we safely recovered the blood.”

Nimiral. Now I have to worry about a monster that’s probably hundreds of years old.

With a heavy heart, I scratched my chin. A coffin with a reddish luster. A vampire lies inside.

“What did the investigation reveal?”

“We’ve confirmed the coffin wasn’t made on the Moritani continent. Since red cedar only grows on the continent, it must have…”

“Come from across the sea?”

“…That’s right.”

Ibrahim nodded with a dark expression, and I stared intently at the coffin, lost in thought.

As he just said, the coffin came from the continent, not Moritani. Even if red cedar grew here, it wouldn’t change the fact.

Burying the deceased in coffins is not part of Moritani continental culture.

Al-Yabud, the religion encompassing the entire Moritani continent, has many similarities with Islam. This is evident in funeral procedures as well—like in the Middle East where Islam predominates, funerals follow the principle of burying the deceased within 24 hours of death.

For natural or disease-related deaths, a dying Muslim completes wudu (الوضوء: the process of cleansing all parts before prayer) and begins the shahada (الشَهَادَة: profession of faith) facing Mecca. If they cannot move, family or acquaintances may perform this process on their behalf.

Muslims then dress the deceased in clothes they frequently wore, wrap the body in clean cloth, and bind it with rope.

After completing the shrouding and funeral prayers, family and friends carry the body on a cloth stretcher to the burial site—similar to a Korean bier.

The funeral concludes after placing the body, covering it with stone slabs, and then with soil and gravel. This process takes place during daylight, and unlike other cultures, rarely involves placing a coffin in the grave. That’s Islamic doctrine. Even when the Saudi king died, he was buried according to tradition.

Therefore, that coffin is inevitably an alien object that doesn’t align with Moritani continental funeral culture.

“Have you identified the body in the coffin?”

I pointed at the coffin, and Ibrahim, who had just drawn water from the dispenser, brought the cup to his lips.

“We found no clues to identify the person, either on the exterior of the coffin or at the scene. However, scholars analyzed the coffin’s style and were able to estimate the approximate burial period.”

“How many years ago was the coffin buried? 300? 400?”

The Holy Knight commander added briefly:

“800 years ago.”

“Wait. What did you say? 800 years?”

“Yes. The coffin’s style closely resembles those from 800 years ago, so at the very least, that’s when the coffin was made.”

My eyes widened at the unexpected number. 800 years ago means the 1100s.

Damn. How could a coffin made back then still exist? Even the vampire would have rotted by now.

While I was grumbling internally, Ibrahim, looking down at his paper cup, began to make a sour expression.

“Since this is information inferred from when the coffin was made, it might not match the actual age of the vampire.”

“You’re not saying the vampire might be older than 800 years, are you?”

“Unfortunately, that’s exactly what I’m saying. There’s a possibility it was placed in a coffin made earlier, but…”

Usually, when both positive and negative assumptions appear simultaneously, the negative one is often correct. Like Murphy’s Law.

Reading novels about vampires was just entertaining, but facing one in reality wasn’t fun at all.

Flicking a flint—click, click—I asked Ibrahim:

“Could the cultists have taken the saint’s blood to feed the vampire?”

He assessed it as a highly plausible hypothesis.

“The inquisitors and exorcist priests have similar opinions. Al-Yabud’s judgment is the same.”

“You recovered the blood safely, right?”

“Yes, we recovered all of it. It’s now securely stored in the Lateran vault.”

Lucia’s blood, which was the target of both the Holy Knights and the cultists, is now under the Church’s strict protection. Since they recovered every drop, whatever the cultists’ purpose was, they failed.

So what remains is…

“How will you deal with that vampire?”

*

The discussion began.

The topic: methods to kill the vampire. How to kill the monster safely without letting it escape.

“What about opening the coffin lid and pouring in holy water? If it’s undead, it should be vulnerable to holy water. If we dump a barrel on it, how could it resist?”

“That won’t work, I’m afraid.”

“What about driving a stake through its heart or burning it with consecrated oil?”

I suggested common-sense methods for dealing with vampires.

To be precise, they were at the level you’d find if you Googled “how to kill a vampire.”

Lycanthropes, orcs, goblins, elves, dwarves, dragons, and so on. Despite living in a neighborhood as mixed as a stew of all kinds of races, information related to the undead was hard to find. This was because religious organizations, including the Church, had prevented the spread of “impure knowledge” in the past.

I don’t know how they learned about China’s beautiful culture, but the Church faithfully followed the traditional games of the Chinese people.

They dragged out scholars researching the undead and tortured them, smashed specimens and research materials, and gathered and burned all the books.

Of course, it was an era when villagers would label a magician (or what seemed like a wealthy widow) as a devil worshipper or witch and turn them into a bonfire (a rather large one), only to be caught by an enraged inquisitor and tied to a wheel, so it was understandable.

In an age when even magicians were killed if caught, dying of natural causes while being caught researching the undead? Well…

Anyway, as a result of religious organizations burning all historical records out of concern for the study load of future Academy children, information about the undead today can only be obtained from historical materials that barely survived the burning of books and burying of scholars, or from creative works infused with authors’ imagination.

In other words, utterly useless knowledge.

“If that were possible, we would have done it already.”

“Hmm…”

While I was cursing the completely unhelpful Namu Wiki and authors who didn’t do proper research despite living in an age when the Inquisition no longer gives dirty looks, Ibrahim explained “why vampires cannot be killed.”

“We’ve tried most of the methods you mentioned, but they didn’t work. When we sprinkled holy oil, high-temperature steam was generated and people were injured. When we hammered a silver stake, it bounced off and embedded itself in the wall.”

“The coffin?”

“No. It was a person who bounced off. He died instantly when his head collided with the rock wall.”

“……”

“The coffin itself is suspected to be the source of the problem, but it’s not a certain assumption. Perhaps opening the lid and pouring holy water would kill the vampire, but… both the Church and Al-Yabud have agreed to leave opening the coffin as a last resort.”

After hearing this, I examined the records stored in the video surveillance equipment and found them quite a spectacle.

The coffin seemed to be made of steel rather than wood—it wouldn’t break no matter how much it was hit or poked, and it wouldn’t even get sooty when fire was applied. No matter how hard they tried, the smooth luster that the cedar coffin boasted wasn’t damaged even a hair’s breadth, and the shadows around the edges just writhed ominously as if mocking their efforts.

Moreover,

-Pssst!

While playing the video, the screen suddenly cut off. The facility manager came to try to revive the device, but it was all in vain.

“The credit card is completely burned. I think we need to replace the terminal.”

“Why did it suddenly burn?”

“I’m not sure either…”

The Church and Al-Yabud employed numerous methods to kill the vampire but achieved no results while suffering 3 deaths and 49 injuries. Whoever the deceased is, they seem to be extremely shy.

At this point, wouldn’t it be better to just leave it alone? Old people already have trouble sleeping, so instead of making noise and waking them up, why not attach weights and drop it into the ocean?

Thinking it was a good plan, I cautiously suggested it, but it failed due to strong opposition from the Church and Al-Yabud’s clergy. Their logic was that confirming the vampire’s death was necessary to prevent further damage.

Just before returning, I visited Ibrahim one last time to ask a question.

“You said earlier that the coffin was made 800 years ago, right?”

“Yes.”

“Let’s assume the vampire is roughly 800 years old. How strong is one that has lived that long?”

He was loading ammunition into a magazine. They were consecrated bullets that shone with a silvery light, different from ordinary bullets.

“Since an undead’s age and power aren’t proportional, it’s impossible to gauge a vampire’s level by its age. However, surviving for a long time means it has survived dangers targeting it. Such undead usually fall into one of two categories: cunning or strong.”

Click, as the bolt moved forward, a blessed bullet entered the chamber. Nearby, what appeared to be Church firearms were displayed, and a priest wandered around, shaking a holy water sprinkler.

The Holy Knight commander posed a question:

“The vampire I mentioned, ‘Countess Erzsébet,’ who was exterminated in 1614, was a monster who took tens of thousands of lives on the battlefield. She was the fourth most powerful vampire ever exterminated by the Holy Knights and the Inquisition. How many years do you think ‘Countess Erzsébet’ lived?”

“Let’s see. Fourth strongest, so about 400?”

“183 years.”

Clank! Ibrahim closed the gun case.

“It wasn’t that the Vatican didn’t know of her existence. They simply didn’t dare to capture her. Because she was too powerful a monster. So let me ask you again.”

He hung a sling around his neck. A silver cross swayed on his uniform.

“How strong do you think a vampire that has lived for 800 years or more would be?”

*

Ibrahim said he would stay at the facility.

“We need to find a way to kill the vampire somehow.”

He seemed to plan on staying there for a while.

Probably until the vampire dies or they find a way to kill it.

He did say he would stay with his subordinates until reinforcements from the Church arrived, but judging by his eyes and attitude, he seemed quite determined.

“What are you thinking about so seriously?”

On the way out of the facility, while walking through a path between rock walls, Matt asked a question.

“Just thinking about the vampire.”

“Are you planning to kill it?”

I shrugged my shoulders and pouted. Matt raised an eyebrow.

“Do you need to worry about such things? The conflict between Asen and Sanya hasn’t been resolved yet.”

“Work is work.”

“I don’t mind as long as it doesn’t interfere with your duties, but…”

The intelligence officer walking ahead stopped briefly.

Then, turning back and looking at me, he said:

“Stop getting entangled in unnecessary incidents. You’ll be lucky if it just gives you a headache—one wrong move and your life could be at stake… Well, you probably know that.”

“……”

“Take it as advice from an old man’s concern. I meant no harm.”

“I’ll heed your advice.”

“I’ll contact you as soon as news from the warlords comes in. Keep the regular line open.”

Matt stepped onto the magic circle and disappeared instantly.

I stared at the spot where he had vanished, then sat down on a nearby rock to wait for my magic to recharge.

“……”

As he said, the vampire is a secondary issue.

Just as the conflict between Asen and Sanya is important to Matt, I should focus only on successfully completing my assignment in Moritani.

I don’t know how strong the vampire might be, but with the Church and Al-Yabud involved, they’ll surely handle it properly. Organizations that can defeat demons should be able to easily deal with a centuries-old elder.

…

…That’s what I thought just a moment ago.

“…Why are you here?”

“You don’t seem very happy to see me after so long.”

I slapped my forehead and closed my eyes.

“Major?”

Ah.

I completely forgot about this one.