Chapter 470: Abandoning the Elderly

The food you eat when you’re most starved tastes the best, and the sleep you take when you’re most exhausted is the sweetest.

Though I was holed up in a burrow with only a blanket beneath me, I was experiencing the most comfortable rest of my life.

Of course I was.

My fatigue had built up over the last three days, and I was finally letting it all out in one go, how could it not feel amazing?

To truly feel light, it’s not about carrying nothing, it’s about lifting something heavy and then setting it down.

Humans are creatures of adaptation, all stimuli are felt relatively.

Feeling significantly lighter, I sat up straight—

Huh. I feel light?

That’s strange. I’m sure Hilde was sleeping beside me last night.

So why didn’t I feel any weight or presence?

The reason was simple: Hilde wasn’t beside me anymore.

Did she go out? Without me?

What did she find that was so interesting she’d leave me behind?

Feeling slightly curious, I pulled the blanket aside and reached for my clothes—only to find a small, crumpled scrap of paper tucked into my Bio-receptor.

I obviously hadn’t put it there in my sleep. Hilde must have.

I smoothed out the wrinkled paper and read it.

Who’s snoring?! And after all that drama about finding herself, now she’s suddenly serious?

Also, I told you, I’m not your father.

And I’m not going to miss you.

Just how many mistakes can you cram into such a short note?

I tried to pick apart the message sentence by sentence, keeping a cold and logical mindset, but something started to nag at me.

What was it…?

This letter almost sounded like she was saying we’d be going our separate ways.

“…Wait. Did I just get abandoned?”

No matter how I looked at it, that was the case.

The context of the letter was basically: “I’m leaving you here, live well.”

This can’t be happening.

Is this some kind of joke?

I’m just a normal, fragile guy, damn it.

If I don’t have a bodyguard, I can’t even outrun an Ancilla, let alone an Elder!

Stunned, I turned toward the burrow entrance.

It must be a prank.

Surely, any moment now she’d step back inside and say, “Just kidding~.”

As expected—

“Hey! It’s a hole!”

—A different girl showed up.

From her face to her demeanor, she was nothing like Hilde.

She was a mountain village girl through and through, born and raised nearby, and planning to live her whole life here.

She had found the hole and shouted without approaching any closer.

“Mister! I found a rat hole! It’s huge!”

“Matilda! Don’t get too close! Chief Viltear said not to approach strange holes before nightfall!”

“Why not? I can catch rats just fine!”

“No ordinary rat would dig a hole that big! Get back! We’ll keep an eye on it, now hurry!”

Though she seemed annoyed, the girl thankfully backed off without coming closer.

Safe.

At least until nightfall…

Wait, no.

I can’t even guarantee a win against a Neonate, especially at night.

When facing vampires, the rule is to fight during the day.

That’s a hard-thought ironclad rule.

If I really wanted to escape, I had to bolt out of the burrow now.

But there was a problem.

I’m bad at fighting against multiple opponents.

One-on-one, I can read and outmaneuver my enemy.

Group fights, I can slip through the chaos and find gaps in attention.

But one-against-many?

That’s a different story.

My style is psychological warfare which included trickery, bluffing, exploiting weaknesses with hidden cards.

But the key to winning mind games is numbers.

No matter how clever the tactician, you can’t win at a rigged table.

Fewer cards means fewer plays.

And worse: the opponents are village folk who’ve put their trust in a vampire for protection. They’re amateurs who don’t even know how to fight properly.

That makes them more dangerous to someone like me.

You can’t predict how someone will swing a spear if they don’t even know any proper technique.

Escaping unscathed from a dozen of them is nearly impossible.

Especially if they’re surrounding the burrow’s exit.

Which means… I have only one option left.

“Up!”

I’ll break through from above and escape the encirclement.

It’s my only shot.

Thankfully, I don’t have to pass by the vampire’s hut.

I can shift a little to the side with Earthweave.

Earthweave isn’t all-powerful, I can’t control the ground like it’s playdough.

When I borrowed the power of Jizan, I could split the earth, but without that?

It’s back to basics.

I can only burrow like a worm, carefully shifting soil without destabilizing the structure.

Ridiculous as it sounds, it’s useful.

I angled my tunneling passage upward and clawed my way through the soft soil, knees first.

Maybe my movement tipped her of, —because I heard a vampire’s voice in my head from above.

｢Burrowing through the ground, are you? I thought you were just a rat. Turns out you really do have rat-like abilities.｣

Hah. So what?

What can you even do, Neonate?

You’re powerless under sunlight!

Scoffing, I pushed up with Earthweave.

A faint glimmer of morning sunlight seeped through the crumbling soil.

｢If you thought a five-hundred-year-old like me couldn’t prepare for something that simple… you’ve gravely misjudged me.｣

…What?

I tried to read Viltear’s thoughts, but before I could, the vampire made her move.

Tch. Vampires.

Their minds are old and vast, which makes them harder to read in a hurry.

I didn’t expect this, she had already claimed the entire building as an extension of herself!

Her cabin was made of logs and sealed with leather to block sunlight.

Now she was channeling blood through its interior.

She may be a Neonate, but moving a building isn’t outside her capabilities.

Grrrrk.

The hut scraped across the ground and shifted.

The soil that had supported it came crashing down on me.

If I stayed still, I’d be buried alive.

I burst upward, shoving dirt aside.

And right in front of me—in a darkened space—a girl in a dress glared at me with glowing red eyes.

“There you are, little rat.”

It was the village chief, Viltear of the Bloodleech Coven.

I greeted the suddenly hostile vampire with forced cheer.

“Squeak squeak.”

“You’ve still got jokes? That tunneling ability… Are you a Fallen Dominion alchemist? Or perhaps from the Order of Gaia? …No. Wait.”

Viltear reached out and summoned weapons, fork and knife.

Not so much weapons as cutlery, but for the Bloodleech Coven, who equated combat with feeding, they were perfectly appropriate.

“L-let’s put away the sharp things and talk first, yeah?”

I hesitated, rising slowly, but Viltear gripped her cutlery in reverse grip and stepped forward.

“Fine. I’ll talk. After I hang you on a hook.”

Damn it!

She’s a Neonate!

She may be lacking in Bloodcraft finesse, but any blood she owns is under perfect control.

Compared to the Military State, she’s a General-level threat.

Unlike the Qi Arts, Bloodcraft is their life.

It’s perfectly stable.

A trained martial artist might be stronger in bursts, but if they slip, they can die.

Vampires like Viltear?

They don’t die.

The “Shadow” I once fought in the Military State was much stronger than me, and even then I had to probe cautiously.

But Viltear doesn’t have to.

I’m not a threat to her.

“If you don’t resist, I’ll settle for just eating your right arm.”

“Why is it always the right arm?! Why are so many people obsessed with my right arm?!”

My scream was cut short as her knife swung for my shoulder.

I was reading her thoughts, but I could barely keep up.

Until now, someone stronger had always protected me, but this time, I was on my own.

Damn it. I worked so hard to protect this arm… I have to block it!

But my frail body didn’t—

Wait.

“…Huh? I’m moving.”

Thunk.

My hand stopped Viltear’s wrist.

The force was intense, but instead of being completely overwhelmed, I was only slowly pushed back. I was resisting.

I’d read her move and reacted in time.

I’d never managed that before.

Maybe it’s the power of the Divine?

Come to think of it, my body has felt lighter lately.

“So your mouth isn’t the only thing with guts.”

“I think you could use a looser mouth. Since we’ve got time, how about a conversation instead of blades? Don’t worry, I’m not proposing a kiss.”

I even tossed in a joke, but it didn’t land.

Viltear instantly twisted her wrist.

The knife redirected, aiming for my arm instead of the shoulder.

She was aiming to make me bleed.

And if she did, it’d be all over.

Wounds made by vampires don’t heal easily.

I shoved her hand aside and dug into my belt.

My available cards: a skewer and two steel wires.

That’s it?! I really need to restock.

With no other option, I threw the cards in desperation.

Predictably, they stabbed her but had no effect, she’s a vampire after all.

I bolted, leaping over her chair and sprinting for the wall.

She followed leisurely, voice echoing behind me.

“You can’t escape. This cabin won’t open until I allow it.”

“What kind of thief asks for permission to leave? Goodbye!”

I slapped the Elixir Card against my palm and smashed it into the wall.

The Golden Lord’s card could transform any material into a card, even a vampire’s hut.

This is the power of a Divine.

Witness it—

Dozens of cards exploded from where my hand met the wall, converting part of the cabin into cards.

But… the wall didn’t collapse as expected.

“I told you. You came in with my permission and you won’t leave without it.”

Viltear whispered as blood surged to her hands.

The blood she’d let out earlier now circled the walls like a frenzy.

My card had transformed part of the hut, but her blood had instantly flooded in and reinforced the space.

The Bloodleech Coven’s ability is consumption.

It’s a form of Bloodcraft that rarely manifests outwardly, so I’d underestimated her.

But reading her thoughts now, I finally understood.

Viltear had spent years embedding her power into this cabin, essentially making it a part of her own body.

“The moment you entered this hut, it was over. You are inside my stomach.”

Plates. Chairs. The large pot. The poker by the fireplace.

Everything in the cabin began to move, slowly, like it was alive.

Like a house out of a fairy tale, a witch’s house.

The blood-bound furniture began closing in on me.