The Summons to Phoenix Hall
How long had he slept?
“Master. Master.”
“Mmnh?”
Row Gibson was shaken awake by the hand of the boy who served as his butler, Wilhelm. When he opened his eyes and looked around, the plane had already touched down.
“Ahh. Air travel is truly exhausting.”
He raised the shade. This was his private aircraft, the windows coated to block the sun.
“Hmm. Definitely Las Vegas.”
“Shall we disembark?”
Wilhelm rose first, briefcase and laptop in hand. Row Gibson yawned once and stood from his seat.
Was there any place that looked more romantic than an airport at night? Even if the lights existed only to guide planes in, the beams rising from earth to sky scattered where they touched the darkness. A stage for countless partings and reunions, the airport—chosen endlessly by directors with calcified imaginations—never switched off its lights. Even a private airfield on the outskirts of Las Vegas still possessed that romantic airport air.
This field had been specially set up for the occasional VIP who arrived by private jet. Originally a military airstrip in the middle of the desert, it had been bought and converted by a private company once Las Vegas kept expanding and the base relocated. The control tower and terminal platforms were now glass-bodied buildings that retained no trace of the military.
A structure like that should turn into an oven under the desert sun, yet some combination of thermal-storage climate control and coolers seemed to keep the air manageable.
“Huh?”
At the moment, however, two aircraft sat on the field. Both were Boeing 737s. One was the plane Row Gibson himself had arrived in—but the other?
“Is someone else using the airfield at this hour?”
“Probably the mafia.”
Wilhelm shrugged as he eyed the men in black suits entrenched in the terminal. Row Gibson whistled and climbed into the airport transfer vehicle.
“Busy people. Ah—is the car ready?”
“Sydney should be waiting.”
“I don’t much care for chauffeurs.”
“You keep a pilot for the plane, don’t you? Or is it Sydney you dislike?”
Wilhelm opened the door first and stepped out—then froze. Mafiosi already waiting in the cabin had drawn their guns and leveled them.
“Well, well—if it isn’t the famous Mr. Gibson himself!”
Don Jubilo approached Row, his body that looked ready to burst wrapped in a black suit. The undisputed king of the Las Vegas night raised a hand and ordered his men to lower their weapons.
“Stand down. What assassin arrives in a 737? Ah—my apologies for the discourtesy.”
“If you knew it was discourteous, then apologize properly! You didn’t even charter the whole airport, yet you shove guns in people’s faces the second they appear! Just because you’re mafia doesn’t mean you own everything!”
Wilhelm was furious enough to talk back to Don Jubilo. A boy talking back to a mafia boss was so unthinkable that Don Jubilo and his bodyguards all wore blank expressions. That was when Row Gibson pinched Wilhelm’s ear.
“Wilhelm!”
“Ow-ow-ow-ow!”
Only then did Don Jubilo’s face relax. He looked at Row Gibson and, as if he had never pointed a gun first, launched into a lecture.
“My, my. Quite the bold little one. If you don’t educate him properly, he’ll grow into a rather tiresome adult.”
“Ah, yes. I’ll see that he’s cautioned. Come along, Wilhelm.”
Wilhelm looked ready to explode.
“M-Master! What are you saying?! We’re the victims here!”
“Enough. Pointing a gun doesn’t kill you and it doesn’t hurt.”
“But—!”
Wilhelm never finished the sentence. Row Gibson simply scooped him up and tucked him under one arm. Carrying the thrashing boy at his side, he strode out of the terminal as if fleeing the scene.
“You little brat. Cool that temper. Are you looking to pick a fight with the Jubilo family?”
“Sure, why not?”
“……You go be clan lord, then.”
He rapped Wilhelm once on the head. Anyone who photographed the scene would have had grounds for a child-abuse charge, yet the victim himself only stuck out his tongue, unconcerned. At that moment the chauffeur waiting at the entrance spotted them. Calling him a chauffeur felt odd—the black man was so massive one wondered whether he would even fit inside a car. The limousine parked beside him suggested he would, just barely.
“Over here, Boss!”
Sydney threw both arms wide in welcome. A former football player, his cheer looked like a wall.
“Ah, right.”
Row deliberately walked slowly so he would not break into a sprint, and stopped before the black limousine.
“Did you enjoy the long flight?”
Sydney was grinning even with a crowd of mafiosi lined up behind them.
“You know perfectly well I hate flying, Sydney. Just drive.”
Row Gibson tossed Wilhelm into the car and climbed in himself. Sydney settled behind the wheel with an easy smile.
“You’re rather popular.”
“No time for jokes. Move.”
The limousine rolled forward. Sydney handled the vehicle—nearly the size of a minibus—with practiced skill and even winked at the mafiosi. The windows were tinted black, so they could not see, but the looks the mafiosi gave the car were far from friendly. Row had deliberately yielded a point, yet they still stared like that; he was already wondering whether a firmer hand would have been better when Sydney asked,
“Did Don Jubilo do something?”
“Eyes on the road.”
“Yes, yes.”
The airfield lay some distance from downtown Las Vegas; the drive to Phoenix Hall would take about ten minutes. Row Gibson sank into the seat and let his thoughts wander.
“Calling me when it isn’t even a regular meeting… so they must have found it.”
He spoke as if the question were casual, but of course it was not. Every vampire on the planet had their eyes lit for the same prize: the blood of the two Jinma, Chang-woon and Juk-yo. They had been the oldest of vampires, mortal enemies for millennia, until they exhausted each other in battle and were finally hunted down by Jinma hunters.
Yet in dying they had inflicted such wounds on the hunters that their blood was never sealed; it was scattered into the world. Where had it gone? Juk-yo’s children still seemed unable to let go and were combing Seoul, but Phantom’s thoughts ran differently. That blood had almost certainly already been absorbed by someone and given birth to a new vampire.
“I don’t have the details, but according to the information we’ve obtained, a new Jinma has been born.”
Sydney shared the same conclusion. That alone was more than enough reason to call an irregular gathering.
“A high VT and nothing else does not make a Jinma.”
Slightly stung in his pride, Row Gibson—Jinma Phantom—crossed his legs and stared out the window. Unlike Juk-yo’s faction or the other clans, Tetra Anax’s intelligence was always swift. They had only just entered Korea and already found the trail. Still, the newly born Jinma worried him.
If—just if—the new Jinma had received the blood of both Juk-yo and Chang-woon, then even allowing for some loss the VT would break eight hundred thousand. In pure VT terms it would be the strongest vampire ever born. Naturally the others would never leave such a prize alone. It was almost strange that Tetra Anax itself had not already leapt to devour it.
“Wonderful news, Master! Let’s go to Korea, eat that worthless VT, and make you the strongest vampire alive!”
Wilhelm spoke as if the matter concerned him personally. Jinma Phantom simply shoved him away with a foot.
“You go be clan lord.”
“But Master, it’s obvious! The other Jinma must already have bloodshot eyes for that blood!”
“I won’t deny that… but if you have a brain, use it. If vampires pour in by the dozens, do you really think I can simply brush them all aside and claim it? If anything happens to me, Phantasmagoria ends up just like Juk-yo’s faction.”
Phantom scolded Wilhelm. While they spoke the limousine stopped before the two-hundred-seventy-story complex known as Phoenix Hall. Owned by R. Gordon—majority shareholder of Flex Medical and almost certainly the head of Tetra Anax—the building was a vast manor that gathered every function of a city: hotel, shopping mall, casino, offices, leisure facilities. Just as a medieval manor had been self-sufficient within its walls, so was this tower. And of course, in its shadows, there were vampires.
“Pointlessly tall. It’ll be a headache when the building’s lifespan ends and they have to tear it down.”
Row Gibson stood before the structure and grumbled. To a human, a building lasted a lifetime; to a vampire who lived centuries it was barely an instant. Lifespan had to be considered.
“The Far East has plenty of land—why build so high?”
Row Gibson approached the entrance. True to a city of wealth and pleasure, impeccably dressed bellboys and staff greeted him. He settled the bill in the lobby with a platinum card and followed a bellboy toward the private elevator reserved for suite guests. Hidden below was a special subterranean level ordinary people never entered—the true Phoenix Hall.
“Well then, I’ll take my leave. Ah—your attendant? Entry inside is forbidden.”
The bellboy stood as still as a salt statue, only his mouth moving. To keep secrets, humans who approached important places were not merely dominated; they were turned into blood-slaves. Ghoul transformation—an ability Tetra Anax’s own bloodline lacked. Probably the power of Vanishing Blood. The clan that served as Tetra Anax’s hands and feet had always been on poor terms with Phantasmagoria. Naturally Wilhelm got on no better with them.
“I know!”
Knowing the man was Tetra Anax’s eyes and ears, there was nothing to gain by defying the order. Last year and the year before, attendants had never been allowed into Phoenix Hall; even for an irregular summons, entry for anyone who was not a Jinma was naturally forbidden.
“Because this is where the kings of the vampires gather.”
Phantom murmured the words and opened the door. Inside lay a darkness no human eye could pierce. Sixty meters underground, where not a single ray of sunlight ever reached, that was only natural. Even a nuclear strike would not kill the Jinma within.
“Well then—shall we hear why they called us?”
Row Gibson—here he was Jinma Phantom—stretched a hand toward the hall door. A massive steel gate weighing several tons began to open of its own accord.
“As punctual as ever. You could afford to be late once in a while.”
In the darkness a man in a black tuxedo sat waiting. Short-cropped hair, a somewhat slight frame—he was clearly of East Asian appearance. “Slight,” of course, only by Western standards; at one hundred seventy-five centimeters he was perfectly ordinary.
“I made an effort to arrive on time, so don’t greet me like that. Zein—or are you using a Japanese name now?”
Phantom entered and took the seat prepared for him. Exactly as he had expected, the only Jinma present on time were himself and Zein. Zein, leader of Vanishing Blood, was a perfectionist who boasted he had never once broken a time appointment in thousands of years; in that respect he and Phantom were similar. Yet what a perfectionist hated most was probably another perfectionist.
“That’s right. In Japanese I’m Takamura Zein.”
He smiled. The malice was so obvious he did not even bother to hide it—irritating. If he were at least honest about it, Phantom could simply unload a barrage of insults without a second thought. Phantom never treated discourteously anyone who kept the forms of courtesy, malice or not. He had held to that principle for over two thousand years and saw no reason to break it now. He sat and crossed his legs.
“Nothing much has changed, has it? Just one extra family name stuck on.”
“And that one I took from my wife.”
“…….”
A vampire getting married to a woman—Phantom shook his head, speechless. Then again, remaining single as long as he had already made countless people suspicious. Forging a human identity and living among them, nothing worked better than marrying a human woman.
Bang!
An explosion of sound and the steel door was sliced open. Without even turning around, a gaunt woman was already seated in a chair. Her makeup was so exaggerated one might have believed it was for Halloween; the thick white powder plastered over her emaciated body looked enough to asphyxiate an entire brigade of asthma patients.
“Taken up death metal, Messiah?”
“Phantom. Idle chatter.”
She answered in a filthy voice like scraping metal shards. The girl-doll seated on her lap—no, the girl—added a word of her own. Not ventriloquism. The girl spoke with her own voice.
“Mm. Hello, Phantom. It’s been a while.”
“Hmph.”
The adorable girl who looked like a French doll raised a hand in greeting, but Phantom’s expression remained indifferent. Messiah, clad in tight red leather that clung to her body, snapped in a sharp voice,
“Get to the point! Even if we live long lives, time is still money!”
“Don’t you already have more gold than you can stand?”
From beyond the curtain, the head of Tetra Anax—who never showed himself even to his peers—spoke.
“That joke. Completely unamusing. I’ll remember it.”
Messiah’s tone was threatening. Her voice was dangerous, and so was her nature. One might have called her already mad—yet she was far too intelligent for that. She had acquired Shell and already controlled most of the petroleum-based energy system. When ideology collapsed and the world slid back into pure capitalism, America had poured explosives into the Middle East for energy. An oil company was that important; it was not territory a lunatic vampire should be able to dominate.
A mad genius, then. The harder kind to handle.
Phantom thought as much and raised his hand. A razor-thin metal plate had been driven into the armrest where his hand rested.
“The necessary information is contained there. Even for an irregular assembly, only four Jinma… at this rate the customary title of ‘the Twenty-Four Jinma’ starts to sound ridiculous.”
The metal plate thrown by the leader of Tetra Anax—currently known as R. Gordon—was covered in Braille so densely packed that no human fingertip could ever read it.
“Still the same bad taste. If you’re going to use things like this, there was no point in Chaeyun opening a paper mill.”
Phantom lifted the plate and put it in his mouth. Braille cut to the scale of hundreds of microns was illegible to humans, but a vampire could read it with the tongue.
So the contents are exactly that, after all.
The message informed them that a new Jinma, Jeong-ya, had been born. Having consumed the blood of both Juk-yo and Chang-woon, her estimated VT exceeded one million. Since Juk-yo and Chang-woon themselves had been born alongside Iron Age civilization, their power was immense. Jinma-grade blood suffered enormous loss upon absorption, yet the estimate still surpassed one million. If Jeong-ya ever fell to Silvester, the entire vampire race could face decline.