Chapter 15
Chapter 15
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: Testify to the Faith (4)
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-I need to report this to the Vampire Princess.
The Succubus Secretary said that and hurriedly left the room.
She was so flustered in her departure that I couldn't understand why she had suddenly left to make a report.
My guess?
'One of two things.'
One.
The corruption had succeeded.
But there was one problem.
'Did they not know the ritual was performed?'
Did they fail to detect through magic that a ritual had taken place at the altar, or that it had succeeded?
Or was it something that couldn't be checked in real time and required a direct report?
'They weren't paying attention to this place, or they just didn't care.'
Whatever happens, happens.
Or maybe there's no way results would come all at once.
Like how new material research wouldn't succeed overnight just because the budget ran out and researchers were assigned, they might have just brushed it off as, "Oh, the altar activated."
'That might actually be the real thing worth reporting.'
Squelch, squelch.
Priestess Dalia wildly swung her flail wrapped in black and white energy.
"Urgh, uwaaa!!"
A prisoner entered and recoiled in horror at the sight of his dead comrade, but Dalia immediately chased him down, grabbed him by the nape, and threw him into the execution chamber.
"Goddess! Deliver judgment's flail upon the traitor—!"
Splat.
Another one, his head smashed open and dead.
Blood splattered all over Dalia's body, but she swung her mace even more gleefully.
That power contained in the mace.
Holy power?
Hard to say.
It felt like some divine energy was emanating from it, but it was ambiguous to judge carelessly.
'I don't have enough information.'
All I knew were the miracles granted to me and the clues I'd gathered in this training room.
'Whatever. Just focus on surviving.'
I steadied my resolve.
If I hadn't staked my life as a trainer, the one with their head exploding against that mace right now would have been me.
"Hoo, hoo."
Dalia caught her breath.
Precisely, down to the very last one—she had smashed all eight male prisoners with her mace. The ones who had relentlessly shoved their cocks into her.
"Goddess..."
Dalia knelt and clasped her hands in prayer.
"Hey."
I approached Dalia, but she quietly turned her eyes toward me.
"Can't you see I'm praying?"
"Nah, just saying good work."
"Hah. My efforts are recognized by the Goddess. You just... urk."
Dalia grimaced.
Bathed in blood though she was, her red eyes visible through the gore were growing even redder.
"......."
Dalia had become a vampire.
Was a bloodthirst impulse kicking in, perhaps?
If so, the only target she could feed on was—
"You."
"What."
"What's your name?"
Dalia slowly rose to her feet.
"I need to remember it."
"Name? Who knows."
My previous life's name held no meaning, and I had no particular attachment to my current one.
"Andy, Jack, Malcolm, Jace. Which do you like?"
"What?"
"Forgot my real name. Or you could give me a new one."
"......A revelation from the divine."
Dalia looked at me with clear displeasure.
"She said She bestows upon you a new name."
"Why say it all solemn like that?"
"Shut your mouth. It was truly Her words delivered to me."
"The Goddess?"
"Yes. Thanks to that... She's watching. This place."
Dalia smirked pointedly.
"The Goddess extends Her sanctity even into this demon stronghold, the dungeon depths."
"......."
I wanted to say she was just deluded, but it seemed the gang rape had hit her harder than expected.
No.
Did I go too far?
She endured the men's gang rape somehow, but maybe seeing those corpses spray their cum on her priestess robes broke her mind?
"Azajiel."
"What?"
How is Azajiel even a name?
"You mocking me?"
"...No. Azazel, She said."
"......?"
It shortened, but not in a good way.
Not like Azazazazel or something.
"Ridiculous. Did the Goddess really say that?"
"She watches this too, so dare not test Her."
"Ridiculous."
"......."
Dalia glared at me like she wanted to kill me, but even gripping her mace, she couldn't swing it my way.
"What? Wanna hit me?"
"......."
She dropped the blood- and flesh-covered mace to the floor and glared for a long while, clearly displeased but not swinging.
"Anyway, what happened to the other women?"
"Other women?"
"Eris and—"
"Ah. Everyone except the ones here is dead."
I mimed slitting my throat.
"The female thief got eaten by a slime, and the female warrior... got dragged off by orcs."
"Cannibalism...."
"Our Master doesn't order her subordinates to eat people."
The Vampire Princess kills humans, but doesn't eat her.
"Unlike other dungeons."
"......."
"Instead, when you die, all the blood gets drained from your body."
"Isn't getting drained the same as being eaten?"
"At least the feeling's different."
Being chopped up alive to become a cannibal feast's side dish might be worse than having your heart ripped out in one blow and then drained dry.
"I see.... So Eris is still alive?"
"Yeah."
Alive? That's all.
She was my save point—
"I'll help you."
"......What?"
"I'll help, I said."
Dalia flashed a sly smile and licked her lips.
"I want to share the joy of falling to demonkind."
"...You."
Suddenly, it hit me.
"Not just because you want to turn the other bitches like you?"
"......."
Dalia didn't deny it, just smiled.
Ah.
Women's greatest enemy is other women, huh.
"No harm in that."
A decrepit castle shrouded in thick darkness.
In the central hall of a castle painted entirely black with red decorations, a single woman sat upon a jade throne.
White hair, red eyes.
The quintessential vampire traits.
But her near-pure white hair and vividly blood-like red betrayed how close she was to a 'true ancestor'.
Someone might call this woman thus:
The first progeny of the Vampire King.
The First Princess of Vampires.
But those in the Vampire Princess's castle called her by another name.
"Master."
The dungeon's lord.
"I have an urgent report."
"The 4 Great Cadres of the Demon King Army meeting is in ten minutes."
Or one of the Demon King Army's 4 Great Cadres.
Her most famous epithet: the Vampire Princess.
"If it's something that can wait until after the cadres' meeting..."
"It might be even more important."
"......."
The Vampire Princess paused her gesture at the Succubus Secretary's report, kneeling on the central red carpet.
"You're not one to lie. Report."
"...Could you clear the room?"
"Insolent!!"
The old vampire attending the Vampire Princess bellowed.
"You dare seek a private audience with Her Highness? You, a mere Grade 7 administrator?!"
"Quiet."
The Vampire Princess raised a hand to silence the old vampire.
"I'll judge after hearing the details. If you waste my time, atone with death."
The Vampire Princess slowly rose.
"No need for words. I'll see for myself."
As the Vampire Princess descended the steps from her throne, the Succubus Secretary quietly undid the top button of her shirt.
"I'll confirm what you've seen and heard through the memories in your blood."
Pierce.
Very slowly, the Vampire Princess's fangs sank into the Succubus Secretary's neck.
"Eek, urgh...!"
Blood rushed to the Succubus Secretary's face in an instant.
The Vampire Princess ignored it, closing her eyes as she drank from the punctured neck.
And then.
"......!!"
Her eyes flew wide in agitation.
As if seeing something impossible.
As if something unexpected had come true.
"......."
And simultaneously, as if something inconceivable had happened.
"......."
The Vampire Princess, looking shocked, stepped back, and the Succubus Secretary collapsed, legs giving out.
"Haa, haa, haa."
The Succubus Secretary, lost in ecstasy, clutched her neck.
They say being bitten by a near-true ancestor vampire brings incomparable pleasure.
That one marinates in bliss unaware even as death approaches—just like her now.
The fortunate part?
"You."
The Vampire Princess had stopped her draining bite after reading the memories.
"Not a shred of falsehood in what you saw."
"......Yes!"
The Succubus Secretary nodded vigorously.
"He—"
"Shh."
As the Succubus Secretary opened her mouth, the Vampire Princess pressed a finger to her lips.
"Quiet. Don't speak."
"......!!"
"Akkamond."
"Yes, Master."
The old vampire Akkamond approached quietly.
"Attend the cadres' meeting in my stead."
"P-Pardon?"
"It's just a routine meeting. Nothing urgent, so a proxy's fine."
"B-But... without a proper excuse, the other cadres will grow suspicious."
Akkamond eyed the Vampire Princess up and down.
"Whatever it is, if Her Highness must confirm personally, it's grave indeed. As for why I'm proxy..."
"Say my period hit."
"......."
Akkamond's already pale face blanched further, but the Vampire Princess was already helping the Succubus Secretary up by hand.
"We'll talk after the meeting. Stall, Akkamond."
"Understood. And not just the cadres..."
"Classified, even from the Demon King."
Akkamond mimed zipping his lips and nodded deeply.
"Good luck, Master."
"Mm."
After Akkamond gathered stacks of documents and vanished somewhere.
"Well then... shall we go meet him?"
The Vampire Princess smirked and reached for one of the many mirrors on the hall wall.
"Toward my legion's hope, who awakened my aspirations and the 'ancient power'."
"Ancient... power."
The Succubus Secretary swallowed hard, and the Vampire Princess reached into the mirror.
"If that power is a fragment of the 'Chaos Demon God', worship forbidden since the current Demon King's ascension. If succeeding in corruption has brought part of that power back to this land..."
Lick.
"My thinking wasn't wrong after all."
The Vampire Princess placed a hand on her chest, smiling rapturously.
"That trainer—we must plant him in our legion, by any means necessary."