The Bait
On the night of our promised meeting, I leaned against a tree in the forest where Kaen and I had agreed to meet, waiting for her arrival.
"Hmm..." Sierra let out a low, discontented hum, staring at me with a pout on her face.
Even though I felt I had explained myself well enough to her, she still scolded me, asking if I really had to phrase it that way. I decided to just bear with it. Besides, the footsteps of Kaen approaching from the distance were already heavy with immense anguish.
Kaen spotted me from afar and hesitated, hovering in place instead of drawing closer.
"You are late," I said to Kaen, who I knew was staring at me, without even turning my head.
Only then did she hesitantly shuffle toward me. As I had requested, she was wearing casual clothes instead of her academy uniform.
"I-I could understand if it were the dormitory, but calling me out to a forest like this..."
"And how exactly would we meet in the dormitory?"
"By sneaking in, or something..."
I ignored her muttering and stood up. Kaen looked like she had a mountain of things she wanted to say, but she chose to keep them to herself.
Now that Kaen had arrived, I began walking to head outside the academy. When I started moving without offering any explanation, she mumbled something like, "Still, the outdoors is a bit..." before obediently falling into step behind me.
We walked through the quiet forest in silence. Suddenly—thud! I heard the sound of Kaen tripping behind me.
"Oof..." Turning around, I saw Kaen sprawled on the ground, having tripped over a tree root, looking on the verge of tears.
"...Is it very dark right now?" I asked, helping her to her feet. Because my Night Vision skill was active, everything around me was perfectly bright, leaving me unable to gauge the actual darkness.
"..." Kaen took my hand, stood up, and brushed off her clothes. Fortunately, she didn't seem to be hurt. From then on, I made sure to warn her about any roots or rocks in her path.
The forest was as quiet as ever. Along the way, Kaen suddenly stopped and stared blankly at something, prompting me to halt as well. Fireflies? Over a small stream running through the woods, tiny, glowing insects drifted through the air, casting a soft light.
I waited patiently for her. Soon, she snapped out of her daze and looked at me. "..." Her gaze lingered on the blindfold covering my eyes before she silently resumed walking.
As we continued to walk in silence without any explanation, Kaen, who had been quietly trailing behind, finally let out a whine of complaint.
"Um, excuse me, but could you at least tell me where we are going? Is it really necessary to go this deep into the forest...? W-We could just do it anywhere..."
"We have arrived," I said, calmly cutting her off. A look of utter confusion washed over her face.
"This way." I approached a gap in the massive fence surrounding the forest, just large enough for a single person to squeeze through. It was the secret path I frequently used whenever I snuck out of the academy.
I slipped through the gap first and waited for Kaen to follow. On the other side of the fence, she stood hesitating, reluctant to cross over.
"You... did promise, did you not?" At the mention of our agreement, Kaen let out a deep sigh and finally squeezed through the gap.
"To think the reason you told me to wear casual clothes was to sneak out of the academy... What is even out here? Ah, wait. Is it because there's nothing out here...?" Kaen grumbled, smoothing down her hair as she stepped onto the other side.
"Let's go catch a carriage," I said, pulling a hooded robe over my shoulders. Kaen stared intently at the robe before speaking up.
"...Why are you putting on a robe?"
"Well, I tend to stand out quite a bit because of 'this,' do I not?" I pointed to the blindfold covering my eyes. Kaen stared at me, seemingly at a loss for words, and quietly followed behind.
We walked in silence toward the carriage stop. "There's no way a carriage would be waiting in a remote place like th—" Just as Kaen was speaking, the carriage I frequently chartered came into view.
"Yo! Brought a young lady with you this time, eh?" the coachman called out cheerfully upon spotting me. I walked over, handed him the fare, and gave him our destination.
"...It seems this isn't your first or second time sneaking out, Cadet Zeto." Kaen climbed into the carriage, looking suspiciously at the familiar rapport between the coachman and me. Well, I did sneak out quite a lot. I simply shrugged in response. We set off toward our destination in the swaying carriage, accompanied by the endless chatter of the talkative coachman.
This venture wasn't exactly a quest. It was more of an "accidental event" I was intentionally triggering. Still, resolving it would yield a very decent item.
In our destination city, a criminal syndicate serving a high-ranking vampire was lurking in the shadows. They kidnapped young virgins from the city and offered them to the vampire in exchange for money—essentially acting as a subcontracted kidnapping ring.
The syndicate, being quite loyal to their master, had prepared a piece of armor as a tribute. That armor was my target. Since it was meant as a gift for a vampire, it uniquely possessed a special stat: Holy Magic Resistance.
Holy Magic Resistance wasn't a particularly useful stat for the battles ahead, as enemies wielding divine power were rare. However, the armor also boasted exceptionally high physical defense, making it a highly-rated piece of gear in the game.
The only problem was that I didn't know the exact location of their hideout. In the game, players wandering around this city would hear rumors about disappearing virgins. The game would build up an ominous atmosphere as if an event was about to trigger, but no matter how much you roamed the streets afterward, nothing would happen.
To trigger the event, the player had to intentionally unequip all weapons and wander the streets at night to get kidnapped. Only then would they be taken to the syndicate's hideout. It was a hidden mechanic that a player had stumbled upon purely by accident.
Since the syndicate only targeted young virgins, this method was naturally only possible if the player character was female. Once successfully kidnapped, the screen would fade to black, and the player would wake up inside the hideout. However, because the game skipped the journey to the hideout and only showed the escape afterward, there was no way to find the location beforehand. The developers had intentionally locked this event to female characters.
Of course, now that the game had become reality, there were other potential workarounds. But I couldn't just wait around indefinitely, not knowing when, where, or who they would kidnap next. While I had no way of identifying a virgin walking down the street, the kidnappers possessed a unique method to detect them. I couldn't afford to waste time staking out the city forever.
That was why I had put this matter out of my mind. But since I had won a favor from Kaen in our duel, I decided to use it to acquire the armor. We had already arrived at our destination. To get kidnapped, Kaen had to disarm herself. After walking through the city streets for a bit, I asked her to hand over her sword. Her patience finally snapped, and she dragged me into a deserted alleyway to demand answers.
"Now you want my sword too?! I don't care how empty the streets are... What are you planning to do to me here after taking my weapon? I-I've never even heard of such a bizarre fetish before...!"
Kaen, who had been speaking with her arms crossed, ended up pointing a trembling finger at me, her eyes welling with tears. I scratched the back of my neck, realizing it was finally time to clear up the misunderstanding.
"I think you are misunderstanding something... I did not bring you here with that kind of intention, Miss Kaen."
"W-What do you mean by 'that'?! Then why did you say you needed my body..." As I began to explain, her voice grew quieter, filled with confusion. Leaning against the alley wall, I turned my head toward the main street and continued.
"There are rumors circulating that young women are disappearing from this city every night. I found it suspicious and investigated, only to find that the rumors are true. Women really are vanishing. I suspect a vampire is behind this."
My sudden, detailed explanation caught her off guard. Naturally, Kaen found it difficult to keep up with the rapid shift in conversation.
"A-A vampire all of a sudden? This is moving way too fast. How do you even know about this, Cadet Zeto? ...And even if it is true, this doesn't seem like something academy cadets should be getting involved in..." Kaen bombarded me with questions, unable to make sense of the situation.
"I am simply carrying out my master's will. It is also the reason why I can finally wield the sword she left behind. As for the information... let's just say I have an exceptionally talented informant." I offered a plausible excuse. It only needed to be convincing enough to ease her doubts so she would cooperate.
"Master's will, indeed... Are you going to attribute achievements to This Lady that I have never even accomplished? ...Well, I suppose that has its own charm." Sierra's amused snort echoed in my mind.
Kaen looked down at the ground and murmured softly, "Your master..." She was likely thinking of her own master, the Sword Saint. As his disciple, she understood better than anyone how profound of an influence a master held over their pupil.
"...Fine. Let's say that is the case. But why does that mean I have to hand my sword over to you?" Kaen asked, accepting my fabricated story without much resistance.
"I believe I told you that I required your body for this, did I not?" I took a step closer to her, speaking in a low, suggestive tone. The moment the word 'body' left my lips, Kaen's face flushed a deep crimson.
"Even my informant couldn't pinpoint the exact location of their hideout. That is why I decided to change our approach." I stared down at Kaen, whose cheeks remained burning hot.
"An... approach?" Kaen tilted her head, still struggling to grasp my meaning.
"We will use a bait to locate their hideout, and then launch a surprise attack. ...And that 'bait' is going to be you, Miss Kaen."
"Then... d-does that mean... when you said you needed my body, you meant..." Having suddenly become the bait, Kaen finally connected the dots and stammered.
"Even at this very moment, innocent young women are likely having their blood drained by a vampire." I stepped closer as she instinctively backed away. Leaning in until our faces were inches apart, I whispered.
"...So, please leave your sword with me and allow yourself to be kidnapped, Miss Kaen." I offered her a warm, reassuring smile to put her mind at ease.
In the end, Kaen agreed to cooperate. "A promise is a promise, but if what you say is true, then we can save innocent people!" she had declared with fierce determination. It was a sentiment truly worthy of the Sword Saint's disciple.
And so, I leaped onto the rooftops of the nearby buildings, leaping from roof to roof while concealing my presence to tail her. Looking down, I could see a girl with pink twin-tails walking anxiously through the deserted streets.
"Are you certain she will be alright...?" Sierra, floating alongside me, asked in a worried tone as she watched Kaen.
"She will be fine," I replied. I would make sure she never faced any real danger. If I lost track of her, things could get risky, but with my Night Vision active, there was no way I would lose sight of that vibrant pink hair in the dark.
Besides, if I recalled correctly, the syndicate members were only around level 20. At level 30, Kaen could easily beat them to a pulp with her bare fists if she had to.
After tailing her for about twenty minutes, a figure wearing a top hat caught my eye, stealthily creeping up behind Kaen. Finally, they show themselves. It was a mob I recognized from the game.
Hidden beneath that tall hat was a "unicorn horn" grafted onto his skull by the vampire. In almost any media, unicorns shared a deep connection with virgins. In this game, unicorns were monsters, but they possessed a unique trait: they would never attack a virgin. In other words, they could instinctively identify them.
Vampires craved the blood of virgins above all else. To satisfy this thirst, the vile vampire had surgically implanted a unicorn's horn into the crown of his human servant's head. The servant used the horn to sniff out virgins, treating it as a sort of biological radar.
"M-My, it sure is nice that the streets are completely empty tonight...!" Kaen, having noticed her stalker, spoke in a painfully awkward, forced voice. Did she really have to say that out loud? She was trying to act oblivious to facilitate the kidnapping, but the problem was that Kaen genuinely believed she was a master actress.
"Does she truly believe she is fooling anyone with that performance...?" Sierra seemed to share my sentiment.
Yet, contrary to our expectations, the top-hatted man approached her without a shred of suspicion. He lunged forward, pressing a chloroform-soaked cloth over her mouth and nose.
"Mmph... m-mmph!" Kaen put on a half-hearted struggle before dramatically limp-falling to the ground, pretending to lose consciousness.
"Hehehe... Too easy." The man let out a sinister chuckle and removed his top hat, revealing a grotesque unicorn horn protruding from the center of his skull. He leaned down, pointing the tip of the horn toward the collapsed Kaen, and gasped in delight. "She's a pure one, alright!"
Watching this absurd spectacle unfold, Sierra spoke in a flat, deadpan voice. "I believe I now understand why her terrible acting succeeded..."
"...Me too," I muttered under my breath.