Chapter 539: Bloody Requiem (14)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 539: Bloody Requiem (14)
The ancient castle, once roaring with clashes from every corner, fell silent in an instant.
Everyone felt it. Everyone saw it.
The Duke’s death.
It was an unbelievable event for both sides.
“The… The Duke was defeated….”
“Hey, did you see that?! Our young gun took down that monster!”
Everyone knew.
They all knew just how powerful Duke Vlad Tepes was.
The shock dealt a devastating blow to the vampires’ morale.
“N-No way….”
“How could the Duke fall to a mere blood bag…?!”
The True Ancestor had only recently awoken from his deep slumber.
So who had been leading the vampires until now?
The answer was obvious.
Duke Vlad Tepes.
The kingless remnants of the army had gathered under the Duke’s command to bide their time.
He had built a reputation by playing the part of a passionate president, then used that fame to set his plans in motion—organizing large-scale blood drives under the guise of overwhelming public support, or capturing bandits outside the capital to drain their blood.
All the blood he collected was used for the True Ancestor’s revival.
The fact that his resurrection, which should have taken at least a hundred years, was accomplished in less than ten was a testament to the sheer volume of blood that had been sacrificed.
Though he was a far cry from the True Ancestor, for the past decade, the Duke had been another small sun to them.
“Don’t miss this chance!”
“Push them back all at once!”
“Just a little more!”
Seeing the vampires’ spirit shatter, the Raid Team immediately launched an offensive.
Everyone gathered here was a veteran.
They all knew this was the perfect opportunity to seize an easy victory.
Slice!
“Kugh…!”
Boom! Boom! Boom!
“Gaaah!”
“Kyaaak!”
The vampires fell, given no time to react.
Their screams reached the True Ancestor’s ears with perfect clarity.
“…Pathetic fools.”
His expression soured.
He didn’t like it—the whimpering of these weaklings, shaken by the Duke’s death while their king was still fighting.
He even began to doubt if they were truly vampires born of his blood.
“Heh heh… What will you do now? You’ve lost your last remaining subordinate.”
Francis Meyer’s taunt followed.
The True Ancestor, Jasper Vladimir, scoffed in response.
“It’s nothing more than the death of a chess piece. I can always make another.”
A cold smile formed on his lips.
“And the next chess pieces will be your comrades.”
Francis’s expression hardened.
To be defeated by a monster was one thing, but to live on as his minion?
There could be no greater humiliation.
He tightened his grip on his sword and muttered.
“That’s not going to happen.”
“Is that so? Do you truly believe you can stop me?”
“Alone, it would be impossible.”
But.
“I’m not alone anymore, am I?”
Having finished a brief check of his condition after finishing off the Duke, Kim Do-jin immediately joined him.
Now there were two, not one.
No.
“Ajeossi! You’re alive?!”
One more person was added to their ranks.
“Oh, you’re still in one piece!”
“Were you hoping I’d be dead?”
“Hmph, as if you could die.”
“That would be a bit difficult, wouldn’t it?”
“Ehehehe.”
“Hahahaha!”
Angela, having finally ended the Marquis’s life after a long and arduous battle, had arrived.
That made three.
But it didn’t end there.
“Francis! We’re joining you!”
“I don’t know how much help we’ll be, though.”
“Just tell us what to do!”
One by one, comrades began to gather from all over.
“We will assist as well.”
Even the Volunteer Group, who had been tied up treating the wounded, joined in.
Everyone was here.
Everyone except those too injured to fight.
They all stood before the True Ancestor, who radiated an aura so powerful it was terrifying.
“How about it?”
A deep smile spread across Francis’s face, his comrades at his back.
“With this many of us, don’t you think we have a chance?”
He was truly confident of victory.
Because when his comrades had his back, he had never known defeat.
Not even once.
The True Ancestor smiled back at him.
“Come. I will teach you what a true difference in power looks like.”
Whether it was one weak human or dozens…
Nothing would change.
“Hup…!”
“Hmph!”
A group standing back-to-back against a single individual standing utterly alone.
KRA-KOOM—!
The two diametrically opposed forces collided.
*
Our lives are not a drama.
Much less a shonen manga.
But sometimes, it happens.
That thrilling moment when a team snatches victory with a walk-off grand slam in the bottom of the ninth with two outs.
The only difference is that what happens as often as breathing in dramas or shonen manga occurs with an incredibly low probability in reality.
To make an analogy, it’s like pulling the ultimate 5-star character that has a 0.0001% drop rate in a mobile game.
Why am I saying all this now?
“…I’m fucked.”
Because I was, in fact, fucked.
A group against an individual.
The power of the True Ancestor, which I had only observed from a distance, far exceeded my expectations.
Far, far exceeded.
「Bloody Rose」
A red rose began to bloom from his fingertips, soon blanketing the world.
A crimson rose, as if made from molten ruby.
That single, beautiful flower soon came into full bloom.
Wide open.
Its tightly closed bud unfurled, naturally stealing everyone’s gaze.
Then, one by one, its petals began to fall, scattering and tormenting the onlookers.
“Ah…!”
No flower stays red for ten days.
It was as if the flower was embodying the saying that even the most beautiful things cannot last.
A single petal, drawing gasps from all, drifted down and landed on a Raid Team member’s shoulder.
It fluttered precariously on his sloped shoulder, looking as if it would fall at any moment.
Then, before he could do anything, it mercilessly took root in his shoulder.
Plunge—!
“Keuk…?!”
The root dug deep, causing immense pain as it began to relentlessly suck his blood.
“My blood, my blood is—GAAAAAH!”
And then they bloomed.
Hundreds of new roses, nourished by the team member’s blood.
All over his body.
Francis screamed.
“Get back, now!”
He and I, after shouting the warning, immediately lunged forward, cutting down as many of the fluttering petals as we could.
Swish-swish-swish-swish-swish!
But it wasn’t enough.
It was impossible to slice through the thousands, tens of thousands of petals scattering from hundreds of flowers in a single breath.
The petals we missed mercilessly stole the lives of our comrades.
“P-Put up a barrier!”
“It’s no use! The petals are phasing right through it!”
The hastily erected barriers couldn’t stop the petals.
It was as if they weren’t even attacks.
“Th-Then block them with something physical…!”
Tankers holding shields stepped forward to block the petals.
「Ice Wall」
「Earth Wall」
The barriers raised by the mages met the same fate.
The fluttering petals couldn’t penetrate the physical shields.
For a brief moment, I thought we could hold them off here.
But another blood magic spell cast by the True Ancestor pushed the Raid Team deeper into death’s embrace.
「Bloody Tornado」
Gathering the petals that had been gracefully drifting down from above…
WHOOOOOSH!
A crimson storm raged.
The petals, empowered by the storm, shot out in every direction and clung to the bodies of the Raid Team members.
Plunge!
And they drank, causing dozens of red roses to bloom upon their bodies.
“Keuk, kugh…!”
“S-Save… me….”
“I-I don’t want to die!”
“GUWAAAAAAAAAAH—!”
Strangely, unlike the first victim who died instantly, those who were consumed afterward did not perish right away.
Instead, their lives were drained away with excruciating slowness.
As if to meticulously carve the meaning of fear and death into their minds.
When most of them had been consumed by the flowers and were slowly marching toward death, the True Ancestor finally spoke, a look of satisfaction on his face.
“I will not kill you. You will become my minions and serve me.”
For a hundred years, or a thousand.
“Huhuhuhu.”
His low laughter echoed throughout the castle, tightening its grip on my heart.
My gaze was fixed on one spot.
“Keuk…!”
“I-It hurts… sob…!”
Si-hoo and Ha-rin.
“Agh…!”
“Ugh, heua….”
“Fuck… it hurts so much… hic!”
Elena, Seo-yeon, and Shin Yu-jeong collapsed one after another.
It was to be expected.
If even seasoned veterans of the industry were taken down without a chance to properly react, what hope did they have of stopping such an attack?
However… their conditions were relatively better.
“Just hold on a little longer, kids!”
Ju-yeon was desperately holding onto her comrades’ lifelines.
But it wouldn’t last long.
Even for an S-rank Hunter, divine power wasn’t infinite.
No.
Since he said he would make them his minions, perhaps I should assume they wouldn’t die.
Either way, it was just as disgusting.
“That son of a bitch.”
The fact that this bastard held my comrades’ lives in his hands didn’t change.
“Hoo.”
I forced myself to cool my burning head and searched for a way out.
What do I do?
How in the world can I wring that bastard’s neck?
“Hoo….”
I didn’t know.
How was I supposed to fight that monster?
Even if I got an opportunity, could I even finish him off?
Just as my mind was descending into chaos, the True Ancestor’s gaze fell upon me.
“I saw and heard you clearly just now. You said your talent was heavier than my blood.”
The bastard chuckled.
“It wasn’t a baseless boast. The single strike you showed when you cut down the Duke was truly marvelous.”
Despite his condescending smile, he genuinely acknowledged my talent.
“To so perfectly unite two talents with such polar opposite paths and directions… that is something even I could not do.”
A faint light flickered in his crimson eyes.
“That is why I wish to make you a proposal.”
A proposal?
What a joke.
“I refuse. I have no intention of listening to whatever you have to say.”
“Huhu, I wonder. You might think differently once you hear it. It is, after all, a most alluring proposal.”
With a confident expression, he extended a deathly pale hand toward me and continued.
“In place of the dead Duke, become the new Duke and serve me.”
“…What?”
What kind of nonsense was this…?
“Do so, and I will let every human here go free, including that arrogant Francis.”
“……!”
Just as he’d said, it was an offer that was difficult to refuse.