The Fugitives (1)
The low chant echoed through the chamber. “The curse of blood shall rise like crimson mist!”
As the words left his lips, a red, blood-colored fog began to surge upward around Ikshion’s body.
“Peter, Honnow, come here.”
The two boys he treated as servants approached. Ikshion took their hands.
“I shall witness your devout hearts toward Lord Blatian. Rejoice, for you will be put to use in the ‘Mist of Grace’ bestowed by Lord Blatian.”
In that instant, a thick, viscous blood-red mist poured out from around Ikshion. In contrast, the skin of the two boys whose hands he held began to shrivel as if air were being sucked from a balloon. Within moments, they looked like nothing more than skin and bones.
“P-Preacher… s-spare us… ughhh…”
“Hahaha. Did I ever say I was going to kill you? This is simply an act of piety—returning the blood Lord Blatian granted you back to the church.”
Once the blood mist seemed sufficiently gathered, Ikshion flung the children aside. He then stepped forward, and the blood mist moved with him as if it were alive.
It was then that he came face to face with me—swinging my mace and firing off bursts of blue light.
When the female mercenary had been struck by an arrow and died, her blood had spilled right before my eyes. And when the defectors were ambushed and slaughtered, there had been even more blood. At some point, I must have grown desensitized; the metallic stench no longer registered even when it flooded my nose.
Even while I was busy killing people with my mace, the smell of blood hadn’t bothered me. But now, an overwhelming reek suddenly slammed into my nostrils—so intense it felt like it was filling every sinus. It was as if someone had deliberately created and sprayed the scent into the air.
The pungent odor made me realize something around me had changed.
“Blood mist?”
A crimson fog, thick as smoke from a smoke grenade, swirled all around us. It clung to my clothes and skin like the clammy humidity of a midsummer monsoon, seeping in.
It felt gross and wrong. I tried to move away, but I couldn’t tell which direction was which. It was like I’d been hit with a spell.
Wondering if it was some kind of illusion magic, I tried to dash forward or sideways, but I collided with something. It was Meni and Pyutel. They looked like me, yet different—both of them were coated in a thick layer of something that looked like dried blood.
“My body… won’t move. Feels like I’m underwater.”
“This blood mist seems to be sticking to us like slime, preventing any movement,” Pyutel said tersely.
Thinking it might still be an illusion, I cast buffs on both of them and refreshed my own. Nothing changed. If anything, the blood mist that had begun clinging to me made my body feel heavier, sluggish.
At first I thought it was just bloody moisture soaking into my clothes and skin like thick fog. But then the blood began to merge, transforming into something slime-like that started covering my entire body. It felt exactly like I’d gotten stuck on the rat glue I’d left out to catch pests.
I tried to forcibly rip the bloody slime off, but it wouldn’t tear away. Realizing I was in serious trouble, I quickly circulated my mana and spat a stream of fire from my hand.
The flames startled the blood mist and made it retreat, but my wrist joints were already encased in the bloody slime. I couldn’t even bend my arm properly.
“Fuck, what the hell is this!”
The proliferating bloody slime began to cover my whole body. It felt like I was being wrapped in multiple layers of thick latex.
“C-can’t… breathe…” Meni groaned.
Pyutel was the same. The thick, latex-like coating pressed down on every inch of us, making movement impossible. The crushing pressure made it hard to even speak, and breathing grew increasingly difficult.
“Kuhuhu. It seems everyone is overwhelmed by Lord Blatian’s grace. How delightful. Don’t you think you should offer something in return for this divine favor?”
Ikshion emerged through the blood mist. In his hand was a tiny dagger no longer than a palm’s width.
“Doesn’t it feel like you’ve become scarecrows, unable to move? Isn’t that wonderful? A scarecrow remains a scarecrow even if you stab it in the neck. So you can stay exactly as you are right now.”
His pointless joke carried a strange, dreamlike quality—as if a spell had been woven into his words. The fact that I couldn’t move a muscle while he approached to stab me in the throat filled me with unbearable frustration.
I tried every buff I had and forced my mana to move, but the bloody slime coating my body refused to let me budge. There was nothing I could do.
“Fuck…”
Now the slime had covered even my face. I really thought I was going to die.
[Squish—!]
I was convinced a hole would be punched through my neck and I’d drop dead back on Earth from sudden cardiac arrest. Yet there was no pain in my throat at all.
Then came the sharp clang of metal hitting the ground. Only then did I sense that something was off.
I twisted my body with all my strength, and the bloody slime covering my eyes finally receded. When I opened them, the scene before me left me stunned.
Ikshion stood with his eyes wide, the dagger he’d meant to stab me with lying on the floor. A black blade protruded a full hand’s length from his chest.
Wondering who had done it, I turned my gaze and saw a vampire standing behind him.
“Hahaha. Ikshion, you fell for your own trick!”
It was the vampire named Carol.
Carol, who had been driven like prey and blocked by holy water, had fully recovered. He had driven a blade into Ikshion’s back from behind.
“H-how… your wounds should have been too severe for proper regeneration… glurk…”
Even as he died with a hole through his chest, Ikshion’s curiosity won out.
“All thanks to you. Thanks to this ‘Mist of Grace’ you cast, I was able to obtain the blood needed to heal my wounds. Hahaha.”
“Ah… damn it… why didn’t I think of that…”
With a look of utter resentment, Ikshion died with his eyes still open.
“Hmph. If you had known the history of the faith, you never would have unleashed the Mist of Grace that creates this blood fog. This spell is one of the support magics created specifically for us vampires.”
As Carol spoke, the bloody slime that had covered my body began to slide off. It vaporized once more into mist and seeped into Carol’s form.
“I’ll be taking all of this.”
When Carol placed his hands on me, Meni, and Pyutel, the slime that had been slowly dripping off us flew toward him and was absorbed.
“Mmmhaa— How long has it been since I possessed this much blood power? When was the last time I was so filled with Lord Blatian’s holy spirit… Haaaa—”
The blood mist swirled like a tornado as it rushed into Carol. Having absorbed the fog, he closed his eyes in rapture and let out continuous sighs of ecstasy.
Once every trace of the blood mist that had filled the area was gone, Carol opened his eyes and began to rampage like a madman.
Until now, Carol had fought by grabbing enemies, flying into the air, and dropping them. But with his body overflowing with the power of blood, there was no longer any need for such theatrics. A single gesture sent shields flying. A single kick burst open the stomach of a burly man, killing him instantly. He needed nothing else.
“L-Lord Carol, spare us! We were dragged here against our will!”
“Me too! Preacher Ikshion forced us to come! Please spare us!”
Once two or three threw down their weapons and fell to their knees, the rest began to read the room. When they realized that Ikshion and all the other leaders of the nearby church faction were dead, they scrambled over one another to discard their arms.
“The oracle from Lord Blatian was correctly interpreted as the birth of a new vampire. This very situation proves it!”
“Waaaaah!”
When the summoner Harhil stepped forward and shouted, those once called defectors all raised their voices in fervent cheers.
“Ugh, it’s gross. I want a shower.”
The bloody slime that had felt like rat glue had been completely absorbed by Carol. Still, the memory of my entire body being wrapped in that bloody mass left me feeling inexplicably dirty.
“Looks like everything worked out. What do you plan to do with them now?”
Cezanne’s words snapped me back to practical reality.
“Now that the pursuers are gone, it should be fine, right?”
“Not at all. Why do you think the other priests pulled out? The Blatian Church—and every other church—does not forgive defectors.”
“So they have to die for this to end?”
“Yes. They will keep sending pursuers until every last defector is dead. Unless you flee as far as the Arean Continent, the chase will never stop.”
Only then did the true weight of my decision to accept these people begin to sink in.
After some thought, it seemed I first needed to sort out the priests who had left their party. Since priests tended to share information quickly among themselves, I could make use of that as well.
“Then I guess we have no choice but to head for the Arean Continent. No helping it.”
I was in the middle of bluffing the priests when Carol and Harhil approached, the battlefield now under control.
“First, I wish to apologize for the previous ambush. When our scout party first entered, Melanie said this was a disputed zone and that it made no sense for another mercenary party to be here. We assumed it was a trap and attacked.”
“Since no one died in the ambush, we can let it slide. By the way, do you have a map of the dungeon drawn up? We entered on a scouting request, so we need to complete it.”
“Ah, of course.”
Harhil brought the map they had drawn, and the group that had come with Preacher Ikshion also produced theirs.
“Combining all three maps—including the one we drew—should be enough to complete the scouting request. Hmm. There are three other entrances besides the one we used.”
There was the disputed zone we had entered from, one connected to the Aiparak Dungeon, and two entrances coming from the Redecup Kingdom. On the fourth-floor map, the words Bone Dragon were written.
“Have you actually seen this Bone Dragon?”
Since a dragon was basically a final boss in this world, I had to confirm.
“I saw it myself. There was a lich mage as well, so I couldn’t get too close, but it definitely exists.”
It was the vampire Carol. He must have used his vampiric abilities to scout the fourth floor.
“Priests, since a Bone Dragon is on the fourth floor and it is beyond our ability to handle, we will conclude this request by withdrawing.”
“Hmm. If it’s a Bone Dragon, Count Shulman will surely understand.”
Following the priests’ lead, even the Rangers offered no further objections at the mention of a Bone Dragon.
“We will close the scouting request here. As for the matter of heading to a sanctuary, we’ll need you to wait a little longer.”
“Then… are we really going to the Arean Continent?”
“Since the Blatian Church will continue to pursue us, crossing continents is the right choice.”
The elderly summoner Harhil nodded. He had originally planned to head to the Dark Lands of the North—a frozen wasteland abandoned by the world. Compared to that forsaken place, the Arean Continent with its many sand deserts seemed far more appealing.
“We’ll head up, make our report, and prepare transportation. Do you have enough food to hold out here until then?”
“We have the supplies the preacher brought, so we should be able to last a month.”
“Then let’s all rest a bit before heading up.”
We moved to the space where Carol and his group had been staying. There was nothing there. It was just an empty cavern with piles of luggage.
Once the excitement of battle faded, weeping began to echo from every direction. The fretful cries of children mixed with the sobs of those remembering family members they had killed or lost. The atmosphere grew unbearably heavy.
In the dark dungeon lit only by a few candles, the gloom pressed down on my chest even more. The realization that in this world, humans existed for the sake of gods rather than the other way around filled me with irritation and frustration.
I lay down, pretending to rest, and tried to force myself to sleep.
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“What should I feed them to make people say I fed them well and put everyone in a good mood?”
I needed something that could wash away the suffocating darkness of that dungeon.