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After introducing Dilorè to Mother’s kelpie at the mill pond where she lives and learning from Carson how to operate the front gate for myself, I changed into my armor.
Genette shook her head in silent disapproval the entire time I was arming myself. The two-piece swimsuit exists in this country, but my armor would be on the daring side even for Orestanian swimwear.
Once I had Durandal strapped to my hip, I headed out, but I did so while feeling very conflicted. It was less than three hours since Rod and company arrived, and that time had mostly been spent on the requisite welcoming dinner. I had a long list of subjects I could not bring up in front of everyone else in the parlor or the dining room, so they had to wait. And I had found no time to discuss them with the involved people.
I wanted Dilorè, Ryuu and Chiara to explain exactly how they ended up outside the mountain where I left them, and in charge of transporting Rod and the contingent of fairies and mages that Oberon sent from Relador to Atianus. I did try to ask Dilorè, but she insisted on hearing about the things that happened in Cara Ita first, and then we were dealing with the kelpie. The two were still negotiating when I left.
I wanted Rod to explain in much more detail exactly what he believed he could accomplish here, even though I strongly suspected he just winging it, and his only well-formed goal was being in Atianus in order to prevent Ged from walking into the danger here.
And I very definitely wanted to have a long heart-to-heart with a certain pink-haired shoujo pseudo-protagonist.
No, I was not jealous of her, even though all evidence showed she was clinging to Rod. She clearly needed to, for her own protection, and Diur had apparently approved of and helped implement this situation, so I didn’t blame her. And… well, frankly, if anything was happening between them, I would consider it a good thing.
If I did marry to Rod, he needed a concubine or mistress who was actually attracted to his gender to stand in for me. Mireia wouldn’t be a bad choice, if she really was the powerful alien wizard that Diur described. The only better places for her would be either attached to Ged or attached to Uncle Owen, presumably in the same role. As a non-aristocrat, she couldn’t legally marry any of them, under current Temple law, which only allows marrying up or down one class, but no law prevented her from being a concubine.
Of course, that was assuming she wanted such a thing. I had no intention to force it on her, of course, and I had no idea what her feelings actually were.
I approached the Royal Army base which had been operating as Uncle Owen’s headquarters in full vampire cloak, and witnessed for the first time just what they meant by the camp being devastated. The damage had extended into the village of Langram nearby, and the level of destruction rivaled an F5 tornado.
In the camp, many tents had been restored, but it was obvious from the mess and the many sites still ravaged that the entire camp had been flattened.
Expanding my mind to manage the inflowing information, I sent out a [Blood Mist] to inspect the area in better detail.
Almost immediately, before I could begin to learn anything, a strange force punched back against it. I pulled away in surprise, withdrawing the mist with me, then found the force reaching outward, as if trying to wrestle control of my thin haze of condensed blood from me.
Alarmed, I pushed out at it with my fairy sense, intensifying it with the extra spiritual strength I was able to exert with my expanded mind. The nature of the strange force became apparent immediately; it was another vampire’s [Blood Mist], veiled with the same [Vampire Cloak] skill that I was using.
Another blood magic user was here, and determined to find me. I instantly sucked all the blood back into my core, while spilling out all seven mana elements and Holy mana from the core into my mana pathways and my spiritual vessel, arming for combat.
Old Man, we have an opponent, I said, although I did not draw my blade yet. Not sure if you can perceive them. Get ready for a fight.
As you wish, My Lady! he replied. Durandal had a way of always sounding one hundred percent confident when combat was imminent.
Then a large [Wind Scythe] cut through the air at me at shockingly high speed, shattering when it hit [Fortress of Gaia] and generating a powerful shock from the opposing manas.
It helped me finally locate the well-concealed blood magic user in my fairy sense, as a faint blotch on the ground. I had my combat fan out and tied to my wrist already, but I decided to draw the Starfire Jade Writing Brush instead of Durandal. The fan wasn’t good with high levels of Fire or Light, and these elements were the best when the opponent turned out to be a vampire rather than a demon. Then I poured on the speed, using Will to push aside the [Blood Mist] as I bored a hole through it, toward its owner.
The opponent bolted and then rose into the air, following a standard take-off path for a normal vampire. They’re stronger flyers than bird kindred, but still can’t just leap straight into the air like fairies.
So the opponent was not just a blood magician, but a strong combat mage too.
But I had their exact position and trajectory, and the Writing Brush. I aimed the handle end and intoned in my mind, [Light Bullet]
It was one of the level one spells that Ceria had managed to teach me during our mission in the Tabad, and this was the first time I had a chance to use it. One wouldn’t think a ‘bullet of light’ had any ability to inflict damage, but manifested mana is a strange thing. It doesn’t obey Newton’s Laws. The physics in this world is orderly, but it isn’t the same physics as Earth. A [Light Bullet] can hit with force. And it looks more than a little bit like a shot from Han Solo’s blaster.
Right now, it had another important quality. Vampire physiques are as strongly founded upon Darkness as naiad physiques are founded on Water. And Light mana is the polar opposite of Darkness, so it was the most effective thing I could fire at this opponent.
However, they had the right response, casting out a shield of Darkness to absorb the bullet. But I had sent a spray of four rounds, and the fourth overcame the shield. It penetrated and hit the vague shape of a vampire in one of their wings.
While this was happening, a moment after they suffered damage to their means of flight, I charged them head on, while chanting [Body Fortification] in my mind. But I still didn’t draw Durandal. After all, I had no idea what side this opponent was on. I was still going for non-lethal attacks.
By this time, we had left the perimeter of the camp, and were over a space that was probably once a farmer’s field but now employed as a drilling ground. I intended to tackle the opponent, but I collided with another Darkness shield thrown out at the last moment.
Fortunately, the [Body Fortification] was plenty enough to buffer me from the impact, and I only needed to pump more Light into the Writing Brush because the spell was still active. A [Light Bullet] at point blank range blew the shield away, and I dropped both fan and brush in order to sieze the figure by the arms and fly it into the ground.
It wasn’t that reckless, dropping my two magic items. One was tied to my wrist, and the other can be called like a pet, returning under its own power.
The air huffed out of my opponent as she struck the ground and her wings dematerialized in the shock of impact. I held her pinned to the ground by her upper arms while crouching over her.
A moment later, I gaped at the stunned woman beneath way and stammered, “Aunt Elianora?”
In reality we’re aunt and niece the other way around, as her father was my elder brother as Duke Egon’s son. But she’s centuries older than me, so we’ve maintained the opposite relationship in practice since Tiana was a baby.
Normally, she uses makeup to give her the appearance of a dignified forty-something physician, but right now she was in a Royal Army uniform and she had the same vaguely seventeen-to-twenty-year-old appearance that most adult female monsters and fairies have in their natural state as non-mortals. But I recognized her aura instantly once her [Vampire Cloak] disappeared.
I could see and feel a massive surge of both Earth and Wind in her pathways, so I shouted, “It’s me, Aunt Elianora!”
The mana surge died away as she finally recognized her niece.
“My Lady, what in the world?” she demanded. “Why did you attack me?”
“You attacked first!” I retorted as I got off her.
“I was shooting at a blood magic user penetrating the perimeter…” she broke off as she saw my rueful grin. “Wait, was that you using blood magic, My Lady? I have never even taught you about it, and you’re far too young to learn it!”
It was two days before the new moon, and well before moonrise, but it was a clear sky with plenty of starlight, which is all that vampire or fairy eyes need. I could clearly see her disbelieving expression as she rose up to a sitting position while grappling with a near-impossibility.
“My grandmother helped me get started,” I confessed sheepishly as I settled into a sitting position beside her. “And I… had a shortcut of sorts.”
Suddenly, the normal strict Elianora was back in full force. “Young Lady, blood magic is not something to trifle with. It can be extremely dangerous to a young vampire, even life-threatening! It’s not something you should take shortcuts with!”
I put up both hands, waving negation and taking on a placating tone. “Aunt, I really do have some special circumstances. I’m not trifling with anything. Please let me explain.”
She looked like she was going to continue lecturing, then sighed, closed her eyes, then nodded. “Alright. Explain.”
“It turns out that I’m a reincarnator,” I stated simply.
She stared at me blankly, having received an unexpected answer.
Reincarnators are much more common on Huade than on Earth, but not common enough for most people to know of it as fact. However, none of the religions dispute the concept, and it is actually a tenet of Dorian beliefs, so it isn’t dismissed out of hand, the way that it is in the West on Earth. Most people on Huade have an attitude of, ‘Yeah, it’s possible,” and will not sneer at someone who claims to be a reincarnator.
I explained in more detail. “I was a blood magic user in a previous life. Once Grandmother taught me how to build my blood core, I began remembering my old skills.”
“But that was far too large a blood mist for the core that you could have built up since the last time I saw you!”
I felt a little embarrassed suddenly, because the way I had done it probably looked a bit like cheating to a vampire.
Explaining everything about Elders would take too long, so I decided to frame it in simpler terms.
“Almost all of it is stolen,” I confessed.
“Stolen?” Her nose and brows both wrinkled slightly in confusion.
I smiled and explained, “I have a way to combine my fairy powers and blood magic to drain demons of their blood cores. My blood core probably looks hundreds of years old, at this point.”
My ability to use [Healing] was a result of the Elder bond, a combination of the vampire and fairy bonds, but I had to simplify it to something she knew. I would give her the details when we had more time.
“You can feed on demons?” Elianora’s eyes glazed over for a few breaths as she absorbed that information. Then she coughed and shook her head. “You’ve always been an unorthodox student, in every way possible. I suppose I can’t be surprised anymore.”
My fan was still dangling from its tether. I loosened the knot around my wrist and tucked the fan away, then held out my hand and commanded, “Starfire Jade Writing Brush return!”
The brush came spinning through the air into my hand. Elianora gave a smile and another shake of the head.
“You’ve upped your magic skills as well,” she noted. “That was a [Light Bullet] you shot at me earlier, wasn’t it?”
I gave an embarrassed laugh and nodded. I had a lot of catching up to do with her.
