Nozomanu Fushi no Boukensha (LN) - Volume 8 - Chapter 1

Chapter 1: The State of Maalt 

Wolf asked me to help search for thralls and vampires. 

“I don’t mind, but are you sure?” I replied. 

“Sure about what?” he asked and cocked his head. 

“You know I’m a vampire. Not that I had anything to do with this chaos, but don’t you worry I might join their side?” 

That seemed like a normal concern to have, and Wolf said, “Well, maybe it’s not impossible.” 

“In that case—” 

“But from what I can see, it’s not happening.” 

Now I was the one who was confused. 

“Did you already forget why I wanted you to join the guild staff?” he said with a sigh. “Simply put, I value all the work you do for this city and its adventurers. I know how much good you’ve done. These guys are just trying to destroy the place, so I don’t see why you’d work with them, fellow vampire or not. It’s obvious. Am I right?” 

I was a little surprised. I did get the feeling that he thought a lot of me, but I didn’t think it went that far. Maybe I just had a low opinion of myself. It seemed unusual for a guildmaster to pay such attention to each individual adventurer, though. Wolf was just special. 

And he was right. All I felt when I saw Maalt like this was anger. It wasn’t the biggest or best city, but the peaceful lives of its people were being ruined for probably selfish reasons. I loved this town, its adventurers, and its citizens. Seeing it like this was nothing but enraging. 

“You’re absolutely right,” I said to Wolf. “Got it. I’ll join the search. Can I decide where to go, though?” 

Those decisions were usually made by the guild for the sake of efficiency. They didn’t always operate that way, but Wolf was a competent and rational guildmaster. I presumed he would prioritize productivity. 

“Fine with me. Got any place in mind?” he responded promptly, contrary to expectations. 

“Yeah, sort of. Besides that, there’s the fact I’m a vampire to worry about. If I work with other adventurers, they might get suspicious of me.” 

“Right, makes sense. Well, I’m sure you can handle yourself, but be careful out there. Now get going!” 

I dashed from the office and out onto the city streets. 

I ran through the town with my destination already decided. The city was in a dire state, so I took a look around to get a grasp of the situation first, but I had come back to Maalt for Edel, so he was my priority. I’d only waited as long as I did because I had confirmed he was alive and in a place where he would likely be safe for a bit. 

Unlike other monsters, the undead could survive and recover from any amount of damage so long as their head remained intact, so I knew Edel would be okay. I was a bit afraid to test that by blowing my own head off to see if I could revive, but maybe even that was possible after enough time. I had no desire to try it out, though. 

As for where I was going, it was Maalt’s Second Orphanage. That was the home of Alize, Lillian, and the other orphans, as well as Edel’s base of operations. I got a reading from Edel, and it was coming from there. He still seemed to be unconscious, but he was alive, so he was at least fine in some sense. I also wanted to know if Alize, Lillian, and the orphans were safe. 

I rushed through town until I arrived at the orphanage. I saw people scrambling around on the way there, and I helped some who were stuck under debris, but I didn’t see any vampires or thralls. Helping people didn’t take too much time. This body made it pretty easy to move heavy objects and avoid harm. It was like nothing I could have imagined in the past. 

I thought the changes to my senses might help locate vampires and thralls, but that proved difficult. They seemed to be concealing themselves with magic like Wolf mentioned, including their scent. I was personally so dry that I didn’t have much of a smell, but some thralls were supposed to be more damp than others. I’d heard they could smell pretty nasty if they didn’t get enough nutrition, but I’d never tested to see if that was true myself. 

In any case, I didn’t take the time to use the knocker. I threw the orphanage door open and stepped inside. 

“Rentt?!” Alize cried. 

She was standing right at the entrance with her wand in hand, pointing it straight at me. I guess she was trying to protect the orphanage as best she could. Lillian stood next to her with a spear at the ready. She was a plump middle-aged woman, but her stance had the mark of combat expertise. Maybe she actually knew how to fight. I never got that sense from her when she was sick and lying in bed, but looking at her now, it seemed likely. It was as if she had lived through her fair share of battles. 

“Alize, Lillian, you’re safe?” I asked. 

Alize ran up to me and clung to my hips. “I was scared,” she said. I stroked her head. 

Lillian approached me next. “We heard about the thralls, so we’ve been defending ourselves here. I can use divinity, so perhaps I should be going out to hunt them, but I do have orphans to look after.” 

I didn’t know exactly how powerful Lillian was, but I knew she had a fair amount of divinity in addition to the signs of combat experience I could identify. Maybe she would be more than a match for the thralls, but this situation was a little unique. 

“Even if the children would be safe without you, I don’t think you should go out there,” I said. 

“Why not?” 

“I don’t know how much you’ve heard, but the thralls seem to be disguising themselves as humans. You won’t be able to find them easily.” 

If not for that, each of the churches could have sent out their divinity users to make quick work of the monsters. But since their locations were unknown, having adventurers meticulously search the city to root them out was more efficient. 

Besides, divinity users could vary. Lillian could use a weapon and defend herself, but most weren’t like that. The majority just went from town to town to provide blessings and had guards do the fighting for them. With the city in such chaos, sending them out didn’t sound like such a good idea. If this city lost some saints, it would probably be a nightmare down the road. 

“They’re in disguise?” Lillian asked. “Can they not be detected with divine arts?” 

“I don’t know precisely how much divine arts can do, but would you be able to detect a thrall from within a crowd?” If she could, it’d be nice if she would. Either that or she could teach me how to do it. If it was easy enough, I could try it myself. 

“It would be hard to do on such a large scale. I could do it, but it would severely exhaust me. If there are a lot of them to find, I don’t think there is much I can do.” 

In the end, it sounded like the adventurers’ search would be more efficient. The certainty she could have provided might’ve helped, but this was such an emergency that the searchers could get by with just tearing suspects’ clothes off. There was no need to make her go out there. Besides, Lillian had a responsibility to protect this orphanage. 

“So it seems,” I said. “Are all the orphans safe?” 

“Yes. Alize volunteered to help defend the orphanage with the magic she learned, but there have been no invaders as of yet.” 

“That’s good. Do you know what it’s like under the orphanage?” 

I asked because that was where Edel was. Alize and Lillian both knew he lived there too. 

“You want to know about Edel?” Alize asked, still clinging to me but looking up at my face. “Oh right, I haven’t seen him. At a time like this, you’d think he’d be crawling out to talk with the other mice.” 

I knew that Edel’s mouse communication network was vast and that the mice frequently spoke to each other. This seemed like the perfect time to take advantage of that, so it was strange he hadn’t been seen anywhere. 

“I’ll go check the basement. I think you two would be better off hiding further inside. If something happens, shout for me. I’ll run up here right away,” I said and then headed to the basement. 

“Hey, Edel!” I yelled as I entered the basement. 

Five mice scurried up to me. They were the henchmice who’d attended Edel on our first encounter. Maybe it was because they served Edel, or maybe my power had an influence on them, but they were somewhat smarter than the average puchi suri. They understood human words and emotions to some extent. When they gathered around me, I knew something had happened. 

“Where’s Edel?” I asked. One of the mice walked off to the side, wanting me to follow. The basement wasn’t that big, but it was packed with things and a bit hard to navigate. I stepped around the junk in my path as I followed the mouse to a black puchi suri lying near the wall. It was Edel. 

“Hey!” 

I hurried over and laid a hand on him. He looked dead, but he clearly wasn’t. Still, I didn’t know exactly what kind of state he was in. I could feel him breathing and didn’t see any noteworthy injuries. Although, it was questionable as to how much breathing meant to the undead. I breathed, but mostly just to blend in. I sometimes noticed I would stop breathing in tough situations, so I knew this couldn’t be too rough for Edel. He just seemed to be unconscious. 

I thought it might be safe to force him awake, so I sent mana and spirit flowing into him. It looked like he was lacking in both. The great distance I’d traveled might have weakened the supply of energy I sent him. I didn’t know for sure, but I could ask once he was awake. 

“Sqreak!” Edel cried as he abruptly opened his eyes and got up. He looked around warily until he saw me and relaxed. Something strange must have happened if he was so on edge, but I didn’t know what. 

Edel read my thoughts and communicated his own through images. In my mind I could vividly see what he had seen. The number of things Edel could do kept increasing. I didn’t remember him being able to do this before, but I appreciated having such an exemplary familiar. 

“Is this a dungeon? The Water Moon Dungeon? No, the New Moon Dungeon?” I wondered aloud. 

This image was probably from the perspective of one of Edel’s henchmice. It was less agile than he was. It didn’t act much smarter than a typical mouse either. It zigzagged around needlessly, but it was certainly heading somewhere. 

Then I saw someone. That would have been fine, except that this person was biting an adventurer’s neck, blood dripping from his mouth. When he spotted the mouse, he said it wasn’t nice to watch. Then he unleashed flames and the image went dark. The mouse probably died, sadly. I could feel Edel’s rage at the death of his ally. 

I wondered who this person was. I knew he was a vampire, considering he was sucking blood. This wasn’t anyone I knew, though. There were a few people whom I suspected of being vampires, but he wasn’t one of them. Despite that, I felt like I had seen him somewhere before, or heard his voice. 

That’s when I recalled a singular, brief memory. It was from one of the times I explored the New Moon Dungeon. I was hunting orcs, and as I left the dungeon, I passed by someone. His voice had been exactly like this vampire’s. I was surprised to remember him in Maalt so long ago, but I also recalled that this was around the time new adventurers began to disappear. Suddenly, it all started to make sense. I met him not far from where the novice adventurers Raiz and Lola were fighting when I first saw them. I thought maybe our encounter was a coincidence, but considering his true nature, maybe he was targeting those two. But my presence there made him fear exposure, so he didn’t do anything...or something like that. If so, Raiz and Lola lucked out. At any rate, now I knew the identity of the vampire and likely the culprit behind the missing adventurers as well. 

I had to report this to the guild, but I didn’t know where that vampire was, with my only guess being the New Moon Dungeon. I asked Edel, but he said he didn’t know. From the images he showed, he couldn’t catch the exact location in the end. Considering that the shock of watching through that mouse’s eyes as it died made him pass out, it was to be expected. 

I didn’t know exactly how to handle this. If I just went and told people there was a vampire in the New Moon Dungeon, it would sound sketchy. Besides, I had no way of knowing if he was still there. I needed something more convincing. 

“What’s that? You have a good idea where the thralls are, you say?” I asked Edel. He responded affirmatively. 

According to him, mice were informing him of bizarre acts being committed all around town, everything from loitering to arson. They were probably seeing thralls. Most of Edel’s henchmice weren’t especially strong the way Edel was, so they couldn’t defeat monsters, but they could at least keep an eye on them. 

In that case, maybe it would be best to first clear out all the thralls from the city. Vampires had the ability to produce more thralls, but they couldn’t do it easily. It wasn’t like baking a cake. Even that could take a while, but making a monster took even longer. First they needed humans to use as a base, then they had to suck the blood out of them and replace it with some of their own. But even then, they had to wait a while before the person became a thrall. They had to ferment first, to put it in a not-so-funny way. 

It took a long time for humans to become monsters, which is why people would say to burn any suspicious corpses on sight. Even if they were in the middle of turning into a thrall, burning them to ash before the process finished would destroy them. There were exceptions to this, though. Vampires could instantly create thralls too, but it cost them a lot of energy. I didn’t know whether it was their mana or blood that was the problem, but it didn’t matter so much. 

If Wolf was right and there were close to a hundred thralls around, then they couldn’t have been made just now. They had to have been produced over a long time and hidden away. This wasn’t possible in a matter of hours, but if he had weeks, he could have made a hundred thralls. 

“All right, guess I’ll start with the thralls. But that vampire might have left the New Moon Dungeon and returned to town too. If I find him, let’s make him our priority,” I told Edel, who agreed. He was always dependable, not to mention extremely convenient to have around. “Can I have you watch over the orphanage too? If any thralls come, warn Lillian and Alize as soon as possible.” 

He told me he would, so that was one concern taken care of. Now I could go thrall hunting with no regrets. Well, first I needed to tell Lillian and Alize that Edel’s henchmice would be standing watch around the orphanage. 

“I see, that’s greatly appreciated. Thank you,” Lillian said when I told her. “But is this a safe way to use familiars? I’m not an expert, but I’ve heard you can’t control so many monsters at once.” She wasn’t concerned about whether they would do the job but about whether they would obstruct the thrall hunt somehow. 

“I only really control Edel, and he controls the others. He seems to have a ton of henchmice, so they can do multiple jobs at once,” I said. 

“I see, so you indirectly have power over all these monsters, in a way.” 

I guess Lillian thought I was a monster tamer. She looked impressed. I didn’t know anything about them myself, so this could have been perfectly normal for monster tamers as far as I knew. Maybe there were monster tamers doing the same thing as me, and if so, then they must have had insane information-gathering skills. But I preferred to think that this ability was unique to Edel. Still, I figured it would be a good idea to learn something about monster taming eventually. I could have asked my dad about it, but he wasn’t exactly normal either. I wanted to find some ordinary monster tamer to acquaint myself with. 

“This is one of my secrets, so please don’t tell anyone.” 

I left the orphanage and ran through the city. Edel was sitting on my shoulder and directing me toward any suspected thralls. He received that information by viewing images through the eyes of his henchmice stationed throughout Maalt. Or so I assumed, but I wasn’t receiving the same information and couldn’t say for sure. Trying to look at all that myself sounded pretty brutal. He showed it to me for just a bit as a test and it took a lot out of me, so I didn’t feel like trying it myself. 

On the other hand, Edel had an easy time with it. It felt kind of weird that he had some abilities greater than his master’s, but that could happen with familiars. My dad had a familiar who could fly, but he couldn’t fly on his own. As far as I knew, at least. I couldn’t rule it out, but I’d be pretty shocked to see wings sprout from my middle-aged dad’s back. I guess I could do something similar, though. Anyway, from that perspective, Edel’s range of skills wasn’t that strange. I was the stronger fighter, so we complemented each other in that way. 

I was surprised by just how many puchi suri there were all over the city. I’d never thought much about it, but now I was seeing them on every street corner and in every nook and cranny. Edel was probably seeing through their eyes. Having so many eyes everywhere certainly made it easier to find thralls. 

Edel squeaked at me when we neared a crowd. The first thrall seemed to be here, but as I got closer, I realized that this would be pretty difficult. This was the town square, but it looked like the townspeople were using it as a gathering place for those fleeing from the fires. There were a lot of people around, and I couldn’t tell who was a thrall at a glance. They were presumably using magic to disguise themselves, so there was no way for me to recognize them. But Edel seemed to know. He telepathically told me who the thrall was. 

It was a man sitting on the fountain in the middle of the town square. He had a beard but otherwise didn’t stand out much from the crowd. He was wary of his surroundings, but so was everyone else who had just fled from the fires. I doubted anyone would believe he was a thrall, but Edel guaranteed me that he was. If so, there was something I had to do. 

“Excuse me,” I said to the man. 

“What is it, pal? You ran to this town square too?” he responded, sounding like anyone would. 

That kind of made me mad. It wasn’t that this thrall was pretending to be human, but that he sounded so natural. When I was a thrall, it killed me every time I had to talk. There was no justice in the world. But I kept that to myself. 

“No, I’m an adventurer. I’m trying to find whoever started the fires,” I said. 

The man kind of twitched but otherwise didn’t react. “Huh, is that right? Then go find them already. Make them pay for what they did to this city. Please.” 

Nothing was strange about what he said. That was what made him scary. These monsters could lurk among humans undetected. That was what led to this commotion. I wanted to expose his true identity and exterminate him already. But before that, I thought maybe I could capture him alive and get some information out of him about the other thralls and the vampire. 

“Yeah, I’ll do that. By the way, the culprits seem to be thralls. Sorry, but would you mind taking off your clothes?” 

“Why? Look, you can see that I’m human.” 

“I hope you are, but maybe you’re not. Thralls have rotting bodies, so I’ll know for sure after you take your clothes off. Go on now.” 

The man stood up and started to back away. “Why should I have to? I’m human. Human, I tell you.” 

It didn’t sound like he was lying, but I knew this man was a thrall. I pressed him further, but he suddenly ran off and reached a hand toward someone else in the crowd. 

It didn’t look like there was much use in talking. I drew my sword and prepared to slash at the man, but then I heard what sounded like a cannon. A moment later, the man was on fire. The fire wasn’t red, but light blue. Wondering what happened, I turned to see where the flame came from and saw a woman. 

“Oh, what do we have here? If it isn’t Rentt! How long has it been?” 

The woman had dark gray hair and fiery red eyes. She was menacing yet beautiful. That beauty was undeniable, but I could never describe her as dainty. She was like a bird of prey or a carnivorous beast. Strangely, despite all that, she had a sort of purity about her. In my twenty-five years of life, I had never met another woman like her. 

“Hello, Miss Nive,” I said. 

“Just Nive is fine, thank you. We’re both adventurers, you know. You can treat me like one.” 

That was true, but I kind of wanted to put some distance between her and me. It was hard to object to her, though. “All right, Nive. Why are you here?” 

“A simple enough reason. This is my time to shine. The perfect opportunity to burn these creatures to ash,” she said as she kicked the blazing man away. I thought that would’ve been hot, but this probably wasn’t ordinary fire. I was nearby and couldn’t feel any heat either. It must have been produced with divine arts. 

The others in the town square were aghast at us. From their perspective, she was a magician who just set a middle-aged man on fire and I was a suspicious man in a mask and robe having a friendly conversation with her. That was about what I expected. Judging by the reactions, the light blue fire was visible to the average person as well. Maybe this wasn’t the Holy Fire, just fire ignited by divine arts, so it didn’t matter if it was visible. Plus, if the man just started writhing without any visible cause, he might have looked threatening to the crowd. Maybe Nive had that in mind. Not that she seemed like she’d care. 

But the visible flame presented another danger. If it looked like she set a random citizen on fire, knights might arrest us. I was going through the trouble of questioning him beforehand so I could avoid that. Now I had no idea how to get this situation under control. 

“Oh? Doesn’t look like that was enough to kill him. The servants of those blood-sucking insects can always take a beating,” Nive said as she turned her clear, round eyes toward the burning man. Even as the fire blazed, he kept glaring at us. I don’t know why he had to look at me like that; it’s not like I was the one who set him on fire. But to be fair, I was going to attack him once I was sure he was a thrall. 

I prepared for a fight as Nive looked around. “I’m sure that startled everyone!” she shouted. “But as it turns out, this man was a monster hiding among you! He’s a thrall! Look at how he burns alive yet still stands and glowers at us! There’s your proof! Get away from here, everyone! I’m Gold-class adventurer Nive Maris, and this is my assistant, Rentt Vivie! We’ll slay the monster!” 

Apparently she’d thought of a way to get the situation under control already. I thought she just hadn’t considered it, but I guess she also kept the flame somewhat weak for that reason. A thrall could take far more damage than a human, and a little burning wouldn’t kill it. But Nive hit it with divine fire that purified the body. The thrall’s regenerative capabilities conflicted with the divine purging, causing his body to decay, restore, and decay again repeatedly. Nobody could see this and think he was human. 

The crowd seemed to recognize that the man was a monster and scurried away from the center of the town square. They didn’t leave entirely because they wanted to see how this fight concluded. Most civilians never got the chance to see adventurers fight a monster, and a thrall no less. They may have heard news about vampires and thralls killing townspeople in great numbers in other towns, but few would have seen these monsters themselves. They probably wanted to see the thrall slain so they’d have a story to tell later. I thought it was kind of needlessly bold considering the emergency at hand, but it was typical of people in small cities. They could be brave, bordering on careless. Well, they could always run away if they had to, so there wasn’t too much to worry about. 

“Now, Rentt, let’s do it,” Nive said with a grin. 

“I never agreed to be your assistant, Nive,” I complained, but I still faced the thrall. 

“What’s the problem? I’ll even pay you!” 

Nive closed in on the burning thrall. She didn’t appear to have a weapon, but once she was close enough, she swung her arm. The man jumped out of the way, and I heard a clanging sound and saw sparks fly from the ground. 

“Claws?” I asked. 

“Yes. I use an ordinary sword too, but when it comes to killing vampires, I just love the feeling of tearing apart their flesh with my fingers,” she explained. It was pretty messed up, but not surprising coming from her. “But it’s tougher than I expected. This one seems to be of a relatively high rank. Rentt, let’s attack it together.” 

I nodded. A Gold-class could probably handle this solo, but she must have had some ideas. Maybe she wanted to observe this thrall’s physical abilities to gauge the strength of the vampire in charge. 

I readied my sword and drew near the thrall. He looked surprised, but he swung his arm at me. His nails were unnaturally long and probably his weapon. I avoided the attack and chopped his arm off with little trouble. 

Next up was Nive. She aimed her claw at the man’s neck and swiped faster than the eye could see. A moment later, a horizontal red line appeared on his neck. His head fell off and dark blood flowed from the gash. But the man’s head was still alive and glaring at Nive. His body was on its knees, but it had yet to fall. His life force was something to be feared. Or since he was dead, maybe I should have called it something else. I couldn’t think of anything, though. In any case, he could take more punishment than the average monster, as the undead could. I could probably take about as much, but the thought of it made me ill. But of course, there was a way to destroy even these creatures. If there weren’t, vampires would be unstoppable. 

Nive walked over and picked up the thrall’s head. She then recited some incantation. The head began to burn bright. These flames were more powerful than the last. The head fell to bits without regenerating, ultimately turning to ash. Around the same time the head disintegrated, the body turned to sand. No such phenomenon would have happened if the man were human. 

All that remained of the thrall was a magic crystal. Nive tossed it to me and said, “There’s your pay. It’ll sell for a pretty high price.” 

A thrall crystal certainly wasn’t bad as payment. Vampiric monsters could live among humans, so their magic crystals were hard to acquire and sold for a lot. This was even true of thralls, a lesser form of vampire. On top of that, the guild had put out an urgent request to slay thralls, so it would sell for even higher. At the current moment, this magic crystal was about as valuable as a decent jewel. 

“Are you sure?” I asked. 

“Yes, I don’t hunt vampires for money. Defeating them is enough for me,” she answered. 

That sounded a little sadistic. It would’ve been more of a relief if she’d said she did it for money. Then I could at least see her humanity. This just made it sound like she had an insane urge to hunt vampires, which I suppose she did. 

“You’re not thinking anything rude, are you?” 

“No, not really.” 

Nive looked at me dubiously. She had a pretty face, but something about that light in her eyes made me want to avoid her gaze. They were like the bloodshot eyes of a starving monster. Her stare felt like it could kill. It was extremely uncomfortable. 

Nive’s eyes relaxed. “Well never mind, then. Anyway, Rentt, considering all that’s going on and how we happened to run into each other, what if we worked together?” she suggested, but she was soon interrupted. 

“Nive!” someone called out from behind her. It was a woman dressed as a cleric with silver hair and amethyst eyes. She was Myullias Raiza, a Lobelian saint. Nive furrowed her brow when she heard the voice, but only for a moment before she smiled and looked over her shoulder. 

It felt like I saw something I shouldn’t have. I wondered if they were on bad terms, but I was utterly incapable of guessing how Nive felt. Maybe there was no deeper meaning to the expression I saw, or maybe she was deliberately trying to mislead me. It felt dangerous to think too hard about it. 

“Oh, if it isn’t Saint Myullias? Don’t run like that; it makes you look half as holy. You hardly look the part of a saint as it is,” Nive said scathingly. The Church of Lobelia was by far one of the biggest religious organizations on the continent, so she had some guts to say that. 

Myullias looked momentarily irked, but she quickly settled down. “I wouldn’t have had to if you didn’t abruptly run off,” she said before noticing the ashes on the ground. “What’s this?” It seemed like she already knew the answer to that. Given the state of the city, a Lobelian saint would be able to guess at what happened. 

“The remains of a lowly blood-sucking insect, of course,” Nive answered. “Rentt and I took care of it.” 

The way she treated them like insects was awful, but it was how people had been speaking derogatorily about vampires for a long time. The sorts of people who hated vampires talked like this. 

“I see, so that’s why you ran off.” 

“Yes, he was disguising himself as a human. He was extremely difficult to tell from the real thing, but Rentt forced him to give up the act by questioning him. And when he was about to attack someone, I tried purging him with divine arts. It turned out that he was a thrall after all. That was a close one, wasn’t it, Rentt?” 

Apparently she had been listening in on our conversation, but I couldn’t guess when she started. If she decided to use divine arts because he was about to attack someone, I suppose that was acceptable. 

“Nive, when did you figure out he was a thrall?” I asked. 

“I was only certain of it when he was close to attacking the crowd. I did pick up the scent of thralls from this town square, though. I have a good nose.” 

I didn’t know if she meant that figuratively or literally, but either would have made sense coming from her. I’d believe it if she could find thralls by instinct, but I would just as well believe she was a vampire connoisseur the way I was a blood sommelier. I imagined her sniffing a three-hundred-year-old vampire, commenting on how it was well-fermented and ripe for killing. The thought of it grossed me out. 

Myullias seemed to be similarly taken aback. “Is that right?” she said with a sigh. 

At any rate, Nive and Myullias appeared to be working together still. Nive didn’t sound too excited about that, but it wasn’t any of my business. The thrall was dead now anyway, so I just wanted to get away from Nive. 

“I’d like to go see if there are other thralls around, so I’ll get going now,” I said. “May there be light in your futures.” I hastily recited a Lobelian prayer and rushed away from the town square. 

“Wait, Rentt! Rentt!!!” Nive shouted, but I ignored her. 

Thankfully, I wasn’t just running away. I had my job as an excuse. I still had no idea what relationship Nive had with the Church of Lobelia, but I hoped she wouldn’t be able to ditch a saint and come after me. I ran for a while before looking over my shoulder, but Nive wasn’t there and didn’t seem to be giving chase. Glad that I was safe, I ran through town in search of the next thrall. 

I chopped the head off a third thrall and purged it with divinity. It shrieked in agony as it died. It was just a monster I was killing, but to the onlookers, it looked like I murdered someone for no reason. The townspeople were somewhat unsettled, but unlike when Nive did this, I made it clear that this was a thrall before killing it. I didn’t have to fear arrest that way either. 

But while Wolf did tell me there could be a lot of thralls, I was shocked by just how many there were. I was surprised they could all talk like normal humans too, a big difference from when I was a thrall. I had to wonder what made them different. Maybe they got used to talking that way. Maybe my vocal cords just happened to be rotten. Different thralls could be rotten in different areas, so I was probably just unlucky. Well, these thralls were probably living humans in the past, so I guess we were all unlucky. 

These thralls could talk pretty well, but that didn’t mean they still possessed the same mind they did in life. They might have acted like it, but only to trick humans, or so it was said. I didn’t know how true that was. They started to contradict themselves after being questioned for long enough, so it was presumably correct, but the fact that they acted so human made them painful to kill. Regardless, if left alone, they would attack humans and eat their flesh, eventually turning into vampires and becoming a threat to humanity. 

Wondering if it had been long enough yet, I looked at the thralls as if checking to see if dinner was finished cooking. They had mostly turned to ash and likely couldn’t revive. 

As for the other adventurers helping out, they were splashing the thralls with holy water to deal with them. It was a fairly expensive item, but the guild was providing it for this occasion. Even if they didn’t do that, some adventurers could just shout for Nive when they found one. She’d definitely come running over. But there was only one Nive, as far as I was aware. She couldn’t respond to calls from all around the city. 

I also saw other saints searching for thralls around town. Their divine arts were especially effective against them. But few saints had proper combat abilities, so they mostly just served to finish them off. Saints whose main job was purification could purify entire towns at once. If a saint like that were here right now, they’d probably have a lot to do. Unfortunately, there weren’t exactly a lot of them. There was maybe one per country, and hiring them could cost a fortune. You’d think that they’d give discounts during disasters like these, but then they’d never get to work at full price, I guess. When you have that much power, it’s hard to find the right time to use it. 

Anyway, I wondered what the vampire could stand to gain from setting the town ablaze and causing chaos. If he made this many thralls already, I felt like just slowly corrupting all of Maalt would have been the smarter plan. But maybe that would have been tough in itself. Thralls didn’t need that much blood, but if they became lesser vampires, they would need tons. If people started discovering signs of vampire attacks, vampire hunters could come after them in great numbers. Maybe he wanted to start something before that happened. It kind of made sense, but it kind of didn’t. 

There wasn’t much use thinking about this, though. I got back to hunting for thralls. If I hunted them all down, the boss would have to show himself. Or leave Maalt, but that would be fine too. I didn’t know how many were left, but thanks to Edel, I could always find more. 

“Let’s move on,” I told the mouse on my shoulder, then ran off. 

“After all this, I still haven’t drawn my target out?” somebody said somewhere in the New Moon Dungeon. 

The low, hateful voice was directed at the many other people present. Young boys and girls were sweating and meditating. They were breathing hard and looked extraordinarily exhausted. 

The children sat in a circle around a man who stared at them apathetically. He looked frustrated, as if a tool wasn’t working right, but expressed no more concern than that. 

“Ugh!” one of the boys groaned. Then he coughed up blood and collapsed. 

The man looked at the boy and held his head like he had a headache. “Where was it this time?” he asked. 

“A thrall in the second commerce district was slain,” the boy answered. 

“Hm, not that it matters if they’re killed, but they’re being found a little too quickly. At this rate, I might run out of thralls before my target shows up.” 

“Are you sure this person is in this city?” 

“Yes, certainly. Narrowing it down to this city took ages, but there’s no question. However, I don’t know exactly where to look, and I suppose I can’t expect them to come out of hiding, unfortunately.” 

“But if we could get their help...” 

“Yes, we’ll get much closer to our goal. That’s what we’re here to do. I’m putting a great burden on you, but it’s all for the sake of our futures. You understand that, don’t you?” the man asked and looked at all the children. They were still focusing, but they nodded. 

The man was without a doubt their greatest hope. He showed them light they’d never seen in their lives. That was why they controlled the thralls for him. He granted them this power too. 

The man watched the children and smirked. 

Not only thralls, but most undead were tragic creatures. They gained immortality in a way, but at the same time, they lost their humanity. Once they died and became undead, their corpse was inhabited by a new personality. Nobody knew why this happened, or where the old personality went, despite endless debates on the subject. 

Regardless, it was accepted as fact that they became different people after death. There were many reasons for that, but the biggest reason came from religious authorities. They declared the undead to be impure beings and prioritized the purification of them above all else, so they couldn’t accept the undead as having humanity. They may have looked like they did in life, but they couldn’t be seen as the same person. 

I didn’t particularly criticize that idea. I could see why religious authorities couldn’t accept the undead as the people they were in life, considering the positions they held. But the important thing about their assertions was that they were half proven. That was why I questioned all the thralls I came across. When you questioned the undead for long enough about their past lives, their answers would start to contradict each other. If they were the same people they always were, this presumably wouldn’t happen. Considering their bodies were falling apart, though, you could also explain that away as memory loss. It was hard to say anything for sure. 

But even if that explanation were true, it didn’t change the fact that the undead attacked humans. There were some, such as greater vampires, who could control themselves, but even they tended to attack humans. Nobody wanted to accept such people as their family, friends, or significant others, so the undead were historically understood to have become different people after death. That was why they were exterminated. 

However, humans aren’t so simple. Think about your family or loved ones. What if, after they died one day, they came back to life before you could process it? What if they sounded and acted exactly the same, so you couldn’t deny it was them? I don’t know if many people could reject them right away. Call it kindness, or naivety, or even weakness. I don’t know what it is. But what Lorraine and my other friends showed me was kindness. 

“Why? Why?!” someone screamed. 

But as for what was happening in front of me, I didn’t know what to call it. 

Adventurers had gathered. Not all of the adventurers in town, but around ten of them. One of them was Guildmaster Wolf, who should have been at the guild delivering orders, so something special was going on. But I suppose the situation wasn’t incredibly unique. I got lucky, but it wouldn’t be strange if similar incidents were taking place all around Maalt. 

The adventurers were surrounding a lone boy. More than just a boy, he was a thrall. His eyes were bloodshot, and his torn clothes revealed dry, rotting flesh underneath. The disguise magic was no longer hiding him, because his face was covered in scars and holes. It was all part of the thrall hunt, but this thrall was posing as an adventurer. His equipment and age made him look like a newbie. 

“What’s your name?” Wolf asked the thrall. 

“Tita Well. I’m an Iron-class adventurer. I’m only just starting out, but I’m trying to get to Bronze-class. I want to make some money to send to my parents back in my hometown. I’d also like to be able to get a nice wedding dress for my sister.” 

“When did you become a thrall?” 

“A thrall? I’m Tita Well, an Iron-class adventurer.” 

I had only just gotten there, but it seemed the others had asked these questions multiple times. Wolf shook his head and looked behind him, toward some adventurers who were holding a girl by her shoulders. “This true?” he asked. 

“Yes,” the girl answered through tears. “Why can’t you let him go? Look, he’s talking to you. He’s saying the same things he said before.” 

“I get how you feel, but you saw what happened. He was going berserk just a minute ago. We can only talk to him like this now because we’re holding him down. If we let go, no question he’ll attack someone again. Can you really say he’s the same person he always was?” 

“But, but...!” 

Wolf was harsh, but he was right. Tita’s eyes wavered between sanity and madness. Turning him back to normal didn’t look impossible, but no such thing had ever been accomplished before. 

“Sorry,” Wolf said. “If I’d done my job better, he probably wouldn’t have been a victim. But what’s done is done, and I’ll do what I have to. If you don’t want to watch, close your eyes. If you hate anyone for this, hate me.” 

Wolf drew the broadsword slung over his back and raised it over his head. The girl, presumably an ally of Tita, tried to reach out her hand, but in the end she shuddered and withdrew it. She must have thought it was hopeless, and she was right. 

Wolf chopped Tita’s head clean off. Then he splashed holy water on both the head and body, turning them to ash. All that remained was Tita’s cheap armor. The girl embraced the armor, scooped up the ashes, and wept. 

Wolf watched the girl, his expression conflicted. I approached him from behind. “Rentt?” he said without turning around to look at me. He must have noticed me watching these events play out. 

“Sorry you had to do that,” I said, though the words felt kind of trite. 

“He was an adventurer with my guild. I was the best man for the job.” I could sense the dignity and responsibility that he felt as guildmaster. We were lucky to have him in charge of our guild. 

“So that boy was from Maalt’s guild?” I asked. I only started to watch in the middle of it and didn’t have all the details, but I figured he was, and now Wolf confirmed it. 

“Yeah, he was one of the newbie adventurers that went missing. That crying girl went on adventures with him. He up and vanished one day, and that was that, until...” 

“He came back as a thrall?” 

“Right. It’s tragic. If they’d gone after someone like me who’s got less of a future to look forward to, that’d be one thing, but they had to target someone with aspirations. It makes me sick.” 

If I were that vampire, I probably wouldn’t have wanted to pick a fight with Wolf either, but I could see where he was coming from. Targeting the weak was the logical move for any hunter, but when those targets were human, it was unconscionable. Newbie adventurers tended to be children who didn’t know their way around the world yet. Only a coward would attack them. 

“Let me ask you something just to be sure,” Wolf whispered to me so nobody else would hear. “You don’t know a way to turn thralls back into people, do you?” Wolf had talked to the girl like there was no way, but he apparently wondered if it was possible somehow. After all, he had me as an example of sorts. 

“Unfortunately, I don’t know if there’s a way. And when I was a thrall, I never lost my mind like that. My voice was kind of hoarse, but I could talk like an ordinary person, and I was perfectly sane. Maybe there’s something fundamentally unique about me compared to them, judging by what I’ve been seeing here.” 

The boy couldn’t clearly answer Wolf’s question. It was questionable whether he was even aware he was a thrall. But I was different. I was fully conscious of what I was. I couldn’t say I didn’t have any monster-like impulses, but aside from when I attacked Lorraine, I was able to control them. I was also still drinking human blood every day, but I never even thought of attacking another person. That boy, on the other hand, was going berserk before he was captured. There must have been something that made him different from me on a fundamental level. 

Wolf looked both disappointed and relieved at my response—disappointed that he couldn’t save the adventurers that had been his allies and relieved that his decision to purify said adventurers was the right choice. If he had killed them when they could have been saved, it’d probably be pretty hard to apologize for. Either way, it was his only choice in this situation. If he revealed that I was undead and claimed to know a way to cure the thralls on top of that, it would put him in a precarious position. But he was willing to cross that bridge if it would help them. 

“I see, got it,” Wolf said. “That’s good to know. Oh, also, we’ve gathered some info. Listen to this.” 

Wolf told me about the current state of the city. I knew some of it thanks to what I saw through Edel’s vision sharing, but I wasn’t as analytical as the guild. Edel and I could try to figure it out on our own, but we would be lacking in some areas. The guild knew how to handle situations like these, and they had plenty of staff members to sort through the information, so listening to them was beneficial. 

First, he told me that they found and defeated thralls all around Maalt and that there seemed to be somewhere from fifty to a hundred of them in total. Some, like the boy from a moment ago, were new adventurers who had disappeared. This all but confirmed that a vampire was behind the disappearances. 

They were trying to locate and capture the vampire at the same time they exterminated the thralls, but they were unable to find him. They also tried to guess the vampire’s location based on how the thralls were distributed throughout Maalt, but the vampire seemed to have taken that into account by stationing them evenly throughout town. He knew better than to set them all up around his hideout, apparently. If he was repeatedly creating thralls and sending them out from his location, presumably they wouldn’t have been so evenly distributed. We could assume from this that he’d thought about positioning before starting the attack. 

“Well, the thrall hunt’s still coming along just fine,” Wolf continued. “I think we’ll take them all out eventually, but there’s been some considerable damage. Wish we could beat the boss already. Speaking of which, I want to ask you something.” 

“What?” 

“Do you know how close a vampire has to be to control a thrall? They all showed up and started attacking people and setting things on fire at the same time, so they all probably received the same orders. I’d think the vampire’s at least close enough to give instructions to them.” 

“I wouldn’t know about that,” I answered. 

“Why? Aren’t you, you know?” Wolf asked and cocked his head. He avoided saying I was a vampire directly. I appreciated his thoughtfulness. 

“Well, think about it. I don’t attack people, and I’ve never created or controlled any thralls. I wouldn’t know exactly how close you’d have to be to control one, or how many could be made.” 

“Right, I get it. Now that you mention it, how would a vampire who doesn’t attack people make thralls? But man, will we just have to search every nook and cranny for this vampire?” Wolf said and crossed his arms. 

“Hold on a second there. I may have never made a thrall before, but I have made a familiar. Here,” I said, pointing to the mouse on my shoulder. Edel stood on his hind legs and crossed his front legs. For a mouse, he was remarkably dexterous. 

“I thought that was just a pet,” Wolf muttered as he looked wide-eyed at Edel. I couldn’t imagine this would be many people’s first choice for a pet, but I guess he thought I was weird. Maybe everyone did, and that’s why nobody commented on the animal sitting on my shoulder this entire time. 

“If he actually were just a pet, it would’ve been kind of insane for me to have him ride on my shoulder through a city under siege, you know.” 

“Well, I figured that’s the kind of thing you’d do. You’ve got a reputation for abruptly doing things that don’t make sense. You’ve always been like that. But now that I think back on it, there was some sense to all those things. Well, enough about the past. So that’s a familiar. What about it?” 

“Thralls are made from humans, so maybe it’s not quite the same, but the way I made my familiar is mostly identical. Maybe the range from which they can be controlled is the same too.” 

“I see, so how close do you have to be for that? Hey, are you actually controlling this thing?” Edel started erratically dancing around atop my shoulder. Wolf gave him a suspicious look. I didn’t know if Edel was just bored or something, but whatever. 

“Well, I usually let him do what he wants. But if I give him orders, he’ll follow them. So, as far as the maximum range of that, I at least know we can contact each other from anywhere in Maalt. And even from outside of Maalt, I can give him some simple instructions.” 

“Dang, that far? How far is it specifically?” 

“I don’t know. I think it’d extend up to about the New Moon Dungeon.” 

I hadn’t actually tried that before, but it felt like it would work. I wouldn’t be able to give detailed instructions, and it would probably take some time for the messages to reach him, but general commands would work up to that distance. Besides that, there was also what I had seen at the New Moon Dungeon. I decided now was a good time to bring that up. 

“By the way, he can share his senses with me to some extent, and he has his own followers of the same species who can share their vision with him. Through those abilities, I learned something a bit curious.” 

“Back up a bit there. Share their vision? All right, the size and color of your familiar is pretty unusual, but isn’t it a puchi suri? So it can see what other puchi suri see? Pretty much any adult with a knife could kill a puchi suri if they felt like it, so nobody really bothers with them and they’re left to roam all over the place. If you could sense what every puchi suri around is sensing, that means...” Wolf murmured under his breath, putting the pieces together. “Sounds like I was right to put you in my guild. You know everything that’s going on in this city, don’t you?” 

“I wouldn’t go that far, but they can sneak into all kinds of places to get information.” 

“Better not be doing that at the guild. But whatever, that’s not important right now. Anyway, what’d you find out?” 

“I saw a vampire biting someone at the New Moon Dungeon. It’s been a while since then, but I think that might be the vampire’s base.” 

“I see. The disappearances mostly happened in dungeons. They happened in town too, but not as frequently. Didn’t think it was possible to control thralls from so far away, though. I haven’t started a search all the way out there, but sounds like I should.” 

With the city on fire and thralls attacking people, there wasn’t anyone available to send to the dungeon when the chance of finding something there was incredibly unlikely. Capturing the vampire was important, but not as important as protecting the townspeople. However, from what I said, there was a fair chance the vampire was there. 

“Well, still don’t have too many adventurers with their hands free,” Wolf said after a bit of thought. “We’re slowly getting things under control here, but this is far from over. I’ll have to pick out a few people to send down there. Rentt, will you go?” 

I nodded. The enemy was a vampire, and while I didn’t know its rank, I would know the most about it in some sense. 

“And it’ll probably be good if Lorraine goes too, right?” Wolf suggested. Lorraine would help make sure I didn’t screw things up, and she was also one of Maalt’s few Silver-class adventurers. “Who else?” 

“You’ll take me along too, won’t you?” someone asked, sneaking up from behind Wolf. 

“Whoa!” Wolf yelped. 

The person behind him was, of course, Nive Maris the vampire hunter. I just wished she would go away. 

“How much did you hear?” Wolf asked Nive with a puzzled look. He was probably worried that she’d heard something about me. But I’d seen when Nive waltzed up behind Wolf like a cat, and nothing problematic had been discussed since she appeared. 

“Oh, I just heard you say you were picking people out. Nothing before that,” Nive answered. “It sounds to me like you found the boss’s base or something. How you found it faster than me, though, I have no clue.” 

It sounded like she hadn’t heard anything that would cause issues, but I couldn’t be sure she wasn’t lying. Maybe she was playing dumb, but I had no way to guess. She certainly looked like she was trying to act cute, like a child who saw a toy and couldn’t wait to play with it. A child’s intent might have been written all over their face, but I couldn’t imagine what Nive was thinking. 

“Well, guilds have their ways. Mostly we just throw adventurers at something until it works, though,” Wolf said, relieved he hadn’t given my secret away. And it wasn’t entirely a lie in this case either, if you just replaced adventurers with mice. 

“I see, and you just happened to find it that way, did you?” Nive replied. “Not even I can compete with the power of coincidence. So anyway, can I come with?” 

I was kind of hoping she’d forgotten what we were doing, but my hope was in vain. Nothing could distract Nive from her vampire obsession. 

“Sure,” Wolf said. “You’re Gold-class, not to mention a vampire hunter. It’d be good to have you around. Right, Rentt?” 

He asked me not so much to get my approval but to say there was no choice in the matter and I would have to deal with it. Considering Nive’s strength and abilities, turning her down would be absurd. We had to send the best of the best, and nobody in Maalt fit the bill better than her. My feelings about her being untrustworthy and dangerously spontaneous had to be set aside. 

“Right, it’ll help to have an expert around,” I answered, but only because I had to. 

“Excellent,” Nive said with a giggle. “Let’s not waste any time. Where are we going, by the way? I haven’t heard that part yet.” 

“Oh, the New Moon Dungeon,” Wolf explained. “Can’t guarantee that the vampire’s there, but there’s a good chance.” 

“Really? I see, that certainly may be true. The average vampire would find it difficult to control thralls from so great a range, but a powerful vampire could do it. Even lesser vampires can sometimes do it if several work together. The maximum distance from which someone could control the thralls in Maalt would be somewhere around the New Moon Dungeon.” 

“So you think we’re right?” Wolf asked. 

“Yes, but I thought I was hunting a lesser vampire that was acting alone. I thought there was a high chance they were hiding in Maalt itself. But considering the quality and quantity of the thralls, it might be best to toss those expectations aside. If there are multiple vampires, though, I would have expected more casualties.” 

“I think a pretty large number of adventurers and civilians disappeared, though.” 

“Not that many, relatively speaking. A lesser vampire needs to feed on a couple humans per month. They wouldn’t necessarily have to kill anyone if they had humans willing to provide them with blood on their own, but they’d have to be highly organized for that to work. There was no organization like that in Maalt, at least. Maybe I just haven’t investigated thoroughly enough, but I would guess they’re using blood medicine. That’s a surprise.” 

Wolf cocked his head. “What’s blood medicine?” 

“A special drug that can suppress a vampire’s blood-sucking urges. But it’s not easy to produce. A handful of vampires wouldn’t be able to make it on their own, I can tell you that. Hm, now I’m really itching to capture this vampire.” 

“Why?” I asked. 

“Because they have to be getting the blood medicine from somewhere. If we capture and question them, it should lead to a huge gang of vampires. It’ll be a vampire hunting jamboree! What’s more exciting than that?” 

Nive’s sincere enthusiasm was terrifying. I almost felt bad for the vampires she was pursuing. Wolf probably thought the same thing but kept it to himself. 

“Well, glad you’re passionate about your job,” he said. “If you can capture the boss for us, Maalt will go back to the nice little town it always was. I’m counting on you.” 

“Of course. I’ll capture the vampire, I assure you.” 

I looked at Nive’s grin, reminded of how much I hated having to work with her, but there was no way around it now. Thankfully, there would be someone else around to keep an eye on her. I looked behind Wolf and saw Myullias running toward us. 

“How many times do I have to tell you; stop randomly running off!” she shouted between heavy breaths. It wasn’t very saintly of her.