Having declared that I would face the Evil Race and vampires alone, Carla simply shrugged with her usual faint smile.
Turning my back to Carla, I took a step forward, knife in hand. Sarara, the Evil Race vampire, twitched her brow.
“…Human filth. You don’t know your place.”
Bash! Sarara slammed her Black Iron Chain against the ground. The village vampires and failed ones, who had been wary of Carla’s flames, bared their fangs with bestial expressions, as if their minds had suddenly switched.
Sarara, needing to strengthen and control her subordinates, narrowed her golden eyes with displeasure, revealing her long, uneven teeth. Those golden eyes still kept Carla in sight. Vampires are wary of magicians. They probably think that close-combat types like me… especially scouts, are not a major threat, even with high combat power.
“You lot, teach her some manners.”
“Oooooooooh!”
The vampires and failed ones roared at their master Sarara’s command.
As the remaining two village vampires stepped in front of me, a child’s voice echoed again from among the surviving villagers who had been gathered.
“Daddy!”
Whether it was the boy’s father or not, the moment the child’s voice rang out, a large vampire, like a hunter with an axe, turned his face towards the child.
“D, Dad…”
A frightened, sad voice leaked from the boy. But that man was no longer human.
The vampire nature, freed from reason, sought the blood of his own kin, twisting his face into a bestial, distorted smile of guilt.
“Aaaaaah…!”
Just as he was about to pounce on his own child and the wife protecting him, hunger and desire overriding his master’s orders—
Thwack!
“Gah!?”
My Dagger, moving faster, pierced the man’s medulla oblongata, the bloodied tip protruding from his mouth.
“Dad…”
The man groaned, even with his medulla oblongata pierced, and the boy’s eyes widened.
Even with a wound that would instantly kill a living creature, a vampire does not die. The man, his neck pierced, swung his Hand Axe behind him. I ducked under the axe while pulling out my Dagger, and then I slashed the man’s neck halfway through with my Black Knife. I then thrust the Black Dagger into his heart, where I felt a strong Mana.
“…Ah?”
The father vampire collapsed, not understanding what had happened to him. His temporary life ended, and he returned to being just a corpse. The boy, splattered with blood, stared at his father with a dumbfounded expression.
“Gaaaaaaaaaaah!”
The next moment, the last vampire and the failed ones pounced on me. Even though they were controlled and had no reason, there was a slight hint of fear in their eyes as they looked at me, who had brutally murdered the vampire in front of the child.
You have no sin. You are just pitiful victims. But you have become my “enemy.”
“Gah,”
The Slashing Style Pendulum’s Blade horizontally sliced through the throat of a failed one that had jumped out, and I thrust the Black Dagger into its brow.
The throwing Knife, released while flipping my skirt, pierced both eyes of the man behind it.
My kick, enhanced with Level 4 Body Enhancement, snapped the man’s neck. While spinning in the air, I slashed the man’s carotid artery with the Black Knife.
Just before landing, I swung down the Ball-Shaped Pendulum that I had thrown overhead. The Black Iron Ball crushed the woman’s skull as if gouging it out.
Even if they are vampires or failed ones, they are just difficult to kill, and their combat power itself does not change that much. A low-level vampire is probably only about 30% stronger. That difficulty to kill is the biggest threat, but the biggest threat is the fear of the Undead that living beings instinctively feel.
But I’m not afraid. Whether they are Undead or whatever, as long as they exist in this world, they will eventually die if I keep killing them.
In the darkness of the night, the Black Blade howled, killing the failed ones.
Even though they knew that they were no longer human, the surviving villagers screamed as familiar faces were killed. When I crushed the neck of the last village vampire with my Dagger and slashed it off with the Black Knife, the villagers were so breathless that they could not even make a sound.
(…Is that really a human?)
It wasn’t about her strength. Sarara, who had grown up as a monster, not a human, felt an extraordinary mental strength from the girl who was slaughtering the failed ones in the form of villagers with a blank expression.
She couldn’t be underestimated. The subordinates she had created to increase the number of subordinates to be used up in this land were destroyed in an instant. She had thought that the magician woman was the one to be wary of, but Sarara realized her mistake and tightened her grip on the Black Iron Chain.
The Human Race nations and the Evil Race have been fighting for hundreds of years. There have been no major wars in the last few decades, but skirmishes have continued, and the Evil Race has been sending spies to various countries to work behind the scenes in preparation for the next great war.
The Human Race is weaker and has a shorter lifespan than the Evil Race, but they overwhelmed other races with their bellicose nature and their numbers. Among them, the Calfaan Empire, a warrior nation close to the Evil Race Nation, the Ganzal Kingdom Union, with its enormous wealth, the Fundoria Theocracy, which unites the Holy Church that opposes the Evil Race, and the Kingdom of Claydale, with its powerful national army and great national power, were formidable enemies that the Evil Race could not ignore.
No one knows when the Dark Elves came to be called “Evil Race.” Long ago, their goddess of fertility, who was just an Elven species, fell into darkness and became an evil god called the Goddess of Darkness. Their skin color was dyed black, and the Human Race and other demi-humans became their enemies.
The Goddess of Darkness challenged the God of Light to a battle and was sealed away. There is no longer any reason for the Dark Elves to fight, but the followers of the God of Light say that the Dark Elves’ black skin is still proof that they worship the Goddess of Darkness, and they had to fight to survive against enemies who were trying to destroy them.
Kill or be killed. Killing is the only way to live. That’s the norm in this world where human life is cheap. Only those who have never felt their lives in danger since birth would criticize it.
Sarara’s Vampire Clan also had to fight to survive. In the Evil Race Nation, where the absolute number is small, not only ordinary Dark Elves but even those who have become intelligent monsters such as vampires and werewolves are treated as citizens. However, even if they were originally the same Dark Elves, it would be difficult to completely trust bloodthirsty monsters. The Vampire Clan, which numbered only a hundred, far fewer than other clans, had to show other clans, who were their allies, that they were needed.
That is why only ten skilled members, including Sarara, were sent to the Kingdom of Claydale, which is far from the Evil Race Nation. In other words, only the Vampire Clan, which could be expected to achieve great results even with a small number of people, could infiltrate this country and achieve results.
However, vampires cannot walk under the sun. Their appearance is too different, so it would be immediately obvious that they are Dark Elves.
There were those who contacted them. They gave Sarara and the others, who were Evil Race, a base and brought them the necessary information. They had their own intentions, but Sarara and the others deliberately took advantage of them and began to work behind the scenes in the Kingdom of Claydale.
Then, based on that information, Sarara and the others’ leader made a plan and ordered several members, including Sarara, to attack a remote village not even on the map and increase their subordinates.
What appeared before Sarara were two girls. A scout and a magician duo. Were they Adventurers? Both were high-ranked, with combat power of 1500, but they were no match for Sarara, a high-ranking vampire standing in the night.
The only one to be wary of was the magician who used fire Magic. Sarara, thinking so, was so wary of the magician that she misjudged the Pink-Haired Girl’s ability.
This scout girl is an enemy that cannot be underestimated. Sarara sensed that the magician girl showed no sign of moving, and thought that she should first crush this scout while being wary of the magician.
“Woman… state your name.”
“Aria.”
Clang!!!
At that moment, Sarara’s chain struck like a snake without either of them even showing a sign of moving, and Aria deflected it with her Black Dagger.
Sarara’s ears caught the sound of wind cutting through the air from the side. It was probably the Black Weapon attached to the end of the thread she had seen earlier. If she dodged, a gap would be created. But vampires have their own way of fighting.
Gush!
Sarara used her left arm to intercept the black iron weight that flew in an arc, flesh bursting and bones shattering, but she fearlessly lunged forward, swinging her chain.
Aria dodged the tip of the chain as if leaping back. Even though her combat strength didn’t match Sarara’s nearly 2000, Aria’s speed slightly surpassed Sarara’s.
Even so, Sarara didn’t panic. While a lower-class Vampire would take tens of seconds to regenerate from a wound, a high-class Vampire could recover in seconds. As an Undead, poison had no effect, and she didn’t tire like the living.
“You’ve lost, Aria.”
“………”
Even if she was slightly slower, she shouldn’t lose. Aria’s blade repeatedly struck Sarara, who didn’t defend, but the wounds regenerated in an instant.
(What a waste)
Thinking that, she swung her chain, and Aria, having dodged, slashed at Sarara. However, that single attack became two, then three at once, and Sarara noticed the change.
(Aria’s speed is increasing!?)
Sweat flew from Aria, who was breathing heavily and showing signs of fatigue, and silver wings seemed to flutter like remnants of light on the back of the girl wielding her blade like a dance.
Before she knew it, Aria was unleashing a furious barrage of attacks using weapons in both hands. The Black Knife tore through Sarara’s tendons and muscles, and the Black Dagger pierced her eyes and shattered bones.
Her wounds couldn’t keep up with the regeneration. No, that wasn’t it. By regenerating so much in a short time, the Mana Particles Sarara possessed were beginning to deplete. At this rate, she would be killed. Finally realizing this fact, Sarara transformed her face into that of a beast and, abandoning her chain, lunged forward to suck Aria’s blood and Mana.
Even with near-fatal wounds, she could kill the enemy as long as she didn’t die. Abandoning even her pride, Sarara made her last gamble. But—
“Gah!?”
Her knee joint, which hadn’t fully regenerated, shattered, and Sarara knelt on the ground.
Sarara had taken too many attacks undefended. She was too late in realizing it.
Seeing Aria slowly raise her Knife behind her back, for the first time since becoming a Vampire, the word “death,” which she hadn’t even considered for hundreds of years, flashed in Sarara’s mind.
“—【Critical Edge】—”
And the last thing Sarara saw was the ground beside her eyes and her own body, headless and spewing black blood.
“You were too arrogant.”
The Vampire who attacked the mountain village had been exterminated. In reality, it was a Vampire of the Evil Race, but the corpse that would prove it would turn to ash in the morning, leaving only its Magic Stone.
Even so, if they took that Magic Stone to the Adventurer’s Guild for appraisal, it would be clear that the culprit this time was a Vampire of the Evil Race. And selling that Magic Stone should provide “them” with living expenses for the time being.
Only a dozen or so villagers had survived, but they chose not to remain in the village and would head to the town where the lord resided, the acting village chief said. With fewer people, everyone could use a carriage and reach a populated place before dark.
At that moment, I silently deflected a stone that flew from behind and turned my gaze to the boy who had thrown it, whose mother was frantically holding him back.
“Why did you kill my dad!!”
The boy shouted as he was held by his mother.
“Because you and I were weak.”
“What?”
I approached the stunned boy and continued, looking down at him with cold eyes.
“Because I was weak, killing your father was the only way to save him. Because you were weak, you couldn’t stop your father from being attacked by the Vampire.”
The villagers who had been preparing to leave stopped, and everyone’s gaze was directed at me.
“If you don’t want to be taken from, become strong. Your father went to face the Vampire to protect his family, right? If you’re frustrated, become strong enough to kill me. So that you’ll never be taken from again.”
“………”
The boy looked down, biting his lower lip, and several villagers averted their eyes from me as if closing them.
What I said to this child was also directed at myself.
If you don’t want to be taken from, you have to become strong. If you’re weak, you’ll lose everything and become a corpse.
The villagers who had finished their preparations left the village where they were born and raised. Just before that, several villagers, including the boy’s mother, bowed to me, and the boy’s eyes, which never looked back, were fixed straight ahead.
And—
“Carla.”
“Aria, you really do look good covered in blood.”
When I, stained with blood, called out, Carla approached with an enraptured expression, wiped the blood from my cheek with her finger, and licked it off as if savoring ambrosia.
“What do you know?”
When I asked, Carla laughed like a mischievous child, carrying her words on the morning breeze.
“You already know, don’t you? I’m the one who brought the Evil Race into this country.”
Next time: Aria arrives at the Marquis’s territory and begins her pursuit of Grave.
What is the relationship between Grave and the Evil Race?