Both Rosalind and Hibiki looked shocked. Their faces turned bright red. What was this ‘pure maiden’ stuff about, anyway? Was it something I could help Lea with?
“Lea’s quite the free spirit, huh? If only she was a little more aggressive...”
Even R seemed to know what Lea was talking about. I guess I really was the only one left out. Nevertheless, Lea’s mysterious (at least to me) comment had stopped the battle for a moment, but...
“Gah! This is so stupid! Let’s just finish this fight already!” Rosalind yelled. The very air around her seem to shake.
“...If I’d known this was coming, I would’ve eaten more of Tsumiki’s cooking,” Lea whispered as she dropped into a crouching stance.
“Tch...!”
I readied my hands into fists, and Hibiki moved in front of Chelsea. But then... Rosalind’s body suddenly exploded into red fog.
“What the hell?!”
The red fog swallowed all of us, effectively blinding us.
“Is this her special power as a vampire?!”
I could hear Hibiki, but I couldn’t see her.
“...Gah!”
Next, I heard a low scream followed by the sound of someone collapsing. The red fog then converged on a single spot as if it had a mind of its own. When it cleared, Rosalind reappeared. A downed Lea was lying at her feet.
“Lea! Damn it!”
“Don’t move.”
I started to leap forward, but Rosalind reached out a hand that appeared to transform into two red and black wolves. Damn! Could she just do anything she wanted? By the time I realized that this was another one of her vampire powers, both Hibiki and I had been knocked to the ground by the wolves.
“You’ve wasted a great deal of my time,” Rosalind said.
“Gaagh...!”
Even in her weakened state, she had to be incredibly powerful in order to go toe-to-toe with Lea like that. And on top of that, she had all her special abilities. Was this the true power of a vampire?
“Now, let’s start with the most troublesome one...”
Rosalind reached down with her other arm and grabbed Lea by her hair. She lifted her head up so that they were face-to-face. Then her red eyes flashed. It was her charm magic. Lea had resisted it earlier with her strong will, but what would happen when she was unconscious?
“You are my ally. You want to do anything you can for me. And you won’t listen to anyone but me.”
“Hnn... Hnngh...”
Slowly Lea stood up.
“Lea!”
“...”
But she didn’t answer me. At least the “won’t listen to anyone” part of the charm must have been in effect.
Rosalind giggled when she saw her.
“You... What are you trying to do by controlling Lea?”
“I told you, didn’t I? I’m going to take everything from you.” She looked down at me, practically expressionless. “This time, I’ll cast a more powerful charm on you. One so powerful you won’t even notice if everyone you care about disappears. Then when you’ve lost everything, I’ll be there to comfort you... And once you can’t live without me, I’ll tell you the truth.”
“No way! I would never just forget about everyone!”
“Give up now. There’s nothing for you to do but become mine, Namidare.”
Rosalind reached her hand out towards my face.
“I won’t... I won’t give up!”
I focused my mind to resist the charm, desperately trying to think of some way out of this. It was in just that moment that I saw out of the corner of my eye someone leaping towards us from the top of the station building. They were aiming straight for Rosalind’s back!
“What?!”
It was a surprise attack from her blind spot, but Rosalind must have sensed it somehow. She quickly tried to turn the wolves back into her arm and turn around, but it was too late. A sharp knife was sticking out of her left shoulder.
“Gwaah!”
With a scream, Rosalind tried to back away from the mysterious attacker. It was only then that I got a good look at our surprise ally. It was a girl with long, unkempt, dirty silver hair. She was staring at Rosalind, but there was no suggestion of an expression on her face. She didn’t even speak.
“...”
Her long, silver hair was moving about on its own in defiance of gravity. The ends of her hair wove themselves together, forming countless rows of silver knives. So she wasn’t human either?! As I watched in shock, the mysterious girl charged at Rosalind.
“Lea, protect me!”
“Understood.”
In response to Rosalind’s order, Lea slammed into the silver-haired girl from the side.
“...”
Still without saying a word, she turned her silver hair into something like a shield—probably using the same method she’d used to make the knives a moment ago—and jumped back away from Rosalind.
Rosalind’s summoned wolves turned to fog and reformed as her arm again. That gave us some breathing room. With the wolves gone, we were able to get up now.
Me and Hibiki. The silver-haired attacker. Rosalind and Lea. A strange triangle was forming between the lot of us.
“Silver Slayer... You’re still alive?”
“Affirmative.”
The mysterious attacker—Silver Slayer—seemed to know Rosalind.
“You’re always so unfriendly. And always so persistent.”
“I was created to defeat you. It is inevitable that I will follow you until I do so, vampire.”
“Hmph. You’re the slave doll of an alchemist. Nothing more,” Rosalind said angrily as she clutched the still-bleeding wound on her shoulder. “Tch. Silver wounds heal so slowly... We’re leaving, Lea.”
Rosalind leaped up with surprising force and landed far, far away.
“Wait! Lea!”
“...”
Lea completely ignored me and followed after the vampire. They were gone before we knew it. Now it was just me, Hibiki, the still-unconscious Chelsea, and the strange girl that Rosalind had called Silver Slayer.
Interlude: 50 Years Ago
Somewhere on the bottom of the ocean.
“...Mmm...”
A girl woke from a dream.
“...”
She slowly opened her eyes only to be met with the bleak darkness of the ocean floor—a blackness so deep that even the eyes of a vampire could barely pierce it. And without moving a muscle, the girl—the vampire Rosalind C. Bathory—stared into the void. She still seemed to be in a dream.
How long had it been since she was sealed in this coffin and sunk to the bottom of the sea? She’d counted the days for the first two or three years. After a decade or so, her mind started to fade in and out.
“...”
Now she was in a state where she didn’t know if she was awake or asleep, or even if she was alive or dead. No, she was probably still alive... whatever good that was doing her.
The lifespan of a vampire was incredibly long. Killing one was not an easy task. Even if she wanted to die, there was nothing she could do to take her own life here. And so in the end, she found herself in an abyss of sloth and resignation.
“...”
Her mind eventually gave up on the very idea of the future, and so without being conscious of it, her mind started looking backwards towards the past. Once she gave up on counting the days, it was all she could do to fill her thoughts with pleasant memories from the past. They were like a dream. A radiant dream. It was the one shining light for her down here at the bottom of the black ocean. And the source of that light was always the same thing—a young boy.
“Nami... dare...” Rosalind cried his name as if trying to find him.
In her mind, she was reliving the days she’d spent with him. The illusion was strong enough to bring a smile to her forlorn lips. But it never lasted. The shimmering, beautiful memories always ended in tragedy. A silver knife in her breast. Namidare’s hand on the blade.
“..
.”
In her dream, she screamed wordlessly. Her expression twisted in pain, and for the first time in a very long time, she moved her body. She stretched her right hand, touching something like a scrap of paper. It was a photograph. A photograph she’d once taken with the boy named Namidare.
In the faded, ripped picture, Rosalind was smiling. But that was just a memory now. All she had left was pain. This photo, a memento from happier days, was her only solace.
“...”
Rosalind closed her eyes once more, clinging to the warm feeling the photograph instilled in her. Deeper and deeper she sank... Deep enough that she wouldn’t have to feel the pain anymore.
Chapter 3: Namidare
Night. The Namidare household.
When I got back, Harissa was gone. I went next door to Satsuki’s house, but her parents said she’d suddenly gone out too. Rosalind was probably controlling them both. It was safe to assume that Iris was gone too.
As I was trying to figure out what to do about this, Hibiki came back from laying Chelsea down so she could recover.
“Is she okay?” I asked.
“She’s just unconscious,” Hibiki said. “She’ll wake up soon.”
“I see.”
When this all started, I was supposed to be helping her with her story, but now I’d gotten her caught up in one of my own. I felt pretty guilty.
And then there was the matter of our other guest. The girl who’d ended up saving us—Silver Slayer—was just standing silently by the window, not doing anything in particular.
“Um... Silver Slayer?”
“Yes.”
She turned around obediently when I called her name.
“Hibiki’s here too now, so do you think you can tell us about Rosalind?”
“Understood.”
I had Hibiki and Silver Slayer sit down on the living room sofa, then dragged over a chair from the kitchen so I could sit across from them.
“First, I want to make sure I understand what’s going on. I’ve got several questions for you. Can you answer them?” I asked.
“There is no issue with answering your queries.”
“Then first... what do you know about Rosalind?”
“I do not know her personal history. However, I have confirmed that she’s a powerful vampire, at least five hundred years old.”
Honestly, I was a little disappointed at her answer. If I could find out something about Rosalind’s past, I thought, then maybe I could understand her situation...
“What do you know about her vampire powers?” Hibiki asked.
“This information is primarily based on my combat experience with her, but she has physical capabilities far exceeding a normal human, including exceptional stamina and accelerated healing. She also has the ability to turn into a wolf, a bat, or mist; the ability to supernaturally charm people; and the ability to turn someone into a vampire and make them her thrall by sucking their blood.”
“In Bram Stoker’s novel, only people who were pure could become a vampire after having their blood drained. Are there any restrictions like that on her power?”
“I believe she’s capable of using it on any living creature. I once fought a cow she had turned into a vampire.”
“...Hmm, that’s tough.”
Hibiki gave me a look.
Yeah, I know... Worst-case scenario, she’s already turned Satsuki and the others into vampires.
“Next question.”
“Proceed.”
It was Hibiki’s turn to ask Silver Slayer a question again.
“Who are you?”
“...”
“And what were you doing back there at the station? That power you used to turn your hair into knives... In a sense, you’re even stranger than she is. It doesn’t seem like you’re against us, but I’m not sure I’m comfortable working with a total stranger.”
“...Organizing non-classified information. Please wait.”
Silver Slayer froze for a moment. She was so expressionless that she looked like a doll when she stopped moving. Her almost inhuman beauty only added to the effect.
“In short, I am a homunculus that was made by my master, an alchemist, approximately two hundred years ago.”
There was plenty about that sentence that went over my head. What was a homunculus? And wait, two hundred years ago?
“Do you require additional information regarding homunculi?”
“Yeah. Give us the short version. Rekka won’t be able to understand the long one.”
“Well excuse me!” I yelled, but I couldn’t say much else. She was right.
“I shall limit my explanation to the essential data then.”
“Please do.”
“Homunculi are artificial life-forms created by a technology called alchemy.”
“...Alchemy?”
“A general term for a set of techniques that involve changing lower orders of matter into higher orders. For example, lead into gold. It was studied widely in Europe many centuries ago.”
“So... we’re talking some ancient, mysterious science?”
“If that explanation works for you, then yes.”
Yes, it does. But you don’t have to look at me with those pitying eyes. It hurts.
Anyway, did that mean that Silver Slayer was an artificial life-form like R? The technology used to make them was pretty different, but that seemed to be the case.
“Hmm... Why did Silver Slayer’s master make her breasts so small? He should’ve been able to make them any size he wanted. Maybe he had a fetish for small boobs?”
One was much less dignified than the other, however.
Hey, wait, your breasts are small too. I guess that’s appropriate for your age, but... Come to think of it, Silver Slayer does look old enough that hers could be a bit bigger, huh? Wait, what am I thinking about?!
“I will continue my explanation. The powers of a homunculus are determined by the wishes and capabilities of its master. The one thing that all homunculi have in common is that they are tools that exist only to carry out the will of their master.”
Something rubbed me the wrong way about how she said “tool.”
“Silver Slayer, you’re acting in accordance with your master’s orders, right?”
“Affirmative.”
“Hmm... If carrying out your orders is why you exist, then you didn’t follow us home from the station out of a sense of duty after saving us, but because you had some other reason?”
“Affirmative. As long as it does not go against my orders, I am allowed independent thought in order to achieve my mission. I judged that following you—Sir Namidare in particular—would prove extremely beneficial in completing my objective.”
“M-Me?”
I would be useful in completing her objective? Did that mean...
“Yup. Silver Slayer’s another of your heroines,” R said in answer to my confused glance, swinging her legs in the air as she spoke.
“I figured it was either me or Rekka, but since Rosalind said she wanted revenge on Namidare, I guess it makes more sense that it’s him,” said Hibiki, not looking especially surprised.
Wait a second... Did Silver Slayer want me to do the same thing one of my ancestors had?
“Then your goal is...”
“My master’s order is the annihilation of the vampire Rosalind C. Bathory,” Silver Slayer said in a cold, calm voice.
▽
Silver Slayer was planning to murder Rosalind. If that happened, I couldn’t save Rosalind’s story. But if it didn’t happen, I couldn’t save Silver Slayer’s story. So not only was a heroine my enemy, but two heroines were fighting each other? As I considered how to deal with a problem that was more complicated than any I’d faced before, the door to the living room suddenly opened.
“Hibiki, are you there?”
“Chelsea, are you okay to be up and about?”
“Yeah.”
It was Chelsea, the girl who’d come with Hibiki to visit me toda
y.
“I didn’t get a good look at her at the station, but she’s got an impressive figure. Especially her breasts.”
Why was R so obsessed with boobs?! I mean, sure, there was quite a bit of cleavage visible underneath her tank top, but still...
Hibiki explained the situation so far to Chelsea as I sat there blushing.
“I see. That’s a pretty nasty situation, huh?” Chelsea sighed and shrugged her shoulders.
“Sorry for getting you caught up in all this,” I apologized.
“Nah. When you’re a treasure hunter, you get caught up in all kinds of messes.” Chelsea gave me a wink and a grin. “What’s happened so far isn’t important. What matters is how we decide to handle it now, right? I’m in a tight spot, so I need your friend Satsuki and her precise divination magic.”
“You’re looking for some demon pot that grants wishes, right?”
“That’s right. I need to cure my sick little brother.”
Despite the incredible things going on around her, Chelsea was still acting pretty casually. As bad as things were, her optimistic attitude was a big help for me.
“Okay. Then first, we need to save the others.”
Moving forward. That was the first step towards bringing these stories to a happy ending. I wasn’t going to accomplish anything just sitting here.
“Wait, Rekka.”
“Gwah!”
But before I could go save anyone, Hibiki grabbed me by the collar.
“I agree that we need to save them, but do you know where Rosalind is right now?”
“Uh... Maybe we could check places a vampire might like to hang out?”
“And where do you think a vampire would hang out?”
“Um... Caves? Maybe a church?”
“Hahh... Rekka, you don’t like to think things through, do you?” Hibiki sighed.
“No, I mean, I am putting some thought into this, you know? She’s after me to the point that she transferred into my school, so she can’t be that far away.”
“Sure, I’ll give you that. But there’s someone here who can do a better job than you, right?” Hibiki looked at Silver Slayer as she spoke.
I Saved Too Many Girls and Caused the Apocalypse: Volume 4 Page 7