A short moment later, the strange, soft sound of beating wings could be heard.
The two vampires transformed into bats again in a poof of red smoke. They took to the air and joined the main force of vampires before flying towards Black Rose Manor under cover of night.
In the blink of an eye, only Spalla and Viria were left.
“Let’s go. You will help me infiltrate from another direction,” Spalla said coldly.
The minor vampire, Viria, trembled and acknowledged her orders.
She stood up and turned into a red-eyed bat, flapping her wings and taking to the night sky.
The two silhouettes–one big and one small–circled around and quickly approached Black Rose Manor from another direction.
High up in the night air, with the cold winds brushing against her face, Viria felt a bone-chilling cold, even with the fur on her body.
A not-very-large human manor was quickly approaching below them.
It was an incredibly ordinary manor.
The main building was a wooden, three-story structure. Several tiny wooden huts and warehouses were scattered behind the main building, with a small plantation on the side. In front of the building was a simple garden and plaza. The fountain at the center was already dried up, revealing the mud at the bottom.
A simple road paved with pebbles stretched from the manor’s entrance all the way to Andman City, not far off in the distance. It wasn’t hard to imagine how the city’s nobles and prominent individuals had ridden here on carriages for banquets when the city was still thriving.
Small manors and mansions like these that were close to the city were the nobles’ favorite places to party!
However, with the start of the adept war, this place had changed completely.
Powerful auras could be sensed everywhere, in every key entrance and hidden passageway. Packs of voodoo beasts patrolled the manor’s surroundings. Any creature not wearing an emblem of the Dener Clan was attacked on sight.
A troop of elite adepts stood guard at the entrance, carefully and seriously examining every individual that entered and exited the manor.
As for the three-story building? It was shrouded in a strange mist, fading in and out of view. It was hard to discern what was happening within.
A protective array…the building had been obscured by a protective array.
Viria beat her wings with all her strength and flew against the sharp winds. She spoke in a soft voice, like that of a mosquito, “My lady, that’s the building. The last place the Grand Duke was seen was…”
As the two of them communicated, the quiet manor was suddenly shaken awake by an alarm.
The vampires that had secretly descended from the skies triggered had the security arrays scattered all over the manor the moment they landed.
As the blaring alarms rang, the vampires gave up on sneaking around. They revealed themselves and charged toward the main building.
“Over here.”
“The enemy…they’re in the skies.”
Shouts could be heard all over as groups of adepts and voodoo beasts gathered from all over. They quickly surrounded the vampires.
The two Second Grade vampires had no choice now but to land along with their remaining four dozen subordinates.
They transformed into their human forms, and the battle started instantly!
“Careful, they are vampires! Watch out! Don’t let them bite you.”
There were several knowledgeable individuals in the enemy ranks. They were instantly able to identify the vampires based on their abilities and the way they dressed.
Everyone knew that vampires were powerful assassins with ridiculous Agility. They were also extremely resilient and hard to kill. The only way to kill them was to attack their only vital point.
“Adepts who can fight at melee range, intercept them. Everyone else, use your spells. Remember, aim for their hearts! That’s their true vital point!” The leader of the Dener forces shouted. He quickly made strategic arrangements while pulling out his staff and preparing a powerful spell.
It was a hundred times easier to create a vampire than it was to raise a human adept. Yet, vampires were not the mainstream force of the World of Adepts. The main reason for that was because adepts had thoroughly researched the vampire’s weaknesses and strengths. Thus, everyone had an idea of the techniques and means to deal with vampire adepts.
‘Major Illumination!’
‘Modified Stinking Cloud (Garlic Stench)!’
‘Static Forcefield!’
Several simple, modified spells explicitly adapted for use against vampire adepts crashed towards the vampires. Even the melee adepts had swapped their weaponry for silver weapons. They enchanted those weapons with a strange magic that prevented the vampires from healing through consuming blood.
Even an ordinary adept could inflict significant damage on a vampire with the aid of such equipment, let alone this army. The army was composed of elite-force adepts from the Dener Clan.
The enemy had badly beaten Spalla’s group of vampires in the blink of an eye. The vampires had suffered over a dozen casualties upon contact, while only three of the Dener adepts had stepped back from the battle due to injuries.
The Dener Clan had also lost nearly a hundred voodoo beasts. However, as voodoo beasts were a disposable force, neither party counted them as actual casualties.
The vampires that had broken-in were beginning to falter. They quickly started to attempt to escape the manor, even as they continued to fight.
Chapter 1285 - The Life of a Grayskin Rat
“Go back; you have no place in this battle.”
Spalla hovered in the dark, lightless sky as she said this. Then she dove straight down towards the manor.
The cool night wind rushed past her aerodynamic form, causing her soft fur to wave quickly. Spalla vanished without a trace after a few quick turns in the air. She was nowhere in sight now.
Viria felt a sudden chill rush over her body. She beat her wings and quickly flew away.
The battle in the manor raged on.
The invading vampires were clearly at a disadvantage. They slowly retreated even as they fought. Their forces had already scattered in the darkness of the night. They scampered all over the manor, spreading chaos throughout the building.
Six adepts wearing Dener Clan emblems were herding a pack of voodoo beasts and chasing after a group of vampires. When they passed by a tall tree, a white and slender arm reached out from the darkness and grabbed the last adept in the group that had fallen behind, pulling him behind the tree.
As the hand was swift, the other adepts, who were completely focused on their task, did not at all realize that they had lost a companion.
Back in the shadows, before the abducted adept even understood what happened, a slender figure pressed up against his body as two sharp fangs sank into his neck.
A short moment later, Adept Ralph stopped trembling and stood up straight.
“Go to the main building and bring me to Antoneil!” Spalla instructed before turning into a bat and slipping into his sleeves.
“Understood!” Ralph replied respectfully.
When he emerged from the shadow of the tree, he lifted his head, and one could vaguely see his inhuman transformation under the dim light of the moon. His eyes had turned red, and his face was unusually pale.
He tidied up his collar, hiding the small bite wound on his neck, then turned and walked towards the building without hesitation.
Even amid the intense fighting, security around the building had not relaxed at all.
A group of strange adepts in standard white armor stood guard in front of the entrance. Among them were both males and females of various ages, but everyone had a strange emblem of a mountain on their right shoulder.
It was a black mountain shrouded in white mist…it was an unusual design. Even with all Spalla’s knowledge, she had never seen such an emblem.
“This is the emblem of Lady Marilyn Mona’s D
ream Garden troop. They are Lady Mona’s direct subordinate force. I have no idea what unusual abilities they have,” Ralph continued to communicate with Spalla through a unique mental connection as he walked calmly towards the adepts.
“Who are you? Why are you here?” A male adept stood out and stopped Ralph in his tracks. His stern expression did not change at all, even in the face of an ‘ally.’
“I am Ralph of the Seventh Adept Squad. I have critical information to report to Lady Mona. Let me through!”
“At this time,” The male adept hesitated for a moment and said, “Lady Mona is most likely still in deep meditation at the moment. She won’t be willing to see anyone! Just pass on the information to us!”
“My captain was the one that sent me back. It is critical information. I have to hand it to Lady Mona personally!”
Ralph’s insistence seemed to push the male adept to a compromise.
He turned back and instructed, “Yasna, bring him to wait in the living room on the first floor. Send news to the lady once she awakes!”
“Understood!” A young girl in short brown hair and leather armor nodded in acknowledgment before leading Ralph into the building.
The moment he entered, Ralph could clearly feel himself pass through a transparent barrier of light. The inside of the building had a very different air to it.
An old but broad wooden set of stairs stood across from the entrance, leading straight to the second level. Meanwhile, to the left and the right were the dining hall and a small guest hall, respectively. There were also some tiny rooms in the corners meant for servants to rest in.
Lady Mona had taken up residence in the entirety of the second and third levels. Thus, her subordinates had no choice but to live in the servant’s rooms. However, no adept dared to make a single complaint in the face of such ‘unjust’ treatment.
“Follow me! Don’t walk around blindly, or you’ll trigger all the magical traps laid down around here. Neither of us will be able to pay the price if we end up disturbing Lady Mona in her meditation.” The short-haired girl was fairly enthusiastic as she led Ralph into the guest room on the left.
“Keep this girl occupied while I will go take a look on the second floor!” Spalla gave Ralph a few simple instructions through their mental connection before silently crawling down from his robe. She then turned into a black-haired rat and scurried up the stairs.
Once a young and beautiful druid of the Faen Plane, Spalla was skilled at transforming into other animals. After being transformed into a blood elf and taken back to the World of Adepts, she slowly became the shapeshifter that she was now.
She was the only individual among the converted druids who had not lost her ability to shapeshift, despite turning into a blood elf. However, as the druid’s Wild Transformation ability was not very compatible with a blood elf’s innate talents, it was tough for her to grow stronger.
The rat that Spalla had turned into climbed up the stairs, avoiding the areas radiating with magic. She managed to evade all the runes and arrived at the entrance to the second floor.
Without any hesitation, Spalla turned down the right corridor and ran across the wooden floorboards. Her fur started to change colors like a chameleon as she sprinted, camouflaging her as she progressed. In addition to her small size, it was nearly impossible for an enemy to spot her.
A particularly massive Many-Eyed Beast crouched in front of one of the five rooms there, dutifully keeping guard.
Many-Eyed Beasts were a type of voodoo beast that the adepts created with a beholder as a blueprint. These creatures had stout bodies, a dozen flesh tentacles reaching out from all over, and weird eyes at the tip of their tentacles.
Like beholders, these monsters could fire magical beams and curses of various attributes through these eyestalks. Moreover, the eyestalks were covered in a thin layer of scales, making them agile and resilient. They could even be used as whips in melee combat.
These voodoo beasts’ only weakness had to be their slow movement speed. That was why most adepts used them as guard dogs more than anything else.
At the moment, the Many-Eyed Beast was lying on the ground lazily. Only three of its twelve eye stalks were raised high, surveying the corridor. The rest rested on the ground, seemingly bored.
One could faintly sense two weak life forces behind the wooden door it guarded. One was an ordinary person, while the other radiated weak elementium power. It seemed like one of them was a First Grade adept.
This place wasn’t an adept tower, and the wooden door was only a simple wooden door. It did not have the ability to obscure or block out the senses of the adepts. Otherwise, Spalla would not have been able to sense who was in that room so easily.
This must be where Antoniel was kept prisoner!
Spalla didn’t dare approach the Many-Eyed Beast.
She knew very well that these Many-Eyed Beasts often had the ability to see through invisibility and sense elementium on one of their eyes. It was fortunate that she was only using shapeshifting and camouflage; these abilities did not generate much magical flux. Otherwise, she would have been discovered the moment she stepped into the corridor.
Spalla curled up in a dent along the wall, using the shadows to hide herself. She then carefully let out a strange aura.
Call of the Wild!
It was an ability to summon animals that was unique to druids.
However, while most druids used it to summon animal companions, Spalla was probably the only one who used it to lure out critters.
A short moment later, a chittering sound could be heard in another dark corner of the corridor.
A small mouse with thin whiskers poked its snout out from the shadows and sniffed. Its appearance naturally attracted the attention of the Many-Eyed Beast.
Spalla could hide by shapeshifting and camouflage, but this ordinary mouse had no such ability. No matter how stealthy it was, it was shining as bright as a sun in the night in front of the Second Grade Many-Eyed Beast.
Its eyestalks slowly rose, and the ones that were already on guard turned around, staring at this little fellow hesitating between the shadows and the light.
Even though this Grayskin rat was being bothered by a strange aura that was fervently calling it forward, it could also sense the terrifying aura of danger beyond the darkness.
Ever since a strange group of humans took up residence in the building, all the Grayskin rats had frightfully hidden in their homes. They didn’t dare come out to scavenge or move about. This agony lasted for seven days. Now, they were all starving badly, yet they still did not dare emerge from their nests.
They could sense a fearsome aura of death outside. Their powerful instinct for danger prevented them from acting on impulse, allowing them to survive until now.
However, when that strange calling power appeared, this particular rat could not hold back any longer. It slipped out of its nest and came here to this place it was so familiar with. One more step forward, and it would leave the shadow’s embrace and enter the light.
Here, it hesitated; it doubted.
One step forward was death, and one step backward was survival. However, its inferior intelligence prevented it from resolving the complicated feelings it was experiencing.
Finally, the Grayskin rat was no longer able to suppress the impulse in its heart. It dashed headfirst out of the shadows!
Chapter 1286 - Illusion
The instant the Grayskin rat darted forward, the Many-Eyed beast leaped forward impulsively.
Slow Ray!
Beam of Decrepification!
Aura of Weakening!
Three gray beams landed on the rat simultaneously, causing its tiny body to turn grayer than before. It wasn’t until the rat was crouching on the ground and utterly immobile that the Many-Eyed Beast shifted its heavy body beside the rodent. One of its eye-stalks wrapped around the rat and put it into its giant maw.
The gray rat was so tiny that it could barely even sate the appetite of the Many
-Eyed Beast. However, the taste of blood was more than satisfying.
The creature reached out with its red tongue and licked away the last bit of flesh and blood from between its teeth. It was then that the Many-Eyed return to its spot, glanced around, and finally crouched down again.
How could it possibly know that in the five seconds that it left its post, a tiny snake no more than a foot long, had slithered under the crack beneath the door?
There were two men in the room. One was standing, and the other was lying down.
The one lying on the bed was a middle-aged man in adept robes. His face was pale, and his lips were purple. His skinny chest heaved with strenuous effort, and his breathing was labored. The other man appeared somewhat fat. Even though he was dressed in intricate nobles’ clothes, he still seemed to be disheveled and worn-out due to the lack of grooming.
The adept lying on the bed had lost consciousness and was in a coma. That seemed to be the reason the noble was pacing around the room anxiously. The man couldn’t help but let out a sight whenever he saw his companion’s unconscious figure.
Spalla snuck into the room but did not reveal herself immediately. Instead, she moved into the shadows in a corner of the room and silently evaluated everything in the room.
She was already a Third Grade vampire adept, not a rookie that just made her way out into the world.
This man looked exactly the way Antoneil was described in the information she possessed. For some reason, though, Spalla felt a genuine unease in her heart when she laid eyes on the man.
It was almost as if someone somewhere was hinting at something to her.
What was wrong, exactly?
Was she too suspicious because her trip here had been too simple and easy?
Or did she actually fail to catch something crucial?
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