Vampire Reincarnation

How much is there? Where else can I look? The Western Lands are a long journey away, and more difficult than the war I fought so far…

Karfi sighed and put his daughter down, temporarily forgetting about the drawing. “Please, don't call me that.” He sighed and broke out into a smile. “It’s been years since I’ve been a Fatty.”

“Fatty~” Tausi repeated as she picked up her drawing and crawled away on the counter.

A smile creased the woman’s thin lips, and her short, black hair swayed gently as she hurried over to the countertop. Her armor - A set made out of dark leather reinforced with iron, rattled as she sat down and leaned her elbows on the table. “Cut the jokes Fatty, you’ve barely lost any weight since ten years ago.”

“Yasa.” Natasha’s cold, yet wavering voice reverberated in the air. “What do you want?”

The armored woman glanced at Natasha, scoffed, and said similarly coldly. “I’m here on a mission from the West Side Army. I figured if anyone were to know something about it, Fatty would be the one.”

“Right,” she continued, pulling out a few copper coins from her pouch and dropping them on the table. “Could you give me a glass of ‘Halved Cooper Serpent Blood’? I know you still have some in stock.”

“I’m glad to see your tastes haven’t changed, Viper,” Natasha said, downing another glass of liquor. “Pour me one as well.”

Karfi sighed and served the two women, a spark seemingly forming between the two as he turned away, which quickly faded as he poured their drinks. “Yasa, will you tell me what brings you here now? Not that I don’t enjoy seeing your face, of course.”

“Well,” she said, bringing the glass to her lips and taking a small sip. “Thing is, there have been some strange… creatures showing up all around the Kingdom.”

“Strange creatures?” Karfi asked, placing the bottle back below the counter.

Strange creatures? Kai’s ears twitched as he made himself as invisible as possible, listening in on the conversation.

“Yeah. They’re very weird and… aggressive. They’re small, about the size of a toddler, with varying colors of skin. So far we’ve seen a lot of green ones, and very few purple ones, but never managed to catch any ourselves. All we have to go off of is word of mouth and corpses.”

Hearing that description, Kai’s heart skipped a beat, and he couldn’t help but give Yasa a long, meaningful stare as the food and drinks he had began rising his throat as he remembered what he had done not so many weeks ago.

Yasa didn’t notice his strange behavior, and he completely ignored him as she continued. “I heard a few rumors that their origins are from this side of the continent.”

Kafi locked eyes with Natasha, and they quietly spoke through glances and eye movements, and ultimately let out a soft sigh. “Indeed, we have heard of them before.”

“We?” Yasa asked, turning to Natasha who downed another glass of alcohol before gently placing it on the countertop. Wiping her mouth with her sleeve, she said,

“Yeah, I’ve seen a few of them… their victims that is.” Her eyes quickly darted toward Kai before switching back toward Yasa, and they locked gazes as Natasha continued. “They’re rare, but not uncommon. Their victims steadily increased over the years… At first, seven years ago, I wasn’t sure what they were, and I didn’t know precisely until two months ago.

“The number of victims has steadily increased at a rapid rate, and that’s the patients I know of. This can only mean one thing, I hope you realize that.”

“They’re breeding… and fast,” Yasa said under her breath, before lifting her gaze. “Wait, you said you didn’t know precisely until two months ago, what happened?”

“Well…” Natasha began, a look of hesitation appearing on her face, glancing briefly at Kai, whose heart raced still. Yasa’s eyes quickly flew to the boy as well, causing him to jump in place, startled.

“Don’t tell me it has to do with that kid.”

Natasha bit her lip and nodded gently, prompting a frustrated sigh from Karfi. The armored woman immediately turned to Kai and a smile that seemed innocent at first creased her lips. The boy almost took a step back before realizing he wasn’t standing on the floor and gulped as the woman’s intense gaze scanned him.

“Um…” Kai mumbled, feigning fear as he avoided looking at the woman altogether. However, his eyes couldn’t help but wander toward her pale face, then down her neck, and he gulped once again as blood rushed to his head. “Can I help you?”

“Yes, you can!” She said, missing the subtle hints Kai gave her, prompting an exasperated sigh from Karfi and Natasha.

“Yasa, get your ass back here,” Karfi said, pulling her by the collar, leaving Kai some room to breathe. “You’re suffocating the child.”

“Right, sorry.” She said, her tone as sincere as a crocodile’s tears. “It’s just, it’s an urgent matter.” Her voice held a tingle of panic this time, unnoticeable to Kai, however obvious to the other two, who were much too familiar with her. “Please tell me everything you know.”

“Well… The thing is-” Kai’s heart thumped, his eyes almost tearing up as he eyed the woman.

“Yasa, it’s fine. He already told me everything.” Natasha interrupted, pulling out her notebook and flipping its page to her most recent notes. A drawing of Kai’s wound, accompanied by his description of the beast and its weird ability to explode.

The armored woman didn’t waste a single second and quickly read everything, her fingers trembling as she continued reading. “So you’re telling me they’re weak enough for a child to kill them?” Yasa said, almost mocking the dead creature, and inadvertently attacking Kai’s pride.

A child who trained his body like hell- Kai wanted to add, quipping to himself as he calmed his nerves.

“I-I got lucky, haha.” He chuckled awkwardly instead and sipped from his drink. Glancing at Onyx, he saw the man still wasn’t done studying him, and he turned his attention back to the other conversation.

“So they explode as well… good to know. Although,” Yasa said, flipping through the pages. “It seems like there are more attacks in this area than all the others combined… This is peculiar.”

She pulled out a map as well, a geographical map depicting the continent, with eye marks in the different corners of the kingdom. “Most of them here were only spotted, and there are almost no attacks. However due to the weird nature of the creatures we were sent to investigate them. I hate to say this but we’ve mostly come up empty-handed.”

“Now, however.” Her eyes sparkled, rolling up the map and turning to Karfi. “Now we have a lead that could potentially lead us to understanding these things more.”

As Kai listened, he calmed down, and his mind became clearer. He avoided looking at the people before him for too long, however a peculiar memory popped up in his mind. It was right after he saved Orphelia and got himself killed that he looked for the archer who saved his life at the last minute and found a strange boy named Léandro. That little bastard mocked my sword skill and told me to go look for a technique in a city… a city infested by ‘Gobelins’... I thought they were commonplace but it seems that it’s the opposite. How did he know of them then? And Julie too… Well, I guess the closer you are to the weirdness the more common it is.

This was indeed a weird detail, that Kai only picked up on now. But this information will surely be useful to them. He smiled to himself and tried to recall the conversation he had with the weird man. Lustra, he and Julie said… He raised his gaze, looking at Yasa and the other two as they talked about the gobelins.

“To think such a thing was happening right under our noses!” Yasa bit her lips as she clenched the glass of liquor in her hand. “I’m ashamed to call myself a knight of the Kingdom.”

“Don’t beat yourself up too much,” Karfi said, cleaning an already spotless glass. “How could you have known this so fast? It’s a recent event after all.”

“Yes, maybe..,” She said, looking at the map. The circles - the markings where the gobelins were spotted - only focused on the central and western parts of the continent. The eastern side, toward the Vampire Kingdom, was almost deprived of markings, safe for a place near Evicario. That’s the city I was in before going to Aina and Elizabeth! Kai thought, stealing a glance at the map. But Lustra isn’t even on the map…?

Kai had a weird suspicion about all of this, however he held his tongue still and listened in for a while longer. Occasionally, he glanced at Onyx, who seemed to be pampered by Lutha, and the other man who now stared at Yasa with a burning gaze. Weird guy…

“This is making me worried.” She sipped from her glass of liquor, downing it one gulp. “We need to go to the Barren East and check there as well… it’s weird though, the generals there haven’t been replying for a few months now.”

“What?” Natasha’s voice suddenly rose a pitch higher. She cleared her throat and turned away from Yasa, her cheeks reddening slightly. “What does that mean?”

Yasa shook her head, sighing. “We’re not sure, scouts have been sent and they reported that everything was normal.”

“All of them?” Karfi raised an eyebrow.

“Yes, all of them. I don’t know the details, but I will go see it in person. Before that, the south is more important. I rushed over here first though.”

Natasha chuckled, holding the glass just below her lips. She placed one leg over the other, slowly moving them under Yasa’s gaze, before saying. “It seems like you just wanted to see Karfi.”

Yasa blushed and looked away, hiding her reddened cheeks. “Shut up Natasha.” However, she glanced at the woman and said in a fairer tone. “But thank you, this information is invaluable.”

“Fufu, you’re welcome, Viper.” Natasha chuckled and finished her drink.

“Stop calling me that.”

“Stop calling Karfi ‘Fatty.’”

“Never…” Yasa turned around and whispered, her flushed face meeting Kai’s equally burning gaze.

“What do you want, Kid?”

“Nothing much.” Kai held back a sarcastic tone and avoided looking too much at the woman. Fuck is going on with me? He thought, gulping. “Just… I may know of… some clues.”

“Clues?” Yasa immediately returned to normal and looked at Kai with an icy gaze. “Kid, you better not be joking around.”

“I’m not, I’m not!” Kai quickly waved his hands, turning his head slightly. “But if I tell you, you need to promise me something.”

Yasa stared blankly at the boy for a second before letting out a sigh, “Fine, just tell me what you want.”

“I heard that- I heard that Lustra has been overtaken by these monsters, these creatures. If you go there, I want you to let me accompany you.” It should be safer than traveling alone… I can just say I have a rare condition that makes me sensitive to light… What was it, albinism?

“Lustra?” Yasa asked, bewildered. “You mean the abandoned city… the one that was abandoned decades ago?”

“Yes, that one. A… friend told me about it when I was on my way here.” Kai quickly told a half-truth. Well, it’s not entirely a lie… “They said it’s infested by these creatures now, but I haven’t seen it with my own eyes.”

“Right… it’s worth taking a look if what you’re saying is the truth.” Yasa agreed with a half-skeptical tone. “But why do you want to go?”

“I… have some business there.” Kai looked away, his voice stuttering, and a small bead of sweat running down his forehead.

“Right… I’ll think about it, kid.” The woman stood up and handed Karfi a large silver coin before heading toward the door. Lutha sighed, and scribbled down one last piece of information before standing up as well, and, accompanied by the large man, left the bar all at once.

“That was… weird?” Natasha commented on the weird interaction that just happened. “They were together?”

The other two shook their heads, an awry smile decorating Karfi’s face, whilst Kai’s gaze lingered on the closed door.