Xangô POV: Day 51

Current Wealth: 1 silver 47 copper

It was a fucking vampire. It stood like a vampire, looked at me like a vampire, and when it moved it was all…Vampiry. Like a panther. Like a panther on ice, with a body made of something lighter than flesh, an effortless, easy motion that seemed to exert it no more than might taking a breath. I was so caught up in the monstrous dexterity of it, that I didn’t even notice the speed until it was on Argar.

The giant swung well, quicker, as always, than one might expect. But his reflexes were human, if enhanced by his high level. They were clumsy, apish things compared to the creature attacking him, and it deftly sidestepped his hammer blow before retaliating with a neat thrust to his chest. Argar shifted to one side, but the sword still caught him anyway. Sinking inches, maybe hands, into his torso and dropping him in an instant.

It was then that I finally gathered the prescience to overcome my shock and Appraise it.

[Appraisal]

* Class: Warrior

* Level: 4

* Condition: Fine

* Modifiers: Strength +1, Speed +1, Toughness +2

* Statistics: Strength 15, Speed 15, Dexterity 4, Stamina -, Toughness 16, Alertness 14, Charisma 6, Intelligence 4

Level 4, and it moved like that? No, of course it did, it was a vampire. They were badass, in our world, ten times stronger than a human by default, and faster and tougher to boot. We’d based them on the original Dracula who, according to Solitaire, had a grip like a vice and the strength to pimp-slap familiars across a room.

As I might’ve deduced, by watching him crush a man’s hand in his grip, then pimp-slap him across a room.

I was moving in an instant, and so was everyone else. Solitaire closing in with all his magically bolstered speed- and seeming as slow to this creature as his level 1 self had been to him. Beam came in from the side, glowing magical spear outstretched, and the Vitonnian woman followed suit from his mirrored direction with her more mundane weapon. Their movements were so synchronised and lethally-precise that I actually thought for a moment they might leave a mark on the monster before them.

Then it turned to Beam.

Crimson light engulfed him from head to toe, seizing his entire body and forcing it still as muscles stiffened and rigidified. The spear fell from limp fingers, and a fist crunched into his face, turning his body almost fully upside-down as it soared backwards. Solitaire was on the vampire, by then, swinging hard. It turned towards his blow, then blinked as he abruptly let the weapon go mid-flight.

The moment of stunned confusion bought him an instant to act, and he was efficient about it. Sinking down to a crouch, freeing a knife from his boot in one, swift move. The same knife he’d had when we were Isekai’d, stainless steel and pocket-portable. It found the vampire’s thigh, punching through fabric and drawing a hiss of pain from them, which turned into a knee against Solitaire’s chest.

If the vampire hadn’t been off balance, my friend might’ve died then and there. Ribs smashed in, unaugmented resilience simply walked over by the monstrous strength on display. As things were, he just went tumbling, then stopped in a convulsive heap a few feet away.

A spear came within inches of him, but the vampire was just quick enough to avoid it. The Vittonian was last to face its strength, and she folded over its fist like a pillow, dropping to her knees and vomiting. Then its eyes turned to me.

They were red, pupils elongated, ovular slits like those of a cat. My blood ran cold as it focused on me, and my body was torn in a thousand different directions at once by my conflicting instincts. I wanted to run, to fight, to break down crying. I wanted to get it all over with and cut my own throat to spare myself a slower death, to drop down onto my knees and beg for mercy, even to pray.

But somewhere along the way, somehow, my brain just snapped, and all the wild, animalistic, idiot fear melted away beneath the glare of a towering sun of pure rationality. I spoke, and even to me my voice sounded straight as our enemy’s rapier.

“You didn’t attack until you were attacked.” I called out. “Not even after the first time, so you’re here to talk. What do you want?”

The vampire’s head tilted, and it eyed me in a way that was disconcerting for more than one reason. I’d seen that stare before, but never received it. It was the look my father had taught me to give something I was giving thought to buying.

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“I take it you are the one who used the Eastern powder here?” It asked, voice running out like smoothe silk. Smoothe silk, I reminded myself, that was currently wrapped around a jagged, rusty knife primed and ready to stick into my guts.

I blinked. Eastern powder? Did it mean what I thought it meant…?

“What are you talking about?” I asked, feigning ignorance. It was tempting not to, seeing as it was apparently my knowledge that held the enemy’s hand on turning all that speed against me.

“Don’t play coy, I recognise the power and smell of Echoityan alchemy when I see it used upon my own forces. It is not known to these lands, and you have the skin and accent of a foreigner. Are you the one who made it?”

He was walking forwards, now, crimson eyes falling upon me, drawing dangerously close. And Solitaire was still sprawled over directly in his path. Barely an instant before the vampire was within reach of my friend, I answered him.

“No, that’s him.” I nodded, speaking quickly to ensure Solitaire’s value before anything impulsive or vicious could be done to him. The vampire paused, still scrutinous as it eyed me.

“It is.” I pressed. “Ask around if you want, he spent all day working on making it.”

I knew the moment I saw the vampire’s face that I’d said just a few words too many. It hadn’t said I’d made it, only used.

“It is rare, even in Echoityan, to find someone knowledgeable of the secret formulas.” It noted, seeming to muse over every word even as they left its mouth. Lightning-quick, the vampire reached down to grab Solitaire, hoisting him up off the floor and shaking him for a moment. The act, or perhaps the simple proximity to an undead apex predator, proved more than enough to wake him, beating away the cloudy pain that’d been keeping him insensible and triggering a familiar, convulsive struggle in my friend’s body as he found himself in the creature’s grip.

The vampire threw him back to stumble away and fall against a wall, eyes only on Solitaire now.

“I came to this town for its corpses.” It said, “For the unseen multitudes buried beneath its soil from previous generations now gone by. What I found instead, however, was…Progeny.”

A smile crept along its face, feline and sinister.

“A man capable of mastering the Echoityan sciences of alchemy and black powder.” It noted, eying Solitaire. Then turned to me. “One who thinks quickly enough to stay my hand more than once.” It added, then finally turned back to Beam.

It was a testament to the thing’s deadliness that Solitaire didn’t even try stabbing it in the back.

“And…A warrior. A warrior of impossible bodily gifts, and a magic even I have never seen before.”

Finally the creature’s eyes moved back around, coming to rest on me.

“Any of you would be a worthy addition to my kind’s ranks, and so I offer you this chance to come with me and join the Ichorous Court. Live forever, as Gods of the grave, or die, here, tonight. The choice is yours.”

I just about shit myself at that, mind racing, head coming up with nothing particularly useful despite the frenzied thought it’d thrown itself into.

“Can we…Discuss it?” I asked at last. The vampire, to my surprise, nodded.

“Of course.” It said, calmly. “You’ll be making a decision about eternity, it would be remiss of me not to give you at least a few meagre minutes to debate its merits amongst yourselves.” It stepped back, sweeping an arm out as if to gesture us all into speech. I remained silent, Solitaire only glared, and Beam was still dribbling into the wooden floor and rolling around with his eyes crossed. Not a great ground for rational discourse, I must admit.

Still, I gave it my best go, turning to Solitaire…Then catching the look in his eye.

Vampires were evil. Not just in a general sense, becoming one, in Redacle, meant leaving all the moral cores of a person’s psyche behind. Empathy, remorse, compassion. It all died as sure as your reanimated corpse. It was to be fundamentally changed, as a person. As I said we based them on Dracula, and Dracula wasn’t a story about the grey morality of undeath and monsters with bleeding hearts.

Which is why, I must say, I was quite fucking surprised to see that Solitaire was actually considering the offer. I wanted to hit him, I wanted to push him out the window and watch him land on the rotters, I wanted to blow him up and add him to the pile of limbs. Instead I forced myself calm, forced myself to focus on our current predicament, and concentrated on buying time.

“What do you think, brother?” I asked, hoping Solitaire had an idea I’d not thought of yet. He usually did. Usually? Almost always. If I didn’t think of the smart thing, just statistically, he almost definitely would have.

But he had nothing, this time, and told me with a fractional widening in his blue eyes. It sent a chill down my spine. I turned to the vampire, already thinking of something to try and convince him to give us the room alone.

And then I noticed Beam, silent as he lay where he was, but shifting slightly. Eyes clearing up, blinking and frowning. Body starting to move with some measure of focused dexterity.

People didn’t stay knocked out for that long, generally. When they did they probably had brain damage. How much longer until he was fully recovered? I doubted it was more than a minute.

So could I keep the vampire occupied for that long or more?

Well, I’d been taught business from an early age. As Solitaire would say, occupying vampires was my special talent.