Vampires couldn’t enter private property. It also worked if you laid claim to it, even if you didn’t legally own it, as was the case with the so-called Morris Shore. The Haven, or rather, St. Lucas High School was the same now. That’s how Aunt Charlie put it and Sean could only nod in response to that.

They’d apparently finished getting it ready and the babysitting duty had been lifted off her. Sean managed to wriggle away by pointing a finger at Marie and saying that she could do what he did.

Chris stayed behind with his mother and they managed to not talk with each other once again. Sean was hesitant on starting a conversation with him now. He was never a good liar and if he let the fact that he was leaving soon slip, Chris would figure that he could leave with him.

“You’re some psychos, you know that?” said Jason from the back.

They were on a boat now and Sean was holding onto it for dear life. It was a larger one that could fit four people on it. Jason, Sean, Max, and Rex were on it at the moment. The motorboat couldn’t be salvaged after what they’d done to enter the school and there weren’t any others in the vicinity.

Rex was rowing from the middle and Jason was at the very back. Max was at the very front and he was also rowing, making Sean feel all the guiltier. It was moving just fine, though. They’d get there in a minute or two, they said.

“What? Angry that we stole your spotlight?” retorted Max.

“It’s not that. It’s the fact that you guys literally fixed up a damn motorboat and crashed it in the backyard and then managed to somehow murder more than ten of those vampires!” shouted out Jason, “It feels like you went into a dungeon without me or something.”

“Not convinced,” said Rex from behind Sean. He was getting somewhat used to the movement but every single time it wobbled, his stomach churned and he held onto the wood of the boat for dear life.

“Hey, I wasn’t going to murder even one of them either way. Those guys are even worse than you lot. You should’ve seen them in action. I saw them climb to the third floor with nothing to hold on to,” said Jason as they finally thumped into shore. There wasn’t any convenient boat stop or anything of the sort on the other side, simply a sandy beach.

Sean was helpfully thrown to the shore by Rex. It wasn’t really a throw. He grabbed him with one hand and placed him on the ground after reaching the side. Whatever his Strength was, Sean was quite sure it was a lot higher than his.

“That, I can get behind,” said Rex with a nod.

“Is every member in your family a Chuck Norris or something?” asked Jason with pouting lips as he stretched. It didn’t even take all that long a time to get to the other side with a boat. Especially when they were all superhuman.

Sean was pretty sure Rex was stronger than most heavy lifters and he himself was as good as most athletes at this point. He wasn’t the best before but now, it was different. And that was without getting any benefits to his physical stats from his Class.

Rex and Liz probably did.

That said, he didn’t see an excess of muscles on anyone. Even Rex, who was already a large guy, hadn’t grown larger. Did that mean that a girl with barely any muscles on her could beat him in an arm wrestle if her Class was one that offered physical benefits?

Sean looked over at Jason. He knew that Rex was a Knight and that Max was a Rogue. He still didn’t know Jason’s Class yet.

Nothing appeared.

He turned his head and spotted Sean. He was at the front after they got off the boat.

“Surprised? That’s my Class Skill,” said Jason with a confident smirk, “Anonymous, or so it says. I get notified when someone tries to use Appraisal on me and I can’t be sensed, heard, or felt unless they know I’m there or are looking at me.”

“That’s totally a cheat,” mumbled Sean after he heard that.

His own gave him Intelligence whenever a Metabiology Skill was updated but he hadn’t done that yet.

Wait, he said Class Skill, so that meant it was the equivalent of Mana Sight? It was indeed useful and it was something of a cheat as well, letting him see through obstacles as if they weren’t there.

That brought up the question of whether the others had special effects attached to the Classes themselves rather than the Class Skill.

“Mine is Indomitable Will. It basically lets me negate anything that affects me. Max’s Class Skill lets him imbue objects with the properties of poison by draining it,” said Rex from the far front, “Marie’s let her turn her Mana into ice and rapidly freeze things. They’re all cheats depending on how you look at it.”

Everyone had something like a cheat.

“Then there’s the Level 5 Class Skill that’s a whole another beast,” said Rex as he stopped and looked back at them, “If I activate it, all attacks from those I deem an enemy and all negative effects that are affecting those I deem an ally get redirected at me. Those effects can then be negated by my first Class Skill. That’s some tank nonsense straight out of a game.”

“And my new one lets me give a Status Effect to anything, including plain water,” said Max with a smirk.

Was he the only one with a not-so-useful Skill?

Recovering 5% of his total Mana Pool was good but it was by no means on the level of what Rex and Max had.

Jason was positively pouting now, “Yeah, yeah. Cool Level 5 kids are yapping away about how great they are.”

He almost felt embarrassed to talk about his Essence Absorption. His titles would be doing most of the heavy lifting when he ate something, not his Class Skill. But it was also the one that was the most practical for prolonged combat.

And it would activate no matter what he ate.

Could he possibly eat something like a bug and recover his Mana? That would turn the skill from a half-assed one to a ridiculously good one. Except, he remembered that the bugs in this new world were different. They were bigger and deadlier if mosquitos were anything to go by —and they were the only bugs he’d heard or seen lately.

“You guys should totally see this,” said Max from up above. He’d climbed out of the sandy area and managed to make it up to where dirt was. It wasn’t all that far away nor was it too high to climb. They were just busy chatting while Max had been busy moving forward.

Rex hopped to the top and pulled himself up with only his hands to get up there. Considering the gap between the sand and the dirt was about a meter tall, it was a considerable parkour feat. Especially in that stuffy armor of his.

He went quiet.

Sean followed them to the top and his mouth was sealed as well.

Jason, on the other hand, had a different reaction. He shouted out a brief “Holy shit,” and stepped back, falling down to the sand again.

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What met them when they reached the dirt wasn’t grass but a field of overgrown red vines. They weren’t a meter tall but wadding through it was impossible. It was like a scene right out of a Disney movie where a villain made a field of vines grow from nothing. The fact that it had only taken like a day or a night for it to happen meant bad news.

“What the hell is that?” asked Sean as he stared at them spamming over a mile and over the hill in the distance. It truly felt like a scene right out of a cartoon as the needles that were sticking out of the vines were as large as fists.

“Whatever it is, it’s not from Earth. I haven’t seen any shit like this in my life and I liked studying about plants back in high school,” said Max and shook his head, “I motion to royally screw off before whatever this monstrosity is poisons us with something that our immune system can’t handle.”

“When did this happen?” asked Rex as his brows furrowed and he put a finger to his chin, as if in deep thought, “It couldn’t be yesterday. Last night?”

“We have to get fucking lost earlier than later. Think later,” urged Max but Rexford didn’t budge. Max couldn’t manage to push him away even when he physically did that.

“Yeah, let’s get the fuck out of here,” said Jason as he finally recovered and climbed back to his feet. He jumped up and stared at it some more. He squatted down and looked at it from up close, that being from over three meters away.

Unlike Rex, Jason wasn’t stubborn. In fact, he was probably wanted to get away from the place as much as Max did. Thus, Max managed to drag him away and Sean followed. The field didn’t seem to have an end in sight but if common sense was anything to go by, the road that was over two or so kilometers down the road wouldn’t be overgrown by plants.

After a few more moments of staring at the vines, he gestured for them to stop.

“Now what?” asked Jason with a grunt.

“Get down to the sand. Trust me,” he said and the trio begrudgingly accepted and hopped down. Rex, on the other hand, remained on the dirt ground and slightly unsheathed his sword. Then, he slightly cut it and swung his hand toward the plants. Some of the droplets fell on the vines and some on the ground.

The plants started to move and stretch toward the droplets and almost wiped it off the others. Bizarrely, some of them had open eyes. That was Rex’s cue to leave as he jumped down and back onto the sand.

“Fuck!” shouted out Jason as he stumbled back, eyes-wide-open.

Sean didn’t fare any better and could only step back. Most of his threats could be solved with a Mana Ball to the face and the plants were no doubt the same, but this was so utterly disgusting and out-of-place that he was temporarily in shock.

“I was sure I saw an eye blink on one of the plants,” explained Rex and breathed out, “Thankfully, they seem stationary and unable to move from the ground they are on.”

“What the fuck are they?” asked Jason as he held his head and hair. He walked around, his eyes never resting in the same place for long, “Vampire plants? Great, we’re fighting human vampires, bug vampires and now plant vampires. What now? Oh wait, there’s nothing else that could be a fucking vampire. We’ve exhausted literally all the options.”

Sean peeked over and used his Appraisal on it, guessing that they should have some information about them.

Skill ‘Appraisal’ has been activated!

Name: Blood Vine

Status: Flora

Type: Dangerous

There was a Status saying that it was a Flora.

The monsters from Earth didn’t have that, even the seemingly mindless Nosferatu had titles and the like. This meant it was spawned by the System. He didn’t know whether to be relieved or disturbed by this.

That said, could he appraise plants?

Sean’s eyes turned toward the regular grass on the ground and willed for Appraisal to activate, only to get nothing.

It was from the System, that was for sure. But he had a question. If they killed them, would they get any experience? That said, how deadly were they? It said it was ‘Dangerous’. Was there another level called ‘Lethal’ and would it be able to kill any of them, especially as they were now?

He wasn’t willing to get answers to that question. At least not by risking anyone here. If he got someone else killed, he wouldn’t forgive himself. It was bad on his conscience, despite knowing that humans would be attacked soon.

Then again, if it didn’t have a Level, it mightn’t give them any experience. But it was easier to check than assume and theorize. He could see the plants even from the sand from where he stood.

So came two Magic Circles. One was that of a Mana Disc and the other one was for a Push Component. The deadly sharp disc shot forward at Sean’s command and slit apart four or so of them before breaking apart into blue smoke. Red liquid that wasn’t thick enough to be blood spilled to the ground, coloring the barren land red. It smelled like iron and an unearthly screech sounded out.

Whatever it was, it wasn’t good for the grass around it as the area covered in the vines was barren, with nothing growing out. It almost looked like what the cracked ground in deserts looked like, except dark brown.

“Why the hell did you do that?” asked Jason, glaring at him.

“Check your experience,” said Rex before Jason finished talking and he looked at Rex like he was a moron, eyes narrowed and brows slightly furrowed. Then awkwardly, Rex added with a small smile, looking at Sean, “That’s what you were going to do, right?”

Sean nodded and called for his Character Screen.

Character Screen

Name:

Sean Morris

Class:

Blue Mage Level 5 (21 / 80 XP)

Status:

Conqueror

Title(s):

Practitioner of the Arcane Arts, Glutton, Legend

Health Points:

450 / 450 (+12.6 per minute)

Mana Points:

940 / 940 (+7.1 per minute)

Attributes

Strength: 43 (???)

Intelligence: 79 (94)

Agility: 30 (???)

Perception: 44

Durability: 45 (???)

Endurance: 43

Vitality: 46 (126)

Wisdom: 56 (71)

He had a feeling that his Intelligence and Wisdom had increased, but he didn’t know how much. His Strength was way beyond what he thought it would be at this point and Agility had increased significantly as well. His Vitality was also shaping up rather nicely after those gains from the titles.

After the encounter with the Noble, Sean hadn’t fought anything so there was no way for his XP to have changed. It was still at 21, despite ‘killing’ those plants. That most likely meant that they didn’t grant XP. Destroying them would most likely be a total waste of time.

“It hasn’t gone up,” said Sean, and his eyes were drawn to Status. He didn’t know where the Prometheus Status went and focused on it.

Please choose which Status to display:

1. Conqueror

2. Prometheus

A screen that let him choose between which to display appeared?

What did that mean? Appraisal couldn’t see Status Screens unless-

He himself could see the amount of Mana Points a target had, which was also why Mana Sight was such a cheat. Then that stood to reason that other Skills like it allowed someone to see Statuses? So by choosing which one to show to others, he could be either hated or respected by them.

Conqueror was an obvious choice, especially when he literally had a title that called him a ‘Legend’. There was no need to hide it. Showcasing Prometheus, on the other hand, would make people ask too many questions. That would mean he’d be with people all the time.

Well, monsters.

He didn’t want that.

As long as he has Clara to talk to, he was fine. Others, he didn’t want to interact with. His own personal would undoubtedly be somewhere where only the two of them would be in, with no one to interrupt it.

That said, to see whether or not Titles could be displayed or not, remembering Hugh having no titles at all, Sean focused on the Title section of the Character Screen, to no avail. It seemed that he couldn’t really do anything.

That was a disappointment, but there wasn’t really any need for him to hide it at the moment.

When he became a monster, though… he didn’t know what would happen. Would he be ostracized for being a former hunter? Would he be hated, on the verge of being murdered at every turn of the way?

He didn’t care much about that as long as he survived and was with Clara. Well, survival was a non-essential part of that, though. Being with Clara was what mattered. If she wasn’t on that side, then he would undoubtedly struggle until all his limbs fell off and his brain exploded.

But she was on that side and he didn’t have qualms about leaving this one.

“Hey, you alright?” asked Jason with a pat on his shoulder and he put a smile on his face. He’d spaced off again as if he had his Research active. Sean almost jumped at the contact.

“Yeah. I just got lost in my thoughts,” he said and looked at the boat. They could row downstream and get to where the road was, or wherever the field of red vines ended. The name wasn’t creative at all. Maybe that was an effects of the translation of whatever language was used to name it on whatever planet it made its home in.