‘It's now or never. I have an opportunity here right now to do something after doing absolutely nothing about these vampires for two weeks.’ Arthur slowly crept out of the dormitory and out of the barracks into the empty street. Occasionally Arthur saw a paladin or two patrolling the roads who paid no attention to him.
Soon Arthur found himself at the Free Parrot Bar and walked behind it looking for the small entrance to the meeting place. The walk down the small path was eerily quiet, almost as if anything hiding just behind the tree line was waiting for Arthur to pass by.
Soon the graveyard came into view, all the graves were dug up with large mounds of dirt off to the side and a lone humanoid standing with their back to the opening. “So you must be Axia.” Arthur called out from the entrance.
“That is correct Mr. Arthur. Have you come alone?” Axia turned to face Arthur as she spoke. She wore a similar attire to the vampire assassin Mulier with a set of red leather armor and a matching cloak to cover her body. Something he did not have the opportunity to notice before was that the cloak had a symbol of an eye unlike the one on the daggers the cult members had which depicted teeth.
“I did. No one knows of our meeting but us and your Lord Darius.” Arthur crossed his arms as he spoke, giving Axia a view of his armor and weapon to make her think twice about attacking him.
“That's good. Then If you would follow me and I will take you to Lord Darius, he has been quite interested in meeting you for some time now.” Axia gave a small chuckle not unlike a fair maiden at a fancy dinner, but it felt twisted and wrong to Arthur who could see Axia was no maiden but a bloodthirsty monster.
Axia walked past Arthur and gave him a coy look from under the hood giving Arthur a clear view of what would have been her beautiful face if not for the deathly pale skin and blood red eyes. Arthur followed her down a portion of the path he came from, at about halfway back Axia made an abrupt turn into the tree line.
Arthur, confused at her action, simply watched as she walked through the trees as if they did not exist. For several seconds Arthur just stood there until Axia’s voice came from the other side. “It's just an illusion. So don’t dilly dally much longer.”
Hesitantly Arthur did the same and walked through the illusion without any difficulty. The other side however was a bit of a surprise. A well taken care of path lay before them with several types of trees that Arthur did not recognize that ranged from dark brown to even one that was orange.
Axia upon seeing Arthur immediately began walking again down the path. As they passed by about one hundred meters the trees began to dwindle to an open field and a single large manor that was three stories tall. The exterior was a bit worn from time in the elements and was built from grey stone bricks. An old fountain sat before it that clearly had not been used for quite some time, the field was overgrown with all sorts of plants and the brick path had several small plants poking out from it.
This manor had clearly not been taken care of for quite some time and the vampire cult had taken advantage of that to make it their own. Upon entering Arthur could see that despite the outside appearance the inside was clean and there were even a few torches lit along the walls.
Arthur followed Axia down the largest hallway that went directly forward until they reached a very large and open room with a few chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and windows on the left and right sides. The floor that perhaps once was pristine and clean was now cold with dirt and old wax from candles, leaving the room feeling long forgotten.
Along the sides were about twenty people total wearing matching red cloaks with a hood covering their face and each holding a candle with both hands. But the biggest anomaly was the throne encrusted with gold and a few red gemstones along with the man sitting in it. From a distance it looked to be a human noble with his exquisite clothing worthy of a duke, but the deathly pale skin and blood red eyes gave away his nature as a vampire. The vampire who was none other than Lord Darius himself looked no older than twenty two years old. “Welcome, welcome my friend to my home here in Antium.” Lord Darius stood as he saw his guest enter the room. “Please make yourself comfortable.”
Axia walked off to the side to join her fellow blood spawn while Arther stood just inside the room looking at Lord Darius. Despite the clear case of vampirism and cult personality Lord Darius looked and spoke as if he really did see Arthur as a friend. “I would exactly call us friends. As this is the first time we have met.” Arthur slowly began walking further into the hall and looked around taking note of how many people were there.
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“But who is to say that won’t change. People like us have so much in common. People like us are held down at every opportunity by those who are in power and suck the life out of good people. Good people like those I have surrounded myself with!” Lord Darius shouted as he spread his arms out towards the people standing along the walls.
“And what exactly do we have in common? Because if I recall correctly your little vampire tried to kill me after I exposed two of your “Good People” dumping a dead body.” Arthur began walking on the right side around the center of the room.
“And if I recall correctly that woman was a terrible person. Taking advantage of people's feelings to garner a large amount of gifts and attention that she had no intention of returning whatsoever.” Darius began to walk around the center of the room like Arthur was doing, creating a circle that the two walked around like two predators waiting for the right moment to strike.
Darius could see that Arthur's hand had not left the hilt of his sword since he had entered the room, clearly he did not have any intention of taking his gift. “Do you know how I chose who to bestow the gift of immortality to?”
“And just how would I know that?” Arthur saw that Darius did not look the least bit worried, if anything he looked almost happy by Arthurs words.
“Well the first way is to give it to someone who has served me in a matter that greatly pleases me and shows they are worthy of my gift. The second way is to defeat one of my other children in combat and kill them, proving that they are more worthy than the one they had just slain.” The realization hit Arthur and it showed in his face.
“That is why I invited you here. To offer you what you have rightfully earned by killing Mulier and proving yourself superior and more deserving of my gift.”
The two other blood spawn who were standing off to the side walked over to Darius’s side. “Join us brother.” They spoke in unison revealing the second one as a slim man. Arthur stood looking at Darius and his poisoned apple that he presented as fresh.
“No I will not.” Arthur drew his sword from its sheath and raised it up above his head. All the flames from each candle jumped towards Arthur's sword, coating it in flame. It was a trick he figured out how to do during his basics of pyromancy class, it took several tries and help from Eligius relighting all the candles but he eventually learned how to do it. And as a reward for doing something that was outside of his expectations Eligius taught Arthur how to use his mana to fuel the flames and keep them from burning out, it wasn’t conjuring flames but it was the next best thing.
“I may not be here on behalf any god, but you are all a blight on this land and need to be removed permanently for this place to heal.” Arthur pointed his flaming blade directly at Darius as he spoke, as if he was challenging him directly.
“A clever trick, but it pales in comparison to the real deal. Axia, Hegio, please take care of our guest.” Darius said with a disappointed face as with a wave of his hand he floated back to his throne and watched the ensuing fight.
Axia as it turned out was a mage and began to launch a series of water projectiles at Arthur from a distance while Hegio was a frontline fighter with his one handed axe and shield. The two made an excellent team with Hegio right up in Arthur’s face and Axia targeting his vitals to try to land a killing blow.
But Arthur was more than ready to face two young vampires who have only faced opponents far weaker than them. Arthur used another technique that he learned in his basics of aeromancy class, propelling himself forward with the use of gusts of wind. He was able to use this to get up to a meter or two of movement in a second or two and used that to strike at Hegio’s unprotected spots or to move behind him blocking Axia’s line of sight.
“You are a fool to reject Lord Darius’s gift.” Hegio struck down with his axe and was blocked by Arthur with his sword getting caught in the small grove that connected the blade to the handle.
“And you are a greater fool for accepting it.” Arthur angled his sword down towards Hegio fingers holding onto the axe handle and with a small nudge the blade severed a few of his fingers cauterizing them in the process causing extreme pain that up to this point he had not experienced.
“AHHHHH!” Hegio screamed out in pain as he dropped his shield and his axe with what few fingers remained. His reaction was unnecessary as with the help of Lord Darius he could have reattached them. But Arthur did not waste the opportunity and with Hegio blocking the line of sight of Axia, Hegio was stabbed through the chest and slashed across the face severing a portion of his jaw.
Hegio collapsed onto the floor slowly bleeding to death from both his mouth and chest. Axia saw someone she viewed as a brother fall to the ground with horrific wounds that he would likely not recover from with the enemy so close and with a heavy heart she chanted a spell that she believed would kill her opponent instead of helping Hegio like her heart told her to.