Chapter 119: Honey Trap

They gathered once again, within Nara’s door domain in her nebula house, for double security. If Siyu was spying on them, he wouldn’t be able to bypass the double layered protection.

“Siyu Hong is likely a Death Essence User, of the vampiric variety,” said Sen.

“I’ve had that suspicion as well,” John said. Vampirism was one of the topics discussed in the field of healing magic and in classes at the Academy. “Which means this can get very bad very quickly. If he feels threatened, he may attack the townsfolk.”

“Nara.” Sen jotted down a quick list. He’d hand the list to Sage, but all her bodies were occupied. “Purchase these objects from Sanshi.”

She nodded, pocketing the list into her inventory, “The Adventure Society trading hall won’t be open now, so I’ll go first thing in the morning.”

“I’m going to occupy Siyu.” Sen said. “Aliyah, do you think you can break into the concealed chamber?”

“Siyu is very much an amateur if his earlier concealment magic is demonstrative of his level. Breaking into the chamber is below amateur.”

“Eufemia, I’d like you to come with me to occupy Siyu.”

“Honey pot?” she asked, immediately catching on.

He nodded. “If you’re willing.”

“That’s easy,” Eufemia huffed, flipping her hair. “Judging by his attitude, he’s a narcissist. Thinks he’s better than everyone around here, oh, none of the women or men here are good enough for him. If I’m a little flirty but standoffish, that’ll get him going. His desire to conquer.” The disgust in her words made her opinion on that sort of person very clear. None here disagreed.

“The is one problem with my task,” said Aliyah. “I won’t be able to sneak in there without him noticing. If he’s watching us with familiars, he’ll notice us the moment we head towards the warehouse.”

“Unless, I have him lead us to the warehouse himself,” said Sen. “I’ll tell him you discovered it and ask what he knows about it. He already knows you have basic ritual magic ability.”

“If we bring it up first, it makes it look like we’re confiding in him,” Eufemia said slyly. “I like it! Excellent manipulation.”

“And It won’t be suspicious if we hang around there,” Nara added.

Sen nodded. “That’s the idea. We have one additional issue to solve. We may need to evacuate the town. Nara?”

“You want to store everyone within the domain door?”

“Are you comfortable with that?”

Nara pondered it for a moment: Chelsea had said to keep the ability under wraps, but could she really do so when lives were at risk? However, she had already been a target by external forces for reasons other than her Astral Domain ability. Adding on one more reason was adding hay to the haystack of reasons to kidnap Nara.

“I can create a domain doorway, but anyone with a full set of essences may not want to go through. I can’t guarantee that Siyu won’t be able to enter either. But yeah, I’m willing.”

The nebula house wasn’t large enough to house the whole town for evacuation. Otherwise, she would have suggested that instead. It had guaranteed protections that would slow down a bronze ranker. Not to mention, it was capable of making its own defensive attacks. It was nothing that’d significantly harm a bronze ranker, but it was at least a deterrence.

“Are we making our move tomorrow?” Encio asked.

Sen shook his head. “If he’s a vampire, he’ll need to ingest blood periodically. We’re going to drag this out as long as possible, so that he makes mistakes, and uses up his blood stores.”

“I could delay destroying his array,” said Aliyah. “I will disable it so that we may inspect the secret area, then re-enable it when we leave. If he returns to his lair, we don’t want to alert him with a disabled array.”

Sen nodded.

“I’m afraid if he’s an essence user vampire,” Eufemia said, “I won’t know much about them. I thought that the killings were out of character for the vampires I know.” Eufemia felt apologetic, her initial observation had led the team off the scent of a vampire. “The death essence users of Nekroz aren’t what we common folk know about or interact with.”

“Nobody knows much about Death Essence users. It’s hardly a failing,” Encio said, reassuring instead of sniping when it mattered.

“This is good and all,” interrupted John, “But shouldn’t we go and get help? I know you all are gung-ho about challenge, but Siyu—if he’s a vampire—is a real threat to all these people! Nara could call over a bronze ranker and have them deal with him.”

“You make a good point,” said Sen. “I have considered this course of action.”

“But decided against it? Why?”

“Not exactly—let me explain. If we have Nara invite a bronze ranker to this village—firstly, there is no guarantee any can portal directly to this village, even if there was one with a portal ability.”

“I follow so far.”

“I have no qualms with Nara reporting the results of our investigation to the Adventure Society. It is the original objective of our contract,” said Sen. “Since we have Nara with us, it would be prudent to do so. However, the society may opt to have us deal with Siyu regardless.”

“Why is that?” John said, incredulous.

“There is no doubt Siyu has capabilities to observe others from a distance. His familiars or vampiric minions are scattered throughout the town, and likely through the routes leading to and from the town as well. If he detects a bronze ranker approaching the town, he may not react well.”

“You think he’ll tear up the village,” Eufemia said. “Sink his fangs into every last person here.”

Sen nodded. “He has the home advantage. A bronze ranker would be hard to stop with no deaths.”

“But would delayal result in less deaths?” John countered.

“We can only hope,” said Sen solemnly. “What does one do? A path of guaranteed loss, or a riskier path the potential of greater gains or greater losses?” He crossed a fist over his chest, expression unyielding and sincere. “As the team strategist, have faith that I will tilt the scales in our favor, and that we may strike true in Warrior’s stead.”

John met his eyes and acquiesced. In this, he was not the senior.

*****

“Sen Arlang,” Siyu said, greeting him. “A good morning to you.”

“I’m glad I can have your assistance today in these mines, Siyu.”

“Who’s this?” Siyu’s eyes turned to Eufemia.

She was enchanting, seductive, and dangerous—effortlessly so. Her black tight leather armor hugged her body (not the armor Eufemia normally wore, of course). Two daggers hung at her waist, tucked into dark brown sheathes. Her dark ruby hair was done up, revealing her neck, teased with curls. She was a ruby poison apple, clearly dangerous and enticingly so.

“Eufemia Teresina,” she said. She looked at Siyu and smirked, as if she had just appraised him, and he fell below expectations. “I would say it’s a pleasure… but that remains to be seen.”

“I’ll do my best to fulfill your expectations, Miss Teresina,” Siyu said, eyes narrowing. He could taste the challenge in her words, in her posture, and he craved victory.

“Do try.”

“Where’s your auxiliary member? Nara, was it?”

“She’s slept in a bit late today.” Sen said.

“You let her treat you like that?”

“Aww~,” Eufemia said teasingly, “You don’t like that?”

She may have insinuated something between Nara and Sen that the two would have found abhorrent. Sen schooled his twitching expression.

“Eufemia,” he admonished.

Siyu pursed his lips, smiling. It was the sort of smile that was less charming that what the person doing it thought of themselves. “My apologies. I was insensitive. Give Nara my regards.”

Sen had never felt a greater urge to cave his skull in on a stone wall to erase this very moment from his memories, or perhaps a visit to the church of Oblivion. Eufemia must be enjoying this. He side-eyed the stone wall of the closest building, so very tempted.

He did not, blankly replying, “I will give her your regards.”

Even Eufemia praised his ability to hide all of his emotions beneath a veneer of neutrality.

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*****

Nara returned to their inn room, done with her purchases in Sanshi. She would next go with Encio to talk to the town head.

The town head had a similar build to the miners; strong, wiry physique forged from daily exertion. He was one of the few celestines in the town, with cinerous copper brown hair and eyes. The town head himself was previously a miner. His face was tired, worn, showing his full fifty plus years of age. Without a third essence he didn’t benefit from the magical rejuvenation of a full set. Even so, like all celestines, he possessed a natural beauty that was only enhanced by his wrinkles, aging like fine wine.

Nara could tell from his aura that he had two essences, but not which. She wondered as she ranked up and became more skilled with her aura, if that was something she’d be able to detect, like how the silver rankers of Sanshi could detect her race from her aura.

The three sat down in the mayor’s office. Encio activated a privacy screen, which covered the three of them.

“Town Head, Sen Arlang would like to request something of you, and it’s very important that you follow his instructions.”

“You’ve all made headway into the case?” he asked, tense from his built-up stress. “Who is it, who’s killing all the people in this town?” Desperation bled through his voice. He had held up strong for a long time, but he tired of the funerals, the weeping wives and confused children, and the emotional burden each death stacked on top of him.

“We can’t tell you, because then the culprit would know that we know,” Encio said. “Town Head, please, relax.”

Haoran Jing realized that his fists had been clenched. He slowly unclenched them, stretching them out and taking a deep breath.

“What can I do for you?”

“A fight will break out with the culprit, in around a week,” Encio said. “At the time, we may need the town evacuated. Do you have an evacuation location?”

The mayor shook his head, “This town isn’t big enough for a local one. Our shelter is in the outskirts of Sanshi.”

Three days was not too long of a trip for monster wave preparations, which often lasted months. It was the safest city in the region, so none of the townsfolk would complain about their designated evacuation zone.

“If something happens, a portal arch will appear in the center of town. If we ask you to, we’d like you to evacuate everyone into the portal arch, no questions asked.”

Encio prompted her, and Nara invited Haoran Jing to the party.

He was shocked for a moment, observing the strange screen that floated in his vision.

“What is this?”

“It’s my communication ability.” Nara explained, “We’ll be able to give you more details, once things go down.”

The mayor nodded, accepting the party invitation.

*****

Three days had passed. Sen had wasted as much time as possible, asking Siyu to lead him through the mines, with the excuse of “finding hidden cultists.” Eufemia continued flirting with Siyu, until the two were at the fanciest restaurant in town—which wasn’t anything impressive compared to Sanshi with their silver and gold rankers, but the town still had someplace nice for special occasions. Encio, Nara, and Sen sat at another table, with a privacy screen set up.

“Why are we doing this…” The past few days had mentally exhausted Sen. Caspian sat in a chair next to him, food covering his red wolf fur. He reflexively lifted a napkin to wipe the remnants from his bond’s face, who, as usual, refused to cooperate without a fight.

“Well Eufemia made you out to be some sort of Arlang Casanova with a harem of mediocre-but-attractive teammates,” said Encio, who fit ‘Casanova’ far better in Sen’s humble opinion. “So now we all have to flirt with you. Say ahh~,” Encio lifted his fork, placing it within Sen’s mouth, who chewed mechanically, a faraway look in his eyes, as if his soul had left his body an empty, uninhabitable husk.

Encio relished playing the role, and he certainly had the looks to match. He wore a skintight white silk long shirt plus pants combo, cut away at his back and hips to reveal his olive skin and striking soul crest. Beautiful medium length wavy black hair and eyes that glittered like emeralds, Encio could be a high-class escort. Nara wore a pure white loose dress, chosen by Eufemia to “bring out her pure appeal”, because it was the most convincing option for Nara. She couldn’t do black-leather-sexy. (Eufemia said that he could, which had only exacerbated Sen’s headache. He was unspeakably glad she hadn’t demanded that of him.)

“Why do you even have all of this clothing? This is oddly specific.”

“You know I model for Pietro.”

“Women’s clothing too?”

“I work both ways.”

Sen was a lean-muscular, but not nearly slender enough to be a femboy. She eyed him suspiciously.

“It’s Eufemia’s,” Encio finally admitted, pouting as he gave up the truth. “She sometimes puts on the ‘soft and innocent act’. Fools a different type of idiot.”

At least Sen had been spared from his mentor joining the act.

“You’ve having too much fun with this.”

“No such thing,” reassured Encio unconvincingly. “It’s all part of the performance.”

“John has to play the ‘only-competent-team-member-doing-all-of-the-real-work’,” Nara said, “Think about him, eating all alone.”

“I don’t remember the taste of any of the food I’ve eaten,” said Sen gravely. “I envy him.”

“If I sat on your lap,” Encio asked. “Would it make you feel better?”

“It would not.” Sen could not refuse fast enough, resisting the urge to throw up. “I would feel worse.”

“Should I give it a shot?” joked Nara.

“You have the flirting ability of a bee courting a flower. Just sit there and look pretty.”

“I can’t tell if that’s supposed to be an insult. From your tone, I think it is. Besides, I don’t think I’m pretty enough to sit here and look pretty.”

“You could let Sen feed you,” he suggested very unhelpfully, in Sen’s opinion.

Nara stared at Sen and Sen stared at Nara.

“What if I just put food on her plate?” Sen weakly offered after a pause. Somewhere in the back of his mind was a mantra of forthemissionforthemissionforthemission. Perhaps it would drown out reality.

“That’ll work.” Said Encio encouragingly, his voice mischievously sweet. “Now, my handsome Prince, here comes another bite~.”

Sen had never felt so tortured in his life. He prayed a compassionate god would end this cruel existence, snuffing him out like a fleeting candle flame.

Oblivion. He should donate to Oblivion.

“Eufemia Teresina...” Siyu said, eyeing the woman’s ruby hair and eyes, “Are you perhaps part of the Fenhu?” Her last name didn’t match the Fenhu’s usual scheme, but they Fenhu were also known for marrying foreigners. She may have inherited the in-law’s last name.

Eufemia smiled, brushing back a lock of hair. “What makes you say that?”

“Am I wrong?”

“I won’t give away my secrets so easily.”

“Well, Miss Teresina, the Fenhu are well known for their ruby celestines.”

“Hm~,” Eufemia hummed and sipped on her wine. Siyu was a petty provincial essence user pretending to be a hotshot. He knew nothing of the Fenhu except for the stories. Malik and his family did have metallic-red haired celestines (of a more flaming red than her dark ruby), but their skin was fair to tan, and not the snow-ivory that Eufemia inherited from her mother. Not that someone like him would know the intricacies of the current generation of the Fenhu. “What else?”

“I’ve heard that the Fenhu like to use fire abilities.”

“Fortunately,” Eufemia said, leaning in, “I don’t fit the family mold there.”

“I’m sorry that this restaurant is the best this backwater town has to offer the both of you.” Siyu said, his gaze turning towards Sen’s table, where he saw the three feeding each other, although he could not hear what they were saying, due to a privacy screen. “Your team leader seems to be enjoying himself. You don’t need to be there?” He eyed her.

Eufemia snorted, “I’m a peer, not one of his toys.”

“I understand,” Siyu placated, his smile hollow of charm. “That would be beneath you.”

Eufemia was looking forward to the stabbing part of the plan. Physical catharsis was always better after a long acting stint.

*****

The group gathered at the nebula house, in varying degrees of mental exhaustion. Sen was dead inside, as if his life was a watermelon that had all of its contents scooped out, leaving but the bitter rinds.

“You alright there, mate?” John said as Sen walked in, plopping down on furniture within Nara’s false domain. All of his perfect posture and commanding presence was completely gone, stretched out face down over the length of a couch.

“No.”

“Right…” John said, unsure.

“I don’t think we can continue this charade much longer,” said Eufemia, plopping onto a different seat, which conformed itself to her ideal comfort level.

“Thank the gods…” Sen said.

“The longer we stay, the more suspicious Siyu will become. He’ll start to wonder why we haven’t left yet. Besides,” Eufemia said, clasping a hand over her neck, “he keeps staring at my neck. He doesn’t want to bed me; he just wants to eat me.”

“You know you just said the same thing twice,” Nara said.

Eufemia rolled her eyes.

“I’ll keep him busy for one more day,” said Sen, his voice muffled from the couch. “I’ll tell him we’re preparing to leave, and that we apologize for being unable to solve the issue with the town, and to keep us updated if anything happens.”

“During that time, Nara and I will enter his lair, and destroy what’s inside.”

“I’ll get the mayor to start evacuating into Nara’s domain,” said Encio. “Siyu won’t leave the caves during the day, so we have until then. Once we do so, Siyu will realize what’s happening.”

“He’ll try to escape or, he’ll try to fight.”

Eufemia smirked. “He’ll fight. That vamp-bastard is itching to ‘prove’ himself in a fight. He’s been picking on normal folk for over two years to rank up, and if he thinks adventurers are anywhere near the same caliber, he’s got a surprise coming for him.”

“More like five years,” said John. “I’ve been overlooking the papers, back to surprise mutilation and disappearances of corpses. However he ranks up, the dead and normal people didn’t do much for him.”

“Diminishing returns,” Aliyah speculated.

“The fact it does anything for him is abhorrent,” said Eufemia.

“He’s thirty-two? So he absorbed a death essence at twenty-seven? Why?” Nara asked. “If he had two essences at that point, he was so close to getting a normal confluence. You managed to get a picture of him tonight, John?”

“I did,” John said, passing around printouts of Siyu’s sheet for them to see.

“Death, Blood, and Crystal for the Undead Confluence,” Nara read out.

“Crystal, Blood, and Balance form the Vessel confluence,” Aliyah said. “He would’ve been well on his way to becoming an offensive healer. It’s a valued role.”

“Drain enemies, heal allies? That sort?”

“That’s correct.”

“What could’ve possibly convinced him to take a Death Essence then?”

“Immortality?” Aliyah suggested, “Vampiric-like undead usually immediately become ageless of some sort. An aspect of Undeath is the inability to die of natural causes, a corruption of the cycle.”

“Like the vampire-turned in Nekroz,” said Eufemia. “Many don’t want to age and die.”

Essence user to normal civilian: Who did not suffer that sort of existential dread? Everyone knew she may have been referring to a specific person, but they did not voice it.

“He’s vain,” said Encio. “That may have been reason enough for him.”

“Five years and yet only bronze rank,” said Sen, still face down. “His impatience brought negligence, revealing mistakes.”

“A pointless waste of the immortality he wanted,” Eufemia scoffed. “Let’s put this bloodsucking bastard down.”

*****

Over the course of three days, Sen had already asked Siyu about the hidden entrance. Siyu embarrassedly explained that the miners used it as a gathering ground for discussions they preferred to keep from their boss, Kisang Zho.

Nonchalant, Aliyah and Nara headed there. Their excuse, if needed, was that Aliyah wanted to take stone samples from different parts of the mountain, in a last ditch hope of discovering something; Aliyah lamenting her inability to do something else for Sen as his ritualist.

Nara was the supposed storage, so it wasn’t unusual that she went together with Aliyah. Siyu had lost his initial alertness, a combination of Eufemia’s flirting, Sen’s fixation on supposed cult activity, and his ‘harem’.

Nara didn’t feel any eyes on them. “We’re in the clear,” she told Aliyah through voice chat.

They entered the passage, the concealment magic already removed by Siyu when he had shown it to Sen. Nara stood guard; her senses spread as far down the stone corridors as she could. Aliyah examined the concealment and alarm magic, mumbling about the magic.

“It’s clear he learnt his ritual magic from a skill book, and not from an instructor. If it was an instructor, he did an unacceptable job at teaching. These arrays are basic, with no foundational knowledge in theory at all. Even if he learnt magic from a skill book, he should have practiced. This is less than amateur work. Concealment and security require higher standards, that much should be obvious.”

“He probably showed the main ritualist, what was his name again?”

“Adar Wang,” Chrome said telepathically to her because he didn’t have the name-memory of a goldfish.

“He probably half-listened to the lessons from Adar then just demonstrated he could do the rituals. Assuming he used a skill book beforehand.”

“It’s a likely scenario. Siyu looks down on most of the townsfolk. Adar probably saw through his insincerity and gave him a pass since he couldn’t stand to teach such a pretentious student.” After a moment, Aliyah set down her ritual tools. “It’s done. I’ve disabled the magic.”

Nara felt the ambient magic shift, and what had looked like a stone wall became a corridor, the illusion and conjured wall undone.

“Let’s see what this Siyu is hiding inside.”