Arvil Bloodthorn was old, incredibly old to the point he had lived through the eras of numerous emperors, serving as one of its strongest generals and Dukes that reign over the Bloodthorn Dukedom, a small haven for vampire kind within the walls of humanity.

He has single-handedly changed the fate of his race, establishing a good reputation from their originally bloodthirsty past full of killing and feasting on seas of blood. Through his wise tactics and incredible wit, he had devised a deal with the emperor hundreds of years ago and had since pushed his race to an era of fruition.

And to repay him for his grand and generous deeds… he was drowning in paperwork.

He sat there on his office chair, encasing himself within the shadows of his personal room and mindlessly scribbling down on paper. Alongside both of his hands writing at the same time, ten quills were moving in tandem and strategically writing down his signature on their respective stacks to hasten the progress of his work.

There was a sort of defeat and helplessness in his wise old eyes, like a gaze that had seen through the ages and had felt the pain of grief over and over, leaving behind only a deep well of acceptance.

“No good deed goes unpunished,” he mumbled and the quills in both of his hands abruptly cracked. His crimson eyes glowed brightly with anger as he slammed his hands down on the table, causing a loud thud to echo in the dark room, but it appears that this outburst is a common occurrence as the table merely creaked and didn’t break.

This is important because, with the concentration of his vampiric blood, he’d be classified as a bonafide Vampire Duke, a being who can safely be placed in the Arch-level bracket, a being who is on the same general level of power as a dragon, a kingdom-level catastrophe. This meant the table was specifically designed to handle his occasional outburst, like a stress ball of sorts.

Vampires are known for their amazing physical capabilities and innate magical abilities like controlling blood, along with their monstrous regeneration and vitality, a Vampire Duke would be, on average, stronger than the average Arch Knight and Archmage.

The only major flaw the vampire race has is their weakness to sunlight, which causes them to mostly remain active at night. There’s also the fact that they need to consume blood to appease their hunger and maintain optimal combat prowess.

Of course, their need for blood has mostly been solved with the deal Arvil Bloodthorn had made centuries ago, which basically allowed humans to donate blood to the vampires and they’d get monetary rewards in return.

And since the vampires are a long-living race, practically ageless in fact, they all horde an eye-widening amount of wealth and could easily pay off the taxes Arvil placed on his dukedom to pay off the fee for those donating blood.

Because of this, life was good.

The only things the vampires have to worry about in their well-fed lives are finding ways to make money, deal with their boredom, enjoy the nightlife, and other mundane things that vampires of old could only dream of worrying about with their battle-hardened lifestyle.

As for Arvil, he still has to deal with paperwork.

But as he did so, his eyes widened in surprise as everything came to a screeching halt. With wide eyes, his eyes went from looking mindlessly at the dark wall to the bright glowing red orb floating in midair like a very obvious signal that meant something important.

Lance is in danger! Arvil’s eyes turned a deep shade of crimson as a bloodthirsty aura erupted out of his normally decrepit self. In less than a second, he had stood up and had his claws extended out, with his wings unfurled, and his fangs protruding out of his mouth.

In the next moment, a bloody red portal opened in front of him and he rushed through it without a moment to think.

…

Winston was currently fiddling with a ball of warped space when all of a sudden, a bloody red portal opened up in the enclosed space he had set up, his very own personal space prison where escaping was as hard as entering.

A brief look of surprise appeared on his face before it was quickly replaced by a cool and composed look, and he then stood up from his crouching position to prepare for battle.

Arvil arrived and was ready for battle when his eyes landed on the bloody figure of Lance on the side. His clothes were cut and cleaved, while blood was pouring out of his rapidly healing wounds. On his head was a strange purple ring that released an eerie aura, which seemed to be the object that had placed his son in a comatose state.

This immediately shocks Arvil, because while his son may be famously known for being a kind and caring young man who works at the school’s infirmary, he is still a Vampire Marquess which is the vampire equivalent of a Royal-level Mage or Knight.

His strength was also at the peak of Royal-level entities, and he could easily deal with a group of trained professors at the school with relative ease. After all, he’s not only the son of one of the greatest vampires to have ever lived, but had received top-tier training since young and had experienced numerous life-and-death situations to prove himself as a vampire worthy to receive the throne his father held.

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As the heir of Arvil Bloodthorn, the qualifications he has must correspond to the weight he will soon hold.

So, when he saw his son so badly beaten up like that, with signs that showed absolute dominance from the mysterious enemy, he could instantaneously tell the enemy was an Arch-level being just like him.

Even though he didn’t know who the guy was, he could tell that the aura he radiated was not weaker than his, and the murderous vibes he released even caused cold sweat to form on Arvil’s forehead and back.

His handsome face frowned and he slightly leaned forward as blood coagulated around him. Inspecting the closed-off space he found himself in, he squinted his eyes and suddenly asked, “You… You were aiming for me?”

“Hmm, who knows?” Winston asked playfully as the ball of warped space in his hand flickered off into nowhere. Then, as he squinted his eyes and fully released the maddening bloodlust bubbling within him, his ceramic-white hands were covered in a purple hue and transformed into sharp blade-like limbs.

Wings sprouted out of his back and were covered in a gooey membrane, while his legs turned long and grotesque like that of a weird mix between grasshopper and frogs. On his chest, a dark purple orb formed which pulsated with a bright purple light, as if every beat from his heart caused the light to pulsate within the orb.

Lastly, his eyeball turned completely black while his purple irises turned into a darker shade. His aura hurriedly went from calm and collected into a wild beast ready to kill and cause a bloody mess.

Arvil remained unfazed though and snorted. “Let’s see what you got.”

…

“Huh?”

Almost at the same time, both Anna and Noel who were lazing around outside the infirmary stopped moving and turned to look at the door leading to the library at the same time. Even though it was subtle, their sharpened senses from constant divination and searching allowed them to perceive the abrupt twang in the fabrics of space.

There was also the minute burst of mana coming from the room, which then disappeared alongside the auras of Winston and Lance.

“This…” Anna looked at the infirmary with shocked eyes. The vision in her mind turned crystal clear at that moment as all the fuzziness that was blocking her from taking a clear view was fully washed off.

With a simple glance, she could tell that the strange dark space was actually an infirmary that had been distorted due to the lengthening and widening of space. If she had a slider to shrink down the vision in her mind, the scene she would see would be exactly like the inside layout of the infirmary room.

When she remembered the sudden burst of mana and traces of space warping from inside the room, she realized what was going on straightaway and proceeded to act.

The spirits around Anna lent her their strength, and the foundation of reality soon started to be molded to her desires. A bright ball of incredibly hot flames gathered in the palm of her hand as she hurriedly launched it forward.

Even though the aftermath of this spell would implicate them once it explodes, she had enough trust in Noel to know that he would handle this without questioning a thing along with her own skill and control over her magic.

The ball of hot flames exploded into a brilliant burst of heat and light and the door was hurriedly burnt to a crisp, but the flames soon converged towards them as if it would swallow them whole. The young boy that had accompanied them was shocked out of his wits, but Anna and Noel remained calm as a protective barrier appeared out of nowhere to block the approaching flames.

When the flames receded and the young boy finally took the courage to take a peek, the trio saw a completely black and empty space ahead of them through the broken door, revealing nothing but pitch darkness.

Noel frowned as he tried to break the barrier of dense space by creating a black sword with white outlines and stabbing it forward into the pitch-black sheet but to no avail. This did seem to cause a sudden reaction though as the pitch darkness squirmed for a moment before turning transparent.

Through the transparent film, the trio saw a bloody and gory scene, where two beings blitzed through the land and sky at breakneck speeds.

With every swing of his hand, space cracked and fractured, forming deep fissures that would cause mass destruction outside the enclosed space if it were allowed to release the catastrophic energy from broken space.

On the other hand, Arvil was a lot less wild with his attacks. Bloody tendrils covered the ground and sky, while the shadows beneath Winston continuously released dark spikes with the intent of stabbing through his chest or head.

The fight went on at a pace Anna could barely comprehend and perceive. If not for the auxiliary spell Noel had cast in case they did have to join the battle, which allowed her to actually see what was going on, she would have been lost from the constant bangs, sparks, and flashing lights that clouded her view from the intense battle within.

From the west-most side to the east-most part of the enclosed space, the two experienced combatants released one attack to another. Magical abilities that couldn’t be categorized as spells and were rather innate abilities granted by their unique physiology were flooding the room with atmospheric mana, which caused a silent build-up of pressure on their very souls like a room stuffed with heat and humidity - just like a sauna.

Though amidst these flashing lights and flashy attacks, her eyes landed on one small particular detail as the two beings came to a halt at opposite sides of the broken battlefield.

On the unknown man’s hand, there was a tiny silver ring embedded right into the edge of his blade-like arm, releasing a dim green glow that she could barely perceive as if releasing a signal that screamed into the darkness: “DANGER! DANGER!”

This minor detail didn’t escape Noel’s eyes as he couldn’t help but frown. If one looked closely, they’d see that there was a dim green glow coming from his covered ear, and as he caressed the smooth metallic surface of his silver earring, he mumbled in a daze… “He’s… Winston.”

“Winston?” Anna’s eyes widened in surprise as shock ran through her entire body. Like a bolt of lightning, her mind turned blank as everything suddenly fit like a puzzle.

Winston’s sudden appearance, his strange unknown past, the way everyone didn’t seem to know him and only had vague tidbits about his identity… it all became so obvious as if a layer of dirt that was clouding her eyes from the truth were washed away.

A shiver ran through her spine as she immediately realized the underlying reason behind Winston’s actions.

Why did he want to get close to them? Why did he want to know more about them? Why did Noel and Anna spend such a great time with him even though he was practically a stranger? Why did Noel cook dinner for them all of a sudden?

It was all so… obvious.

And at that moment, the image of a certain man flashed in her mind, a man whose skin was darker than night, who wore a white lab coat and a pair of glasses, with a featureless face and a bald head.

Like a terrifying truth that has been unraveled, she felt as if countless ants were crawling right on her skin and her gaze returned to Winston who was looking straight at her.

“You finally know, huh?” His voice echoed from the encased chamber of warped space and outside so that Anna and Noel could hear his softly spoken words laced with sarcasm and joy. “This… this is truly the beauty of betrayal!”

“AH~! Being the bad guy is the best!”