In the midst of the endless stretches of sand, a palace made from rocks stood deteriorating. Its grand scale and the carvings made onto its pillars seemed to signify its importance in the past. The dusty wind obscured its appearance. It felt oddly timeless, as if it had existed since the dawn of life and would continue to even if the rest perished.
Two golden chariots approached from afar, each being pulled by two canine beasts. They were spirit beasts as the mutants abhorred humans to the point where taming them was only a pipe dream.
Inside one of these, Arin sat facing Nocterin and Bhavesh, both of whom seemed to be lost in a trance of their own. Arin could see the ruin's shadow from the window as the chariots drew increasingly near.
Suddenly, the motion halted and the voice of the auriga announced, "We have arrived, your highness."
As Arin opened the carriage's door, the fierce dusty wind hit his face. Each swish, like a cautionary whisper dancing in his ears. The infinite dunes of bland yellow could numb any mind, much less Arin's.
Finally having stepped outside, Arin approached the ruins of the palace in front, an observation startling him. A group of 5 were walking toward the same route, their faces veiled by blue shrouds. One of them, a girl, appeared as the leader.
The coterie's leader and Arin's eyes met, communicating a faint warning to one another through the language of gestures.
By now, Nocterin and Bhavesh had come to his side. The others were to stay in the chariots. Nocterin's hands were pressed against his scythe's handle, ready for any skirmish that may follow.
Arin's palms gestured him to stop, however. Arin didn't want unnecessary fights. He had trust in Nocterin's power, and believed that if things were to go south, Nocterin and Bhavesh would be able to handle it.
Speaking of Nocterin's power, a lightbulb went off in Arin's mind.
"Arin is powerful enough to be a settlement's guardian, right?" Deciding to test his hypothesis in the moment, Arin muttered to Nocterin in a low voice, "Nocterin, could you say and I quote: 'I shall be at thy command'?"
Nocterin's mind was another mess altogether. He thought he had caught onto something, for the prince that was so ruthless before to let be a group that could potentially harm them and now asking for such a weird request could only mean one thing.
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"The prince has fallen in love with the girl. Ah! What a happy situation, a prince and a female adventurer practicing forbidden intimacy. The prince now wants to show off his authority over his subordinates, in order to win her over, that is," he thought, conspiring a story of his own imagination.
If Arin were to know what was going on in his head, he would probably cough up blood.
Having settled on matchmaking the prince, Nocterin's temperament took a 180° turn as he said while revealing a humble subservience: "O most exalted Highness, this wretched servant shall bow to thy command 'til thy boundless grace dost bid me cease. Verily, fortune hath smiled upon this lowly soul, granting me the sacred boon to serve and cherish thee, whose wisdom doth outshine the heavens."
These words were like showers of embarrassment on Kaius' mind, as someone who had never imagined one could speak in this manner unironically.
He was completely baffled by Nocterin's response as his cheeks flushed red in embarrassment, especially after noticing the group looking at him with intent gazes.
Seeing his red cheeks, Nocterin cheerfully assumed that his master was blushing at the group's and most importantly the girl's admiration.
Arin's ashamed face finally brightened slightly as a screen manifested in thin air.
['Special Quest: Recruit a guardian' has been completed.
Rewards: 1. Settlement Establishment Talisman ×1 2. Holy skill; the boon of extermination (first-grade variant)]
Before he could check the skill, he and the others had reached the ruins entry. Despite the dilapidated state of the ruins, the gates were completely intact.
It was made of orange metal, with a huge carving that depicted a graphic face with vividly detailed fangs indented on it.
Retrieving the key, Arin bound it to him, Nocterin, and Bhavesh by touching it to their respective foreheads.
The alien group that they had happened to meet had made a camp in a nearby area, waiting for them to return.
Arin pressed the key against the mouth of the depicted vampire. Black smoke started to explode out of the key as it disappeared into thin air.
Arin started to feel dizzy, a foul stench invaded his senses, and his vision turned blurry progressively.
---
Arin woke up feeling cold, a darkness hiding anything else from his view. He called out to Nocterin and Bhavesh but there came no response. Everything felt bizarrely eerie and disparate from the vampiric ruins he knew.
All of a sudden, bright orbs of white light began to conjure ipso jure in the air, illuminating the surroundings. Looking around, Arin couldn't find even a trace of his subordinates.
"This is completely aberrant from the original view in the vampiric ruins. Nocterin and Bhavesh should have been teleported together with me," Arin assessed the environment while thinking.
It was an incredibly large but closed-off chamber. Many murals and paintings were illustrated on the walls, seemingly of brutalities humans had committed on vampires in the ancient ages, and various statues adorned the corners.
A sudden observation disconcerted Arin: the growling abdomen of a vampire attached to the wall. His bright ruby-colored eyes stared inside his very soul, and bovine droplets of crimson trickled down his exposed fangs. He seemed an extension of the wall itself, a figure that was bound in place yet radiated such fierce bloodlust that one's eyes would turn away in fear and shock.
Out of the blue, an ancient voice escaped his mouth, a disturbing expression elicited on his face: "The hearts of the dreaded are the most broken, the minds of the feared supremely sad. Those who feign sympathy conceal the darkest schemes, and only with vitality theirs, shall my soul attain fleeting peace."
A rueful tone manifested ephemerally on the vampire's harrowing face, only to disappear with similar instantaneity. His face was completely still now, having lost its previous ostentation.