For the next few days, I spent my time getting acclimated to life in the Narrows. While the sun was up, I went around introducing myself to the locals and letting them know of the services I offered as a freelancing problem solver. Although many seemed delighted by the idea of having a local Hunter they could call upon in an emergency, there were others who deeply mistrusted the ascended and wanted nothing to do with the likes of me.

“It’s understandable,” Jamie informed me over drinks at the tavern. “Most registered Hunters are either lackeys of the ruling class or a member of it themselves. It’s difficult for a lot of the folks around here to let go of old resentments. The bluebloods tend to roll right over anyone who doesn’t get in line. That’s why so many leave the cities to come to the reclamations.”

“I’ve heard that term used a lot,” I said. “Is that the official name for habitations outside of the great cities? Reclamations?”

“Yes, indeedy,” Jamie nodded. “Rebuilding civilization can’t be done from the capital cities alone. Redeveloping the land and reclaiming lost resources requires there be permanent settlements for the work to be done. That’s where the Narrows and other places like it come into play. We’re a necessity, which is why Gardenia is forced to tolerate us even though we’re hotbeds of so-called seditious activity.”

“Equalism again?” I asked.

“No kings, no crowns, no nonsense,” she nodded. “Just honest people who want back what this land once offered in abundance, back in kinder times than these; the freedom to be left the hell alone.”

“Human history always chooses the most interesting moments to begin repeating itself,” I said as I sipped my drink. “Even in this era of unprecedented calamity, man chooses to remain divided. Wouldn’t working together for the greater good be the more sensible choice?”

“Not when it requires servitude to an unelected minority,” retorted Jamie.

“Jamie,” I said carefully. “I’m not trying to poke holes in your sentiments, but I can’t help but notice that you and your close family members are all powerful ascended, and that you’re served by lesser ascended like Doug.”

“And?” asked Jamie. “Where are you going with this?”

“Well, you also seem to be the unquestioned leader of this town. You keep mentioning that people came here to get away from being ruled over by ascended, but…aren’t you technically more of the same?”

“Of course I’m not,” she laughed. “I know and respect the value of hard work, and I reward it accordingly.”

“Ah. Well, okay,” I said. “I suppose that makes it completely different.”

“Doesn’t it?” she agreed with a friendly little smile.

Jamie liked to call herself a broker. She arranged to have issues plaguing her community dealt with as efficiently as possible. She was also known for helping those who bought her services to acquire items and information that the Gardenia central authority would prefer them not to have.

Although the Narrows had its own elected council and a town headsman to lead it, it was quietly understood that she was the real power in the settlement. When the residents had issues with each other, she was the one who mediated them. And if her decisions were ever disputed, she had them enforced.

Sometimes lethally, although no one liked to mention that part.

“Doesn’t this make you the head of a criminal enterprise?” I asked her after absorbing all the relevant details. “In what way are you not a bartending mob boss?”

“Doesn’t that truly depend on how one defines words like criminal?” she countered. “It really seems like a matter of perspective to me, sweetie. From my point of view, my willingness to do the necessary work of holding this place together simply makes me a reliable neighbor.”

“Ah. In that case, then thank goodness for moral ambiguity,” I said. “Always there to brush aside those pesky issues of conscience since time immemorial.”

“Exactly,” Jamie said with a wolfish grin. “When in doubt, always remember that shades of gray make it all okay.”

Hmm. You can’t really dispute logic like that, now, can you?

At night, I took Rachel hunting in the wilds. Now that she had awakened to her true, predatory nature, it was important to help her adjust to the new, powerful instincts that she was experiencing. It was vital for her development that she be out in the darkness, hunting prey and exulting in her superiority, after each victory.

At the same time, she needed to develop the self-discipline necessary to humble herself before others; to hide her strength from the eyes of the weak. Humility is an important aspect of a successful disguise. Unfortunately, that was what she was having the most trouble with.

“Get some!” she yelled happily as she broke a kobold’s neck and bowled over its companions by hurling its body at them. “You want a piece of this too? Kiss my little pink toe, creep! Die! Die! Die!”

As it turned out, my sweet little Rachel was a bit of a thug. A boisterous brawler, I believe they’re called. She was the sort who didn’t think there was any problem that couldn’t be solved by simply hitting it until it stopped twitching.

My daughter, the meathead.

Kobolds were rat-like mutants that moved like men and possessed a moderate intelligence combined with a cunning instinct for hunting and invention. A group as large as this one might have been a future problem for the Narrows, so I decided tonight’s job would be to trim down their population to a reasonable size and instill within them a healthy respect for human-shaped creatures.

Sadly, for them, Rachel interpreted my plan to mean Constructicons combine into Devastator, which in the vernacular of a certain popular cartoon series, meant that those poor fools were going to die horribly. And what do you know? They most certainly did.

Afterwards, when Rachel approached me and gave me a hug, excited and energized by her triumph, (while also covered head to toe in gory red bits of Kobold), I couldn’t find it within myself to scold her for her overenthusiasm. Who wouldn’t go a little overboard if they’d been confined inside of a spear for the last two millennia, unable to interact with the world beyond being used to stab heretics? She had a lot of issues she was working through, so there was no point in being impatient with her. Some people catch on quickly and some people need to be gradually coached. That’s all there was to it.

Besides, there was no dire need for her to quickly master her vampiric temperament, not if she could transform back into a human. You can’t lose control of a car if you’re not the one at its wheel.

It wasn’t as though training Rachel wasn’t without benefit to me. As her partner, I received a generous portion of the experience points generated by her playful little rampages, which in turn pushed me to level fifteen. That equaled ten more points dumped into constitution and six skill points which I used to unlock [Blood Orb Mastery] and [Mesmerize].

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Goodness, how had I ever learned to live without the ability to easily dominate the minds of the weak-willed? Speaking purely in terms of convenience, [Mesmerize] was an absolute game changer. Thanks to this skill, I no longer had to worry about being forced to answer any pesky personal questions. If I didn’t like where a conversation was going, I could instantly reset it. [Mesmerize] also allowed me to recruit anyone I came across as either a temporary employee, or a quick source of nutrition if I was feeling snacky. It was all benefits with no negative drawbacks. The quintessential vampiric power.

It felt so darn good to have it back in my arsenal.

I wish I’d had it before reuniting with Pankratz and Cassie. Erasing their memories as soon as we’d stumbled into each other could have saved me from a few potential headaches down the road, but there was no point in grousing over what could have been. What mattered was that I had it now. And thank the night for that, because it didn’t take long for more trouble to come metaphorically knocking at my door.

“I heard you’re the guy who did in the Ringworms,” said a sketchy looking fellow one night, who decided to seat himself at my table, uninvited. “Word is, you go by Stragos?”

I looked up from the Gore Grimoire, irked to have my reading interrupted by this dirt encrusted stranger. Jamie had given herself the night off and was at home, eating with her children and in-laws. Sensing an opportunity to catch up on the history of this world, I sent Rachel and Schulz to join them. Despite her great age, Rachel was still essentially a young girl at heart. It would do her good to interact with her peer group. Naturally, I gave her strict instructions to answer any questions about our personal history in only the vaguest way possible and forbade her from showing off any of her abilities. She grumbled that I never let her have any fun. In return, I performed a silent pantomime of a kobold having its head pulled off and juggled.

I think she got my point.

For the last two hours, I’d been regaling myself with the history of the Allied Kingdom, the country I presently reside in. When the government of the old United States fell during the chaos of the great awakening, after the land was finished terraforming and the oceans had taken their present shape, the remains of the Northeastern part of the country reforged themselves under ascended rule into the three great cities: Gardenia, True York, and Good Harbor. Each a powerful social hub ruled by its own political dynasty.

I was deeply amused to learn that many of the ruling nobles of these cities had been prominent political families of an earlier age. I guess there was a certain logic to it. If you’re going to treat the Kennedys like royalty, should it really be surprising if they decide one day to take you up on the offer?

The Allied Kingdom’s approach to survival was building their three great fortress cities to protect their surviving populations after consolidating the power of the ascended into a new ruling class with which to govern them. Under their philosophy of Noblesse oblige, being a hunter was treated as a sort of sacred knighthood. Those who were directly descended from nobility were even given the privilege of calling themselves Sir or Dame.

Heh, it seemed that the titles of nobility amendment would remain pending indefinitely in this strange new world.

As it turned out, however, the Allied Kingdom wasn’t the only nation to be forged during this time of tribulation. The Midwestern states had themselves become a powerful theocracy that viewed the coming of the system as a divine act, with the ascended proclaimed to be beings chosen by the creator to serve as the servants of humanity. In contrast to the Kingdom, their hunters weren’t permitted to hold any office. They were considered property of the state; living weaponry with no rights beyond that which the clergy permitted.

Renaming themselves The Holy Kingdom of Ethos, the people of that nation were characterized by their devotion to their faith, their almost fanatical desire to convert others, and their intolerance of anything that was not human. But despite their fiery beliefs, the kingdom also had a strong secular population that wouldn’t allow the Ethos faith to control all aspects of their lives and worked to keep the power of the clergy in check. As such, they were led by both an elected minister, and a so-called Archpriest.

To me, it sounded like a complicated arrangement, one that I had absolutely no desire to see in person. A valuable lesson I learned early in life was that the easiest way to avoid being burned at the stake by religious fanatics, was to simply stay the hell away from religious fanatics. You’d think that would be common sense among my kind, but a lot of bolder vampires liked to tweak the noses of true believers by “hiding in plain sight” deep in the territory of the faithful. I said “bolder” and not “older” because fools like them rarely made it to their second century of existence.

For the night’s sake, why do so many vampires always forget that humans aren’t stupid, and that they share the same capacity for reason that we do? We came from them! Our minds are virtually the same! It only takes a single moment for one of them to idly think, hmm, Steve sure is acting like a vampire for some reason, for the pieces to fall into place. And once they do, Steve’s not showing up for Wednesday bowling this week, or ever again.

I swear, I will never understand the urge that some people have to live on the edge.

I licked my thumb and folded the end of the page before closing my book and turning to face my new interlocutor. I could tell at once from his scent and his disheveled condition, that he wasn’t a local. He stank of the wilds, and desperation, as well as more than a few harsh chemicals that were coming out of his waxy skin pores.

There was an entire section on the Southwestern free states coalition that I hadn’t gotten to, and how all three powers had formed a tentative alliance with each other, popularly known as “The Reunited States,” but I would have to put that on pause for now.

Being considerate of others can be so taxing.

With his twitching eyes and wheedling smile, I had the thought that this fellow looked even more like a rat than the kobolds I’d helped dispose of earlier. I wanted nothing to do with him, but my manners demanded I at least hear him out before dismissing him from my presence.

“I am indeed Stragos,” I replied. “And you are?”

“Pus-head,” he said.

Okay. That was enough conversation for me.

“Stragos, huh? You got a first name?” he asked.

“Absolutely,” I replied.

Then I smiled and waited for him to go away.

Instead, he kept speaking to me.

Goodness, life can be so difficult at times.

“You gonna tell me what it is?” he asked.

Instead of answering, I used [Mesmerize] and ordered him to tell me what it was he wanted.

“You rescued that noble bitch from True York,” he said in a flat voice. “Because of you, my clan’s in trouble with the bluebloods who hired us to get rid of her and her escorts. Not only that, but you killed the Ringworms.”

“No worries, friend, I’m certain you have a few left in you,” I said encouragingly.

“No man, the Ringworms were a gang that were under my clan. You killed all of them when you rescued that noble. My boss wants you dealt with real bad, he’s pissed. Sent me here to collect you.”

“Did he really?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said.

“How were you going to do that?” I wondered. “Chase me out with your odor?”

“Nah, I was gonna trick you into following me outside, past the walls. Then we were all gonna grab you and teach you a lesson,” he said.

“Wow,” I said. “That’s a very clever plan, Pus-face. Did you think of it yourself?”

“Yeah,” he said with a smile. “I’m pretty smart. Uh, but it’s Pus-head.”

“Of course, it is,” I said apologetically. “Give me a moment to think, please.”

Hmm. This wasn’t an unpredictable development. When an apex predator sets root in a new environment, it was only natural that those who’d been toppled from their perch would desperately seek to reassert themselves.

I’d known from the start that allowing my name to be passed around the community meant that I would eventually face challengers who either envied my success or wanted to test their skills against me. There would also be the troublesome allies of those whose lives I’d taken. The cycle of vengeance would soon be in bloom, guaranteeing no shortage of those eager to settle the score.

Theere would be lots of killing in the days ahead. Not necessarily a good thing.

Killing was an activity that could swiftly get out of hand, if you weren’t careful. Even if your actions were due to altruism, you could quickly find yourself resorting to murder due to how easy it gradually became. Eventually, you were doing it because it was a faster solution than talking things out, and you just didn’t care anymore.

I really didn’t feel like explaining any of that to a guy named Pus-Head.

So be it. I’d just have to catch up on my reading at a later time.

“Congratulations, Mr. Pus. I’ve been thoroughly ensnared in your crafty web. Lead me to where your comrades await,” I commanded him.

“The boss is gonna reward me for this,” Pus-head said as a happy smile broke out across his face.

“Will it be a good one?” I asked.

“I hope so,” he said. “It’s hard out there. Every little treat helps.”

“I imagine so,” I said as I followed him out of the tavern and into the darkness. “Did you ever imagine you’d end up living this way when you were a child?”

“My life’s been shit since the moment I was born,” he replied. “Always has been, always will be.”

“It can always get worse,” I said.

“In what way?” he asked doubtfully.

I smiled and said, “Let’s just see where the night goes.”