「And here is my bedroom…」

Lily pushes tall doors apart, and enters with Straf casually trailing behind her, with his hands in his pockets.

「Kind of looks like a throne room, actually.」

Straf comments as he walks in, noting the queen-size bed on the part of the throne room elevated by a few steps, presumably where a minor ruler would look down upon his subjects from.

「Indeed. It was a throne room, but I have thrown that gaudy thing out. Hup!」

She nods, glancing at Straf as she walks towards her bed, then loudly hops onto it.

「Do you not ever dust this place? Do vampires get allergies?」

Straf looks at the omnipresent dust on the floor, walls, the windows… In short, any surface that was not recently used.

「You jest, Straf.」

Pat pat.

She pats a spot beside her as she sits on her bed, and looks at Straf with a smug smile.

「It's past my bedtime. We have a busy day tomorrow, if you are really intent on hunting the beasts. Why don't you join me in my bed?…」

Lily slyly suggests, with a tilted head and a confident look.

「No thanks, I have my own. I wouldn't trade it for anything else.」

Straf looks at Lily for a second with a bored expression, then shrugs, and pulls the bed borrowed from the palace from his [Portable Storage]. The purple vortex lets out a continuous roar as the bed returns to this plane of existence.

Thud!

He casually sets the bed down near the tall windows, with a heavy wooden impact on the ex-throne room floor.

「And don't crawl into my bed. You have yours, I have mine, got it?」

He sits down to untie his boots, and stops to point at Lily over his shoulder, speaking in a stern tone.

「…Fine. I'll slip into something more comfortable, then.」

Lily sighs, and gets up. She walks behind a large folding screen, and rustles of clothing can be heard from across the room. Lily emerges with her black nightgown on, and her gothic dress hanging off her forearm.

She hangs the dress on a nearby chair's armrest, and pulls the blanket on her bed out of the way, just as Straf pulls his onto himself.

「Ahh… Take me away into the world where I am a published writer, cloud of dreams…」

Straf sighs with relief, sinking into the soft bed and pillows with a contented smile on his face.

「Goodnight, Straf.」

Lily calls out towards Straf, before laying down and pulling the blanket on top of herself.

「Uh-huh…」

Straf quietly moans out, too comfortable to even move his lips…

…

Somewhere else, in a dark room…

Eight figures sit at stone thrones with tall backrests around a large, ornate, circular table of granite. One of the thrones is empty, and the shifting glint in their eyes tells that they are subtly glancing at each other in complete silence.

Large double-doors open, a robed middle-aged man with a graying beard enters, silhouetted heavily by the light behind him.

Thud!

The doors shut, as he takes a seat in the last remaining empty throne.

「Thank you for your patience… Let us begin, shall we? Scale, how goes the operation?」

The man clears his throat, and turns his head to the dimly lit figure sitting directly across the table.

「Everything is exactly as planned. We are preparing the coins, they will enter the circulation shortly.」

The hooded figure replies in a deep, confident voice, and his hands form a pyramid in front of his shadowy face.

「I have a question…」

Another man announces, deep from the shadows of the room.

「Yes, Steel?」

The bearded man turns his head towards the voice in the darkness.

「…Can we make the room a little brighter? Why are we sitting in the dark? Someone's going to trip and smash his teeth out.」

The voice asks in an indignant, and ridiculing tone.

「Fair point. Brighten the lights!」

The man peeks over his throne's backrest, and shouts at the door. After a moment's wait, the room's magic light above intensifies its pale blue light. Everyone becomes clearly visible. A collection of bitter-looking men ranging from old, to very old.

「Much better. Carry on…」

An old man with with white, short hair nods in approval.

「Very well. Ear?」

The middle-aged man turns his head to another grim old man, and they lock their gazes together.

「They're in place, the network is slowly expanding. But, I am rather concerned about one thing in particular…」

The grim man speaks in almost a whisper, nearly inaudible, if not for the fact the room is almost completely silent, aside from faint rustling of robes, or wheezing breaths.

「And that being?」

「The king… He's expecting her return, for one reason or another. I have been tentatively told, that he's looking for mercenaries. The best of the best.」

The grim man shrugs his shoulders, after explaining his worry in a quiet, calm voice.

「Hmpf. What nonsense. That is your worry?」

Another elderly man chimes in and scoffs at the grim man, shaking his gray head.

「Explain. I think your worry is unfounded, as well.」

The middle-aged man holds his palm up, pointing it at the gray-haired old man to cease his interruption. The old man chuckles quietly, shaking his head even harder as he looks aside.

「…Things may go very wrong, and the whole operation may require cancellation-」

As soon as the grim man says the word cancellation, the middle-aged man scoffs involuntarily. He clears his throat conspicuously, and awkwardly.

「We have sunk far too much gold into this plan to cancel it. Your worries are unnecessary, simply continue as planned.」

The middle-aged man insists with a commanding tone, staring at the grim man from across the table.

「Sorry, could I go get some food? I'll be back real quick.」

Another middle-aged man with a scruffy beard asks, causing some of the gathered people to pinch the bridges of their nose.

「…We'll be here the whole day at this rate…」

The middle-aged man with a neat, shapely beard groans, also pinching the bridge of his nose, with his eyes tightly shut out of frustration…

…

At an author's meeting…

Straf is sitting at a table, with a microphone in front of him pointing at his face. Hundreds of people sit in front of the stage in chairs. A young man is handed a microphone.

「Straf, what do you think is necessary for a good story?」

He asks, and hands the microphone back.

「Uuuuhhhhhhhhhhh…」

Straf thinks heavily, rubbing his chin.

「That's a good question. You need to weave themes into the story, but you can't rub it into readers' faces. I guess character development is needed too, but it doesn't actually have to be the main character that's developing. There needs to be a message, you know? Next question.」

Straf grimaces, then answers, gesturing with his hand as he's lazily propped up in front of the microphone on his elbows.

「What is your biggest regret?」

A woman asks, after being handed the microphone.

「Woah, shit. Do you want a ranking list?」

Straf chuckles quietly with a grin, and the audience bursts out into laughter.

「To be honest, there's a lot of-」

「I love your first story, Straf!」

Cycelia shouts out from the crowd, interrupting Straf's answer.

「I know, Lia. Settle down. Anyway-」

Straf smugly smiles, tilting his head a little as the crowd laughs.

「Straf.」

With her arms crossed, Lily calls out from the audience to get Straf's attention.

「Lily, wait your turn.」

Straf looks at Lily and quickly dismisses her.

「Straf. Straf. Straf.」

Lily keeps repeating, louder and louder each time.

「Lily, stop being a brat. I said wait your turn.」

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「Straf, get up. Straf.」

Lily commands Straf with her arms still crossed, glaring at him.

《What's up with her?》

「What?」

Straf asks with furrowed brows.

「Straf, wake up.」

Lily shakes Straf by his shoulder.

「…What?」

Straf groggily asks, squinting at Lily's face staring down at him from the side.

「It's morning. Good grief. I like to sleep in, but you're another thing entirely. Are you going to get up, or did you change your mind on hunting the bestiary creatures?」

Lily asks as she walks away from Straf's bed towards the throne room door. He sits up, and blinks a few times before rubbing his eyes.

「Ahh… It was a dream…」

Straf groans, and swallows his dry mouth. He sighs, and throws the blanket off of himself.

「What are you mumbling about?」

Lily asks, tilting her head. The ends of her twin-tails flop around erratically.

「Nothing. I just had a dream, and you broke it.」

Straf grumbles, as he's slipping his boots back on and tying them.

「My apologies.」

Lily grins smugly at Straf, who stares at her with half-open eyes and a mouth stretched in minor frustration.

「You're lucky, though. I don't remember when was the last time that I had a dream. A millennium ago, perhaps.」

She shrugs, and adds. Straf gets up with a grunt, places his bed back in his [Portable Storage], and walks up to Lily.

「I don't believe that. You had to have at least one when you sleep.」

Straf says with his hands in his pockets, looking down at Lily with sleepy eyes.

「But I don't sleep, Straf. I go into a state of torpor. That's why I have no dreams.」

They exchange glances in relative silence, as Lily leads Straf towards the exit.

「That ought to suck.」

Straf sniffles once, and shrugs. Lily picks her parasol back up from the entrance, and they leave through the gate of the castle. The wind has mostly calmed down, and only a relatively gentle breeze blows across the ridge.

「So, where to now?」

Straf asks, taking in the early morning sights from the top.

「Down, for starters.」

Lily slyly smiles at Straf, sheltering herself from the low sun with her parasol almost vertical.

「I can do down. But where to then?」

Straf asks, and Lily points to a grassy field below the mountain.

「If we are to hunt the entries by proximity, the closest one is there. Woolers are all over fields like those.」

「Woo- Ah, those giant sheep things… How are you going to get down?」

「I'll lower my weight, and glide down with my parasol, of course. As usual.」

Lily looks into Straf's eyes as she replies, and Straf's mouth wriggles as he holds back his laughter.

「Yeah, okay Mary. I'll wait for you there, then.」

Straf chuckles to himself, shaking his head. He walks up to the edge of the ridge, and casually leaps off with his hands still in his pockets.

「…Mary? Nevermind that, is he going to be alright like this!?」

Lily takes a running jump off the mountain, and gently floats downwards with her parasol, looking for Straf below…

…

Straf and Lily proceed to spend the entire morning to afternoon slaughtering the entire countryside of the bestiary entries, rapidly traveling from one den to the next, leaving a trail of mangled corpses in their wake.

Eventually, they enter a forest which Lily claims at least one ghoulbear made its home.

「Say, Lily… I kind of glossed over all the quadrupeds in the book… What is this ghoulbear thing, again? An undead bear, or some shit?」

Branches beneath Straf's feet snap loudly, as he walks without a care in the world through the forest with Lily.

「No, it's a misnomer. Ghoulbears are living creatures, but they primarily eat cadavers. They have a taste for human ones the most, hence the name.」

Lily explains, shining with amassed knowledge. A roar from within the forest makes them stop in their tracks.

「You figure that's it?」

Straf asks, looking in the direction of the roar, searching for its source.

「Sounds like it, yes.」

Lily nods, her eyes also scan the mist-covered forest, but fail to find anything.

「More of the same, then.」

Straf shrugs, and continues onward completely unfazed by the rumbling roars. They continue deeper in, where trees block almost all of the sunlight. Few a minutes later, they come across scratched trees and massive paw-prints.

Snap!

A branch snaps beneath Straf's boot again, and he stops to look around.

「Didn't the roars come from around here somewhere?」

Straf asks with his fists on his hips, as his head swivels around.

「Yes… It's odd, I could have sworn we'd find one here. The prints on the ground cut off here, so where did they go?」

Just as Lily finishes her question, holding her chin between her thumb and finger with heavily furrowed brows, Straf hears a rustle of leaves behind him.

「Hm?」

「Straf!」

Lily shouts out to Straf, and he nonchalantly turns around to see a giant bear, as big as a small family house standing on his hind legs, towering above him.

Rrrrrrrrroooooooaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrr!!

The beast roars, vibrating the leaves above its head.

「Hm. There's more behind you, too.」

Straf announces, completely unbothered by the threat of the gigantic bear. Lily turns around, only to see four more ghoulbears rise from beneath the ground. The dirt trickles off their filthy fur, almost like a strange liquid.

Straf opens his [Portable Storage], pulling out the blessed sword. In the middle of him accessing his storage, the bear swipes its heavy paw at him.

《Hold the fuck up, I'm not done yet.》

Straf thinks, as he casually walks out of the way of the bear's paw.

Slam!

The claws rip through the dirt in front of the bear, creating massive trenches and causing the earth itself to rumble as its paw impacts the ground. Straf flicks his sword at the bear, and a red flash appears just before the blade's impact.

《Level up. Attribute points gained. Skill points gained.》

Straf turns around, still keeping one of his hands in his pockets, as he walks in front of Lily.

「I'll take those three, you can play with that one over there.」

Straf nods his head at the ghoulbear off to the side, causing Lily to blink in confusion.

「What!? What about that bear-」

Lily turns around to look at the bear that attacked Straf. The moment she does, the bear splits in half horizontally and falls to the ground, after standing on its hind legs just a second ago.

「Heh… As expected of Straf.」

Lily grins, and walks towards the ghoulbear Straf has set aside for her…

…

Straf kills the three ghoulbears with ease, casually walking around their deadly claw swipes. They are completely helpless in the face of an enemy that disappears and reappears, only to kill them in one strike.

《Level up. Attribute points gained. Skill points gained.》

「Man, this shit again… How are things on your end, Lily?」

Straf asks, and throws his sword back into the [Portable Storage].

「Straf, look! Is this metal!?」

Lily shouts a question, leaping back and forth around the bear, viciously clawing into its thick hide.

「No, not really.」

Straf walks closer with his hands in his pockets. The boar roars in pain, getting more and more injured with each of Lily's passes.

「I am not done yet!」

Lily shouts, slashing at the bear's side. A gout of blood sprays out onto the forest floor. She abruptly leaps to its side, and delivers a heavy swipe of her own claws. The bear splits in half, much like when Straf killed the first bear, this bear's wound is however terribly jagged. Its body was ripped apart, rather than cleanly cut through.

「Is this metal, Straf?」

Lily turns around, lifting her bloodied, clawed hand up in a menacing and exaggerated pose.

「No, not really-」

Straf sighs, grimacing a little as disappointment of Lily's show sets in. He stops himself when a sudden rain of blood splatters on Lily's parasol and the surroundings, while she holds her menacing pose.

「Oh! That's actually fucking metal!」

Clap clap clap clap.

Straf lightly claps his hands in appreciation of the excessive, and exaggerated vampiric violence.

「Heh… Naturally. I am metal.」

Lily grins in satisfaction when the brief shower of blood ends as quickly as it came.

「Do these things usually burrow in the ground?」

Straf asks, placing his fists on his hips as he looks at the mangled bear corpses around them.

「No. I have never seen or even heard of them do that before. It's odd. Very odd. Perhaps they were learning new things? Doesn't matter now, does it?」

Lily looks at her handiwork, and smugly smiles at Straf from beneath her bloodied parasol.

「Nope. Where to next?」

Straf shrugs, and looks down at the bloodied little vampire with his eyes returning to their almost normal boredom.

「Next entry shouldn't be too far from the capital. That would be the swamp strangler.」

Lily glances aside to think, before her scarlet eyes return to Straf to reply.

「Cool. At least it's not a chicken choker. Let's go.」

Straf says, and puts his hands back in his pockets, as they turn to leave the forest…