Mere hours before Aaron and Cassandra’s arrival at the Ripper’s lair, patrols have started and our trio of Url, Suiga, and Lau stroll around the northern block. No vampires in sight for the time being, so the two newcomers assault Url with all sorts of questions.
Lau: Why do you wear that mask?
Url: Personal reasons, but mostly out of style and hygiene.
Suiga: How long have you known Aaron?
Url: I’ve known him since I was 16.
Lau: Why do you smell too good for your looks?
Url: I bathe every day.
Suiga: Are you and Aaron some sort of “brothers from another mother” deal?
Url: A concerning question, no, I adore him, but we aren’t related.
Lau: On another note, why is that brute always grumpy?
Url: I hope it’s a rhetorical question, cause even I don’t know that answer.
Suiga: Shut your mouth Lecourt, you know nothing of sir Aaron.
Lau: Great, fangirls all riled up.
Url sighs as the two start hair-pulling and pinching each other. In his moment of despair, he comes up with a rather interesting question. As he looks at the moon, then the mess next to him…
Url: Hey guys, why did you become hunters?
The duo stops fighting. Confused, they try to find a logical answer…
Lau: I mean, it’s our job?!
Url: And I want to know the reason behind it. Your REAL reason for being here, tonight…
Suiga, after a few seconds of thought, finds an answer.
Suiga: Help as many people as I can, stop as many vampires as possible. My sword lives for justice!
Url: Hmm, nice! The hero route, I see. Was hoping for something darker, but I’m just as pleased.
Suiga: Uuh, I don’t know if I should feel grateful or worried, haha.
Lau: Weak reason, prince boy! I aim to slay every bat I see on sight and uphold the Lecourt name! The scion of the Lecourt household should only strive for perfection, even if it means working with a bunch of homeless-looking lunatics.
Suiga: Big talk from someone who was crying for some humble workers…
Lau: SHUT IT!!!
The embarrassed Lau starts lightly hitting Suiga again. Url sighs once again as their scuffles seem inevitable in nature. However, in the whole mess, his ears do catch a faint, persistent sound in the background. He signals the duo to stop. He tries to focus on the sound, slowly realizing that what he hears is a muffled cry. Like someone has been gagged and kept in a basement for more than 2 months. He chooses to follow the muffled cry, the other two in tow. Swiftly walking the street, they end up noticing a man in a small dark alley. A man in a cradled position, his muffled cry now resembles more of a persistent humming as he cradles on and on next to a garbage bin. No other people in sight thanks to the patrol alarm and the curfew put by VHC since Wutsworth’s incident, the hunters are free to explore this strange phenomenon.
Url: Might be a bat.
Lau: Uuuhh, this is definitely a bat. Definitely…
Suiga: Scared, shrimp? Lecourts shouldn’t be so cowards.
Lau: Not the time, topknot, not the time!!!
Suiga: Url, how should we proceed?
Url: Ah, Suiga could you go front? You are the toughest fighter here, we’ll cover you if that guy shows fangs.
Suiga: Do not worry. I’m on it.
Suiga slowly approaches the humming man. He tries calling out to him but to no avail. Too focused on humming away, Suiga puts his hand on his shoulder instead of shaking him up.
Suiga: Sir, are you alright? Sir?
The man rests unresponsive, cradling and humming away. As Suiga keeps shaking, he notices blood on the man’s clothes. On further inspection, the blood is fresh and drips from the center of the man’s body.
Suiga: Sir, you are injured, we have to take you to
As Suiga tries to move the man, he startles and backs off. The fresh blood came off of a dead cat, its neck bitten and shredded like a chicken rotisserie. The man, still humming, but now loud and clear, his bloodied mouth now free of the cat’s flesh.
Lau: It was definitely a vampire!
Lau quickly tries to attack the cat killer, but the homeless vampire dodges her attacks. Hissing at them, blood droplets all over the floor, he spreads his wings and flies on the rooftop, from which he then starts to run.
Url: Damn it, he’s getting away!!
Suiga: I’m on it!!
Suiga notices some bricks missing on the walls. He firmly climbs the wall and gives chase to the bat.
Suiga: He’s going east!! Meet me there!!
He’s giving chase. The bat’s wings seem shattered, so he only uses them to boost his jumps and glide through lower rooftops. Suiga manages to follow through. Despite his kunai proficiency, he fails to strike the already damaged wings. Url and Lau in tow, they all follow the bat in front of a sewer gate on an isolated part of the city port, gazing at Salazar prison. The vampire tries to open the gate scarcely, ignoring his broken fingers. His attempt bore fruit, as Lau pierces his skull from behind with her rapier, downing him.
Lau: Damn… That was a sweaty run!
Url: Guess extra bathing in for tomorrow. What the hell is this though?
The gate is large, rusty, and seemingly impossible to open, even for a vampire. Our heroes rest confused.
Suiga: Guess this must be some sort of hideout. What horrors could this hide inside?
Url: Then we should call support. We have no idea what the bats cooked up behind door number 3.
Lau: What a bunch of cowards!! My father would have kicked this door down and chased the first bat he saw!!
Suiga: Oh, then please!! Be our guest!
Url: While I’m itching to see what’s inside, Suiga’s right Lau. We should at least wait for Aaron to finish up so we can search this thing together. What if this is the Ripper’s hideout?
Lau: Exactly! But the brute might finish in three hours if the bats know we are behind the gate, they could leave at any moment!!
Jack: She’s right you know, you guys are sitting on a gold mine here.
Url: She has a point, yes, but we have to consider-… Who said that?
Suiga: Uuh, the gate’s glowing red signs?
The gate was indeed glowing red signs. Vampire spell craft, the gate is emitting the hollow sound of a young man.
Jack: Yep, it’s me, the Ripper. This is weird, I never had hunters for the smart sort to figure out where I live.
Lau: What is this…
Url: Well, it’s DEFINITELY a vampire, but how can we know this is the Ripper…
Jack: A nice question, bird face!!!
Url: Mind reading??
Jack: Correct! And it seems you chose to kill poor Adam. He didn’t even like humans. Damn hunters, you’ll even kill our deviant members of society, won’t you?
Suiga: When they quietly eat cats while humming like lunatics, we will.
Url: What are you playing at, Ripper?
Jack: A lot of stuff, honestly. But right now, I want to play with you people.
Lau: Where is he going with this…
Jack: So, long story short, I have a bunch of humans ready to become blood bags here. Around five, I think? Unless the others stole from my stash…Anyways, I’ll open the door for you to come and try to save them. However,…
The group stays focused, waiting anxiously for the Ripper’s next words…
Jack: This sewer’s pretty huge. Could take hours to arrive at the lair. Enough for me to just order an attack on VHC. But I guess you have enough hunters to guard it well, right?
The group tries to block their thoughts, hoping the vampire won’t probe any information about the VHC’s lack of personnel…
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Jack: So, you either come here, risk your lives for a bunch of humans, or you stay, wait for support, and hope we don’t get hungry.
Lau and Suiga: Damn asshole!!!
Url stays hesitant. There sure is a lot at stake. The safety of the city and his teammates, or the lives of innocent people, and an opportunity to grasp the Ripper.
Jack: Let me help…shake the dice.
The muffled screams of a child can be heard. The boy starts crying for help from the hunters, but his screams come to a slow stop as the vampire seemingly bites through his neck and dries him out of any blood he has in his system. Helplessly gasping for air, the boy is heard falling to the ground.
Jack: Aaah, 4 more then! I’ll leave the door open for about 2 minutes. That way support won’t even arrive in time. See you inside!!
As the rusty door opens, the trio stares at each other. Filled with a raging determination, they decide to engage the bat in its own domain. As they walk through, the gate is sealed and locked once again…
The sewers are old. Dating from Landen’s foundation, they’ve seen a lot of eras, a lot of damage, a lot of reconstruction. While they are maintained, an outer part sewer region like this one has clearly been left alone for a while. Rusty pipes, stone walls painted a vomiting green from the moss, and water holding all sorts of nonsense running down the system. A few additions can be noted in this hall, though. Blood, vampiric drawings, and some restored bulbs give our heroes some vision in the dark. They press further and further inside the sewer passage, following the amounts of drawings in vampiric language that increase the deeper they go and the further they leave the gate. Url discreetly leaves bandage pieces around, as checkmarks for reference when they escape…
Lau: I’m really hoping this will be the last “sewer vampire” I’ll ever face (holding her nose)
Suiga: I have to agree with the shrimp. For a prolific murderer, this bat is really putrid in living arrangements.
Url: It is the perfect place to have a hideout.
Lau: Oh please, Wutsworth fooled you for 10 years and his office wasn’t in any stinking sewer pipe!!!
Url: Because Wutsworth wasn’t a renowned killer revered by all of Landen. This place is on the outskirts of town, no one would think of entering a sewer vault next to the biggest vampire prison on the continent, it’s genius.
Lau: Are you really giving him praise? He KILLED a CHILD!!
Suiga: That’s sir Url for you, never on the spot with the atmosphere.
Url: Hey, give credit where it’s due. I was present at the disaster, too. I can’t wait to torture this asshole. But still, this place is the perfect hideout.
Suiga: Some open windows could be of use…
Lau: Hey, home designers, door on our way!
The trio stumbles upon a peculiar door. Steel and halfway opened, a lot of arrows drawn on the walls point at it, along with a huge “What took ya’ so long?”.
Lau: They really think they can mock us like that?
Suiga: What a weird language. Most of the bats we saw don’t speak like that.
Url: Yeah…
Url stares at the rudely written note for a while. He then ignores it and nods at the others to follow as he passes through…
Deeper within the sewer, we notice a few cloaked vampires in a spacious section, looking out at waterfalls of sewer waste falling into the abyss. Three males, one female. They kneel in front of one more. With thick, short curly orange hair, and a small earring for each earlobe, this vampire looks younger than the rest. Wearing a khaki long fur jacket, a white shirt, and brown jeans, he moves his ring-adorned hands as he orders around his subordinates with pride…
Vampire Leader: What’s the name?
Vampires: Jack the Ripper!
Jack: And what is our job today?
Vampire: Kill the damn hunters!
Jack: Fucking perfect! Now, since I’m in a darn good mood, I’ll leave you guys to handle how you are going to kill them.
Male 1 : (Stern voice) I want the samurai. He could prove an adequate foe to practice my blade.
Jack: Great, he’s yours.
Male 2: Let me handle the bird freak. I want to see the man who managed to kill Jack.
Jack: Sure, go at ‘im!!
Male 3: I’ll take the young lass, I love killing noble human trash.
Jack: Gladly!
The female rests disappointed…Jack approaches her, his hand gently squishing her cheeks…
Jack: Hey, hey, hey no tears today!! This is a special evening for our little cult. Today we get rid of the hunter stick that’s been up our arse the past week.
Female: But, sire. Our sources tell us there are two more hunters in the city.
Jack: That’s why I send them to the half-alive bait, dumbass!!!
He pushes her away on the ground…
Jack: See, it’s questions like these that make you lot my servants. How are we supposed to screw our hunters if you can’t even fucking remember what I FUCKING TOLD YOU YESTERDAY???
Jack’s wings spread as he violently slams the sewer walls, scaring his subordinate cold. She cries and begs for forgiveness as she holds his feet with fear…He calms down and reassures his subordinate of his understanding.
Jack: Uuh, look, just…get your damn twin and go guard the door. The other two fucks might catch up early.
The vampire is filled with joy and leaves immediately to fulfill her orders.
Jack: The rest of you, go chase down your shitty targets.
Vampires: Sir, yes, sir!!!
Jack: And remember. What’s the name?
Vampires: Jack the Ripper!!
Jack the Ripper. A prolific killer, a violent, ruthless vampire. Other than the horror he left on every Landenian’s soul, his most distinctive mark was… His lack of identity.
No one ever saw the murders. No one ever saw who blew up the hole in Salazar. No one knew who the gut-loving bat really was. A 40-year-old man? A 24-year-old woman? A bunch of children? No traces and no witnesses mean pretty much no suspect. Honestly, it wouldn’t be weird if someone just came up and said:
“What if the Ripper was a lot of people all at once?”
That’s what it is, apparently. That’s what the trio thought once they encountered the three vampire servants on their way to the lair, as they all chanted “I’m Jack the Ripper” simultaneously, smiles on their faces and hands trembling with excitement.
Url: You have to be kidding me.
Suiga: I don’t think it matters anyway. We’ll just kill them all.
Lau: I’ll agree with the fangirl. Even if they are lying, once they’re all dead, the Ripper is gone for good.
The vampires giggle condescendingly.
Jack: Honestly, the poor hunters don’t know what’s coming for them.
Jack: Should we tell them?
Jack: Might as well. They’ll be dead in a few hours anyway…
Suiga: What are you lot scheming?
Jack: You see, there are three Jacks here. Now, one could be the true Ripper. Or it could be all three of us. The thing is, the one named Jack is also the one who can send an order around the lair to begin the assault on Landen using the hostages as sacrifice for the hulking spell.
The hunters have a slight panic surge. Landen is almost defenseless. A bunch of ravaging hulks laying waste on the streets is more than just trouble for the VHC.
Lau: You shitty…
Url: Hold it, Lau. There’s a catch. Or these asshats would have begun the assault the minute the vault locked.
Jack: Guess one of the trash is smart. But don’t flatter yourself. I did say I wanted to play with you…
The vampires suddenly release smoke from their cloaks, engulfing the whole room. Once it dissipates, they are nowhere to be seen.
Jack: Come get me, hunters!! I might just send the order now!!!
Jack: Get over here!!!
Jack: I’ll slaughter ya’ dead!!!
The corridors fill with maniacal laughter, echoing through the iron pipes.
Url: Great. To make matters worse, now we have to split up.
Lau: What!? The hell are you leaving me in this nasty sewer alone!
Suiga: The fate of the city rests on the palm of three deranged bat freaks. I’m sure a Lecourt can handle some dirt.
Lau: You are asking for it, fangirl.
Url: Calm down! Uh, unfortunately, if we kill one altogether, the other might have time to start up the assault.
Suiga: Do you really think they will do it?
Url: It’s the Ripper we are talking about. Right now, all logic is thrown down the drain.
Url poses his hand in front of them, preparing for a pat down.
Url: I really don’t want to leave you guys, but we’ll have to split up and take them out as soon as possible. If things get tough, just bolt it and hide away until you find help.
Lau: Like hell, I’m running away! The Ripper’s throat will bleed from my blade today.
Suiga: We also have to rescue the hostages before they turn into Wutsworths.
They pose their hands too. They depart further into the sewer, where they start splitting into different corridors each…
Back to our villain, he goes to sit on a bone-adorned throne right before the sewer waterfalls. Posing his left fist to rest his head, he dwells in thoughts…
Jack: The three pieces of trash I send will at least stall the hunters for a bit, and even if they make it here, they’ll be weak enough to kill them in seconds. And then…
The vampire starts frowning, his tense bitten lips and fists showing a sign of anger…
Jack: That hunter…Willheart…
He looks at his right arm. Forearm in sight, we see something rare in vampires: Scars. While one would believe eternal life and regeneration beyond human capacity would get rid of such a nuisance, vampires can, for a few reasons, bear scars from otherwise fatal hits, deadly concoctions, or other phenomena the hunters could use against them. And to a being craving perfection, believing it its birthright, such a mark could be a nuisance they’ll hardly forget.
Jack: Willheart. You don’t remember me, but this hand does. Come, you bastard…
He clenches his fist…
Jack: I’ll spill your guts all over the floor…
Suiga arrives in a small corridor, filled with imps guarding one of the Jacks. As he takes out his cloak, a pale blonde man with glasses looks him in the eye, preparing his blade…
Jack: As I was promised. Take out your blade, samurai. I want you to witness true swordsmanship before you fall.
Suiga takes out his sword, readying for battle…
Suiga: Bring out whatever you want, I’ll never fall!
Lau arrives in another room. From the carpets, tables, bedrolls, and humans chained to the wall, this is probably the lounge…An old-looking vampire, similar to a man in his mid-60s, white mustache, and beard, he takes out his own rapier and points out at Lau.
Jack: Lecourt! Your kind shouldn’t dwell in this city! I’ll make sure your crest is painted red with blood.
Lau: (Seems like they were informed of our backgrounds. They wanted us to come here, surely). I’ll make sure you want to live to regret your words…
She takes out her rapier and lashes out at the bat…
Url instead arrives at some kind of storage room, filled with enough shelves to make it a labyrinth of sorts. He notices a young male vampire walking around slowly…
Url: Really? The smart one has to fight the “labyrinth floor” type of thing?
Jack: Don’t flatter yourself, plague doctor. You are not even smart or strong enough for me to consider this a “fight”.
Url: Before I shove that phrase down your throat, I have to ask. Is all this really a necessity?
Jack: What?
Url: You can just flick your fingers right now, and all of Landen will go to hell within minutes because a bunch of Wutsworths will spawn out of nowhere and no one upstairs will be able to do a thing. Why stall?
Jack: If only you knew…
Jack starts smiling… Suddenly, more and more of him start appearing in front of Url’s eyes
Jack: Take out your weapon hunter. You have neither the time nor the luxury of asking any more questions…
The three hunters steel their will. Determined, they rush at their opponents…