Undead City - Altraud
Inside the dungeon of shadows.
After five days of travelling, Arya and Co finally reached the edge of the grasslands and gazed at the dark forest a few hundred meters away from them with awe and wonder. A deserted land stood between the two borders acting as a transition zone.
"Finally!" Maya cheered and the group of undead imitated her while Arya and Ervin fought with one last hoard of rabbits and joined them.
"Aren't there a bit too many rabbits? " Peter questioned worriedly, he had been on the lookout for the beasts around them and noticed a bit too many of them to his liking.
"Don't worry it's just rabbits " Maya responded while brushing off his worry and strolled towards Arya and Ervin. She looked carefree on her surface but was freaking out internally thinking about the abnormal number of rabbits that they encountered.
Glancing at the dark forest on the horizon she wondered if the beasts inside it were also abnormal in number.
"Alright kids, rest for an hour and then we will return" she announced after arriving near Arya and Ervin, receiving a lot of groans and protests as a response which she promptly ignored.
Ervin too glanced at her, perplexed. They were at least one day away from even reaching the foot of the mountain where the actual powerful beasts resided. The forest did have strong beasts but he was confident in protecting the kids from them.
Noticing his perplexed look, Maya whispered,
"I have a bad feeling about the forest and don't want to risk the kid's life"
obtaining a nod of understanding.
They then stared at Arya, only to find her getting ready for their usual training.
"I am ready" she informed while getting in a combat position but Ervin shook his head,
"No sparring today, we will be in trouble if you fall unconscious" he notified her while glancing at the dark forest in the distance but Arya was not satisfied and after some pondering suggested a compromise.
"You shoot and I will dodge. We will stop once I get hit"
Ervin agreed and they both readied themselves while Peter stood behind Arya, imitating her every move.
The spar started with Ervin firing four arrows successively, aiming at Arya's legs and shoulders, but she just sidestepped to dodge them. Regaining her footing in seconds she used her blood dagger to deflect an arrow aimed at her chest while simultaneously dodging an arrow directed towards her left eye.
Observing her nimble footwork, Ervin sighed and took out a crystal from a pouch attached to his hip bone. His bow used energy from a crystal to produce arrows and a single crystal can only produce 6 Arrows. Placing the crystal in a depression on his bow, he pulled the string and fired while aiming at her vitals but Arya nimbly dodged the arrows and deflected the few that she couldn't.
The spar continued for half an hour until her reflexes were forced to become dull because of fatigue. She deflected a couple more arrows directed at her eyes but failed to fully dodge an arrow aimed at her heart. The arrow grazed her shoulder ending the bout.
A few drops of blood fell on the ground before
Arya stared at her damaged clothes and sighed in frustration. Wiping the few drops of sweat from her forehead she sat on the ground to recover her stamina while simultaneously sewing her ripped clothes.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Peter observed her take out a bundle of thread from her pant pocket and use a makeshift blood needle to sew her clothes.
"Do all vampires fix their clothes by themselves?" he asked while sitting beside her and imitating her hand movements.
"No, I just played with knives a lot and damaged my clothes in the process. I couldn't ask for help from other vampires so learned to sew, it was fun and helped to keep my mind busy"
Arya spoke in a monotonous voice while informing him about her past which the curious boy noticed but ignored and probed for more.
"What were you using the knife for? Were you good at using the knife?"
"I used the knife to practice stabbing and slicing. I was not very good at it, my hands used to shake a lot when I held any knife but over time the shaking stopped and I became better at using it"
As they were talking Maya approached them and patted her head.
"Alright, Peter go rest, We will be returning in half an hour" she ordered and sat beside Arya.
Peter begrudgingly nodded and hugged Arya while muttering,
"Teacher I like your smile" and walked away. Maya laughed heartily at the absent-minded Arya who just blinked repeatedly while recalling the tender hug.
"Am I good?" she asked with a conflicted look.
"What do you think? Are you bad? " Maya asked back but Arya just remained silent.
"I don't know what happened and I don't care, it's in the past and is better left in the past" she advised and walked away. Alone again Arya stared at the moon while thinking ' I am a devil to others but maybe to these guys I am good', unaware that a calamity was on the horizon because of her deeds.
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Undead city-Altraud
Inside the dark forest of the dungeon.
A pungent smell tickled the noses of a wide range of beasts. It was a smell that they did not recognize yet it had an allure that slowly sapped the consciousness from the beasts and drove them towards insanity.
It was the smell of blood.
The beasts in the dungeon had no blood and neither did they recognise the smell of blood but they did know instinctually that whatever was producing the smell would be a delicacy that they should not miss.
The hunter and the prey, the wolf and the boar, all united for the first time and moved towards the source of the smell with unfocused eyes. At the end of the travel, they found a group of undead and a lone vampire a few hundred meters away from the forest.
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Vampire territory
Imperial capital city.
Veld stared at the group of maids in front of him with a feral grin while a bloodthirsty aura spread around him.
"Well, let's hear it. Who poisoned my wife and daughter?" He ordered, sending a shiver down every one of their spines.
"We don't know-" a male butler intended to answer but a sharp kick to his stomach sent him flying across the room as he collided with a pillar sending him unconscious.
"I already know everyone that is involved. The only reason I did not act is because I didn't want to harm my brother's wife and the possibility of a civil war, but now she allied herself with a bunch of human supremacists and is planning to kill my daughter. I will ask once more, What poison did you guys use on my wife and daughter? And for how long?"
The group of maids and butlers stared at each other as sweat poured down their heads, after some hesitation they all focused on a single maid. The maid in question tried to run away but a spark of lightning burned her arm to cinders and halted her steps.
She screamed in agony but Veld didn't seem to care and fired three more lighting bolts completely separating her limbs from the body.
"Stop your screams, I don't want to waste any more time" Veld ordered as thunder sparks danced around his body. The maid fearfully nodded and spoke in a hoarse voice,
"It's Lady Selena, She ordered to poison Her Highness Lady Victoria and Miss Arya" she spoke amidst the pain but Veld interrupted her.
"I know who did it, I want to know about the poison and its effects on a person's mind"
The maid nodded in understanding and informed
"It's a poison that causes hallucinations and nightmares. We gave small doses of the poison to both Lady Victoria and Miss Arya, but Miss Arya had a strong heart and resisted the poison.
Lady Victoria however suffered from nightmares every day until she developed a fear of sleep and stopped sleeping entirely. The constant loneliness and lack of sleep drove her crazy and after five years of torture, she passed away"
The maid stopped and glanced at Veld only to see him silent, eerily silent. She gulped in fright and continued.
"After her death, we were ordered to drive Miss Arya to commit suicide. We increased the dose of poison but her special affinity made poisons ineffective against her, so we spread rumours that she was responsible for her mother's death and that she was a devil.
We also forced her to eat a month-old rotten food for a total of six months but in the end, she survived and met Lord Sirius"
Veld took in a deep breath to calm his nerves and called in a bunch of soldiers,
"Torture them for six months and then dispose of them" he ordered and walked away.