"Wha-!? Talk about rude!" Huffed Valaque, glaring at me.

"Rude? What do you mean, I thought it was a pretty valid question," I replied, nodding at the crater.

​​

"I don't like this kid, he's a smart-ass. You need to like, apologize or something!"

This is the guy who's been leading The Empire, seriously? I glanced at the Retribution Tier members. I couldn't quite read Lagusa's expression, but some of the others looked nervous, namely Azeria, Rion and Rex. Presde looked just as sleep-deprived as the last time I saw him...or maybe even more than before. Hacte was glaring at me, no surprise there, and Kuua just looked excited...in a bloodlusty kinda way.

They also had some injuries that weren't there before. Kuua was also missing a right eye, wearing an eyepatch like Valaque. There was Rion's missing right foot and Hacte was missing his right arm. Must be the aftermath of their battle against the Vampires. Good to see that they hadn't gotten out of it unscathed.

"Anyway, let's just cut to the chase and talk strategy, shall we?" I suggested objectively.

There was no need for small talk between us and them. And I doubt there even could be any small talk, there was a clear sense of tension between the two sides right now.

"Hey, don't ignore me!" Protested Valaque with a frown.

Well, if nothing else, he seemed oblivious to the tension in the air.

"Let it go, the more you let him bother you, the more he enjoys it," Sighed Lagusa, trying to calm him down.

Tch, don't act like you know me, you piece of shit.

"Ohh, I see...in that case, I won't let you win, kid! You don't bother me!" Declared Valaque triumphantly.

Jesus fucking Christ, this guy is really high-maintenance. It'd be immature to try and push his buttons further, so I'll refrain, despite how tempting it was.

"Yeah, good for you. Anyway, as I was saying...let's get down to business, shall we?"

"Very well, we have no issue with that. Tell me, how many of you are there?" Inquired Lagusa, looking around at our group.

Grr, I really don't want to talk to him...but that's not an option, considering that he was almost definitely the smartest person in The Empire, and definitely their best strategist. Come on, me, just be mature about this...

"...twenty-seven. And how many on your side?" I inquired in reply.

"The eight of us and fourteen lapdogs, all from the Lapdog Elite Squad, we do have more survivors but they are not combatants, at least, not strong enough to be of any use against the Vampires."

It wasn't like him to give away information that wasn't specifically asked for...he must really want this temporary truce to work, and had decided not to withhold any information...good call, and I'll respond in kind...though I do still plan on hiding the fact that I can steal Vampire Crosses.

The 'soul' research they did in the past, the spell they used to extract human life force, it just might work on Vampires, giving us a way to insta-kill them...but transferring the extracted life force into someone might give that person the Vampire's Cross.

Should I bring it up or not? On the one hand, if it really worked on the Vampires, then we won't even need to use the new barrier spell, but on the other hand, if someone besides me obtained Lazarus's Cross, this situation could get a whole lot worse. Hm, whether I bring it up or not, either way it was a calculated risk. Well, I'll just have to decide in the moment, I guess.

"So, that's forty-nine, huh...there are exactly two hundred Vampires in Silvland, so we're very much outnumbered...but looking at it a different way, that's four Vampires each...that shouldn't be too tough-...hey, you guys wouldn't happen to have a place where we can sit and discuss this, do you, or are we going to talk out here?" I inquired.

"I have a question too," Responded Valaque, before adding, "Why is this kid doing all the talking?"

"Stop calling me a kid, you old fart."

"Hey, I'm not that old, just because my hair is white doesn't mean-...," He began, before trailing off as Lagusa tapped his shoulder and whispered something to him, "Ohhh, so he's your old apprentice, the one that's supposed to be like, super powerful and stuff? Huh, I thought he'd be older. Hey, I thought you'd be older! What gives?"

...why?

"This is rather strange...I know these people are responsible for the deaths of millions, and yet they seem so...," Whispered Instructor Tabbs with a puzzled expression.

"Indeed, they hardly seem like mass murderers, and yet we know for a fact that they are," Added Ekai, a quizzical frown on his face.

They looked thrown off, just like how I often felt around Rion. Valaque was kinda similar in that he didn't act like a cold killer, but he was a lot more annoying that Rion.

"Yeah, well, you can't judge a book by its cover or whatever. We have to work with them, but don't forget who they really are," I whispered back to them.

Valaque's face then lit up and he walked over to Presde and whispered something to him. He looked like he'd just gotten an idea...he seems like an idiot, but maybe he's actually an eccentric genius or something?

"Do I have to...? Fine," Sighed Presde, before gesturing to us to step back a bit.

As we did, the ground began rumbling, before rising in various shapes, until...he formed a large round-table with ten seats, and several rows of benches around it.

"Okay, we can discuss strategy on this! Let's have five from each of our sides sit at the round-table, and the rest can listen in from the benches...sound good?" Inquired Valaque with a smug smirk.

Why does he look so proud, it's not like he made this...he had all five Elemental Magic types, so that meant that his Earth Magic wasn't strong enough to pull off something like this. Should I point that out to see how he reacts? Yeah, that sounds like fun, but...I had already decided to be more mature...and given the tense air around us, I shouldn't do anything to make it worse.

"Yeah, sure, sounds good," I replied with a shrug.

"Cool! Take a minute to decide which five of you are gonna be at the table, we'll only have the ten seated in the middle do the talking, the rest must only listen quietly!"

He seems to be enjoying this a lot. You'd think he'd be a bit less chipper considering that his Empire was nothing but a massive crater now. I then turned around and faced the group I came here with, looking around to decide who should be a part of the discussion.

"I'll take part in the discussions, unless there's any complaints. As for the remaining four spots...Atticus slash Fuo, you're up. Instructor Tabbs, you too. Les, since you're a Silvland Adventurer, you should be a part of this too. And finally...Vi, since you've fought and killed more Vampires than most, along with escaping Silvland alive. Any objections?"

"Hey, why Les over me, I'm from Silvland too, and I'm the older sibling!" Protested Selesa with a slight look of dismay.

I don't know why she's disappointed, but she was too much of a wild card...

"Because I have no idea what you might say or do, and I don't need that stress. Les is a lot more...stable."

"Not that that's saying much," Added Les wistfully.

"H-hey!"

As the two siblings bickered, I felt a tug on my sleeve.

"Hm? What's up, Persia?" I asked.

"Well, nothing really...I just feel kinda worried and uneasy, that's all."

"Hey, don't worry, if something happens, I'll make sure to protect you, 'kay?"

"Overprotective as usual, aren't you...but I can't say I dislike that."

"You two never stop, do you?" Sighed Az, stifling a yawn.

"Speaking of stopping, I never did apologize for interrupting you and El-."

"Please don't. Keep your apologies to yourself," He quickly interrupted, his face turning a bit red.

Anyway, a couple of minutes later, the discussion got underway. The five on The Empire's side included Valaque, Lagusa, Presde, Hacte and Azeria. And so, the meeting began...

"I shall start proceedings by outlining the structure of the plan we have drawn up so far," Spoke up Lagusa, "We will attack Silvland from the north while staging a diversion to the west. Ideally, a significant number of the Vampires will be drawn to the west, meanwhile, we will all split up and make our way to the royal castle and covertly kill any Vampires we encounter. Our aim will be to thin their numbers as much as possible while also seeking to kill their king and other high ranking Vampires. We have also discussed the possibility of hit-and-run tactics, but such a method will compromise our advantage of the element of surprise. There are still a lot of details we need to work out, of course, but for now, that is the extent of our plan."

Not bad for an initial outline, though ideally, we could use another diversion...

"Right, we did try to set up another diversionary attack from Bronztan to the east, but they refused to help us, they're apparently working on fortification and defensive efforts," I remarked with a sigh.

Instructor Tabbs had taken a round trip to Bronztan earlier in the day using teleportation, but her efforts had been fruitless.

"Seriously? Then it's decided! Once this is all over, we'll destroy Bronztan first, write that down, Artur- ow, hey!" Began Valaque, before Lagusa zapped him with a streak of lightning and a sigh of exasperation.

...I'll ignore that for now.

"Well, anyway...what exactly do you plan to do for the diversion? We don't want to split up our forces too thin," I pointed out objectively.

"I already mentioned that not all of our surviving lapdogs are strong enough to kill a Vampire...there are nine spare lapdogs we can use for the diversion, they are rather weak, but hopefully they will be able to distract the Vampires for at least a little bit of time," Replied Lagusa.

Coldly logical as always, I see. He was overlooking the minor, yet important, details though.

"That's not going to work, it'll be too obvious that it's a diversion. How about this, we make the lapdogs look like the eight of you using an Appearance Copy and Paste spell, and for attacks, they can use these," I remarked, holding up some of the remaining Extract spells that didn't get used in the ambush.

I'd managed to retrieve eleven of them, three contained my lightning, four contained Ekai's flaming tornadoes, three of Instructor Tabbs' wind tornadoes, and one of Az's Frostbite attack, the big spiky ice boulder. I also brought twenty pairs of empty Store and Extract spells for more attacks. And as for the Appearance Copy and Paste spell, we could just send someone back to the Rustlands to go fetch a copy.

"...I see, the spell you used to infiltrate us, yes? And what are these?" Asked Lagusa, staring at the Extract spells curiously.

"I'll explain that later, all you need to know for now is that each of these Spell Cards contain powerful attacks in them."

"Ooh, really? What does this one do?" Inquired Valaque, picking up one of the Extract spells.

"Point it to your face and activate it to find out," I replied, unable to resist the urge to lie.

"Okay-...wait, were you being sarcastic? Hey, I almost just did that, I could've died!" He exclaimed, putting the spell back cautiously.

Tch, so close.

"...back to the matter at hand. Atticus, mind confirming the numbers and locations of the Vampires right now?"

"Very well, give me a minute or two," He replied with a nod, before closing his eyes and focusing.

"Atticus? Isn't that a guy's name?" Chimed in Rion from the benches, before his eyes widened and he added, "Woah, is that a trap with boobs!?"

I noticed Fuo's eyebrow twitch with irritation...she probably didn't know what a trap is, but either way, she probably wasn't taking it as a compliment.

"Rion, I said only those at the round-table can talk...come on, man, if one of my subordinates breaks a rule I set, it makes me look bad!" Complained Valaque with a look of exasperation.

"Oh, uh...sorry 'bout that, boss, won't happen again!"

"Good...but you raised a good point. Hey, you, tell me...is this person a trap with boobs?" Inquired Valaque, staring at me with a dead-serious expression.

What is with this guy?

"Kuro...just so I'm clear, what is a 'trap'?" Inquired Fuo with an icy glare, taking back control.

"Well, it's, uh...it's a term used to describe a guy who looks like a girl."

"Wha-!?"

Wow, she looked pissed, so much so that she couldn't even get any words out.

"Uh...was it something I said? Hey, kid, is that a trap or not!?"

...what is even happening anymore? Is this really what a tense meeting between two opposing sides that were forced to team up because of a common enemy is supposed to look like!?

"It's kinda complicated...but basically, it's a female body with two consciousnesses in it, one female and one male...Vampire," I explained with a sigh.

"Huh? Didn't catch that last part, male what?"

I'll skip the next couple of minutes, you can imagine how it went, as I explained the situation with Atticus and Fuo.

"...and that's all there is to it...can we get back to strategizing now? Atticus, you got a read on the Vampires' positions?" I inquired, almost pleadingly.

"Yes, somehow...of the two hundred in Silvland, all the higher ranking Vampires are around the center, while the Minions are scattered throughout...most seem to simply be wandering aimlessly, though some are not moving much, they are likely keeping watch. Of those, they are most heavily concentrated on the south, followed by west, and then the east and north are relatively less populated. Including the northeast and northwest sections of Silvland, there are only forty-two Vampire Minions present, two of which I believe are outside the north gates. They likely guard the gates in shifts of two at a time, though I do not yet know how frequently they change shifts."

Huh, that...actually made me feel kinda optimistic about this whole thing.

"Holy crap, you can sense them with that level of detail and accuracy!? Wait, doesn't that work both ways, can't they sense you too?" Exclaimed Valaque with widened eyes.

"No, they cannot."

"Oh, uh...okay then, I guess."

Hm...this actually gave us a pretty good advantage, we outnumbered the Vampires present from northwest to northeast, so...

"We can definitely work with this...first, we take out the guards by the north gate simultaneously as the diversion to the west begins, we'll also need to get an estimate of how long each pair of guards' shifts lasts, to prevent overlap and having to take out four Vampires instead of two. Once that's done, the forty-nine of us will sneak in along different points on the north side of the Silvland wall, using Stealth Barriers-."

"Woah, that sounds so cool! What's a Stealth Barrier?" Inquired Valaque with a gleam in his eye.

I am so going to kill the shit out of this guy once this is all over.

"A barrier that combines invisibility, intangibility and sound-proofability...not sure that last one is a real word, but you get what I mean. Also, the intangibility only lets you walk through inanimate objects, you can't walk through people or other living things, they'll be able to see and feel you if they enter the space of your barrier."

"That's super awesome and shit! Hey, Arturo, why don't we have a spell like that?" Complained Valaque with a pout.

"...I am fairly certain they got the intangibility feature from us."

"Yup, stole one back when I infiltrated you guys. But that's not important right now, back to what I was saying...with these barriers, each person can sneak in through the walls without having to climb it. You can channel Mana while within the barrier, so you can use techniques like Lightning Boost and Lightning Sensory Field, but if you fire out an Elemental Magic attack, it'll dissipate once it leaves the barrier when it changes from intangible to tangible...physical weapons are a different story though, if you throw a knife out, it'll remain solid. If and when you encounter a Vampire, you'll first have to deactivate the Stealth barrier, and then you use this barrier, Stealth Fighting Ring Barrier...uh, the name's a work-in-progress, but how it works is like this..."

After a brief silence following the end of my explanation...

"This spell...it is better than I could have asked for, truthfully I did not actually believe that there was a way to kill Vampires covertly, but this...this changes that," Remarked Lagusa with an optimistic nod.

"Using the Stealth barrier, it'd be pretty easy to sneak past any Vampire you encounter, but I say it's better to kill them...only ignore them if you run into multiple Vampires at the same time, or at least too many for you to handle. But we can't ignore all of them, once we get to the center of Silvland, it's gonna be hard to keep being covert...these barriers are tough, but they probably can't withstand the sheer power of the stronger Vampires," I mused, talking while mulling over the details in my head.

"Yes, and then there is the power, or Cross, of the Vampire known as Zero. We cannot rely on magic against him," Frowned Lagusa, tapping his foot against the ground.

"Right, and that's why we need to take out as many of the Vampires in the surrounding areas as possible. After we all sneak in through the north side of the wall, we'll need to split up. The strongest of us, maybe the strongest fifteen or so, will make a beeline for the castle, seperately of course, since it's not like we'll be able to see each other with the Stealth barriers around us anyway. As for the rest, they'll go around towards the east and west, and continue killing the Vampires in those areas. This won't be a quick operation, it'll probably take us at least a day to get to the castle from the north gate, and it's possible that some of us might not run into any Vampires at all. Those tasked with heading for the castle will gather at a rendezvous point near the castle and then storm it together, taking the Vampires off-guard...as for the rendezvous point itself, hm..."

"There's a small church near the castle, we can use that if it's empty," Chimed in Les, before turning to Atticus, "Are there any Vampires about, let's see...a kilometer to a slight northeast direction from the center, where the castle is?"

"Hm, let me see...no, there aren't any."

With that, the rendezvous point was set.

"That's all well and good, but won't the entire plan be ruined if even one person is discovered?" Asked Valaque with a raised eyebrow.

"For once, you make a good point," I replied, before continuing hesitantly, "Actually, you might have a weapon that could work against them...the spell used to extract life force during the Magic Research Group's 'soul' research."

"We already tried that. I snuck into Silvland yesterday and attempted to kill a Vampire using that spell, but it did not work...and so, I left and returned here," Chimed in Lagusa with a sigh.

Well, that sucks...but on the bright side, I won't have to reveal the fact about Lazarus's Cross.

"Oh, that's too bad. Well, we'll just have to hope that no one screws up. Okay, let's recap, nine lapdogs who are transformed to match the appearances of Valaque and the Retribution Tier members will set off the diversionary attack to the west, while the rest of us sneak in through the north, fifteen of us will head straight for the castle seperately, which the rest will scatter and branch out to the east and west. Along the way, we'll use the new barrier spell to trap and kill any Vampires we come across. And the fifteen that are to head for the castle will rendezvous at the church Les mentioned. At this point, at least a day will have likely passed from the moment we sneak in through the north side of the walls. And then we get to the meat of it, all fifteen will charge into the castle and take out the stronger Vampires...let's not overload ourselves with too much information right now, so regarding the strategy for storming the castle, we'll decide on that at the rendezvous point itself, after we all meet up again. If we take out the king, that should take care of most of the problem...leave that part to me."

"Hold on, that doesn't work!" Protested Valaque, standing up indignantly, "You want to hog the spotlight and steal the glory, don't you!?"

Huh...? Was he being serious right now? I mean, okay, I did have the ulterior motive of stealing Lazarus's Cross for myself, but still, it's not like he knew about that...

"What? Are you stupid or something? I'm saying that because I'm the strongest one here, obviously," I replied with a shrug.

"Ohh, that makes sense...but I'm afraid you're mistaken. By that logic, I should be the one to fight him, because I'm the strongest human in this world!"

"Is that so...fine, we'll settle that after we're done with this meeting and the winner will be the one who fights the Vampire King."

"You're on, kid!"

Okay, I already regret saying that, but for now, I was just glad that he finally shut up.

"Now, seriously, stop interrupting! You aren't taking this thing seriously, are you? I don't care if you're indifferent towards the Vampires or whatever, but-."

"Take that back," He interrupted, his eyes going cold and his expression blank, "You really think I'm not taking this seriously? After what those monsters did to my Empire, to all my hard work over the past several years...I'll fucking kill every last one of them."

What the...? That came out of nowhere. He seemed like a completely different person just then, the dark look in his eyes gave me chills.

"Oh, my mistake...but wait, weren't you the one who technically blew up your Empire?"

"W-well, yeah, b-but...I wouldn't have if they didn't-!"

And he's back to idiotic just like that...

"Okay, enough getting sidetracked, we need to get back to the matter at hand."

"But you're the one that asked me-!"

"Now, where was I? Right, one of us will take on the king, while the other fourteen make sure that the Evil Numbers, Vampire Knights and Vampire Generals stay out of it...especially Zero and Eighty-Seven. Again, we'll discuss the specifics of how to go about doing that at the rendezvous point. Well, I think that about covers the basic structure to the plan, though I'm open to suggestions on improvements. Meanwhile, let's hash out any minor details or doubts anyone has, to make sure we're all on the same page...additionally, you guys barely have any info at all on the Vampires, right? Pay attention now, because I'm going to share everything we know about them," I declared with a serious expression.

"Impressive, you have matured...I remember a time where the idea of working with others horrified you. And now here you are, leading an international meeting," Spoke up Sicario.

"And so what? What, are you trying to make small talk or something? If so, just save it. I don't want to hear a word from you that isn't regarding this mission, you got that? Because once this is all over, I swear, I will kill you."

With that, I began informing them of everything we knew about the Vampires, with some input from Atticus whenever I overlooked or missed something. I also clarified any doubts anyone had, making sure everyone was a hundred percent clear on the plan. However, I left out two important details...well, they were important to me, but they weren't important to the plan.

The first, was of course, the fact regarding my ability to steal Vampire Crosses. And the second...was the fact that I didn't plan on killing all the Vampires. After I steal Lazarus's Cross, I'll give the remaining Vampires in Silvland the following command...go to Platinberg and stay there, and never attack a human from the Rustlands, Silvland or Bronztan ever again.

Once this mission is over, these people will definitely try to rebuild The Valaque Empire, but if Platinberg was being run by Vampires, then they'd no longer be The Empire's allies, and wouldn't support them. After all, this truce was just a temporary measure, taken as a last resort since there was no other alternative. That by no means made them our allies. No matter what, I can't let myself forget that these people are my enemies...

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