"Del, good morning," a voice could be heard from the left of him.

Del opened his eyes. He nodded to the left, his sister was waiting for him. He felt so sleepy. The comfy bed where he was sleeping made his sleepiness much more intense. Thinking about it, how could he end up there? That question was soon answered with the person on his right.

"Welcome to the hospital, Del," a woman said.

That woman was none other than their usual friendly female vampire surgeon, Cassandra Gable. She was holding a clipboard, wearing a white doctor coat, and having a stethoscope right around her neck.

"Cassandra, what happened?" Del asked.

"You were rescued, that is the short story. To be honest, I'm more impressed by your sister's strength. She carried you all the way from the edge of the Landville Forest to Landville General Hospital. I'm just happened to be in the right place and at the right time," Cassandra said.

"You worked here?" Del asked.

"Nope, I'm just here because I'm still taking samples, and no, I am not really sucking anyone here, I'm just here to run a few tests and I will leave," Cassandra said and she opened her clipboard, "Anyway, you have around 55 fragmentations in your body that I managed to pull out, the rest of them are either located too deep inside of your body or located too close to vital organs. Fragments consisted of stones, and tree branches."

Del observed his entire body. His chest was fine, there was no bandage and he was wearing the hospital scrub. However, his entire legs and arms were covered in bandages and there was an IV attached to both of his hands and his legs. Something also covered his entire

"55? How did I survive that?" Del asked.

"Your chest is clean from fragments, it's one of the key factors, and the fragments around your face aren't deep enough to cause any brain injury," Cassandra said.

Del nodded, "I see. But still, Cassandra, who the heck was those guys? They can fly, they can do crazy shits, and they shot fireballs like no tomorrow."

"They are special forces. Of course, they can do that, it's one of the requirements of entering the special units of Ilbistirum. You must be able to use an enchanted magical rifle and you must be able to fly," Cassandra said.

"Ok, I see, so basically, you're saying that kind of thing is regular in the military, how the hell the ground troops are supposed to be countering that? They're fast and they fly high," Del asked.

"You use a weapon with enough fire rate to fill the sky with leads," Cassandra said.

"Well, it makes sense," Del said.

"Anyway, Del, if you see any job that requires you to fight special force soldiers, you are better off not taking it, it's not worth the risk and it's very dangerous, to be honest. Unless you are very armored or very skillful, I don't recommend you fighting them," Cassandra commented.

"Yeah, I get your point," Del answered.

"Thanks for being my test subject again, Del," Cassandra said.

"Test subject? A test subject for what?" Del asked.

"Synthetic blood. Yeah, it was a little bit hard to find human blood around here, as you can guess, more than 90% of our population has a demonic gene at the very least, and injecting their blood into your bloodstream is as same as a death sentence. You will have kidney failure and eventually, total organ failure, and the next thing you know, you will have a funeral," Cassandra said.

"So, about this synthetic blood, how do you even make it, what makes it unique?" Del asked.

"Well, saying that the thing is 100% synthetic isn't true either, but this is similar to a bacterial culture you see. I only need a droplet of any blood, put it inside of a liquid culture that has a specialized chemical mixture, and then, drop the blood sample and apply a magical program to that thing. In 24 hours, all of the cultures will be turned into fresh red blood to drink, sorry, I meant to be transfused," Cassandra said.

"Old habit, isn't it?" Del smiled.

"Not habit, but a necessity," Cassandra replied.

"So, you are taking down two birds with one stone, huh? That's quite impressive if you ask me," Del smiled.

"Research is quite fun too. If the culture fails, I can drink it, and let me tell you, it can taste as delicious as the most expensive cocktail you can get in this town to the taste of sewage water of Elbanian," Cassandra said.

"Blood has a different taste?" Del asked.

"Yeah, even the type of food that you always eat will define how your blood tastes like. For example, your blood tastes bland, not too sweet, but not too sharp either, it was just like drinking flavored water. Cole's blood tastes funny, maybe because he ate something odd back then," Cassandra commented.

"I think I get your point, the taste of blood is defined by the diet and the activity of the user, but don't you think this kind of information is a little bit irrelevant for me?" Del asked.

"Ah yes, sorry, the bottom line is, you have your blood and you're fine now. You just need to take a rest while your sister right there will apply a healing spell for you while the doctors monitor your status," Cassandra said.

"I see," Del said.

"I'm impressed by the effectivity of your sister's healing spell, it's quite rare to see someone able to close a big wound in under two days," Cassandra said.

"Two days? How long have I stayed in this hospital?" Del asked.

"Five days, your sister volunteered to help me and I gladly accepted that," Cassandra said.

Anna just shrugged. She then showed a pouch to Del. She opened it and showed five white gold coins. Del didn't get it. What did he do? He failed the mission and yet, he still got a payment for it. Was it real or was it just a donation from Cassandra?

"Anyway, the guild heard about the report of the assault. You managed to kill four of them, if you have killed more, it's unconfirmed. The target is still standing so you don't get the full reward for it," Cassandra said.

"I see," Del nodded.

"Anyway, see you later, I still have several patients to take care of," Cassandra walked away from the bed and Anna waved her hand at her.

It got him thinking about something though. Where did Anna put all of his equipment? The guns, the NVG, the uniform, the backpack, where did Anna put it? Del looked around the room and he found his guns and ammunition.

"Looking for your guns?" Anna asked.

Del nodded.

"It's there, don't worry, I won't drop our equipment in the middle of nowhere," Anna said.

"Thanks, if it fell to the wrong hand, we'll be fucked," Del said.

"I agree," Anna nodded.

Anna put a blanket on top of Del's body. Del felt sleepy again, it might be because of the number of wounds on his body. He then slept again to let Anna apply her healing spell and to make his recovery way faster. He still needed to make more money.