Leviathan's depths, I'm starting to have too many Vam-, yes Vampire 76 I'll get to you in a moment, Vampires 4, 120 and 48, you may all leave, and-,

Ah, we meet again! You caught me in the midst of work, as you usually do. You might want to book a date sometime, no? It's not as if your presence is irritating but your timing is hardly impeccable. As a matter of fact, it is highly peccable.

Anyhoo, in your absence, I have only grown my forces, as well as my stats. Why, you don't believe me? I don't need to you, but have a look at my stupendous success!

All mosquitos under control

Mosquitos

189 000

Bloodsuckers 29 000 Petite Vampires 5 800

To be fair, I'm quite impressed myself. Once all of them started to get to work, it all fit together like a puzzle. Oh, and let's not forget about my stats, of course!

David Branner Petite Vampire Level 47/50 Power Health 125/125 Blood 1000/1000

Status

Flight 189 Succ 50 Defence 100 Noise 100

Skills

Mitosis (2, 5 or 10 Blood/Use) Evolution Bloodwork Dark Arts

As you can see, not only have my stats increased well into the three digits, but my level is also quite close to max. Life right now is smooth. A bit... too smooth. For my evil life to be complete, I don't want it to be an easy road, without bumps or anything that just gets me from point A to B! No, I want a rollercoaster! Dangerous, thrilling and very likely to make me hurl!

That is why, my current objective is not to evolve, no, before I do that, before I lose all my dearest of underlings, there are some things I must do, some things I must research. Disappointingly enough, even in a big, modern city like this, there is no easy way for a mosquito to get a hold of a personal computer to do their research.

But I have a plan! Even with my current state, I can still do some research!

I will need some things, and having a total of 223 800 mosquito underlings does help quite a lot. My first order of business is to invade a second-hand store, and get a hold of a slouch jacket, the kind Columbo always wore (I only watched that series for research into the lawmaker's mind, I swear!), a pair of pants and shoes (hopefully some shade of brown to match the jacket), and, finally, gloves, a hat, a pair of sunglasses and a bandana to cover up face and hands.

Using all these components, I will build myself an armour of cloth to protect a soft, squishy mosquito-filled inside! My genius is... frightening, really.

To prepare for this, I will begin by recalling any and all mosquitos I have on the field. I won't be sending any of the Bloodsuckers or Vampires into the store, but all the normal mosquitos are fair game. However, before I make them even try to kidnap a coat and everything, I need to assess their strength.

So, return to me, my wretched darlings! Cast your prior purposes aside and come, come to your overlord!

All the vampires swarming my lair either did a U-turn in midair or stepped a bit closer from the line they were in. Right. Now, we play the waiting game.

A few minutes pass, and I hear this... humming. The Bloodsuckers are quite quiet, and from what I've heard, Vampires are (delightfully enough) almost completely silent. The mosquitos, on the other hand...

Here they come. Close to two hundred thousand mosquitos. The thought makes my evil little shrunken heart quiver with excitement. Ever since I got more than 100 000 mosquitos, I forced the window in the upstairs to be fully open, but even that just... isn't enough. They swarm inside like a massive black eldritch tentacle, turning from hive to mosquito-block and back to hive once they come inside.

Okay, okay, this isn't going to-, STOP! Cease your fruitless lollygagging, the lot of you!

The swarm freezes in place.

-I'll come outside. Our business is in the outside, after all. Just... go out in an orderly fashion, will you? This is hard to see!

I could almost hear them all collectively whining like a sorry bundle of puppies. Yeah yeah just get outta here!

Once all of them had exited the building, I follow. The outside is... somewhat chaotic. I'm sorry for calling all earlier collections of all of my current underlings a swarm or a cloud. I was incorrect. THIS... This is a cloud. If I look into the densest part of the hive, I can literally only see black.

Fantastic. How proud I am of you all.

Alright, that's enough dillydalling, into formations the lot of you!!

As quickly as my order is sent out, all my dear lackeys form into formations based on squadron, rank and, y'know, what evolution they are. My dearest Vampires, being the quickest, form their ranks first, with the Bloodsuckers second and the normal mosquitos a clear third. Atter a short while, all 200 000+ of them stand before me in large black squares, like stormtroopers before the senator. Ah, feels good, man.

Listen up, soldiers! As you can see, before us stands a pier, useless in function and form, much like yourselves! But don't let your individual weakness get you down! Stand tall and proud, knowing that not only are you blessed enough to be the underlings of none other than myself, but so, too, are you not one! You are many, as Legion! And together, you can do great things!!

To prove this obvious fact, we shall try lifting things of varying weight to see where the limit lies!

Now, enough of this dastardly foreplay, let us waste no time in achieving our goals!!

Five rocks of different sizes later, and it turns out that mosquitos in large swarms, especially those with higher levels of flight, are quite strong.

Now, to steal the disguise-!

There are three steps to this particular plan. Find a second-hand store, rob it blind, and escape. That is all. The first part was quite easy since Squadron 13B had already spotted such a store just in the centre of town. Any other villain might have backed down, believing a hit in the middle of main street to be too difficult or too eye-catching. But me? No, this is perfect-!

They won't even understand what they saw, HHAHADHAHGA!!!

Now, my underlings, scatter! Stay close to me in a cloud, but not so close that we look any conspicuous-!

I almost want to travel very high up, but I don't think, if my own experiences are anything to go by, that being high up is a very good thing for the normal Mosquitos. If anything, that'll only scatter us. After som trial and error, we find a formation that works, with myself being surrounded by every kind of lackey, the strongest ones being the closest to me.

And, with minor trouble, we reach the store. Before this, I had never been in the main part of town, since I always thought it was more for snobs, and I had never had the kind of cash to be able to act snobby. So, this is my first time actually getting a look here.

Bloodsucker 16754 leads me to the actual store in question. It is surprisingly large, and even at this distance, I can see people coming in and out, carrying bags and looking all pretty and handsome. Oh I'll ruin their day, and I'll revel in it! Underlings!! If you are approached by a human, do not hesitate to bite, just to make their lives worse!

I receive a collective nod and bow.

Very well then.

Time for a mini-heist to prepare for the real heist-!