Blood business

--- Elena ---

After our little meeting, I left the mansion with Dred and made my way towards the local academy. Since Dred was lurking in my shadow, nobody noticed his presence. With the help of my bacteria, I quickly tracked down the three Warton brothers who were still together. I didn’t want to do it like this, originally, but Dred’s words made sense and made me realise that my current efforts were a bit pointless in the long run.

Theoretically speaking, the people I left behind should be able to raise their children according to my ‘laws’, the laws that were enough to keep their lives, but in fact, that was naive of me. Humans wouldn’t stop being humans and demons wouldn’t stop being demons, and the list went on. Even if I wiped out the ‘weed’, new would be born in the future all because of society. The only true solution was to… destroy every race by turning them into our blood servants. Maybe we were supposed to use our blood like that since the beginning.

Although their crazed worship for Dred and me was a rather questionable side-effect, once the whole universe fell, we should be able to ask the Abyss to remove that effect of our blood. But even if it didn't help us, we would bear the consequences of our actions.

My best shot at making the brothers switch sides was to use Boulei’s interest in me. I was pretty sure that I didn’t misinterpret the looks he gave me, but I could be wrong as well. If he refused to bother with my 'openings’ and the friendly signs I planned to show, I’d leave them be, for now. The poor guy didn’t even know he would be playing around with his own fate if he really made a move on me. It all depended on whether he was a dense guy or not.

Making careful my timing was right, I turned on the corner and stopped in front of him, showing a surprised face.

Boulei opened his eyes wide and looked at me happily, “You’re - Elena - Hahaha, I didn’t think we’d meet again.”

“My, certainly, it’s a surprise for me as well,” I put my hand on my face as I replied, feigning surprise. But I was more amused than anything.

“Maybe it’s fate,” he chuckled.

Hmm- so he is trying to close the gap, it seems. Good thing for me.

“That could be,” I said with a smile. “Where were you headed to?”

“Ah, we’ve just finished our first day in the academy. We were on the way to our dormitories. Oh, and they even reward us with some world crystals if we perform well,” he said happily.

His words piqued my interest. I needed a stable income of world crystals to keep my blood servants at least somewhere around my level. I had no plans to keep dragging them on my back. I just wanted all of them to reach the sixth realm, but now that we were here, Dred and I would advance as quickly as we could beside taking care of our ‘work’. I could have asked, but once he turned into my blood servant, I’d find out about it anyway.

“Don’t get your hopes high. If the academy handed out so many world crystals, everyone would attend it and never graduate… Well, or at least, they’d stay there as long as they could,” Dred commented on my thoughts.

“Yes, but you may be wrong since we don’t know the rules of the academy,” I replied.

“That’s a good thing then,” I replied with a smile.

“Miss Elena, do you live in the city as well?” Gin, one of Boulei’s little brother asked.

“I do. Why? Do you want to visit my place by any chance?” I chuckled and in the meantime, Dred contacted Jareg and asked if he's talked with his grandfather yet.

“Master, I talked with him and he said he doesn’t care and that I shouldn’t bother him with matters like these. But he did warn me that I’d have to take responsibility for you if I adopted you. There is a more pressing matter, though,” Jareg replied.

“Hahaha, that wasn’t why I asked it. I wouldn’t want to intrude-” Gin laughed at my question at the same time, but Boulei cut into his words.

“But if you don’t mind, I’d like to visit you,” he said, seemingly a bit overexcited about his chance.

Hmm, he really is trying to get closer to me, I guess. Should we use the ‘elixir’ trick again? They’re coming from far away, so they shouldn’t know that there is no elixir that puts them to sleep. I should hear out Jareg as well, but I can’t talk with two people at the same time, so Dred, deal with him.

As I thought that far, Dred was already listening to Jareg’s report while I focused back on the people in front of me.

Placing my hand on my chin, I said, “I imagine you don’t know the city considering that you’ve arrived not long ago. Should I send someone to guide you there?” I raised my brows. “I can’t receive you right now since I have matters to attend to,” I added.

“No, no, I wouldn’t want to bother you. Please, go ahead and deal with whatever you have to. If you tell me your address, I’ll find your place for sure,” Boulei said kindly.

Hahaha, he’s trying so hard it actually makes me feel bad a bit. Well, whatever.

“You aren’t bothering me, though,” I smiled at him and brushed my hair to the side. “Right, you can find me here” - I said as I used my soul force to share with him the location of the Greywing mansion - “but I’m not sure I’ll be home. Anyway, if you do come and I’m not home, just tell it to either of the maids. They have a way to contact me and I’ll return.”

“Alright, we’ll be on our way in that case,” he smiled back and after saying goodbye, they waited for me to move and then left as well.

“Dred, follow them. I want to know where this dormitory is. Maybe I could turn everyone into my blood servant there as well,” I murmured, a new plan already forming in my mind. It’d take time, but if I could turn the younger generations into my blood servants, everywhere, it would take no more than a few years until I overtook this whole place without anyone knowing. By that time, I should be able to deal with the legendary creatures and people with too much knowledge.

“Fine, fine. Why do I have to do the dirty work, though?”

“What dirty work? You don’t have to kill them, you’ll be just following them,” I replied.

“Yes, but you’re strong enough to follow them without their notice,” he grumbled. “Right, and did you hear Jareg’s report?”

“Partly. But if I got it right, Anna questioned his motives when he told her to stop following Liz and told him that he was acting strangely, right?” I asked.

“Yes. This just means that Anna is suspicious of Jareg and Skeiron as well. But it’s true that both of them went through big changes, both in behaviour and looks. On the other hand, she most likely finds it weird that the servants don’t even gossip about Jareg’s change, even though that would be commonplace. But they obviously wouldn’t since they’re our pawns as well,” he said.

“Suspicion is something I want the least,” I grumbled as I started following the brothers while Dred went back to the mansion. With his and the other servants’ help, they should be able to take down that woman and get rid of our only nuisance.

On the way, I also thought about the envoy that was sent to the elven forest. Once they returned, Jareg would attend the Kings meeting where they’d most likely decide on the next move of the kingdom. I had people almost everywhere in this kingdom, but it’d be for the best if I spread my wings and sent a few descendants to the other powerful nations.

The most powerful nations were obviously Trigon, the Shikanai Dynasty, and the ‘forest of the elves’. I couldn’t help but wonder if their nation actually had a name or just people of Trigon referred to that place as such. The trip to the dormitory took about five minutes which Boulei spent talking about my beauty and my elegance and whatnot. It was quite strange to hear, though it felt good to hear something other than ‘monster’ and other similar words.

While other legendary creatures have a kind of ‘crushing’ aura, like Padinyss had, Dred’s and mine make others feel at ease and comfortable around us instead. As humans with barely any power, Audrey and Jake naturally fell to it and turned into my dear ‘overlords’, hehe.

I guess unless people find out about my true identity, they do see me as a good person bearing elegance and pride. I felt tempted to turn only his brothers into pawns and test how he would react if I told him who I was and what sort of plans I had, but I knew I shouldn’t do something like that.

Yeah, I mustn’t. I’d have to kill him or force him into submission if he turned against me and doing something like that just for a bit of fun and out of curiosity, would be bad. AAAARGH! But it’s the first time that an outsider talked about me like this. I want to see his reaction!

“Dred, help me,” I couldn’t help but ask him. I was sure he understood me. Well, it’d be weird if he didn’t consider that we shared the same soul realm, alas, we were bonded.

“Elena, as long as it doesn’t affect our plans, I don’t really care what you do. Personally, I wouldn’t do something like that, but if you want to find out so much, then go ahead. Even if you end up killing them, I don’t think it really matters after all the bad things we’ve done,” he replied.

“But make sure to turn the other two into pawns, at least. I wouldn’t mind if we had people in that academy or what,” he added.

“I’m… not going to reveal anything. I’ll just do what I was supposed to,” I replied. “Also, how are things going on your side?”

“I’m lurking in Jareg’s shadow and am waiting patiently for the outcome of his meeting. Anna keeps saying that he’s changed ever since ‘this Liz’ appeared. It turns out these two had a rather complicated relationship since Anna is Skeiron’s mother… I should have checked all of Jareg’s memories sooner. Well, it’s never too late, right?” he murmured.

“I guess it isn’t. Also, that’s something Jareg should be able to deal with-”

“Wait, wait,” Dred cut into my words. “It seems that Jareg looked fit in the past, like now, and he was also a kinder and gentler person, like now. And… hahaha, Anna is jealous of Liz because she thinks that she changed Jareg back, not her. Oh, shit, this is turning into a family drama… I don’t think we actually have to kill her. She’s better off joining as well,” Dred said happily, visibly having fun listening to what was going on there.

If only he followed the brothers in my place, I could have had fun watching them. Although I was able to use my bacteria to track down anyone, I wouldn’t know where the location was without actually going there, even if I felt that the target stopped moving at some place. The most I’d know would be a general way and I wouldn’t be able to tell the exact distance either. And so I was forced to track him…

“Elena, there is a slight problem. Jareg and Anna are making up as per my command and even Skeiron came in for a family hug. Now he’s also happy to meet his mother for the first time, but you see, Anna has yet to become one of us and if she finds out that Jareg wants to ‘adopt’ us, she’d definitely change her mind. But Boulei is going to visit this mansion which won’t go unnoticed. We’ll have to send Jareg and Anna on a date somewhere far or I don’t know what to do.”

“I’ll also send someone to track Boulei and notify me when he decides to give the Greywing mansion a visit. If nothing else, you’ll have to ‘bump’ into him on his way here…” Dred said.

“Since you have a solution already, where is the problem?” I laughed.

“Ah… true!” he shouted in my mind.

“Good, I’ve found the dormitory as well. Let’s see… Inspect,” I said and inspected a few of the students I could see through the windows.

Name: Lamass Hill

Race: Lamia (Male)

Level: 608

Threat Level: 4

Class: Flood Magician (Excels in high area damage spells) (Rare)

Allegiance: Trigon Kingdom

Name: Emily Heder

Race: Demon-Human (Female)

Level: 609

Threat Level: 10

Class: Soul Artist (Excels in soul-related spells) (Epic)

After checking about fifteen people, I realised the dormitory was a treasure trove. That girl called Emily surely had some amazing background since with her level, she shouldn’t have such a high threat level. It most likely had to do with her soul-related spells which I was lacking in.

I guess she’s been taught by her parents or some kind of master else there is no way that she’d have an epic-ranked class and who knows how powerful soul spells. Yup, I have to get my hands on her as well and get her to teach us. Sharing work sure is great~ If I had to learn everything by myself and alone, ugh… I wouldn’t have that much time.

For now, I turned around and went back to the Greywing mansion, secretly, of course. Even if Jareg and Anna were in the mid parts of the sixth realm, meaning that they were about five times as strong as me, Anna still wouldn’t be able to sense me. Jareg would naturally know because of my soul realm…

I needed a plan. A plan to turn those talented people in the dormitory, the next generation of talented people into my Pawns or even Descendants.

If I succeeded, even before anyone noticed my presence, I’d sink my claws into this kingdom and turn the key people into my pawns.

All I needed was time and secrecy.