Conspiracies are always exciting until the truth comes to light. Or some might continue to live in ignorant minds just because they are the least bothered to address the truth. For me, searching for kinks in a wire is an exciting job because it points to the inherent flaw of the creation, which may directly point to the creator or retailer who sold it. And I can always exploit that fact to my benefit. That’s how every manipulation works. Whether you are undead or not.

In this dingy rundown room, I was trying to get my hands on such a flaw that might excite the rest of my arduous journey in this world. If it’s a new variety of bread, then I am all the more thrilled. But amongst swarming worms, decaying wood, and rotting stench, I doubt I’ll be able to find anything worthwhile.

I kept my eyes off the worms, and a clean carpet that certainly looked out of place in this filthy tavern entered my view. I raised it, and a metal door interrupted my unbiased vision that expected to find some more filth. I touched it and felt the welcoming warmth instead of the chill of an abandoned shelter. Sure, there were mortals inside. Crazy mortals inside, I correct.

Hesitantly, I opened it and descended the metal railing attached to one end of the square hole that spanned into the endless darkness beneath. Hesitance was not attributed to fear of the unknown but for fear of the known, my lady. I was bound to get scarred today, but conspiracies are something that I enjoy unveiling.

I descended the railing, amidst the rotting stench, by casting [Weightless] spell when it started creaking. After what seemed like a long time, my feet touched the ground, though darkness encased me, beckoning to move toward the faint light that was shining in the distance. I touched the walls on either side of the cramped space, feeling the growing moss and water dripped on my head from the ceiling above me.

This was not a sewer, for this world wasn’t that advanced. Neither was this a bomb shelter for apparent reasons. The water might have been due to condensation, but condensation of what was the question I needed to answer. Were they preparing a massive underground steam bath? That seemed unlikely, given these parts would become sewers in the future.

I walked, splashing a puddle of water to the flanking walls, but realized that the smell wasn’t quite right. I had blamed it on the decaying wood in the deserted tavern, but nothing supported my claims here. I created a glow on my hand by focusing the [Explosion] spell to a single point and lighted up my ambiance, just enough so that I wouldn’t attract superfluous attention.

It wasn’t water. If you had expected it, this undead is really worried about you. I touched my face and noticed there was blood on my cheeks, too, thanks to the methodical drips from the unassailable ceiling. I heard screams in the distance, loud and clear, almost similar to the torturous cries of the burning maid in the elegant tavern.

Puddles of blood splashed on my shoes as I ambled in the direction of the noise, the blood on the ceiling thinning considerably as I reached closer to the light. [Devil eye] lingered before me, more than a few feet distance to warn me of potential danger. I paused when my eye reached the light, which was an open space, almost thrice the room of my lady.

Incantation circles festooned most of the idle ground, mages seated on the periphery within designated circles, with strange inverted triangles meeting at the center. Summoning magic, I knew it at first look. And demon at that, looking at the abundance of bloodshed staining the entire chamber. It was hard to breathe, but the mages were casting spells with ease despite the stench of the blood. They were used to it, which meant this wasn’t a new cult or a spontaneous one.

They were not chanting any spell, rather waiting for the man in the center to get cooked in the cauldron. Like really. I would have thought they were cannibals preparing human soup if it wasn’t for all the robed mages and incantation circles. As scary as it sounds, boiling a human is an ideal way to improve his life force, for it cleanses the mana reserve and other impurities. Though, the human would undoubtedly die. That’s why commoners who had no aptitude for magic never became mages in this world. External casting would have made things different, and mages would have flocked in the capital like heroine’s harem.

Horrified shrills erupted from the man as the two fire mages below the raised cauldron boiled the water, and I watched his skin turning red before it scalded. It was a horrifying sight, blood all around the ceiling and the wall, and humans in various shapes and sizes tied at one corner of the room, watching the ethereal sight with terror in their eyes, but I felt my lips curling. That, you cannot blame me for.

The light in the entire circle glowed, and I watched a summoned demon gobble the human before disappearing immediately. I suppose other demons hadn’t been this peaceful, for there was too much blood in the walls and ceiling to just brush it off. The mana of the mages was too scarce for the demon to feed on it, so it couldn’t sustain the materialization in this realm.

The mages on the periphery breathed hoarsely, depleted of their mana, and looked up at the fire mages in the center.

“Some more bodies, and we might be able to summon a stronger demon that might be able to sustain without our mana,” one among the fire mage said. “Take some rest for now. We’ll continue soon. Also, smuggling people inside the city has become hard, so we need to slow down. I’ll talk to my lord and see what can be done.”

A stronger demon meant an undead like me. Not exactly like me, for I was a pure breed, but something similar to a grotesque immortal monster that leeches off the life force of living things. I am different, you see, for I was a human before. I gather a very minute amount of life force from every living being, unlike them who gobble up an entire human to sustain for a few decades.

In the demon realm, time runs differently, so they are immortal for us, albeit they really aren’t. They die slowly if they don’t sustain themselves with the life force of humans. That’s how all stories about demons attacking humans came about. And people simply blamed the demons for eating them.

How is it any different from mortals eating animals to sustain themselves? The sheer absurdity of the mortals never fails to amuse me.

I scurried away to the railings when I noticed the two men at the center finishing up their tasks for the night.

“Lock them up in the cellars, and feed them well. They need to watch every summoning, for the stronger demon will feed on their fear.”

That’s horseshit, but let’s not debate on that. The strength of the demon summoned depends on the mana reserve of the sacrifice, so if they choose some good high-level mages and use them at once, they might be able to summon someone decent enough to blow up the kingdom.

I am least interested in helping out because even the strongest among the demons in the hell realm won’t be able to hurt an undead. It’s a fact and not overconfidence. When you have lived long enough, there won’t be anything called arrogance in you.

Juggling through the streets can hardly be called strolling, but that’s what I did once I was out of that bloody sewer. My stained shoes had left footprints of blood, which I deftly cleaned thanks to [Waterfall], but it made the already grimy floor appear more marvelous. I wasn’t worried about getting discovered after noticing a drunkard pissing close to the rundown building and falling asleep right beside it.

I walked down the familiar road soon, past my idle bakehouse that had a closed sign trapped in bold at the entrance. Despite having bread in my closet, nothing beats freshly baked bread. I was young and dumb when I thought frozen and heated bread tasted the same, but I had a lot of growing up to do when I had just discovered [Garken]. I was few tens of thousands of years old at the time, after all. A very young undead, indeed.

Commuters changed from gambling bunch to drinking hounds, and guards picked them up at times, helping them stray away from the roads, for carriages start running early in the morning. The soldiers even bowed to me gratefully, probably because I wasn’t drunk. My neck felt cold without the cloak, but I decided not to act like a suspicious old man. Guards often misunderstood me in the dead of the night when my almost grey hair poked out through the cowl teasingly.

When I reached the isolated locality of the mansion, my lady was standing out in the cold, pacing around restlessly. My mouth felt dry, and I gulped whatever little spittle I had managed to accumulate. I waved to her when she noticed me glowing under a magic lamp, and her expression flickered between relief and rage.

“You are late, bastard!” She hit my chest really hard as I wrapped the cloak in my hands around her. [Ward], as always, did the job of keeping curious ears out.

“It smells like smoke,” I said, “but it should ward off the cold, my lady.”

Her ears had turned slightly red, so I was wondering if the cold made it so. Even my modern knowledge failed to give me an answer, so I just left it at that. I was better off not knowing some things about my lady. Curiosity will steal my bread, despite my apparent interest in it.

“I killed him, my lady,” I smiled at her. “And hung his neck close to the bastion. I doubt the royal family would publicly announce his death for a few days. I will be amazed if they do. They are anything but shameless, after all.”

“You didn’t heal it yet?” She ignored my words and touched my lip again, a shadow of a smile on her face.

“My lady?” I was surprised. “Hadn’t you told me not to do it?”

“You won’t, Mongrel!” She turned around and walked inside the gates, hands clutching the cloak tightly.

Well, that was weird. I watched her skip through the gates and enter the mansion. A bow to the guard earned me a grunt, so I just decided to retreat to my humble abode for the day.