The vampire got to his feet and used a Necromancy spell, Negative Heal, to patch himself up. He snarled at Kain, baring his elongated and sharp fangs before rushing at him while drawing a sword from his hip. Time slowed once again, and Kain let the overgrown parasite slowly close the distance before hitting him in the stomach with a body blow that would make a World-Champion Heavyweight Boxer blush. The lamprey was once again knocked back and dropped his sword as he cradled his belly in his hands while he curled up on the ground.

“Wrrraaaghrrh! How can you be so strong?! No bloodbag can be this strong!” The vampire cried out in a guttural and twisted voice. He continued to roll around on the floor, wincing in pain as he applied Negative Heal to himself repeatedly. With great effort he raised himself off the ground with the help of his sword and applied one last dose of Negative Heal to himself before taking a defensive posture. He had now realized that simply charging Kain wasn’t going to work, so instead he would wait for Kain to come to him, so he could have a better chance at drawing blood. He probably assumed his current opponent was only skilled in fisticuffs, but this assumption would soon be corrected with surprising brutality.

Kain raised his hands so that his fingers pointed directly towards him and let loose a surge of Black Lightning from his fingertips. Due to lightning moving faster than the vampire could react to, he quickly was being roasted by the constant surge of electricity that flowed from Kain's fingers across the air and into his body. Lightning was normally part of the Light Magic school, but with Kain not being skilled in Light Magic and instead using Blacklight Magic the lightning was not the normal color or intensity but was instead a central black core with a radiance of deep reddish purple and was slightly more damaging than the blue-cored with white-radiance Light Magic Lightning spell.

“Aaakkkaawrryyackaaiieeeaarrghgh!” Screamed the vampire, apparently in incoherent agony as his undead nerves were filled with electricity and his brain boiled in his skull. Kain stopped shoving lightning in his direction and while the leech was stunned by the pain he sped into his immediate vicinity and delivered a bone-crunching left-handed uppercut to his jaw. The vamp's body flew towards the ceiling, but Kain's left hand grabbed his right ankle before he could fly beyond his reach. With a swift motion, Kain swung his body into the ground before once again lifting him into the air. This time, Kain grabbed him by the left leg and his neck and slammed his bloody form into the stone floor before holding my open paled hands over him as he lay at the King's feet. With a smirk on his face, Kain sent what most mages would view as a Maximum Damage Fireball down onto the undead.

Range wasn’t an issue and neither was mana cost for the freakishly powerful rule-breaker, so diverting most of the mana used for sending a fireball the normal range towards the damage it could cause was more useful than unleashing a normal Fireball into his face. A thunderous roar rocked the throne room and the newly awakened and still somewhat weakened Kain was unfortunately caught up in the blast. The explosion and firestorm that had been created instantly over-cooked the vampire and his flesh began to burn to a crispy and carbonized black. The pain of fire searing and burning Kain's own flesh was something the new mind inside him was unprepared for, but the worst part was that the heat had scorched his lungs. The pain was both unfamiliar and very unwelcome, and Kain instinctively jumped out of the epicenter of the miniature firestorm that had appeared inside the castle.

Kain was likely in as much pain or more than the vampire had been prior, the one who was now charred to a crisp in the flames, but unlike the now re-dead undead, Kain's damaged ears began to heal along with the rest of his body. Kain really was immortal but he could still be damaged like anyone else, so he wasn’t invincible, more's the pity. The sounds and feeling of Kain's skin healing from the third degree burning and the irritating sensation of his lungs and throat mending themselves was enough to make him regret unleashing such a powerful spell so close to himself, so he decided not to do something so boneheaded again until he himself had found a way to avoid taking collateral damage.

Despite the explosion that he had generated and the magical flames that covered a good five to six meters of floorspace, the stone that made up the ground in the throne room were completely undamaged and did not even seem to be under any duress. By the time Kain's body had fully healed, the asshole who had stolen his throne was nothing more than a rapidly shrinking charcoal briquette and the miniature firestorm was dying down. As the last of the flames faded away, Kain approached the smoking remains of the vampire who had stolen his seat and with a heavy stomp, crushed his well-done skull to dust. With that, his body turned to ash and what little remained of his clothes lost their support. Surprisingly, his sword was still intact, although it glowed red hot due to the fire that had consumed its wielder. Kain wasn’t about to sear his hands trying to pick the damn thing up, so he let it rest on the floor next to its former master’s ashes.

With no further opposition, Kain then walked over to the throne that sat at the back of the room which was flanked on its left by a near equally sized throne that was practically fused to the main one. The one with more decorations, the one on my left but the other thrones right, was the throne that was almost certainly owned by Kain, so it was the one he sat down in. As he settled into his chair, a flood of information crammed itself into his head, leaving him with a massive headache that bordered on a migraine. Kain realized he could do so much more than he had originally thought he could without ever having to leave the throne. The upside was that he could restore the capital to its former greatness, build a massive army and reclaim my lands, rebuilding the Darksol Empire and possibly exceeding its previous heights. The downside was that doing so would take time, money, effort, and a lot of them.

The first order of business was to secure a source of money and labor to rebuild the castle, but surprisingly he found that the only currency needed to repair my city was not coinage or other monetary wealth nor were raw materials needed. Rather, Kain required Mana to rebuild his nation. Mana was essential to keeping this nation afloat because, without it, his city and forces would crumble and fall to ruin. Somehow Kain's castle and the city itself were in a dead zone where mana was miniscule at best, despite being surrounded by a near torrent of mana that covered the gallows forest outside. Kain was going to have to make do with what he had, and hopefully, find a way to break the dam that held back the mana hurricane that surrounded the city.

A few groaning noises alerted the King to the fact that the mind-controlled humans that he had knocked unconscious were waking up. He was unsure how they would react now that the vampire who had puppeted them was gone, so Kain rose from his throne and manifested his two longswords. The five humans slowly rose to their feet and looked around the room like they were wondering where they were.

Then, as though a switch had been flipped, the mortals realized what had transpired and that they had been manipulated by the vampire, whose name Kain still didn’t know. As they hugged a wept, Kain stood by and waited for them to notice him. When they finally had let the waterworks flow for a good ten minutes they noticed Kain's presence and hurriedly tried to compose themselves. After another two to three minutes of them attempting and ultimately succeeding in composing themselves, the oldest of the group, a man with matted grey hair and a bushy, greasy beard addressed Kain.

“Thank you for freeing us from the vile grip of the vampire. If there is anything we can offer you to show our thanks, we will gladly give it. Now that we are free from the beast’s spell, I would like to apologize on behalf of everyone. For countless decades we were under that foul monster’s thumb, living as nothing more than cattle for that parasite to feed on. You will be remembered as a Hero among Heroes by all of us, so if you would please let us know the name of our savior?”

Kain had a feeling that telling them he was Kain Anathemas Nekronus von Darksol was going to cause some trouble, but momma didn’t raise him to be a liar and they would have found out the truth eventually, so he told them my identity.

“I am known as Kain Anathemas Nekronus von Darksol, and I am the rightful ruler of these lands.”

The expressions of the five mortals soured and the elderly one sternly said, “If that was supposed to be a joke, it wasn’t funny.”

“I am not lying or joking. I am Kain Anathemas Nekronus von Darksol, and I have returned to this world to reclaim what was mine. All I require of you as payment for freeing you is your word that you will either leave my lands or serve me faithfully and my subjects. I can be merciful or merciless depending on how you with to deal with me. I know not what legends and fables were spun about me after I went to sleep, but I assure you that I am not nearly as terrible as they would claim. So, make your choice, leave my lands or become my citizens. There will be no second chances, so chose wisely.”