“How disappointing.”

Alexis’ words stung like salt rubbed into an open wound. Only one team had met expectations, and the rest had failed to work together. The group that did cooperate was rewarded. They were given praise by the very origin of the Midnight Aristocracy and her spouse, while the rest were looked at with disdain.

The one group that had managed to work together to achieve their goal was now partially exempt from the remainder of the test. While they did have to prove that they could work together, they now had a bit more wiggle room than they previously had. However, the test was not yet over. Several forts still remained, and the threat of death still hung over the young vampires. Only by working together could they hope to avoid the wrath of Alexis, Kain and their own Houses.

Nevertheless, overcoming the divide between the Houses was going to be no small feat. Even though the threat of death and disgrace hung above them like a guillotine, it still would not change the centuries of distrust and arrogant hubris that had been built up. That was why these new-bloods would have to be the steppingstone towards a new age, even if that push for cooperation and unity was a forced one.

That was why the test was the way it was, and no one could change that.

Still, the vampires had a few days to go before the deadline. It would have been barely enough time to get to know each other, let alone deal with a few forts while cooperating with those they had always looked down on. But the clock was ticking, and every second counted. They would have to stop acting as a mass and start working in smaller groups.

…

“I don’t trust any of you at all, save for those of my House, but we have no choice but to work together.”

A House Dracones vampire addressed the others from his team as well as the other vampire teams. They were about 3 days from the deadline, and if they didn’t show results then the lot of them would be reduced to dust.

“Grahg zr’kroal n’rahsah, Drah-koh-nez mrrzra…”

A House Moreau vampire voiced his displeasure as well, but while all the vampires could understand him and his kind, none of them liked the guttural and animalistic noises that made up House Moreau’s manner of speaking. It was something of an… acquired taste that even the members of House Moreau had to deal with after becoming members. After all, their anatomy wouldn’t let them speak Common, so the best they could do was managed to get out a few basic Common-sounding ‘words’ here and there.

“I hear you. I would barely trust any of you with helping in experiments, let alone to aid me in combat… But that just means we have to find some way to work together as a cohesive group or we’ll all be reduced to ashes….” a House Nefarius vampiress said, driving the point home once again.

“Then, pray tell, how we can avoid such a fate?” a House Carmilla vampiress asked.

Silence reigned for a while, but a few voices piped up almost simultaneously. They each had an idea, but they each tried to let the other speak first. It was eventually decided that a House Brandou vampire would be the one to speak first.

“The answer is quite simple, my fair lady. We must play to the strengths of each other while coordinating our efforts. Her Highness never said that we had to keep our team members close to each other; all she said was that we needed to work together with our team members to accomplish our goals as quickly and efficiently as possible with as little damage taken by our undead pawns as possible. Ergo, as long as each team works toward a single goal while cooperating to achieve that goal and doing so with minimal losses and accomplishing it before time is up, we will emerge from this trial and live to tell the tale.”

“I was about to say the same thing, more or less.” one of the other vampires said. “However, I would add that the Primogenitor never said anything about our team members not being able to work with other members of their own House. Therefore, as long as all teams work together and their team members work toward a singular objective, we can make specialized pseudo-teams while also maintaining the mandated ones. For instance, if all House Dracones members from each team work together while coordinating their efforts with all members of the other Houses, then we can achieve a victory without as much struggle and strain.”

It was a bold plan. It would, in certain terms, be using and abusing the wording of the Letter of the Command, but not the Spirit of it. While the Spirit of the order given would have the individual teams work independently, the Letter of it merely stated that they needed to cooperate and coordinate, regardless of distance and the way they did so.

“Well, it would certainly be putting us on thin ice, but I see no other real way for us to achieve our designated objectives in such a short time span. Then, let us begin planning…”

…

Alexis opened her eyes and let a small smile cross her face.

“Are they finally going to work together?” Her husband asked.

“Remind me to write out my commands ahead of time with aid from the legal teams.” Alexis said jokingly.

Kain chuckled as he reclined in his chair. He had warned her that, in times of duress and when rules are vague, people can and will ‘break the rules’ without actually breaking them. As much as he hated to say it, without the damnable language that was Legalese, people would find novel and interesting ways to commit crimes, avoid paying their taxes, cheat and more due to the Letter of the Law being unable to cover everything. That was why he had ordered that a decent chunk of the nation’s laws be updated every few years. So many people found loopholes, and those loopholes needed to be closed.

He was not going to have people and companies avoid paying taxes just because some loophole let them get away with paying nothing. Such parasites would only continue to eat away at his country, propagating and proliferating until their power was too great to deal with in any way other than by the tip of the sword. It was also why he had advised Alexis to use the nation’s legal people to write the order they had given to the new-bloods. But, at her insistence, they had not, and now the ‘dumb kids’ were using the gaps in Alexis’ commands to make things easier for themselves.

“I will remind you next time, but I will also be forced to say that I told you so.”

Alexis finger-flicked her husband as she sighed and leaned back in her seat. She did have to give these new-bloods credit; they had actually managed to manipulate her words to their advantage. Of course, this would result in a bit of… punishment… for them, but if they actually succeeded at the test then she would not make said punishment fatal.

This new generation of vampires was turning out to be far more promising than either ruler had anticipated.