Chapter 1430 (Patreon)

The continued observation of the feral Vampire didn’t yield any new information. After the thing woke up from my spell, it sniffed around the area, maybe trying to locate me, but that was about all it did before scurrying off. We kept following, but it simply moved around, sniffing, searching, or maybe hunting; I wasn’t sure. And it didn’t matter too much, not after I had marked the creature and would be able to detect its presence regardless of distance, likely even through the Astral River. If it worked as I thought, I could later create a scrying construct near the creature, letting me observe its behaviour from the comfort of my home.

“I wonder why the thing instantly attacked the camp,” Lia quietly remarked after we watched the vampire move around a few more bushes, ignoring the critters hiding beneath them. 

“Might have been hunger,” I suggested. “It woke up, was starving and went to attack the first thing it perceived. The humans weren’t stealthy, or maybe the vampire remembered something about their presence; either is possible. When that prey showed it could fight back, it went after another to sate that first hunger, and now it’s looking for more. Maybe for something more substantial.”

“So, predatory instincts, makes sense. Alongside the instincts for fighting and, well, moving, at least with simple locomotion. Though doesn’t it usually take an essentially newborn creature a bit of time to learn how to run? The thing seemed to be quite comfortable right out of the gate.” 

“There was a bit of a learning curve, if you looked closely. Only a few steps, so maybe there are some lingering memories involved, but who knows.” I shrugged, uncertain if we should consider this version of vampire a success or a failure. On the one hand, it was vicious and somewhat dangerous, with decent combat instincts. On the other hand, it seemed to be entirely lacking in the brains department, to the point that I wondered if it would start shambling around like a zombie soon, hungering for brains. 

“Chalk the thing up as a failed experiment?” Lia asked after we spent a little longer watching the vampire sniff around, looking for something. 

“I’d like to wait a little longer; the sun will rise soon,” I replied. “I’m curious how well the thing will do under its light; will the effect be more or less pronounced?” I asked, causing her to look rather thoughtful and a little uncertain. 

Luckily, we didn’t have to wait long for the question to be answered. The sun, though largely concealed by mountains and clouds, was rising, and the feral vampire’s reaction was rather impressive. The moment the sun touched the horizon, long before its rays reached the ground, the vampire reacted. Without hesitation, it started tearing at the earth like some sort of demented mole, but to my surprise, the thing managed to dig a sufficiently large tunnel. If I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t have thought it possible, at least not without some sort of additional tool. But the vampire, using only its curled-up hands and claws, needed only about fifteen minutes to dig a hole large enough to crawl into. Then it showed it had used more than its claws, that it had some sort of Earth Magic ability as well, when the hole closed back up, leaving only a small patch of loose soil.

“That was unexpected,” I admitted, glancing at Lia, who stared at the sight with equally wide eyes. 

“Earth Magic, too,” she replied. “Wonder where it got that from. Not from me, that much is certain. I couldn’t have dug that tunnel half as well, certainly not as quickly.” She shook her head, then gestured at the patch of dirt, making me realise it was slowly settling back down. But not just from gravity, but because the dirt was artificially drawn down, forming an undisturbed surface once more. 

“That’s impressive,” I admitted, once the entire area of loose ground the vampire had dug into had disappeared, making it nearly impossible to spot the vampire’s hideout without some magical perception. “Maybe that’s something I could use for guards in the future. Bury a few of those in the right spot and have them hibernate, or something like that. If the area gets disturbed, the guard awakes, feral and hungry. Would be a rather nasty surprise; you think you found a good spot to make camp before the final assault on the ‘Evil Witch’s Lair’, maybe close to a stream or some other suitable natural campground, and then, in the middle of the night, bam, you get jumped by a few starving feral vampires.”

“Sounds unpleasant,” Lia admitted. “But let’s be honest, anyone capable of invading your ‘Evil Witch’s Lair’ would have the ability to find those things, don’t you think? At least if the invasion of your lair is supposed to have any chance of success.” 

“Maybe,” I shrugged. “But just because the thing can’t hide perfectly during its first night doesn’t mean it can’t learn. Or be artificially improved by a certain outside source.” 

“Fair,” she nodded. “Just make sure that you can spot them, even if you improve them. Otherwise, your trap might just entangle you accidentally.” 

“I’ll be fine,” I assured her. “Want to go and check in on our other test subject? I stashed the other guy at Jademoon, but we might want to take him elsewhere. Maybe my prison.”

“Your prison?” Lia blinked at that statement, looking slightly confused. “You know what, I don’t think I want to know. Just take me where we need to go.” 

When the ‘where we needed to go’ was merely the entrance hall of Jademoon Tower, just above Lady Hecate’s shrine, Lia looked almost a little disappointed. However, the expression on her face changed when one of the walls opened up, the stone melting away and flowing to the side, allowing us entrance. 

“Never knew this was here,” she grumbled. “Another of your secrets?” 

“Not so much a secret as something that I built and used for a bit. Its presence just never came up,” I admitted with a shrug of my own. She didn’t look happy, and when the first somewhat unpleasant, lingering scents of the prison hit her nose, that unhappy expression deepened even further. 

“Never managed to get the smell out of the place.” Now, it was my turn to grumble. “It’s not just physical; there’s something about the despair, the horror or whatever, the emotions that seeped into the stone.” 

“How many people did you put here?” Her eyes widened when I explained the issue, then blinked in disbelief at my answer.

“Just three, maybe four,” I admitted, somewhat amused by her expression. “My prison is better suited for something like that, remember, where I had the Revenant?” 

“That’s the prison?” she asked, then shrugged again. “Fair, I didn’t see all that much. Looked like most of your construction, lots of smooth material, few gaps, that impossible architecture you got going.” 

I was about to ask what she meant by that when we walked through the runic formation that contained noise made in the cells, keeping it from the rest of my tower. The guy I had put there was obviously awake now, and he sounded rather freaked out. Not really a surprise, given that the last thing he likely remembered was going hot and heavy with his boyfriend, out in the wild, so to speak. Now he was lying naked in a dark and cold room, completely made of smooth, cool stone, without anyone around. So, freaking out was a rather reasonable and expected reaction, not that it helped him in any way, shape or form. 

“Want to mess with him a little more?” I asked, a spark of inspiration striking me as we looked down through the nearly invisible grate set into the cell ceiling. Thanks to a bit of magical interference, the guy below us couldn’t see or hear us, so we could talk as long as we kept it quiet. 

“Sure, why not?” Lia grinned, her mischievous, slightly malicious expression mirroring mine.

“Can you use Mind Magic to ramp up the fear and discomfort? Oh, and dampen suspicion, make him more suggestible, that kind of thing?” I asked her, knowing she could handle it easily.

She nodded, and I felt her channel her magic as I added mine. I had created scrying constructs out of Darkness quite often, and now, I was doing essentially the same. Only that the shape I was creating was vaguely humanoid, with two glowing motes of cold, blue fire instead of eyes, giving just enough light for the guy to see an outline of my creation.

Suffice it to say, the guy screamed rather loudly when the dark figure manifested in his cell.

“We have been…” Thanks to a bit of Wind Magic, the voice came out of the shadow’s face, where a mouth might have been. It was rough and raspy, clearly made by something that wasn’t human, and never had been. “Expecting you.”

“We may have overdone it,” I admitted, looking at Lia when the guy below us fainted dead away, the shock and horror a little too much to take. Especially combined with Lia’s Mind Magic.