I jumped away and avoided the bst of energy… it hit the spot I was being half a second ago and then unleashed a bst of energy that made it feel like the night had vanished. In the next moment, I felt weakened again since it didn’t only feel like night had vanished. The surroundings were as bright as they could be.

  In the pce where I had been a moment ago, I could see a spear glowing with warm light. The same warm light made me feel dizzy and weakened, or maybe it was the light of the surroundings. I couldn’t tell… still, it seemed that someone prepared all this for me.

  Before long, I was able to see a blond man running in our direction with a shield in hand. The spear soon returned to his hands. I wanted a weapon with that kind of effect.

  “Grrrr!”

  “Back down, girl. This isn’t your fight.”

  Gcien stepped forward to defend me when the armored knights approached. At first, I didn’t recognize him, but then I saw the blond young woman following him from a distance wearing priest’s clothes of the holy order. It has seen almost ten years since I saw them both… they were Jacques and Iri.

  “Regulus… it has been a while.”

  Jacques stopped in front of the defeated target. He only took a glimpse at him and then focused on me… I thought that Iri would heal the target, but it looked like she was only here to make sure that Jacques would remain in one piece. Besides, it wasn’t like she could heal the target that much anyway… the decay arrows destroyed the limbs of that guy without causing bleeding. It wasn’t like he couldn’t recover them, but it wasn’t something that it could be done here.

  “Don’t you have nothing to say to you older brother?”

  “I have. You have grown more cunning, I guess. Do you want to make me drop my guard with your act?”

  “It isn’t an act. I could have hit you with my spear if I had thrown it with all my might, but I decided to talk with you a bit to confirm if you are the person that Crice cims you are.”

  “Crice, huh? I guess she spoke too much again. No wonder you came here so fast.”

  “While she spoke a bit too much to understand our side, it was already determined that we would find you here.”

  The cirvoyant… It looked like that person saw Jacques’ future and realized that he would meet me here, but they still sent him, knowing that some people died facing me. That means that his future didn’t grow dark after this encounter… I wasn’t fated to kill him or something.

  I still couldn’t understand very well the power of this cirvoyant, but it looked like they imagined that Jacques and Iri would be enough to defeat or capture me. The empire should have sent some reinforcements, but they wouldn’t leave those two alone. The others could be readying an ambush to make sure that I wasn’t going to escape.

  “So, what is the pn? I hope that you have a better strategy than Rowan. Or are you just pnning to rely on numbers?”

  “No, we just came to talk with you this time around.”

  “I guess you just gave another meaning to the sentence: fighting with our fists. Do I need to be weakened for you to be able to talk with me? Should I let you chain me up as well?”

  “This is just a little countermeasure that I take when vampires are around the rogue type. Regulus… surrender and return home now. Do that. I can guarantee that the empire won’t do anything else to you. Father is worried as well.”

  “I am sure he is. Reputation is everything to him. In any case, I am not pnning to return, so do what you must.”

  Jacques went silent for a moment and I could feel the atmosphere changing. It looked like his patience was quickly running out… even Iri’s calm expression looked a lot more severe than before.

  “You know, you might think that you had a hard time, but you had no idea how your presence affected the whole family. Wherever we went, people looked at us with suspicion. Wondering how and why we were raising a certain little monster.”

  I hadn’t seen things from that perspective before, so I couldn’t help but pause and consider for a moment. The kinds of troubles my family had to endure because of me being a half-vampire in the middle of human society were clear. Every time I stepped out, they had to deal with the weight of the whispers and side gnces. People treated them differently, more cautiously, always tiptoeing around the unspoken suspicion of what I represented.

  There were the unspoken accusations, the quiet ostracism from the community, and the constant need to defend not just me, but themselves. My very existence had made their lives more complicated, and they carried that burden without question, though I now realized how much it must have weighed on them.

  “Because of you, father had to work hard to keep the standing of the family. He worked like never before and his hard work was always ignored because wherever he went, people only saw him as someone who kept a monster at home.”

  “We all have to deal with the consequences of our own decisions. Compining to me about his decisions won’t change a thing. Now, you can stop trying to excuse the behavior of the entire family. I honestly don’t care.”

  I could see things from a different perspective now, but it wasn’t enough to make me sympathize with them. I had the mind of an adult, so I managed all that just fine and focused on other things, but their actions could have created a real monster. Moreover, someone allowed an assassin that night at home with the intention of killing a nine years old kid. I couldn’t care less about their side with that in mind.

  “Besides, you compin to me, but it wasn’t I the person who really caused you all trouble. It was the empire, and those who served it. Now you are serving the empire and working as a pawn to expand its interests. So, stop compining and do what you want to do without giving excuses.”

  “... Very well, I will do just that.”

  Jacques lowered his stance and then prepared to fight. Iri put her hands together and pointed them in his direction as well. This was going to be a tough fight. Against two specialists at hunting vampires, and already weakened thanks to the environment, I didn’t have any chances. Still, they should know that as well, that my best chance would be to run away.

  In the blink of an eye, Iri used several support spells on Jacques and then he charged at me with insane speed. I wanted to dodge the charge, but Gcien was right behind me, so I blocked it with my bow. The impact made my whole body shake, and then I was pushed away for several meters.

  “Run… Gcien.”

  Gcien hesitated for a bit, but she knew that when I used her name, my orders were absolute and she was able to tell that I had a pn. The shield alone made me feel dizzy since it was probably a blessed shield, but that wasn’t the real weapon.

  Jacques trusted his spear toward me, but I used Shadow Step to the side since Gcien was already running away. His spear only cut the air.

  “I guess you will have to endure a bit of shame too… failing to kill me here with your track record will certainly make people question you if you tried hard enough.”

  Jacques furrowed his eyebrows when he saw me nocking an arrow and aiming at him. He could tell that it was a decay arrow and that he couldn’t mess up with this one. Still, Jacques’ expression darkened when I adjusted my aim to his side and then aimed at Iri.

  “You!”

  I unleashed the arrow and then Jaques immediately moved to block the arrow, but he failed. He could only hope for a moment that Iri would be able to summon a barrier to protect herself in time… he had messed up big time.

  The arrow flew in the air as if it was in slow motion for Jacques. He saw Iri summoning a barrier to block the attack, but the arrow passed by her side and pierced the chest of the fallen elf that I had captured. All the flesh around the arrow disappeared.

  “Consider the debt paid.”

  When Jacques looked at me again, he saw a rge fireball heading in his direction. He was forced to block the attack with his shield… the impact pushed him backward several meters, but he was surprised to see two more of those heading in his direction.

  After two massively rge explosions, he finally had the chance to see that I was no longer around. Even though I shouldn’t be able to use that much mana with all the holy energy around, I managed to escape.

  … …

  Iri rushed over, her hands glowing faintly with the healing magic she had honed over years of practice. But as she knelt beside her brother, she realized there was no injury to heal. He was drenched in sweat, his chest rising and falling heavily, but the fireballs and explosions had done little to harm him. The charred ground around them and the lingering heat in the air were stark reminders of the power unleashed, yet his body had no burns or wounds.

  They exchanged a gnce, a moment of shared understanding passing between them. Both of them recognized the truth. Regulus had the opportunity to strike, to finish them off in those crucial seconds of vulnerability. But he hadn’t. Whether it was hesitation, arrogance, or something else entirely, Regulus had chosen not to capitalize on the moment. The realization lingered like a weight in the air. Iri furrowed her brow, her healing magic fading as she sat back on her heels.

  “Why didn’t he...?”

  “Let’s go. We obtained some important Intel, and that is what matters.”

  WritingMachineGun