Chapter 82: Chapter 81: The Plans & the Sacrifices

"Hey, what is this about?" asked Bones as he looked into the air. He must be staring at the same quest notification I got.

"The vampires trying to get closer to things like me?" - Garami

"Huh? ...oh, you're a demon. Almost forgot that." - Black Bone

"Just don't forget to post this on the BBS. We're way too outclassed here." - Garami

I'm not sure, but it feels like we have stumbled over some crazy high-leveled quest while skipping past some preliminary stuff. Seeing how this is a World Quest, not to mention one related to the worst vampires possible, it's smarter to give up on monopolizing the quest and rather ask for assistance to prevent some disaster.

"...no good. The BBS and message system are temporarily turned off. Part of the event, or so it says." - Black Bone

I tried it myself, but Bones is right. I'm just getting an error message every time I try.

"...no harm continuing." - Garami

It feels more dangerous not doing anything. We just have to evade the vamps and get to their main office. Not that different from what we had first planned. 

Bones agreed with me on that, but before we left...we ransack the place. I've even increased [Small Inventory]'s skill level by 3, having it reach Lv.10, by using 9 AP. But after I spent 3 AP on [Identification], I ended up broke. I have to start farming points after this.

",,,hmm?" - Garami

But something strange happened when I tried to move the iron maiden in the room. A system message that said "New Trap Recipies are added to [Trap Expertise]" when I touched it...

Oooh, I think I get it. Crafters learn new recipes they can create with quests and research, but they can also learn them from special events or interacting with new items. The iron maiden must have been one for traps. And the newly unlocked traps are...nasty. Plain nasty. 

"Let's look for a torture room." - Garami

"HUH!? Where did that come from!?" - Black Bone

It's no good? I wanted to at least try to see what a guillotine would give me.

After cleaning the storage clean, we walked into the corridors of the mansion...dark! The building's damn dark! And demons are supposed to have Nightvision as a racial trait! It's not impossible to see anything, but compared to how everything feels as bright as it was in the middle of the day all the time, this dark environment came as a shock to me.

I turned around to Bones, but he looked as confused as I am. So it's not only demons who have sight problems in this place, but the undead as well. So it's the darkness who's Nightvision-protected and not that demons have an unfair disadvantage. 

After walking through the corridor a while, Echo, who was riding on my back ever since we entered the building, tapped on my shoulder. A source of light was coming towards us from the other end of the corridor. Along with footsteps. 

Due to the lack of open doors in our current position, I dragged Bones behind one of the furniture in the unnatural wide corridor, and afterward, I hid underneath a table and held my breath. 

Two robbed figures holding old-fashioned lanterns walked past us. They seemed to not have noticed the skeleton behind the closet or me. 

"What were those?" asked Bones after I signalized to him that it was safe.

"Vampires...I guess." - Garami

Bones looked at me with a sullen face but cut me some slack. Those things had an...aura...way different from the few vampires I've met before. 

"How are we going to proceed?" - Black Bone

"...we could follow the patrols. They could lead to some important room." - Garami

"Won't we be discovered?" - Black Bone

"There is that risk... Then how about just looking through all the rooms?" - Garami

"That'll take forever. We only have around 4.5 hours left on the clock." - Black Bone

"...then how about looking at suspicious rooms as we stalk the patrols? Echo may find a hidden room on the way." - Garami

Both the two now and the vampires(?) I overheard before were walking in the same direction, so we may escape running into other vamps if we follow their order.

Bones agreed to this idea, and so we went onward alongside our trusty watch-bat. 

---

2 hours into the quest:

"Bwa-hahaha! We're rich! Rich, I tell you!!" - Black Bone

"Keep your voice down!" - Garami

"You're no better!" - Black Bone

Who can blame me? We've hit the jackpot here! An office filled with treasure chests! 

As we stalked the patrols while taking breaks to unlock any suspicious rooms on the way, we'd finally stumbled over this place as we saw some vampire-like vampire (I know it sounds strange, but the patrols are too weird to be normal vampires) walk out of there, protected by the guards. 

But man, this room's door was trapped to the breaking point. Pitfalls, arrow traps, and even jack-in-the-box-ish boxing gloves. How is the owner of this room able to enter this room without accidentally triggering the traps? It took me a good 10 minutes to get past them all. 

As for the room itself, it was shabby. Nothing of apparent interest. Not until Echo jumped off my back and started hitting one of the walls. It turned out to lead to a secret room. Or maybe you could call it a secret vault? Anyway, this place is our motherload!

The secret room only had boring old wooden crates in it, but the contents of the crates sure lived up to our hype. Some of them contained lots of archetypical items used for demon summoning. Animal bones, suspicious-looking red bottles, pieces of strange chalk, and other stuff that seems at home at an occult goods bargain sale. 

Other containers contained lots of books related to summoning, necromancy, and various evil gods. They are probably related to the vampires' "ritual", but they cover too many genres to pinpoint exactly what the bats are planning.

Bones gladly took the necromancy-related books. In return, I got the main item of the next crate: the Keystone item for the Moon element. Hmm...guess Nyx could get this one. She's the only demon without a second element. Plus Moon fits her, who has a name related to "night". Hope I can find something for Bloom soon.

Other than that, there were various accessories and weapons. All of them seem to be demonic-related, and over half of them seem to have negative effects. Stuff like stopping the usage of skills, preventing HP recovery, and...

"*Squeak*!" - Echo

What's wrong, girl? Did you find something...cosplay? One of the wooden crates had some fancy...or rather, some risque clothes in it. A nurse outfit, a kunoichi, a female police officer, a nun outfit...

"What's that? Presents for Aino?" - Black Bone

"No, I found them laying around... That's strange. I can't interact with them." - Garami

"Maybe the vampires have some players captured?" - Black bone

"Captured? Can the inhabitants do that?" - Garami

"Sure. Some players were caught by bandits and could send a message for help." - Black Bone

Oh, like you can roleplay captured victims and ask for help. That's a new twist.

"Wait, then I'll check the quest page for someone's SOS. Maybe they know something about the vampires' plans." - Black Bone

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"Do that." - Garami

Bones started to fiddle with his menu while I packed away all the stuff in the secret room. As in, literally anything. It would be a waste to leave something for the vamps. FYI, the stolen outfits were stored as a "Crate of Confiscated Items (CAN NOT BE USED)". 

"Hmm, that's weird...there's only one SOS quest in the area." - Black Bone

Just one? But the number of items is clearly above that of a single party.

"What does that one quest say then?" - Garami

"Let's see.........? "Help, I'm about to become stew"...?" - Black Bone

......okay, where are the dungeons! We gotta save that guy!

---

Bingo! There are the cells. Thank god that important-looking vampire had a map stashed in his drawer. 

The building spots some serious cells down in the basement. The entrance to the "cell block" is through a concealed door located in a corridor that leads to the building's wine cellar. 

Finding it is no problem. Getting past the two deformed monster guards that are waiting in the middle of the corridor? A little worse.

"Excuse me for asking, but...why are you so keen on responding to the SOS?" asked Bones while we were hiding in the shadows from the guards outside the cells in the building's basement.

"Even I have enough conscience to feel bad for someone who's gonna end up on the dinner table." - Garami

"Ah, you were aware that you didn't have much guilt in you." - Black Bone

Of course, I knew. Why else would I agree on playing as a demon?

"You can stay back. I'm enough for this." - Garami

"Didn't you have trouble with the vampire on the train? Are you sure you can handle those two on your own?" - Black Bone

"Yup. Because I'm not alone." - Garami

I left Bones and tiptoed closer to the two guards. They are equipped with the same lanterns as the patrols, probably some sorta item to counteract the strange darkness in this building. Gotta remember to look at those afterward. 

If we're going by a gamer's logic, the area lightened by the lanterns is the monster guard's line of sight. Staying away from that light is common sense, but...the jail entrance is 100% covered by the guards' lanterns. It's impossible to get past them undetected. 

For normal people, that is.

"...YOu! ...oH, CaRRY oN." - Guard A

A new deformed guard entered the two's line of sight and passed by, moving to the wine cellar. 

A few moments later, a loud sound could be heard from the passage.

"WHAT Is gOInG o-*muffled noise*-!?" - Guard A

"YOu! WhA-!? ...zzz" - Guard B

Just a second after the guards turned around to see what the third one was doing, a bunch of tentacles came out of nowhere and wrapped around one of them, preventing them from making a noise as the tentacles broke their neck. 

The other guard was about to raise the alarm, but I snuck up behind him and used the good old, yet almost forgotten, [Sleep Demon's Touch] to send him to dreamland.

Mhm, getting the info on these "demon-possessed Ghouls" made things much easier. From what I could gather from the documents that were hidden in the important-looking vampire's room, these guys seem to be lab rats for previous demon-summoning experiments. The possessing type. Their power is greatly enhanced, but they've lost some of their old abilities. Such as an increased weakness to certain status ailments like Sleep or Paralyze.

Then again, it's prolly part of the quest. Knocking these guys unconscious, then proceeding past them. All part of a typical stealth mission. 

And for how long am I gonna hold on to this rotten corpse!?

"Nala, this one too!" - Garami

I strongly whispered an order to the tentacles, Nala, and had her pierce the core of this Ghoul as well after she finished with her own. 

"Wow. That was...damn scary," said Bones after everything was over. Make that "impressive". What do you mean by "scary"?

"Nyx, you can return now," I told the "guard" back at the end of the corridor. As they emerged from the shadows, their figure started to change until they had returned to the old, darkness-made demon we know and (maybe) love.

"This girl can change her appearance now?" asked Bones while marveling over Nyx's evolved skill, [Demon's Shapechange] (sans Crude). 

"Pretty much." - Garami

"Can she turn into a beautiful zombie girl as well!" - Black Bone

"Stay 100 meters away from my demon." - Garami

Honestly, evolved skills are too good. Even Nala's [Assassin Tentacle] (merged-evolved from [Power Tentacle] and [Sneak Tentacle]) showed gold star-level performance right now. 

Not that un-evolved skills are far behind. Echo's already discovered the secret entrance for us while Bones was making a pervert out of himself. Seems like even unpopular skills have their uses. Gotta upgrade it as soon as possible.

"Now, are we ready to save today's dinner?" - Garami

"Yes, ma'am!" - Black Bone

Another 2-and-a-half hours before the quest. More than enough time for any potential difficulties, and recruiting some allies for this quest. Not that they're gonna be any decent folks. You need to be a little weird if you're charging in at a bunch of aristocratic, arrogant, and dangerous vampires...

Okay, the first person who says that to my face is gonna get their teeth knocked in. If they're a girl, I'm gonna make them pay back with their body.

---

Meanwhile, at the Nobilis' secret ritual altar:

"Damn, damn, DAMN! Those blasted Migrants...!"

The old head of the Nobilis clan shouted curses while (literally) kicking a fuss. Luckily for him, the location was empty except for him...and his "servant".

"Lord Nobilis, regarding the sacrifices-"

"Be quiet and do as you're told! Bring the goddess of corruption to this realm so I can avenge my clan! That is the only thing a corpse such as you are good for!" 

"......as you wish, your highness."

The corpse...the lich, dressed in simple, onyx-black robes, simply bowed as he retreated to the shadows. All while keeping his contempt for his so-called "master" hidden within his empty chest.

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