“How do you plan to spread the disease?” Deff asked. He was quite composed, unlike the other Vampire Hunters whose eyes were all wide open in shock.
“I’ll create a strain of disease that will only target vampires, then bring that over to Sanguineum and spread it,” Kang Yoon-Soo replied.
“Can you make something like that? Are you a Pharmacist by any chance?” Renil asked.
Kang Yoon-Soo shook his head and responded, “My class isn’t important, but the one thing I’m certain of is that I have a way to destroy the vampires’ city.”
The Vampire Hunters looked at each other. Spreading a disease wasn’t something they had thought of before.
“I need your help to bring down Sanguineum and kill all of the vampires,” Kang Yoon-Soo said.
“I’ll give you four days,” Deff responded, and the other Vampire Hunters nodded. He added, “Bring the disease strain that will infect only vampires within that time. If that disease really isn’t harmful to us and will inflict heavy casualties on the vampires, we’ll cooperate with you.”
“All I need is a day,” Kang Yoon-Soo replied confidently, reducing the time he had been given by more than half.
The Vampire Hunters seemed skeptical and uncertain as to whether they had to trust the man or not.
Deff got up from his seat and took a silver sword before saying, “I’m sorry, but please keep what happens in this room a secret from the outside. There’s nothing good to be gained by outsiders knowing that we’re hunting vampires.”
Kang Yoon-Soo nodded in response.
Deff wrapped his fingers around the hilt of the sword, which was engraved with the cross of the goddess, before saying, “We’re going out to hunt for vampires tonight. We’ve heard reports that a vampire was spotted on the outskirts of Vulpehin. Would you like to come along?”
“I need the blood of a vampire to create the disease strain,” Kang Yoon-Soo said.
“That’s perfect, then. Let’s meet at midnight, at the Ligris Monastery,” Deff replied.
Deff’s offer for them to join was a sort of test. He wanted to see if Kang Yoon-Soo and the others were going to be suitable comrades for hunting the vampires or not. He was prepared not to take them along to Sanguineum if they turned out to be small fry.
‘I guess we have to show them what we’re capable of,’ Kang Yoon-Soo thought as he got up from his seat.
***
It was midnight, and the moon shone brightly in the night sky. The party walked toward the monastery.
“But how do you plan to spread disease and infect the vampires? Are you pulling a scam again?” Henrick asked.
“No,” Kang Yoon-Soo replied, shaking his head. He explained, “The vampires in Sanguineum are strong. We have no chance of winning without spreading the disease.”
There were more than two thousand vampires living in Sanguineum; there were one thousand low-ranked vampires, seven hundred mid-ranked vampires, and three hundred high-ranked vampires. The mid-ranked vampires could be said to be on equal footing with Kang Yoon-Soo when it came to their combat power, but the high-ranked vampires were considered monsters that multiple people had to gang up on, and fighting a single one would already be considered a raid.
‘I’m not sure whether it will turn out well…’ Kang Yoon-Soo thought.
This was a dangerous attempt even for someone like Kang Yoon-Soo, who had regressed a thousand times. Sanguineum was not a place he could dare to challenge with his current level, and the top-ranked vampires such as the Vampire Lord and the Vampire Nobles, also known as the ‘Rulers of the Night’, were truly fearsome opponents that he had to be wary of.
‘The disease won’t affect them,’ Kang Yoon-Soo thought.
The top-ranked vampires’ racial characteristics gave them absurdly high tenacity and they were very resistant to many things, but they were enemies who had to be killed as well if Kang Yoon-Soo wanted to completely destroy Sanguineum.
Iris rubbed her nose which had turned bright red, saying, “My nose is spicy.”
“You’re hanging so much garlic on your neck; of course it’ll be spicy,” Henrick remarked.
Iris, who was wearing a necklace made out of garlic, cried out in response, “But the vampires will steal my blood!”
“It’s going to be fine, unni,” Shaneth said in a warm, gentle voice, trying to comfort Iris.
The three men—Deff, Renil, and Gasen—were already at the monastery.
“What happened to that old man, Rapentahil or whatever his name was?” Henrick asked.
Renil replied, “That old man is usually in charge of cleaning up after us. He’s gotten old, so he doesn’t join in on the hunts anymore.”
Deff placed a large chest on the ground. The priest, clad in his holy vestments, was wearing thick eyeglasses that he hadn’t had earlier in the day. He opened the chest, and it was filled to the brim with silver weapons. He explained, “These are all weapons made out of pure silver. There’s nothing more effective than these when it comes to hunting down vampires. Please feel free to equip whichever you desire.”
“Can we keep these?” Henrick asked carefully, but Shaneth immediately jabbed her elbow into his waist. Henrick immediately raised his arm, as he had been expecting the attack, and her elbow strike hit his arm instead.
“Euk! Why is it painful even though I blocked it?!” Henrick cried out.
“Please return the weapons after you use them,” Deff said with a smile.
Renil and Gasen each equipped themselves with a silver crossbow and a silver sword.
Henrick took out his summoning box and summoned Rick.
“Yawn…! I’m sleepy…” Rick said with a drowsy yawn. The moonlight shone on her, greatly amplifying her beauty.
Renil opened his eyes in surprise and asked, “Ahjussi, is that your daughter?”
“Do you think I’m crazy enough to keep a doll as my daughter?” Henrick replied.
“Ah… I was going to call you father-in-law if she had been your daughter,” Renil said playfully.
Henrick headbutted Renil in response. Renil cried out in pain and shouted, “Euk! How dare you hit me when we’ve just become acquainted?”
“Guys like you only listen when hit, in my experience,” Henrick said.
Deff was surprised and said in awe, “You have a good eye for people!”
“Deff!” Renil shouted.
Henrick moved his hands that were connected to Rick by mana threads, then said, “Choose your weapon.”
“Hmm…” Rick looked over the weapons in the chest with disinterest. She then pointed at the smallest weapon in the chest amd said, “The silver dagger.”
“Why that, of all the weapons there?” Henrick asked with a grimace.
“It’s pretty,” Rick replied.
“Hmm… At least there aren’t any weapons like a greatsword or a saw in the chest…” Henrick said with a sigh of relief. There was a high chance that Rick would turn into a serial killer if she got her hands on grotesque weapons like those.
However, Deff suddenly unslung a saw he was carrying on his back, then said, “Ah, I was saving this because I was going to use it. Did you want to use it, perhaps?”
Rick’s gaze suddenly changed and turned sharp as she cried, “I want to use that!”
In the end, Rick ended up wielding a silver saw that was much larger than her, and Henrick glared at Deff as if the priest were his mortal nemesis.
“Geez… Thanks a lot,” Henrick grumbled.
“Oh, you’re most welcome,” Deff replied with a hearty laugh.
Shaneth took out her Death Scythe before saying, “I can wrap my scythe in flames. Do you think I should use another weapon?”
“You don’t really have to use a silver weapon, since vampires are weak against fire too,” Deff replied.
Iris looked at the moon shining brightly in the sky while trembling. She asked with fear evident on her face, “The moon is up, but why is Deff not turning into a werewolf…?”
“I purposely wear lenses that don’t let the moonlight through on nights when the moon is up,” Deff explained as he tapped his thick eyeglasses.
Shaneth tilted her head in confusion and asked, “Won’t you be stronger if you turn into a werewolf?”
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“Of course; I can easily tear off a vampire’s head when I’m a werewolf. The problem is that I can’t differentiate between a vampire’s head and a person’s head when I’m in that form,” Deff explained.
“…Please don’t ever take your glasses off,” Shaneth said.
“Haha! Please don’t worry about that,” Deff responded while laughing heartily.
Iris equipped herself with a pair of silver knuckles.
Renil loaded his crossbow with a silver bolt while asking, “Deff, how many are we hunting tonight?”
“Three high-ranked vampires have been spotted in the monastery, but we have to be careful since there are cases in which they keep monsters under their command through their brainwashing ability,” Deff replied.
They hid in the bushes outside the monastery; the old, run-down building in front of them was very quiet. It was a place that had been closed down a long time ago, so the monastery did not have any visitors at all.
“When will the vampire appear?” Henrick asked while yawning. They had waited quite a while, but there were no signs of any movement anywhere in the monastery.
Suddenly, Deff brought his finger up to his lips and said, “Shhh… They’ve appeared.”
Three black bats flew around, and just before they landed on the ground, they flipped upside down as if they were about to hang from a ceiling. The bats started to transform into black figures, resembling humanoids who wore capes.
“Rakmun and Kicharal! My blood brothers!”
“Can you stop giving that ridiculous greeting?”
“I hope you’ve prepared some delicious blood today.”
The three vampires moved around busily. At the moment when they were about to enter the monastery, Gasen fired a bolt toward them.
Psshing!
The silver bolt penetrated one of the vampires straight through the forehead. The vampire who had been hit, named Rakmun, faltered a bit but did not fall down. Instead, he stood up straight and looked in the group’s direction, calling out, “…Who is it?”
Deff started clapping and called out, “Great shot, Gasen! A high-ranked vampire won’t die immediately even if you penetrate its brain. I hope all of you will remember this.”
“It’s the hunter bastards!” Rakmun shouted, and the other two vampires gritted their teeth.
Henrick’s face crumpled as he protested, “Why did you clap suddenly? You just exposed our location!”
“Deff is usually calm, but he goes mad once the vampire hunt is on,” Renil said as a warning as he pulled the trigger of his silver crossbow multiple times. The silver bolts he fired flew furiously toward the vampires.
Psshiiing! Psshiiing! Psshiiing!
The three vampires easily avoided all of the silver bolts Renil fired, then bared their fangs and charged toward the group.
“Grwwaaah!”
“Let’s taste some blood!”
Deff charged toward the vampires as well, swinging his silver greatsword. His explosive strength overpowered the vampires; his sword chopped through one vampire’s wrist, and the vampire’s hand helplessly fell to the ground.
“You monster!” Rakmun, the vampire who had a hole in his forehead, cried out as he aimed for Deff’s back.
However, it was then that a white sword stabbed the hole in the vampire’s forehead and a voice muttered, “Abyssal Sword.”
“Kuheok!” Rakmun cried out before his blood spurted out like a fountain.
Kang Yoon-Soo, still as expressionless as ever, continued to stab the vampire’s head until he was able to crush it. He repeated, “Abyssal Sword. Abyssal Sword. Abyssal Sword.”
“Grwaaaak!” The vampire let out an agony-filled scream before he died.
[You have killed the high-ranked vampire, Rakmun.]
[Your level has risen.]
“Grwwaaah!”
The other two vampires simultaneously charged at Kang Yoon-Soo. However, a silver bolt Renil fired hit one of the vampires in the hand.
Renil let out a cheer and shouted, “Head… No, I mean, handshot! Since I hit its hand!”
Shaneth swung her flame-covered scythe with all her might. Her scythe dug into a vampire’s body and burned his flesh. “Fire Strike! Pyrokinesis!” she shouted, launching fireballs and burning the vampire.
The high-ranked vampire gritted his teeth before shouting, “May a spear of ice pierce through your body!” Then, a spear made of ice formed in his hand. The cold from the ice spear absorbed the flames, and the fire engulfing the vampire died shortly after.
Just as the ice spear was about to pierce through Shaneth’s body, however, a silver saw suddenly cut through the vampire.
“I love blood! I love bloo-oood! Lalalalala…!” Rick was singing a tune while cutting up the vampire. Henrick grimaced at the sight of the doll’s behavior as he immediately checked her condition.
[Rick is butchering a vampire.]
[Rick has found out about the pleasure of murder.]
Mental State: -15
Current Mental State: 30
[*Rick will go mad if her mental state drops to zero.]
“This is driving me mad… Why the hell is her mental state dropping so fast? How the hell am I supposed to recover it?” Henrick grumbled.
“You just have to sing her a lullaby,” Kang Yoon-Soo suddenly said out of nowhere.
“…Are you crazy?” Henrick asked while glaring at Kang Yoon-Soo.
The last remaining vampire had been surrounded by the Vampire Hunters. Gasen threw away his crossbow and equipped a pair of silver knuckles before beating the last remaining vampire into a pulp.
“Kuheok!”
Pukeok! Pukeok!
Iris did not fall behind, joining in on the fray. Gasen and Iris broke the vampire’s fangs and beat the vampire up until the vampire was no longer recognizable, and then it died.
Deff clicked his tongue and said, “The hunt concluded too easily…”
“Isn’t that a good thing?” Shaneth asked.
“There was no chance for me to join the fight,” Deff continued with regret in his voice.
“…”
As the last vampire died, Gasen threw away his silver knuckles before staring at Iris. He silently extended his hand toward her, and Iris tilted her head in confusion.
Renil’s jaw dropped in surprise and admiration and he explained, “This means Gasen has recognized your abilities! This is the first time I’ve ever seen him do this to a woman!”
“Thank you, Gasen. Making a new friend is a really good thing,” Iris said with a smile as she shook Gasen’s hand with her own bloody hand.
The two vampires who had not been killed by Kang Yoon-Soo’s Sword of Revelation had not turned to dust, and they remained corpses on the ground. He kneeled down beside the two vampire corpses and took out seven strains of disease.
‘This is the item I received after killing the black magician who caused the pandemic.’
It was now time for him to create a disease only vampires would be infected by.