Chapter 84: Harvest, Great Sweep, and Investigation

Healers! Raven, Krieg! Get over here! As the dust settled, soldiers and mages swarmed the area, shouting for the healers to attend to Wang Yu and Edward, who lay in the worst condition.

Wang Yu and Edward were in similar states; Wang Yu had added anemia to the puncture wounds Edward had sustained, but Wang Yu’s physical constitution was superior, and with the body-tempering potion still coursing through his veins, the gap between their injuries had narrowed to almost nothing.

With a grunt, Wang Yu wrenched the sharp, flesh-conduit limb from his chest. Thanks to the Blood-Rage ability, he had no need to fear the arterial spray. In fact, aside from the blood that had detonated into spears inside the vampire, he could even reclaim some of his own.

Drawing the residual blood from the limb back into his own body, Wang Yu walked toward the two recovery mages who were tending to Edward. Seeing him approach, the healers looked as if they had seen a ghost, frantic and urging him to stay still. Wang Yu waved them off; he had suffered worse wounds than this more than once. A pierced torso and blood loss were, to him, merely a matter of course.

He sat beside Edward, who was sprawled out like a starfish. The handsome blond youth looked utterly wretched; his chest armor was shattered, and the wound beneath—corroded by concentrated hydrochloric acid and pierced through—was a gruesome sight. Under the mages’ spells, the granulation tissue was knitting together, a process that looked agonizing.

Edward’s golden hair was matted with the filth of the sewer, yet he seemed strangely cheerful. It was a mystery why he would abandon his life as the son of the Lionheart King to join the Night’s Edge, a special operations unit where death was a constant companion.

Edward saw Wang Yu sit down and raised a fist. Wang Yu understood, bumping his fist against Edward’s, and both shared a knowing smile. Whatever their reasons for joining, their first formal collaboration had been a success; they were reliable partners who could entrust their backs to one another.

Leaving Edward to his recovery, the healers saw that Wang Yu was indeed stable and turned their full attention back to the blond youth. Wang Yu, meanwhile, began to observe the changes within himself.

While reclaiming his blood, he had noticed traces of the vampire’s essence mixed in. He had initially intended to purge it, not wanting anything foreign to take root, but before he could, the alien substance simply vanished. "Huh, did my blood just devour it?" Wang Yu shrugged. Was his body "learning" again? It had been much the same when he first mastered battle qi.

What kind of change would this bring? He intended to test it, but was interrupted.

A pair of hands pressed onto his shoulders—not with much force. Wang Yu assumed it was the medical team and gestured for them to just get on with the healing.

"Behave. Lie down." Wang Yu had no choice but to comply, for the hands belonged to Avia. He shrugged and obeyed; it was rare to see the girl so assertive.

The glow of a healing spell shimmered in her palms, her gentle touch brushing over the scars on his chest, stimulating repair and purging the filth and debris from the wounds.

Waves of pain washed over him, but his body adapted quickly. Wang Yu’s physique had been somewhat corrupted; he still felt the pain of a fresh wound, but the agony of the healing process soon faded into a strange, almost pleasant sensation.

At the same time, Wang Yu realized the change in his blood. As it flowed, a portion of the energy within it was consumed to accelerate the healing of his wounds. He now possessed a fraction of the vampire’s regenerative ability—perhaps one-hundredth of their rapid repair, but it was there.

Seeing the shocking state of his chest, the girl sighed and increased her magical output. Her mastery of basic healing spells, bolstered by her talent and a reserve of mana that far exceeded her peers, made the repair effect even more potent. Combined with Wang Yu’s own enhanced recovery, the terrifying wounds soon knit together, at least to the naked eye.

Avia had long intended to learn healing, but time had been short. The recent period of peace had finally given her the chance. While her arcane power was her strongest restorative tool, it was both mana-intensive and difficult to hide.

But Wang Yu was a knight who constantly worried her with his reckless injuries. If she couldn't stop him from getting hurt, she would simply make sure he recovered faster.

Still, his body was truly remarkable; he had survived so many near-death experiences and always bounced back. *Not bad, keep it up.* A strange sense of satisfaction bloomed in her, and a small smile tugged at her lips as she patted his solid chest.

Wang Yu blinked, confused, but he was happy to see her in good spirits.

The medical team was highly skilled, their specialization allowing them to apply their magic with surgical precision. After a dozen minutes, Edward was out of danger. But when they wiped the sweat from their brows to treat Wang Yu, he was already up and active, preparing for the next phase of the mission. After all, the objective was to investigate the sewer’s anomaly, not just to kill a vampire.

The medical team watched, bewildered, as a miserable-looking Charles dragged a group of equally miserable mages to the sewer exit to write the mission report. The cramped, narrow confines of the sewer were ill-suited for mages, so a few experienced veterans and Avia were enough to handle the area, which had already been scoured by chlorine gas.

Charles and the others were left behind to handle the paperwork—a task that was pure torture for someone as restless as him. Yet, once he started, it turned out he wasn't incapable, just reluctant; he actually did a fine job.

...

The sewers remained thick with residual chlorine. The stagnant, humid air trapped the gas, and corrosive liquid particles hung in the atmosphere—a hellish environment for any normal living thing.

For the mages, however, it was trivial. The Abyss Gate’s operation had been a stroke of bad luck; to infiltrate Alastair, they hadn't brought a single mage. A high-ranking knight like Adit should have been able to handle the situation, but Wang Yu’s extreme chlorine-gas purge had wiped them all out. Had they even one wind-mage, they wouldn't have died so ignominiously.

A moving wall of water, constructed by the mages, swept through the circular tunnel. It was a clever, simple method: the liquid film acted as a filter, clearing all chlorine and acidic droplets, leaving a clear path for Wang Yu and his team.

"Large numbers of corpses, many mummified. Their uniforms are corroded by acid, making identification difficult," Avia noted, following Wang Yu and the squad leader, recording their findings.

First, they found the gray, worm-like parasites that had been coiled around the animated corpses. The hosts were mostly dissolved, but the metal badges on their clothing identified them as the missing city guards. The "vampire spawn" seemed to have tried to escape after their hosts died, but they hadn't made it far in the chlorine-choked tunnels.

"It’s a good thing these things died. The fact that they could lure the city guard in means the human disguises they controlled were at least temporarily convincing. If these things had infiltrated the Royal City, it would have caused massive chaos," Wang Yu remarked.

He turned his gaze to the shattered tumor of flesh and the mountain of corpses beside it. This must have been where the vampire emerged.

The vampire had clearly been incomplete. The fact that it could overcome sunlight was significant; sunlight had been the Night Race’s greatest enemy for millennia. Wang Yu was certain that the sun in this world was either steeped in mystery or simply not the same star as the one on Earth.

Since the moon reflected the sun’s light, it made no sense for vampires to fear the sun but not the moon. The ancient Night Race, once capable of wrestling with lesser dragons, were now weak precisely because of the sun’s restrictions.

If something could allow a vampire to overcome the threat of the sun, it had to be the work of a god. And if a god was involved, there was no reason to leave the vampire with the fatal flaw of low intelligence...

Clearly, this vampire had been born prematurely, a botched product forced into existence by the corpses of the Seawentan infiltrators.

Who, then, had sacrificed these people to catalyze this incomplete creature? Wang Yu recalled the tarot usage Charles had taught him and flicked the upright Wheel of Fortune card onto the ground.

As it had for Charles, the card dissolved into a wash of light, coating the floor. Footprints appeared on the filthy sewer ground, leading deeper into the dark.

Wang Yu frowned. He and the squad leader took the point, alert for threats, and moved steadily into the depths. With his ripples fully extended, his fifteen-meter detection range ensured the team would know of any danger well in advance.

The owner of the footprints seemed to lose their balance the further they went. The stride became erratic and disordered, shifting from a steady, straight line to a stumbling, swaying path. One could clearly feel the owner’s confusion and instability as they pushed deeper into the sewer.

Suddenly, Wang Yu stopped. The shape of the footprints no longer belonged to a human. They had become utterly distorted—grotesque, indescribable, neither cat nor dog, neither ox nor sheep. They were just chaotic, random indentations.

But a boot left behind, containing fragments of flesh, told the investigators that the owner had undergone a mutation, shedding their humanity.

The team paused to confirm the situation before pressing on, finally stopping before a wall. This was a junction for the sewer’s waste, where dozens of basketball-sized holes discharged sewage from across the Royal City.

The waste converged here and was flushed out through the tunnel they had traveled. The footprints here had completely lost their form; a trail that looked as if a mollusk had slithered over the wall appeared.

On a drain covered by an iron grate, a pile of strange, viscous tissue fragments remained. The only clue left for the investigators was a set of robes, complete with a hood and mask, lying on the ground.

Wang Yu picked up the mask and saw the gate symbol painted upon it. A veteran mage beside him spoke the meaning of the sigil: "Seawentan. The Abyss Gate."