Le Festin de Vampire Volume 3 Chapter 11

03-11 A Gift

TL: Aria Red
Editor: Fractal

   Feeling the warm sunlight shining on her through the window, Alysia awoke from her slumber.

   She turned to her right and stumbled upon Sherianna, whose body lay beside her in a tranquil sleep.
   She softly caressed Sherianna’s blonde hair, its beauty only masked by the blood splattered upon it. Sherianna leaked a soft voice in return, cutting through the silence. While observing her Alysia spotted Sherianna’s blood red pupil, barely visible through her meagerly opened eyelids.
   As Alysia flipped her body to face the other side, she was taken aback by the presence of Lisel curled up next to her. 
   Personally, she had no problem with him sleeping. However, the problem lay in the fact that Lisel was sharing a bed with two lovely girls.

   Alysia brought her fist down upon Lisel’s head with tremendous force, expressing her fractious mood.

   “Ouch!!”

   “Why are you sleeping here?”

   “…Well, there was no other place to sleep,” answered Lisel as clutched his head with right hand. Holding it there to nurse his pain, he gently rubbed his eyes with his other hand.
   To remain completely unharmed after receiving a hit which could easily crush a giant boulder, Alysia was taken aback. It seemed that dragonkins were not to be underestimated, far past even Alysia’s previous expectations.

   “Couldn’t you have slept on the sofa?”

   ”You’re being mean…” Lisel answered and he stood up, heading for the living room.

   Her low-blood pressure being the culprit, Alysia couldn’t resist the temptation of sliding back into the comfort of her blanket. A certain warmth radiated from Sherianna’s body, and like a moth drawn to a flame, Alysia curled up beside her. She slowly drifted back into her sleep, the pleasant blanket engulfing her.

—

   ーーEh? Where am I…?

   Alysia suddenly found herself in a wooden house which she didn’t recognise. She looked around restlessly as the strangeness of the situation filled her mind.

    Finally, having realised she had fallen into the floor, she hurriedly took the help of the large wooden table next to her to stand up.
   The fact that that it took her that long to realise that she had fallen was strange, but she decided to put that aside for the time being. This was due to the extraordinarily great presence radiating from beyond the door, situated across from the table.

   An ordinary person would have been petrified, or even lose their consciousness. However, Alysia was aware of whom that presence belonged to from the beginning.

   “Long time no see, black-haired beauty-san. Won’t you tell me your name already?” (TL: Kurobi= black-haired beauty)

   The door slowly opened and Alysia recognised the face emerging from behind the door. She was the provisionally-called, the black-haired beauty-san.
   Today she wore a strange attire, like she had a cloth wrapped around her entire body. The cloth was coloured radiant white, symbolising purity itself.

   ”It hasn’t been that long, has it?”

   ”Well, it certainly doesn’t feel that way, because there’s been a lot going on recently.”

   Lately, Alysia’s days had been filled. The tournament, bandit extermination quest, and rendezvous with Lisel had kept her busy. Truly a lot had been going on. As a result, it felt like a lot of time has passed since her last meeting with the black-haired beauty.

   “Do you need something?”

   ”You see Alysia, you’ve been officially registered as a Grim Reaper.”

   ”…Ah, the application form that I got the other day.”

   ”Yes, that one! There’s something which I need to hand over to you in regards to that…” the black-haired beauty said. She waved her hand in the air and created a black hole. It was similar to the sub-dimensional magic which Alysia had used before.
   She inserted her hand and groped inside, looking for something.

   ”…Yep, this should be it.”

   The black-haired beauty pulled out her hand and showed Alysia three items. The first one resembled some kind of tools. If you were unaware of its real worth, it’d look like a cheap knockoff.

   ”This is?”

   ”A gift from me,” said The black-haired beauty with a proud look on her face. She handed over a black rod which was clutched in her hand. It was around 15 centimetres long and 2 centimetres thick.

   ”If you pour your divine power into it, it will turn into a Grim Reaper’s scythe. Care to try?”

   ”Yeah.”

   Alysia poured her divine power in and, just like the black-haired beauty had said, the rod’s length extended to a six telms, with a four telms long crescent-shaped blade attached at the end. It had transformed into an enormous scythe.

   “Why is the weapon taller than me?”

   “…That’s because no one around your height has ever become a Grim Reaper before.”

   “Ah, I see. It’s not that the weapon is too long, it’s just my fault for being too short, right?”

   Seeing Alysia’s scary smile, the black-haired beauty involuntarily took a step back.

   “There’d be no problem if I was only short for the time being. But, I’m practically stuck like this forever.”

   “Right…Sorry…”

   “It’s fine. I will definitely develop a height-extension magic someday,” Alysia declared as she once more shifted her attention towards the palm of the black-haired beauty’s hand. The next item was a silver plank as big as her student ID.
   It was mostly likely some kind of credential that proved her status as Grim Reaper. She was about to ask the black-haired beauty regarding it when she got interrupted.

   ”This is a licence which is used to freely enter and exit the celestial world. The expiration date is 87 years from now.”

   “…That’s long!”

   Even though she had a wrong assumption about the said item, Alysia was more surprised by the length of the expiration date.
   The celestial world was essentially a world where the gods and goddesses who had existed for hundreds and thousands of years lived. Inside of that world, 87 years probably meant nothing.

   “Right, non-mortals are different after all…”

   ”That’s correct. Lastly, this is for you.”

   Only a purple box was left on the palm of the black-haired beauty’s hand.
   As Alysia reached out her hand to grab itー
“Stop. Now, turn around and close your eyes.”

   “Oーokay.” Alysia did as she was told. Then, she felt a weight hanging around her neck. Regardless, she was still very confused.

   “Okay! You can open your eyes now.”

   As she opened her eyes, the black haired beauty held out a hand mirror in front of her (I thought this was better.
   Reflected in the mirror was the figure of Alysia with a beautiful cross pendant hanging on her neck.

   “This is…!”

   “I made it myself!. How does it look?”

   The pendant gleamed silver, with a long black line resembling the night sky and a short gold line reminding her of the glowing full-moon.

   “It looks amazing! I didn’t know you could make something like this…” Alysia said, completely captivated by the pendant.
   The colour and the tint of the pendant were all chosen with a lot of effort, taking Alysia’s hair and eye colour into account. The true beauty of the necklace could only be displayed when worn by Alysia.

   “Thank you so much!”

   “Uwa!?”

   Alysia, overcome with emotion, hugged the black-haired beauty. She clung to her and would not let go.
   According to what the black-haired beauty told her later , the wooden house was built inside the dream using her imagination. Apparently, while inside the dream you could materialise anything which one could imagine.

   “Well then, see you!”

   “Thanks again!!”

   Alysia kept thanking the black haired beauty until her consciousness became faint and she returned to reality.

Chapter end