The Death Mage that doesn't want a fourth time 95

With her shoulders heaving up and down, Ternecia gave a gleeful cackle at the drug-like sense of liberation that was filling her mind. Her appearance was now quite unlike that of a Vampire.

There were horns not only coming from her temples, but twisted, branched horns had also sprouted from her back, abdomen, upper arms, the back of her hands, thighs, knees and calves.

“Kufuh… Did you see it? Did you taste it? This is the power of a sealed part of the Demon King Guduranis... the ‘Demon King’s horns.’”

The fragment of the Demon King that Ternecia had acquired several tens of thousands of years ago. That was what these horns were. The ‘Demon King’s horns’ that could pierce through all kinds of magical defenses and even tear through Adamantite with ease. This was Ternecia’s trump card.

By joining forces with Birkyne and Gubamon, who also harbored fragments of the Demon King in their bodies, she had escaped from heroes with the divine protection of heroic gods and emerged victorious in battles with Pure-breed Vampires who worshipped other evil gods.

But that would end today.

“I see, fufu, they betrayed me. Ah, I see, I don’t need them. I’m this powerful, aren’t I? That’s right, I’m strong. I don’t need them. I’ll kill them, take their fragments of the Demon King, find the other fragments in the Amid Empire and Orbaume Kingdom – guh!”

Ternecia was seething with rage at Birkyne and Gubamon who hadn’t come to save her, but suddenly she gave a groan and clutched her head.

This is bad, the encroachment has already begun. I have to hurry and suppress it…!

Fragments of the Demon King bestowed vast power to those who possessed them. Enough power to even fight against gods.

However, the price of this power was great. The fragment of the Demon King’s body was still alive. It was trying to take over the mind and body of Ternecia, its false host, and gather the other fragments of the Demon King in order to resurrect him.

Even if it weren’t alive, the Demon King’s fragments contained Guduranis’s Mana that had properties that were not supposed to exist in Lambda, so they would still eat away at their hosts.

The extent to which this had occurred was displayed as the ‘Demon King Encroachment Degree’ skill on the Status. Ternecia’s Demon King Encroachment Degree was already level 5. The higher the level of the skill, the more freely she could use the fragment of the Demon King, but it was also proof of how close she was to the Demon King, how much her mind had been encroached upon.

Ternecia tried to calm herself and suppress the Demon King’s horns, but seeing Heinz and his party get back to their feet around her, she had no choice but to stop doing this.

“This is… the power of a fragment of the Demon King,” Heinz murmured.

“To think you’d fill my Adamantite shield with holes. You really outdid yourself,” said Delizah.

Heinz and his companions had been seriously injured, but none of their wounds were fatal. And even those serious injuries were steadily healing.

“… Good grief. It seems that you are far more like Vampires than I am,” said Ternecia. “How is it that none of you died with my last attack?”

Delizah’s Adamantite shield and Heinz’s armor of Mythril and Dragon scales had been torn to pieces by the Demon King’s horns. Even if they were A-class adventurers, at least one… in particular, the lightly-equipped Edgar and Jennifer, should have suffered fatal wounds.

However, all of them were still alive and ready to continue fighting.

Before them was a monster who had lived since the age of the gods, defeated several gods and even possessed a fragment of the Demon King, there was no sign of defeat in their eyes.

Does one of these people have that Job? No, if that were the case, I should have been cornered further. Which means that at most, one of them has the qualities for it.

“Well, that just means that I have to kill you until you die! Raging Spiral Throw!” Shouting the name of an advanced Throwing Technique martial skill, she fired the Demon Kings’ horns that were sprouting from her body!

“Don’t try to block it!” Diana warned her companions. “Please avoid or attack them!”

Heinz’s party did as she said, dodging the Demon King’s horns or striking them to change their trajectories with martial skills.

“We’ll create an opening!” Edgar shouted. “Million Slashes!”

“Go, Heinz!” said Jennifer. “Thousand Radiant Destructive Fists!”

The two of them both used the Transcend Limits skill along with advanced martial skills, closing in on Ternecia while spinning and striking down the Demon King’s horns.

“Leave it to me!” said Heinz. “True Magic Radiant Destructive Attack!” The tip of his magic sword, which was glowing even more fiercely than when he had cut Chipiras in two, closed in on Ternecia.

“Evil Wall!” Ternecia shouted, and the Demon King’s horns grew from her body once more.

The Demon King’s horns were different to the horns of Dragons that were made of bone; in terms of properties, they were more like the horns of deer or rhinoceroses. Just as a deer grew new antlers every year, the Demon King’s horns changed their shapes in the places that Ternecia wanted them to.

The reason she wore clothes with many slits that exposed her skin was so that she could use the Demon King’s horns when she needed to.

The horns twisted, branched and entwined around each other, turning into a shield to meet Heinz’s magic sword.

“UOOOOH!”

“AAAAAAAH!”

Heinz tried to pierce the Demon’s Kings horns and drive the tip of his sword through, but Ternecia grew more Demon King’s horns, solidifying her defense further.

This guy! This guy is a Guider after all!

Guiders were those who led not only their chosen companions, but many others as well. Excluding the champions like Bellwood and Zakkart, who had possessed this Job in the age of the gods, the number of people who had acquired this Job in the past one hundred thousand years could be counted on two hands.

In a way, it was a Job considered to be a requirement to be a champion.

The fearsome thing about Guiders was not only their own strength, but the way they endlessly strengthened their companions and those under their guidance.

As she had once been under the guidance of a champion herself, Ternecia knew this all too well.

“GAAAH! Evil Wall! Evil Armor! Spiral Pulverizing Strike! Light-crushing Dark Spear!”

“Kuh?!”

Ternecia unleashed martial arts of Shield Technique, Armor Technique, Throwing and Spear Technique in quick succession, enduring Heinz’s attack with sheer strength and forcing him back. And then she glared at the one she suspected could become a Guider, as well as his companions who were likely being protected by him, grinding her teeth.

She needed to kill Heinz, his companions and the Dhampir they were keeping at all costs. If they were left alone and given a chance to develop further, it was possible that the Vampires would be helplessly hunted down in the future.

Currently, Ternecia was still stronger than them. If she faced them down now, she would have about a seventy percent chance of killing them all.

However –

“Damn it, if I could just use magic, I would have more options!” Ternecia’s head was in pain from using advanced martial skills in quick succession. The mysterious Mana in the Demon King’s fragment had poor compatibility with other attributes of magic. Because of this, when the Demon King’s horns were active, Ternecia couldn’t cast any magic other than no-attribute magic.

Normally, this weakness would be meaningless due to the sheer power of the Demon King’s fragment.

『The level of the Demon King Encroachment Degree skill has increased!』

Ternecia heard this voice echoing inside her head and she screamed as the sinister sensation of the Demon King’s horns grew stronger. She felt a pleasant, numbing feeling spreading through her body, countering her headache and blurring vision. Her sense of panic reached a peak.

At this rate, even if I kill these guys, I’ll be taken over by the fragment! I have no choice but to finish this later!

“I will definitely kill you. Remember this!” Ternecia screeched.

“She’s trying to escape!”

“We won’t let you!”

Heinz and his companions tried to chase after Ternecia as she fled, but she fired the Demon King’s horns once more, obstructing their way.

By the time Heinz dealt with the horns, Ternecia was nowhere to be seen.

Using the legendary-class Magic Item implanted in her molar, Ternecia managed to teleport to her secret hiding place and then collapsed, pressing her forehead against the smooth, polished stone floor.

“I-I managed to escape…”

She had to regain her strength. She had to tell Birkyne and Gubamon that Heinz could become a Guider and then kill his party with their help.

This wasn’t the time to be waiting for the Dhampir who was beyond the mountain range.

There was something wrong with Hihiryushukaka, too. How could he call himself the Evil God of Joyful Life? Heinz and his party were far more dangerous than a Dhampir who could create Undead, weren’t they? Why hadn’t Hihiryushukaka sent a divine message to kill Heinz earlier!

“Bellmond… Where are you absentmindedly strolling about now?! Hurry and come to me! You are my ‘Foolish Dog,’ aren’t you!” Ternecia called for her last remaining confidant… her most useless servant.

This servant was scum who could only serve as a watchman for this place and as emergency rations; her mind and body were both broken and her appearance was unsightly. However, she possessed the unique skill called Offering. With the effect of this skill, the one who consumed her would recover all of their Vitality and Mana, and most status effects would be removed.

If Ternecia drained Bellmond of her blood, she could instantly make a full recovery. That was why she had kept Bellmond here all this time.

Now Ternecia would have Bellmond give her life to repay the favor of being picked up by the Vampires.

“Why aren’t you coming! Hurry and – ah?”

Ternecia made no attempt to hide her irritation as she stood up. She saw not Bellmond, but five children all with identical faces, pointing a pipe in her direction.

Her mind froze for a moment before she screamed for her life.

“Telekinesis gun, fire.”

With a roaring sound, something was fired from the pipe. Ternecia had been trying to suppress the Demon King’s horns, she was forced to use them to try and protect herself a moment before the projectile hit her.

But the bullet fired from the pipe pierced through the Demon King’s horns, which could normally tear through even an Adamantite shield, as if they were made of hard candy. It found its mark in Ternecia’s neck.

Ternecia’s eyes were still open wide in astonishment when her entire face disappeared. Her headless body collapsed onto the floor once more.

And then there was another roaring noise as the bullet hit the wall far on the other side of her, causing the cave to tremor. A few seconds later, there was a splashing noise as something fell into the underground lake.

“It seems that Orichalcum really does have a different level of power… but maybe I put too much Mana into it.”

Vandalieu sighed as he looked at where his four spirit form bodies had been before disappearing due to the violent recoil and the gun barrel that now resembled a split piece of bamboo.

After Vandalieu put together the various scattered pieces of Bellmond back together, she had told him that the place Ternecia appeared when she visited this place was a port inside the mansion that allowed her to travel directly from the mansion to the underground lake via a boat.

The legendary-class Magic Item that Ternecia had in her molar was small and exceptional in how portable it was, but it was only capable of teleporting her to a previously-recorded location and the place she teleported from.

Vandalieu had been watching Heinz’s party corner Ternecia through Lemures stationed far away from the battle, his gun with an Orichalcum bullet loaded in it waiting for her the moment she made her escape.

While waiting, he had created a small Dungeon for teleportation purposes behind Ternecia’s hideout, wandered around, tamed the Undead Ternecia had created and collected the Magic Items and other items that had been kept here.

Incidentally, a week had passed since Bellmond had joined his side.

“She came here faster and in a more spent state than I expected,” Vandalieu remarked.

“Is there not something else you should be saying?” Bellmond asked him.

“Something else…? Is there something I’ve forgotten?”

“Yes.” Bellmond sounded a little exasperated at the fact that Vandalieu didn’t show any particularly strong emotions after easily disposing of a Pure-breed Vampire who had ruled the underworld since the age of the gods.

But from Vandalieu’s perspective, Ternecia was far less of an enemy than Gubamon, who was the boss of the one who had killed his father and the one who had stolen the corpses of Talosheim’s heroes, and Birkyne, who was Eleanora’s former master.

Of course, Ternecia was the person who had been pulling the strings to cause the war between Talosheim and the Mirg shield-nation two hundred years ago, so she had indeed been on his list of “people he definitely had to kill.”

“Ah, if you’re worried about the fact that this underground space might collapse, it’s fine, because I’ve already made it more tremor-resistant,” said Vandalieu. “Even in the worst-case scenario, we will have time to escape.”

“… I can see that from the numerous thick stone pillars you have built next to the mansion,” Bellmond told him.

“I do not think that is what she meant, Master,” said Luciliano.

Even though it meant being parasitized by a creature and being equipped inside Vandalieu’s body, Luciliano’s burning researcher spirit had driven him in a desire to see the Undead created by a Pure-breed Vampire.

Luciliano was the first living human Bellmond had seen in a long time; thinking that he understood, she felt a sense of empathy.

“Those precious materials on the ground must be quickly collected!” Luciliano exclaimed. “This is a specimen of a Pure-breed Vampire that has lived since the time of the gods, one that has received the divine protection of an evil god! Its value is unfathomable!”

“… No, that is not what I was trying to say,” said Bellmond.

Our senses of values don’t match. It must be because I’m insane, thought Bellmond, feeling a sense of loneliness as she looked at Luciliano’s eyes sparkling with greed.

“I suppose you’re right,” said Vandalieu, agreeing with Luciliano. “Death Delay. Please infest her,” he requested his insects after casting a spell on Ternecia’s body, which had started convulsing on the ground. And then he equipped her corpse inside his body.

It would have been a pity to let the large amount that had spilled onto the floor go to waste, so he turned it into a Blood Golem, made it go into his mouth and gulped it down. The broken horn fragments were collected into his luggage.

『The level of the Bloodwork skill has increased!』

To think that Vandalieu’s skill had leveled up after drinking her blood once. Even if she had been rotten, she was still a Pure-breed Vampire.

“Please let me examine her as well when we return, Master,” said Luciliano. “However… recovering her head is impossible, I suppose. I would have liked the Petrifying Demon Eye that Miss Bellmond mentioned, or fragments of her brain, but…”

“I have grown more and more afraid of going outside,” said Bellmond. “Have you humans not become even more sinful than you were ten thousand years ago?”

“More importantly, do you know anything about the things that looked like horns and thorns growing from her body when I fired my Telekinesis gun?” Vandalieu asked.

“That is… No, I do not know,” Bellmond replied, her tone of speech as polite as ever. “However, I suspect that it may be a fragment of the Demon King.”

Hearing this, Vandalieu used Appraisal on the horn fragment that he was holding in his hand.

『Ternecia’s horn: Details are unknown, but it contains Mana with the same properties as the Demon King Guduranis’s blood.』

“I see… Ah, you two, get away from me,” said Vandalieu. “She’s coming.”

“Coming?” Bellmond and Luciliano repeated.

“Ternecia isn’t dead yet.”

The moment they understood Vandalieu’s words, a black, twisted horn flew out from the distant lake surface.

Vandalieu put up his barriers to try and stop it, but in the next instant, he heeded the warning of Danger Sense: Death in his head and threw himself on the floor.

The twisted horn easily pierced through the Impact-negating Barrier.

“I see, so barriers don’t work on those horns. Still… I’m surprised you’re alive,” Vandalieu murmured in slight surprise as he stood up.

Ternecia, wearing a bloodcurdling, angry expression with water dripping from her body, emerged from the lake’s surface.

“I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you all!” she shrieked.

She had grown a new torso with her regenerative ability that defied reality, but she was in a state where her spine and ribs were accompanied only by her internal organs and a small amount of muscle, with some black, hard substance here and there holding her together.

“It seems that the rule that Vampires die when their heads or hearts are destroyed doesn’t apply to Pure-breed Vampires,” said Vandalieu, immediately using Golem Transmutation to return the gun barrel to its original shape and fire his Telekinesis gun once more, but the bullet was easily avoided this time. “You’re quite fast, considering that you look like you are on the verge of death,” he remarked.

Despite being enraged, Ternecia had not forgotten the attack that had inflicted such severe damage on her.

“There’s no way it will hit if you don’t take me by surpriiise!”

The floor shook with thunderous noises, but Ternecia took evasive maneuvers at speeds beyond Vandalieu’s expectations. That was how cautious she was of the Telekinesis gun, but in reality, there was a delay of several seconds after firing before the next bullet could be fired, and it was difficult to maintain accuracy at ridiculously-long distances or against moving targets. It was an experimental weapon full of flaws.

I suppose I can’t hit enemies that fly around at high speeds.

When fighting Bellmond, Vandalieu had used his main body as bait to stop her movements, while just earlier, he had taken Ternecia by surprise. It seemed that he would need more planning before he could use his gun freely like a protagonist of an action movie.

“DIE! DIIIIIE!”

Ternecia looked as if she didn’t even have a shred of sanity left as more of the Demon King’s horns were fired from her body. Even being grazed by these horns that were spinning, twisting and branching rapidly would likely cause a loss of a large chunk of flesh.

“Extend your branches and vines,” Vandalieu instructed the Immortal Ent equipped inside his body. As barriers were ineffective against these attacks, he had decided to use the Immortal Ent’s vines, branches and his own threads to entwine around the horns and trap them.

This was an effective strategy, as the Demon King’s horns had plenty of spots where they would get entangled due to their shape. Even though Vandalieu couldn’t repel them, he successfully managed to drastically change their trajectories.

“So, Master, what do you plan to do now?!” Luciliano asked.

“There is something I’m curious about, so I’m going to think,” Vandalieu replied.

“Can we interpret that as you being composed in this situation?!”

“Princess Levia, I’m going to give you tons of Mana, so I’ll be relying on you,” said Vandalieu. “Eleanora, please cast Acceleration on me.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” Princess Levia replied as she appeared.

She and the other Ghosts turned into spears and skulls of black flames and then rammed themselves against the horns, trying to dampen their force as much as possible.

“Leave it to me, Vandalieu-sama,” said Eleanora as she emerged from Vandalieu’s body to cast the time-attribute spell, Acceleration, on him.

Like Luciliano, she had been standing by inside Vandalieu with a parasite in her own body.

Now that time had quickened for Vandalieu with Acceleration, he went deep into thought as his Dead Spirit Magic intercepted the Demon King’s horns.

Seeing this, Luciliano and Bellmond moved to support him as well. Luciliano recited incantations for enchantment spells on the Immortal Ent, while Bellmond used the threads that she was so proficient with to help divert the Demon King’s horns.

“BELLMOOOOND!” Ternecia howled. “WHY DID YOU BETRAY ME?! YOU UNGRATEFUL MONGREL!”

With her subordinate’s betrayal revealed, her madness was intensifying. It seemed that her anger was making her become more articulate, but she didn’t even notice that she was firing the horns before they had finished growing or that she was turning the mansion into rubble.

Bellmond gave a scornful laugh at the one she had given ten thousand years of loyalty to.

“So you say, ‘dear guest,’ but my new ‘Danna-sama*’ here treats me far better,” she said. “It is true that you saved my life, but I have served you like a dog for ten thousand years. That is enough, is it not?”

Some would say that one should repay the debt of having their life saved by giving that life to the person who saved it, but that depended on individual senses of values, bonds and relationships.

And Bellmond had in fact spent ten thousand years serving Ternecia while being known as the ‘Foolish Dog.’ Could she really be called a mere traitor?

“You shitty woman! I’ll kill you along with all of the other sluts!” Ternecia screamed.

“Me, a slut…!” Eleanora breathed.

“I-I won’t forgive this!” Princess Levia cried.

“Your language was always rather foul, but oh my…” said Bellmond.

“Ah, it is quite fine if you ignore me,” said Luciliano. “In fact, please forget that I exist, if you can.”

At first glance, this conversation seemed to be a relaxed one, but one attack from the Demon King’s horns finding its mark would leave not only Luciliano, but Bellmond, Eleanora and even Vandalieu helpless. Even Princess Levia and the other Ghosts would be extinguished if they were hit after using up the Mana that Vandalieu had given them.

Even though Ternecia was simply repeating her monotonous projectile attacks, they couldn’t let their guards down.

And Ternecia herself was in a dire state. She had received a fatal wound without having recovered the Mana and mental strength that she had used up in the battle against Heinz and his party. She had somehow managed to survive with her regenerative abilities and the Demon King’s horns, but because of that, she had been forced to continue fighting without undoing the effects of the Demon King’s horns.

Thus, she was unable to use magic. She had no choice but to stay airborne and fight, firing horns and spending vast amounts of Mana. If she didn’t constantly stay moving, there was no telling when she would be shot by that mysterious pipe again, so she couldn’t use her Petrifying Demon Eye.

And since only about thirty percent of her bones and muscles had returned, if she tried to engage in close-quarters combat right now, it was likely that her body would suffer damage.

Damn it! If only I could at least recover my torso! What did these guys do with my body?!

Ternecia was frustrated. If she could at least recover her torso and put herself back together, she might have been able to do something.

Luciliano pressing Vandalieu to collect her body had secretly been an excellent play.

Meanwhile, Vandalieu was watching Ternecia use the Demon King’s fragment, deep in thought.

I also drank the Demon King’s blood. So then, shouldn’t I be able to do the same thing? But over half a year has passed since then, but there were no signs of me being able to do that at all.

Isn’t there some kind of forbidden power? First, I need to use Out-of-body Experience and examine my body… Oh?

As he thought at a pace which had been sped up by Eleanora’s Acceleration, he examined his own body and found a strange foreign substance (?) inside his body.

Put me together, put me together, make me whole.

Vandalieu could hear a small voice that he had never heard before. It seemed clear that there was a will inside his body other than his own.

How… unpleasant.

Put me together, make me whole.

『You have acquired the Demon King Encroach –』

You’re a part of me. I’m you, and you are me.

Put me together… You? I am you, you are… me? I will put myself together, I will make myself whole.

Yes, that’s fine.

Leaving aside Pete and the other creatures in his body, it was not good to have a will other than Vandalieu’s own existing in the flesh and bones that made up his body.

『You have acquired the unique skill, Demon King Fusion!』

The moment Vandalieu heard the announcement that he had gained this skill, he knew how to use the Demon King’s blood.

“DIIIIE!” Ternecia shrieked.

At the perfect timing, Ternecia’s attack pierced through the Immortal Ent’s branches, tore through Bellmond’s threads and closed in on Vandalieu.

Facing this attack, Vandalieu used his claws to cut his own neck.

“Vandalieu-sama?!” Eleanora screamed Vandalieu’s name, but blood gushed out of his neck as if his neck was a fountain, and then twisted around like a snake to intercept the Demon King’s horns.

“W-WHAT IS THAT?!” Ternecia and Luciliano somehow shouted the exact same words.

The Demon King’s horns were swallowed up by the Demon King’s blood that had surged out from Vandalieu’s neck.

“Why do you have a fragment of the Demon King?! Could it be that you undid the seal in Nineland… Hyih?!” Ternecia hastily began trying to escape as she saw the Demon King’s blood not stopping after twisting around the horns, closing in on her. But without warning, her body became heavy and stopped obeying her commands.

“This is, it can’t be… You intend to abandon me?!” Ternecia grunted as the Demon King’s blood, which had coagulated to become solid, broke through the Demon King’s horns as if they were nothing more than small branches and sank into her entrails.

As her internal organs were sent flying and she felt death approaching, she could hear something having a conversation.

I, you, join this body. Gather, me, and make me whole.

Incompetent host, incompetent host, I will join the superior hos– the main body. I am you, you are me.

The Demon King’s blood absorbed Demon King’s horns with the unpleasant noise of skin being torn off before returning to Vandalieu’s open wound. Ternecia, who now had nothing remaining other than a few bones and organs hanging from her neck, fell helplessly into the underground lake once more.

『You have acquired the Demon King’s horns!』

『The level of the Demon King Fusion, Mental Encroachment and Grotesque Mind skills have increased!』

“Great, I’ve won.” Vandalieu performed a small fist pump.

Eleanora and Princess Levia stared at him in astonishment. Bellmond’s mouth was twitching and for some reason, Luciliano seemed to have been moved to tears.

“That just now… was great?” Eleanora asked.

Princess Levia seemed uncertain. “Umm, it seems that you have defeated that person, but…”

“To think that you not only harbored a fragment of the Demon King yourself, but that you would use it to steal the Demon King’s horns. Though I say so myself, it seems that I have wagged my tail for a troublesome individual,” Bellmond remarked.

“To think that I can research one of the highest of all forbidden arts, a fragment of the Demon King, so closely! Ah, I am so glad you took me as an apprentice, Master!” Luciliano cried.

“It seems that my apprentice’s opinion of me has risen in a completely unexpected way, but leaving that aside, let’s collect the Experience Points and materials,” said Vandalieu. “Ah, and please keep it a secret from my mother that I cut my own neck,” he added.

“Umm, Your Majesty? Is your body alright?” Princess Levia asked. She and Eleanora seemed worried, but Vandalieu gave them a nod.

“There aren’t any problems with it,” he replied. The wound on his neck had healed; other than the fact that he had spent a great amount of Mana, there was nothing wrong with his current condition. “Even if it is a fragment of the Demon King, now that it has become a part of the flesh and bones that make up my body, it is a part of me.”

If his dominant hand were to gain a mind of its own and say things like, “Listen to my commands from now on,” it would be very troublesome.

Thus, if it was possible to absorb the Demon King’s fragments, it was best to do so.

“In that case, well, it is probably alright,” Eleanora decided.

“Yes, well, I suppose so,” Princess Levia agreed.

The two of them still seemed strangely bewildered, but Vandalieu thought that they would be more satisfied if he became able to use make full use of the Demon King’s fragments, so he decided to collect Ternecia’s body.

“Bellmond,” he said.

“Certainly, Danna-sama.”

Threads extended outwards, raising Ternecia’s body that was floating on the lake’s surface, and dropped her onto the floor.

There was a groan.

Surprisingly, Ternecia was still alive, though there was a thick shadow of death on her face.

But naturally, Vandalieu showed her no mercy.

“Now then, first of all, let’s collect the Petrifying Demon Eye,” he said.

“W-wait… Stop… Help GYAAAAAH!” Ternecia screamed.

“One of the forbidden books that I took from the Mages’ Guild says that some varieties of Demon Eyes can’t be transplanted if they are not retrieved before death, so I will not wait,” Vandalieu told her.

Ternecia opened her mouth and screamed as Vandalieu mercilessly continued his dissection after having already taken one of her eyes... and then Bellmond put her fingers in Ternecia’s mouth.

“I am aware that you have a Magic Item implanted in your molar,” she said.

Ternecia looked directly into the eyes of her subordinate, who was giving a faint smile. And then she realized that Bellmond was becoming something completely different from her past self.

This woman…! Just like Heinz’s companions, she is being raised up by another being! Who, who is this person…!

Ternecia looked around with her remaining eye to see that the same thing was visible in Luciliano and Eleanora’s eyes.

And then she finally looked at Vandalieu’s eyes, and she was certain that he was the one responsible.

“That eye isn’t a Demon Eye, so I suppose I don’t really care about it,” Vandalieu murmured.

Now that she had lost the Demon King’s horns and her Demon King Encroachment Degree skill, she knew just how dangerous this Dhampir was. Even Guiders were nothing compared to him.

I must not be killed by him!

Perhaps it was instinct or Hihiryushukaka’s divine protection that told her this. She was shaking in fear, but she literally had no hands or feet to do anything.

She had been cursed with misfortune.

“Ah, this is unexpected,” Vandalieu whispered as two silhouettes appeared a short distance away from the mansion that had been turned into rubble.

“Eleanora?!”

“Just what is happening here?!”

Birkyne and Gubamon had teleported to Ternecia’s hideout in order to Judge her.

The two of them had wrongly suspected that she had been working together with the Dhampir. Now, they froze for a moment at this scene that they could not understand.

The same applied for Vandalieu and his companions; they hadn’t expected that any other Pure-breed Vampires would appear, let alone two of them at once.

Using this opening, Ternecia spat Bellmond’s finger out of her mouth and teleported away.

“Curses!” said Bellmond, extending her hand reflexively towards the spot where Ternecia had vanished.

“That doesn’t matter,” said Vandalieu. “We’re running away.”

“OBUH?!”

Vandalieu stuffed one of his Worms into Bellmond’s mouth to infest her while equipping both Eleanora and Luciliano inside his body.

And then he used Telekinesis to fire his own body like a cannonball towards the small Dungeon that he had created.

Chapter end