Chapter 73: "Wouldn’t Be Surprised If Some Vampires Liked Biting Ass!"

Chapter 73: Chapter 73: "Wouldn’t Be Surprised If Some Vampires Liked Biting Ass!"

They moved deeper into the forest, passing by various types of fauna, Rika navigating by map as everyone else followed her, all alert to any beasts.

Then she suddenly raised a fist, everyone froze.

"What?" Kael asked.

"Nothing, just being careful" Rika said.

"...That’s not reassuring," Kael muttered.

"Better to be safe than sorry," Ves said

They carried on moving along the route the map had, and the one Vex and Rika planned to take. After a while of moving with nothing but small creatures, small beasts and red trees, they started relaxing a bit.

"Are tou sure there are any beats on this floor, we’ve been moving for an hour and no hounds spotted yet." Kael said.

"The map said there are, so there should be, also keep tour voice down, if we can get through this floor without a fight then so be it." Rika told him.

"But wouldn’t that mean less loot?" Lucien asked her, mainly concerned about the hounds blood as he didn’t want to miss the chance to get more traits.

"We can get it later on." Vex said.

Lucien sensed it before anyone spoke again, thanks to all his sensing traits, not ahead of them, nor was it behind them, above, no, around and scattered in the surroundings.

He activated Sanguine Perception and caught faint traces of bloodflow and heartbeats, moving low and quiet between the trees.

"We’re being watched and we surrounded." he said quietly.

"There’s a whole pack of them." Vex said.

Rika’s hand snapped into a formation signal.

"Same formation," she said. "Me and Lucien in the front. Kael, you take the flank. Vex, take the rear and find elevation to shoot from. Zalor, take the sides and support when needed."

"I have the rear," Vex confirmed, already backing toward a raised root.

"I’ll watch the sides," Zalor said, and dissolved partway into a nearby shadow.

Kael hefted his greatsword. "I’ll take anything that gets through."

"Try not to get bitten in the ass," Lucien said.

"That’s your job."

"What?"

"You’re the vampire, aren’t they known for biting, wouldn’t be surprised if some liked biting ass." He said while smiling at his own comeback.

"That’s not how it works."

The first Crimsonfang Hound dropped from a low branch without warning, straight at Rika.

BOOM.

Her shield caught it, and she slid back a full meter, boots carving through moss.

"Its around Mid C Rank," she called, jaw tight.

’They’re stronger than anything we’ve encountered so far in this dungeon, most of the slime and bats were only beginner C Rank, while also being weak individually.’ Lucien registered, adjusting his stance.

A second hound came for Kael’s flank. This time he didn’t charge in blindly, he planted both feet, wielding the greatsword with his upper arms while his lower two brought up and equipped reinforced gauntlets.

BOOM.

He punched it clean off its trajectory into a nearby trunk, as its head caved in from the inpact.

"HA! Got you!"

’He’s actually fighting properly now,’ Lucien thought, mildly impressed. ’Good, he’s not a total idiot.’

The fight escalated fast, hounds emerging from the mist in twos and threes.

Rika worked her shield like a weapon in its own right, blocking, then slamming the edge into a hound’s skull as cracking sounds came from them before finishing them off with her axe.

Vex called targets in a steady stream. "Three on Rika! Two coming left! Lucien, behind you!"

Lucien ducked without looking. An arrow whistled past, dropping the hound mid-lunge.

"Nice shot, man"

"I know." He said smiling smugly.

Vex’s arrows shifted with the moment — a piercing shaft for a heavily furred hound’s flank, a binding arrow that wrapped a leaping hound’s legs mid-air, dropping it into Zalor’s waiting daggers.

Zalor moved like something half-liquid, stepping into one shadow and emerging from another entirely across the clearing, shadow tendrils lashing out to snare a hound’s back leg before he crossed both blades through its neck.

"Show-off," Kael called.

"Jealous?"

"A little."

Lucien fought his own share, deliberately weaker than his actual full strength, twin scythes flashing in efficient arcs, chain snapping taut to redirect a lunging hound before it could close on Vex’s blind side.

’Could reach the stairs of this floor in about a minute if I actually tried, maybe even end this floor if I wanted too.’ he thought, hooking a hound mid-air and yanking it clear of Kael’s flank.

’Not going to though, as Beginner C-Ranks fight like this. Efficient, not overwhelming to the point that even Peak C-Ranks can’t do anything to them.’

A hound slipped through the formation from the back, angling for Vex’s unguarded back.

Lucien moved.

SHING.

The chain snapped out, as a scythe caught the hound’s neck, making it dodge sideways into the dirt, as the second blade finished it before it hit the ground.

Vex turned, startled. "...Thanks."

"You were about to get your ass bitten before Kael."

"I know, can’t met that happen." Vex said smiling, narrowing his eyes slightly.

’Too fast,’ Vex thought, though he said nothing. ’I didn’t even sense the hound, before he finished it off, is he actually only beginner C Rank?’

---

The remaining hounds shifted tactics — no longer attacking individually, movements suddenly synchronized, coordinated like a single organism split into six bodies.

"They’re coordinating!" Rika shouted.

"Its their Pack Resonance ability," Vex called. "They’re using the whole group now!"

*Now this is interesting,* Lucien thought, actually intrigued.

Rika barked orders. "Kael, left! Vex, rear! Zalor—"

"On it," Zalor said, already gone.

The party executed the counter cleanly — Rika absorbing the lead attack, Kael breaking the flank wide open, Vex’s binding arrow pinning the marked leader, Zalor restraining a second from the shadows.

Lucien finished the center in three clean strikes.

The pack collapsed.

Silence settled over the clearing, broken only by everyone’s ragged breathing.

Nobody was seriously hurt only some scratches, a few shallow bites, torn fabric, minor mana depletion, nothing a potion or pill couldn’t fix.

Kael examined a bite on his forearm. "...That hurt."

"You got bitten," Rika said.

"Yes. I noticed."

"You screamed," Zalor said.

"A warrior can scream."

"You screamed like a child."

"A warrior can scream like a child," Kael said with total dignity. "And, for your information it’s called a war cry."

Vex laughed, popping a healing pill and passing the rest around, though Lucien rejected, saying the hounds blood would work the same for him, which would save them some healing pills.

"That was harder than the first two floors combined," Rika admitted, surveying the fallen hounds.

"For sure," Lucien agreed.

’Not overwhelming,’ he thought. ’But the dungeon’s clearly starting to actually ramp up now, floor by floor.’

"Let’s collect the loot and move," Rika said. "Don’t want to attract more of them, or lose our loot to a party passing by."

They worked fast, harvesting mana cores, fangs, pelts, paws, glands, and tendons from each corpse.

"Crimson Fangs sell well for weapon crafting," Rika noted, storing a set.

"Silent Paws are apparently quite good for stealth gear," Vex added.

"Makes sense seeing how we barely heard them approaching us in the trees and bushes," Zalor nodded.

Lucien looked at the pooling blood soaking into the moss around each body wh definitely wasn’t so much before, and sighed.

’I’m not doing this one vial at a time again, and not for this many corpses or blood.’

He raised a hand and used Blood Manipulation sparingly.

His eyes flickered faintly. Blood lifted from every corpse at once, thin crimson streams rising through the mist, spiraling toward him in slow, deliberate arcs.

Kael froze mid-motion. "...Okay."

Vex watched intently. Zalor looked genuinely impressed. Rika didn’t even blink.

The streams compressed, tightening smaller and smaller, until.

POP. POP. POP.

Small crimson candies formed midair. Lucien caught each one, sliding most of them into his storage ring.

"You can just do that?" Kael asked.

"It’s faster."

"You could’ve done that on the previous floors?"

Lucien paused. "...Yes."

Kael looked genuinely betrayed. "Then why did you spend so long collecting it vial by vial?!"

"To not waste Mana, and it was more efficient collecting it manually, since the slimes were mostly blood jelly and each of the bats had little blood to cellect."

Zalor snorted. "He’s got a point."

"I hate vampires."

"You’re hurting my feelings."

Everyone laughed. Kael crossed his arms. "...I hate this party."

"You joined it voluntarily, so no complaints." Rika reminded him.

"Also weren’t you calling Lucien a lucky charm, and that if we go, we have to bring him along, even if we had to kidnap him?" Vex asked bringing up Kaels pain if Lucien refused to come.

"I never said that!" Kael said defensively making the others laugh.

"I regret everything."

While they finished sorting the shared loot, Lucien quietly popped one of the compressed blood candies into his mouth, then a second one for good measure.

The blood dissolved instantly, and the system responded immediately.

[Ding!]

[Blood of Consumed.]

[Blood Trait Activated.]

[Blood Detected.]

[Race: Crimsonfang Hound.]

[Trait Extraction Beginning...]

[Trait Extraction Successful.]

[Trait Acquired: Predator’s Mark (Uncommon) — Lv.1.]

Lucien’s eyes narrowed slightly, curiosity sparking.

’Interesting, so there are even traits like this?’

As they packed up to move, Lucien’s gaze drifted toward one of the massive tree roots nearby, still faintly stained with blood from the fight.

For half a second, barely perceptible to anyone else, it seemed to shift as the blood on it reduced a little.

He blinked.

’Did that just... move?’

He looked again.

Nothing. Just a root, motionless, half-buried in crimson moss that was definitely thicker than before the fight.

’Probably imagining it,’ he told himself, though something in his gut disagreed.

He filed it away regardless, falling into step behind Rika as the party continued deeper into the Crimsonroot Forest, towards where the stairs heading down were located.