Sneaking into the base of a vampire is uniquely nerve-wracking. Now that I think about it, I think it would have been better to send one of the Searchers. They would have done a better job than me in this case. The task that I have to pull off here is pretty basic anyway.

  I have quite a bit of experience dealing with vampires. Right now, that experience is the main reason for my paranoia. I know just how sensitive their senses actually can be, and that knowledge just feeds into my worst fears. Even now, I am going through the many ways in which they can find me.

  Dealing with vampires when they know of your existence is always hard. (You never know what traps they have ready for you.) The best way to attack them is by surprise. That way, they cannot prepare any of their little traps for me.

  It is also much easier to sneak into the lair of a vampire that doesn't know that you exist. This time, the enemy expects us to attack. That means that they are on the lookout for us. The vampires' have a weaker mana sense than us all (at least me), but all their other senses are absurdly good. That is what makes dealing with them so hard.

  With mana sense, you can at least hide yourself pretty nicely. You just need to suppress your mana. All of the other senses (which are where they are the strongest) are much harder to deal with.

  I would say that smells should not be an issue due to Patrick. ( I can say with absolute certainty that the spell is capturing all the smells.) Sound and sight are going to be much harder to deal with. Sight is going to be easier compared to sound, since they will see me at the same time that I see them. They won't catch me by surprise even if they discover me.

  Sound is more annoying. There is no way for me to tell whether I will be heard or not. Even if I am detected, there is no way for me to tell. I just don't want to be ambushed by the vampires. That would put me in a very bad position.

  I am naturally trying to prevent myself from being discovered. Right now, I am in the building to the left, hiding in a room that I think was somebody's bedroom. There are remains of his clothes in a corner of the room, in what must have been a cupboard. The rotting remains of a bed lie on the other side.

  The room has a half-decent roof (most of the roof has collapsed for this building) and most of its walls. Right now, I am hugging one of these walls, hiding myself from any vampire looking in this direction.

  Getting to this place has been a nightmare. I have been moving from room to room at a snail's pace. After all, this place must be within the patrols of the vampires. They will be discovering me here if I were to make any hasty move.

  This is the most nerve-wracking I have felt in a while. Part of it is self-inflicted. After all, I am the one who keeps imagining one of the possessed vampires in the room I am in, waiting to stab me in the back. It makes me want to keep checking my back.

  It is not particularly logical that they would be here. They should be in the trap that they have set for the Aegis. If they were here, they wouldn't need to hide like this to kill me. Still, who will tell my mind that?

  Well, this is the end of my torment. After all, this room has been my goal from the start. It is the closest to the vampire's base. I will just need to jump from this room into the enemy's base.

  I just need to drum up the courage to make the final jump. (I will get there in a few moments.) It is not like things will be particularly easy once I jump into the enemy base. From there, I will have to make my way to a door I had seen at the bottom of the building. It is going to be a mad dash to the door, I am sure.

  Once there, I can finally reunite with the Searchers and the Sentinels. Until then, I can't help but feel nervous. It is quite dangerous to be separated like this. Screw it, I have already wasted enough time here. I steel myself as I jump. Even I am surprised by my motion as I sail through the air.

  My target is a little window on the second floor of this building. The vampires had forgotten to close the window. I break into a roll the instant that I land in the enemy base. I have to force myself from removing my sword already. A surge of blood mana in their base is not going to be something that a vampire will miss. (Especially if they are on the lookout for it.)

  I have to force myself into a still silence as I begin to look for the vampires. They might hear and see better than me, but there is no way that they have a better mana sense. As I confirm that no vampires are hiding in my vicinity, I heave a sigh of relief. I had expected that there would be at least one vampire stationed on this floor.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Thanking my luck, I begin to make my way through the second floor. It is a jumble of rooms, though it doesn't take me long to find the exit to the first floor. As I keep making my way down, I can't help but frown. After all, there should have been some enemy activity already. I had sensed a source of blood mana. There should at least be one vampire here.

  I don't stop moving, though, (I have come down to a crawl again, though.) As I begin to make my way through the first floor. Every empty room that I pass makes me confident that the vampires must be in the next room. Every room brings me that much closer to removing my sword.

  It doesn't take me long to reach the stairs of the first floor. This is the first time that I have paused since entering this place. I find myself in doubt. Whatever trap the vampires must have laid would be down here. The fact that this must have been enough for them to leave the above two floors unguarded is not comforting. That means that they are that confident in this trap of theirs.

  I still have to go down and open the door for my reinforcements. Right now, the debate going on in my head is whether it would be worth the risk of going down. I don't want to get ambushed by whatever is down there. The benefits are that if I were to pull this off, then we can get rid of the enemy here. If I fail, though, I will have to figure out some way to escape.

  I could just skip all of this and just run away now. That would mean that I have to give up on this opportunity that I have. I steel myself as I finally descend the stairs. I expect a horde of vampires to charge at me the instant that I get down the stairs. I had expected something kind of blood magic to appear, binding me to the ground. I had expected some kind of magic to overwhelm me the instant that I took a step.

  Nothing like that happens as the ground floor opens up into one massive room. Placed right in the middle of this room is a table and two chairs. Sitting on one of these chairs is a face I did not expect to see. (I guess that I should have expected her to survive.)

  Sitting on the table in front of me is the lady Esmerelda. She is drinking what I think is a cup of tea. (It could just as easily be blood.) It is such a shock to me that I blurt out the first thought in my head.

  "How are you alive?" I find myself asking, as my hand goes to my sword. I don't draw it, though.

  "No need to get so feisty." She replies, an odd kind of calmness in her voice. It feels very weird. "Come join me at the table. I had it prepared just for you."

  I cannot string together my thoughts as I follow the lady's command. I don't let go of my sword, though. I will gut her the moment she twitches a muscle.

  "I am sure you are confused as to why we are he..." The lady speaks, as I interrupt her. I finally figured out the reason why I feel so weird right now.

  "Will you stop using charm on me?" I growl at the lady as I channel my vital mana and finally draw my sword. "If you don't stop it, we might as well get to the fighting now."

  "Fine, fine.", the lady grumbles, as my thoughts get clearer. It feels like I have just woken up from a week-long nap.

  "So why are we here?" I find myself asking. "Somehow, your master's doesn't give me the vibe that he would be approving of such a thing."

  "Well, what my master doesn't know won't hurt him. Anyway, you got rid of my master long ago. The others don't have as strong a claim over me. Let's say that they are just my superiors." The lady replies. "As for why we are here, I thought that would be obvious. I am here for my sword."

  "I don't have your sword." I blurt out.

  "Don't you dare to lie to me, human. I have been sensing that sword in this town ever since you first stepped into this town. It feels like a thorn stuck in my hand." The lady replies, her lips quivering in barely suppressed rage.

  "Fine, I have the sword. I don't have it with me right now, as you must already know." I reply. "But why should I return your sword to you?"

  "Well, as long as you return that sword to me, I shall provide you with the location of our present base. As you must have already guessed, this warehouse was meant as a little trap for you." The lady speaks.

  "Well, I would assume that your sword would be worth more than that," I reply. "I want the location of the necromancers."

  "Well, you might as well ask me to commit suicide.", she replies. "If you suddenly had the location of the necromancers, you would leave this place. My superiors will figure out that l leaked this information to you then. They might not be able to punish me like my master does, but it is something I would rather avoid."

  "Well, what will I do with the location of your base. It is not like we will be able to make your superiors tell us the location of the enemy.", I speak. "They are more likely to commit suicide before telling me anything."

  "Well, I am sure that you will figure out something." The lady replies. "You have already shown that you are pretty resourceful."

  "Well, I might agree to this, but I need some time. I will need to discuss this with my fellows." I reply. In all this time, I have not removed my grip on my sword. I can't understand her angle in all of this. It just can't be the sword. "I do not have your sword here with me anyway."

  "Well, I can agree to that." The lady replies. "I will contact you at the Jolly Tulip. You will know about the place if you ask your fellows. Now that we have completed our personal business, we should return to business. I would like to say that there is nothing personal about what I am about to do."

  As she says, the lady smacks her arm on the table. Before I can swing my sword, the lady is on top of me, her teeth in my throat.