My Patients Are All Mythical Monsters

0030 — The Certificate

Victor Corvinus did not feel like a victor. He felt like a hollowed-out gourd left to rot in the sun. The mana exhaustion—Grade 4, bordering on lethal—had stripped the warmth from his blood. His hands were ice, his vision swam with black static, and his blood sugar had crashed so hard he could taste the metallic tang of his own ketones.

But he had the chair.

He sat in the high-backed oak chair at the head of the kitchen table. Iron-Jaw was crouched by the pantry door, clutching his toilet brush like a holy symbol, refusing to make eye contact with anyone. The cyborg's red optic sensor was dimmed to its lowest setting—the universal machine code for "I am not here, please do not perceive me."

Across the table, Valeska, High Auditor of the Crimson Court, was trying very hard not to look at the toothbrush in Victor's hand.

It was a cheap thing. Red plastic, the bristles frayed and splayed outward like a dying flower. He had used it to scrub the grout in the guest bathroom three months ago. It was garbage.

But Valeska looked at it as if it were Excalibur.

Every time Victor's fingers twitched around the handle, Valeska flinched, her eyes darting instantly to Carmilla. She wasn't afraid of the plastic. She was afraid of the command it represented. It was a conductor's baton, and the maid was the orchestra of violence waiting for the downbeat.

The clink-clink of her silver gauntlets against the table was the only sound in the room.

"The document, High Auditor," Victor said. His voice was a dry rasp, but he pitched it low, making it sound like a threat rather than dehydration.

Valeska stared at the parchment spread between them. It was a standard Certificate of Compliance, the holy grail of bureaucratic immunity. With her signature, the Crimson Court would legally recognize the estate as a "Low-Risk Zone." No more raids. No more surprise audits.

"This is irregular," Valeska whispered. Her eyes darted to the corner of the kitchen where Carmilla stood.

The vampire was currently scrubbing the air. Literally. She had found a dust mote floating in a sunbeam and was aggressively sanitizing the empty space with a spray bottle and a microfiber cloth. She looked manic, her movements jerky and precise, muttering about "atmospheric particulate density."

"Irregular?" Victor raised an eyebrow. He lifted the toothbrush an inch.

Valeska recoiled, her chair screeching against the tiles. "I mean... the readings. They are... impossible."

She tapped the crystal prism resting on the parchment. The numbers glowing inside were blindingly clear: Purity: 99.99%.

"She is a monster," Valeska hissed, leaning in. "I don't know what you did to her, Warlock, but that thing is not a Vampire Countess anymore. It is a biological weapon disguised as a maid."

"She is efficient," Victor corrected. "And she is clean. Are you denying the data?"

"The data is blasphemy! No creature of the Night is that pure. It violates the Third Law of Entropy!"

Victor sighed. He didn't have the energy for theological debate. He was hungry, and he wanted this woman out of his house before he passed out.

He tapped the toothbrush against the table. Tap. Tap. Tap.

The sound was soft, plastic on wood. But in the silence of the kitchen, it sounded like a war drum.

Valeska's face went pale. She looked at the toothbrush, then at Carmilla, then back at Victor. She saw a man holding a weapon of mass destruction with the casual indifference of a god.

"Sign it," Victor said. "Or I ask her to demonstrate the 'Deep Clean' setting again."

Valeska grabbed the quill. She moved so fast she nearly knocked over the inkwell. Her hand shook violently as she scratched her name across the bottom line. The nib tore the parchment, but the signature was legible.

High Auditor Valeska.

It was done.

Victor let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. He pulled the parchment away before she could change her mind, rolling it up with slow, deliberate movements.

"Pleasure doing business," he said. "Now. The fee."

Valeska looked like she wanted to vomit. She reached into her dimensional pouch and pulled out a heavy velvet sack. She dropped it on the table as if it were burning.

"Fifty thousand," she spat. "Take it. I hope it chokes you."

The sack wriggled.

Victor undid the drawstring. Inside, hundreds of Hell Gold coins—minted by the Crimson Court—were shifting and grinding against each other. As the light hit them, the faces stamped on the metal—little screaming faces of damned souls—opened their eyes.

“Greed,” one coin whispered.

“Thief,” hissed another.

Victor reached in.

The first coin bit him. It wasn't a metaphor. The metal mouth clamped down on his index finger, sharp and cold. Victor didn't flinch. He couldn't. He was too numb. He pulled the coin out, flicking it onto the table. It skittered away, screaming thinly.

Victor reached in again. Another bite. This time on his thumb. A drop of blood welled up, bright red against the gold, and the coin let out a wet, slurping sound.

"Count it," Valeska challenged, standing up. She smoothed the front of her tabard, trying to regain the dignity she had lost to a toothbrush. "Court protocol. You must verify the amount before I leave."

She watched him with a predator's intensity, likely hoping the cursed gold would bite a finger off. She wanted the Warlock to admit that the price was too high.

Victor smiled. It was a ghastly expression, all teeth and dead eyes. "Fine. Let's do this the hard way."

He plunged his hand into the sack.

A chorus of shrieks filled the kitchen. The coins swarmed his hand, biting, pinching, tearing at the skin. It felt like dipping his hand into a bucket of piranhas made of ice.

"Son of a—" Victor gritted his teeth. The pain was sharp, immediate, and grounding.

He pulled out a handful. Five heavy coins.

"Royal Mint denomination. One thousand each. That's five thousand."

Blood dripped from his fingers, hitting the table. The coins on the table scrambled over each other to lick it up.

He reached in again. More blood. More screaming.

"Ten thousand."

Valeska watched, horrified. She expected him to pull back. She expected him to ask for gloves. But Victor just kept going, his movements mechanical, his smile fixed. He didn't look like a man counting money. He looked like a man feeding a beast with his own flesh.

"Forty-five thousand."

His hand was a mess of shallow cuts and gold dust. The table was slick with red smears. The coins were rolling around in his blood, lapping it up, their screams turning into satisfied purrs.

"Fifty thousand." Victor dumped the last pile. He wiped his b****y hand on his shirt—a deliberate, savage gesture. "Exact change. Thank you for your patronage."

Valeska backed away. She had seen warlocks, demons, and abyssal horrors. But she had never seen a human look at pain with such utter boredom.

"You are insane," she whispered. "You and that... thing. You deserve each other."

"The dog," Victor said, ignoring her assessment. He pointed a b****y finger toward the foyer.

Valeska didn't argue. She marched into the hallway, where the heavy tungsten cube sat on the rug. She snapped her fingers.

POP.

The compression spell broke. The cube expanded instantly with a wet shhh-luck sound, popping back into the shape of a massive direwolf. Fenrir hit the floor with a heavy thud.

He didn't howl. He didn't growl. He just opened his mouth and retched.

A waterfall of bile, half-digested kibble, and compressed stomach acid splashed onto the expensive Persian rug. The smell was instant and chemical. Fenrir groaned, rolling onto his side, his eyes spinning in opposite directions.

"My work here is done," Valeska announced. She didn't walk to the door; she dissolved into a mist of red bats and shot up the chimney, fleeing the madness of Corvinus Manor as fast as magic allowed.

Silence returned to the house.

Victor slumped in his chair. The adrenaline was fading, leaving him shaking. His hand throbbed. He looked at the pile of gold, at the signed certificate, at the b****y toothbrush.

He had won. He had survived the audit. He had the money.

"Good boy," he muttered to the hallway. "We did it."

He closed his eyes, ready to pass out.

"Contaminant detected."

The voice was cool, melodic, and terrifyingly close.

Victor's eyes snapped open.

Carmilla was standing next to the table. She wasn't looking at Fenrir. She wasn't looking at the vomit on the rug.

She was looking at Victor's hand. The one covered in blood and gold dust.

Her eyes were glowing with a soft, blue luminescence. The "Sanitation Mode" was still active.

"Carmilla," Victor said, his voice cracking. "Stand down. Audit is over."

She didn't blink. She reached out, her pale fingers hovering inches from his bleeding hand.

"Biological hazard identified," she intoned. "Surface integrity compromised. Pathogen vectors detected in open wounds. Staff hygiene rating: Sub-optimal."

Victor tried to pull his hand back, but he was too weak. Carmilla grabbed his wrist. Her grip was like iron.

"Carmilla, no. That's an order."

She tilted her head. A small, innocent smile played on her lips—the smile of a nurse about to administer a very large, very painful injection.

"Initiating Deep Clean: Operator Level," she whispered.

She raised her other hand. The air around her fingers began to distort, smelling of ozone and bleach.

Victor looked at the toothbrush on the table. It was too far away.

"Oh, fu—"

The scream that followed was cut short by the sound of aggressive scrubbing.