Sixth Bloodline [BxB]

ARC 3 - CHAPTER 35: CHANCE ENCOUNTER [THIS GUY, HE'S EXACTLY MY TYPE]

ARC III: MEMORIES

cHAptEr 35:

cHAncE EncOUntEr 

[tHis gUy, HE's ExActLY mY tYpE]

[28 YEARS AGO]

   EGYPT WAS the last place where one would expect to find a vampire, yet it was surprisingly one of the few countries where their population outnumbers humans.

Purebloods humans, that is.

If one wants to find information about a certain vampire or perhaps an influential human — then as long as they had money or another equally important information to give, it could easily be traded for here, on the bustling streets of Peru. Every single street had at least one shop for information trading, and they all belong to seven influential vampires, Purebloods —and  therefore, were all are connected. 

So it doesn't matter which one you chose, all had the same information source.

You could even buy a Pureblood's whereabouts if you're good enough, and if you were to offer whereabouts of a Half-blood, you might be granted an opportunity to meet with a Pureblood and make them owe you a favor. Seven Purebloods that stood on top of vampire race only wanted two types of information — one is regarding Half-bloods, and another regarding other Purebloods.

They were those kind of bastards that wanted to kill each other and would pay a decent amount for any information regarding their sibling's weakness.

Yes, even if you wanted them to kill a certain Higher Noble or influential human, they will make it happen without batting an eyelid as long as your information made them interested.

But that's not something many knew about.

To humans, they absolutely had no idea about this establishment while vampires merely saw it as a gathering place to trade information. If you said that this lair of evil was something controlled by Purebloods, not many vampires would believe you.

Not getting beaten to death immediately would already be considered as them letting you off easily.

How could Purebloods possibly kill or sell information about their own brethren?

To the night walkers, the existence known as Pureblood vampires was perhaps more sacred than the Vampire King himself whom they never saw — so they would never accept a single bad word about their deities.

But other than being one of the biggest vampire lairs, this place was — ironically — the one place vampire Hunters visited the most.

If you had to explain the relationship between Hunters and vampires with one sentence... It would be quite hard, indeed. On the surface, the two sides hate each other's guts and wanted to exterminate the other party, but the number of secret deals done underneath that hatred in the past three thousand years was too much to count.

They're like the bad neighbors exploiting each other since they also had something the other side wanted.

The society of vampires doesn't want to be known to the human race. Not because of some nonsensical fear of extermination or whatnot, but rather just because of them being too lazy to deal with mortals. Humans won't accept them, so they'll start a war — hunts on vampires can be traced down back to three millenniums ago where a single bloodling was hunted down by humans merely for having different appearance and longer lifespan. So vampires who learned that they won't be accepted no matter what no longer gave a damn about humans.

   "You don't see me, I don't see you" — therefore, vampires led casual lives in their own little society and didn't bother getting too involved with humans.

A part of them did, though — half the inner core of government in the world was compromised of vampires acting like humans, after all. Just because vampires preferred peace doesn't necessarily mean that everyone shared that opinion.

There will always be some delusional fools that wanted to rule the world or massacred other people simply because they could — posing great threat to both vampires and humans alike. So some more influential vampires would mingle with human government and try to control the situation from above so that humans can remain ignorant about their night neighbors.

Which led to the cooperation between Hunters and vampires who — although were  sworn enemies —still hired the other group in order to get rid of some troublesome vampires. Although they could deal with those guys on their own... To be honest, vampires were too proud or lazy to do so.

It would involve sending a Higher Noble or Noble depending on the situation, but as they all had important business to deal with in their own society, they can't get sent out too often.

It would occur once or twice in a century that some Noble rebelled — relying on the fact that they cannot be killed in the open —and killing a Noble would cause too much of commotion, so they had guts to do it. The destruction caused by two Nobles fighting was enough to destroy a bigger village, and in current era where every detail could be caught and traced back by satellites, it would be difficult to cover-up.

So, they hired Hunters.

For three thousand years, Hunters were skilled enough to make a vampire silently disappear from the face of Earth, so they were a better pick when it comes to getting rid of rebelled vampires.

But even so, dealings of vampires and Hunters isn't a think that can be shown in open, so only a handful of Higher Nobles and Purebloods were aware of it. Other vampires simply saw Hunters as enemies es they'll never be able to reconcile with.

And with the help from the group in the government, it was easy to cover up everything!

In case where they had no power to cover it up? No problem, just use the power of Suggestion to make the important people forget everything and erase all the evidence! Vampire's Suggestion was more than capable of erasing or twisting memories of any human in the world. Even some weaker vampires can easily succumb to it.

And the remaining talk they missed would only become an empty rumor that would slowly disappear with the passing of time.

Vampires won't have peace if some of them rebelled, while Hunters needed to hunt vampires in order to eat.

This bunch of coincidences was precisely the reason why — despite Egypt being a lair of vampires — you could still find Hunters roaming the streets of Peru and asking for information just as often as vampires.

Mikhael was also one such Hunter. And a vampire.

But...

Compared to other Hunters who were secretive about their identities and careful not to provoke some calamity in this city, Mikhael's bearing was that of a guy that owned this city.

With his blond hair tied into a simple ponytail and average height that made him easy to lose in the crowd, Mikhael munched on local delicacies as he strolled around the main street — seemingly with no particular goal in mind. He wore a simple black mask covering his entire face, slightly titled to the side so that his mouth were free to munch on food — but there were no openings for eyes yet he clearly walked like he saw everything.

Under the thin black jacket, he wore another of his "I hate vampires - neon edition" shirt making some vampires twitch their eyelids in annoyance when they saw him. He was practically going around asking for a beating; perhaps he himself didn't understand how much of a thorn in their eyes he was — but still, no one bothered with him.

Peru was still a place where many 'humans' walked around. But there was an unspoken rule that humans and vampires in this city aren't allowed to fight — so even if some people wanted to hit him, they could only clench their fists and curse him silently.

The mask Mikhael wore was a common occurrence here in Peru: it only had a single function and that was to hide his appearance. When ordinary humans looked at this mask, they'd immediately forget about the person wearing it, while to vampires and spell-casters, this mask simply covered someone's face completely.

Be it vampires, Hunters or even spell-casters, none of them flaunted their face around. What if they provoked someone? 

What a disaster would it be if they got hunted down for the rest of their lives because of their face...

Heavens know that Mikhael was not purposely going around pulling aggro on vampires, he just liked those shirts and well... He had nothing better to wear anyway. Seeing how the robes of Hunters consisted of black and red colors he had to adorn for centuries, his fashion sense simply degraded until he eventually began to dress up like an emo.

Finally arriving to the train station, Mikhael finished off his snacks before throwing the garbage in red designated area next to the entrance of the building. The moment before the paper was about to touch the ground, it completely disintegrated, leaving no trace behind.

   "What a thick mana," he silently mused to himself while  narrowing eyes at the countless railways levitating in the air above his head with elegant white trains about to set off. Then he casually passed through the doors that turned transparent the moment they came in contact with him. In the next moment, he raised his phone and placed it next to an ordinary black rectangular stand. It flashed with green light before another layer of transparent doors opened in front of him, revealing a bustling hall.

   "It's really difficult to forge ID terminals nowadays..."

At this rate, it's just a matter of time before vampires were revealed. Only one ID terminal per person that had their DNA scan, it's extremely difficult to forge a fake on.

   "If nothing else, it's a good thing nano-machines can prolong body's lifespan now," he sighed.

Humanity really progressed fast.

Around the beginning of twenty-third century, electricity slowly became something extremely toxic and the environment more polluted. Humanity needed another source of energy to use instead of it and it was around that period that "mana" became known to them.

Mana. Qi. Spiritual energy. Reiki.

The source of energy for spell-casters who could create miracles that went by many names. It slowly influenced humans, mutated their bodies and 'souls'  creating spell-casters who had both a longer lifespan and faster brain activity compared to ordinary humans.

At first, humanity only saw mana as another form of energy and slowly began to research it. But it was extremely scarce at that time, so much that they didn't really pay much attention to it at the beginning —it wasn't profitable enough to influence the world and only the rich could afford to use it.

But decade after decade, mana in the air slowly accumulated and grew denser, while humanity began to create more devices that used mana as their core and that in turn affected even more mana around them. At that time, some humans exposed to all that mana awakened the ability to wield it, gaining names such as "Espers" or "Ability Users".

This period lasted for another fifty years.

Humanity —as always, once they encountered something unknown and more powerful — turned to hunt those spell-casters for various researches, forcing those people to slowly adapt and learn how to wield mana to preserve their lives.

Those people were — in fact, what Mikhael, vampires and Hunters all knew under another name — spell-casters. But humans who were ignorant of this special group used many names before eventually learning the truth.

The more spell-casters used mana, the more traces they left behind in the air and mana around them accumulated even more. That, in turn, gave birth to more spell-casters and their existence to more infighting.

Spell-caster have existed since ancient times, but they were so rare that only one was born out of hundred thousand humans.. And most spell-casters of the past weren't even that powerful since mana was scarce.

That cycle of fighting only grew more ruthless over time until the point where some areas accumulated such dense mana that spell-casters could even use it to fly in the sky — something Mikhael also grew addicted to. Spell-caster that fought for freedom against humans could only become more heartless and use dangerous spells, so it's no wonder mana grew to be as concentrated as it is now.

There was a huge disparity between using mana within your own body and using mana from your environment — never running out of it or getting tired being the biggest one. The current skills of spell-casters were naturally better than those of ancient times — but humans also grew more powerful and created their own weapons to suppress this group.

Despite being shocked and in the midst of war, potential of humanity was truly something that would never falter with passage of time.

Some people dabbled into studies on mana and learned how to make it practical for everyday life. After almost a century after their discovery  — spell-casters that used to be hunted down were no longer considered as mutant pests, but there were still bunch of regulation codes for them if they wanted to live normally among humans.

Even so, peace was hard to obtain.

Spell-casters still held grudges, some wanted to retaliate while others actually accepted to live with shackles  —  so conflicts erupted everywhere around the world. Various power groups emerged to fight for supremacy — secretly raising their own army of spell-casters using this or that reason to control them.

There would naturally be those who were jealous of their power and wanted to obtain it for themselves, resulting in all kinds of messed-up experiments. Government would "deal" with those villains if they found them, but who knows what actually went behind the closed doors. Some scientists that were supposed to be executed still worked for them with highest treatment, but hidden from the outside world.

Humans were greedy beings, after all.

That had nothing to do with vampires and Hunters, though.

In fact, this war only helped hide vampires since humans were too busy dealing with spell-casters for the time being.

Vampires in Peru would take in a spell-caster or two if they could, but they didn't really put much importance to this group at the beginning, since they already had steady foundations. 

But not even that lasted for long.

Once vampires realized how important the spell-casters were to Hunters because of their ability to create anti-vampire weapons, they enthusiastically began to gather them just to spite Hunters.

That naturally pissed off Hunters; "We're both humans, so why are you siding with vampires?"

Thus began another round of dog fights. The two sides that had been after each other's neck would once again have a arguments here and there, but it wasn't as noticeable as the cold war between revolution army of spell-casters and humans.

Humanity managed to rope in some spell-casters then made them fight rebel spell-casters — which to vampires and Hunters indeed seemed so ironic and stupid, but when they looked at their own arguments...

Anyway, Hunters and vampires have been fighting for millenniums — the current situation outside was really no different than children argument in their eyes.

And although vampires and Hunters fought and all, most of them didn't really want to completely eradicate the other side. They were both keeping each other in check, and none wanted to rule the world and whatnot, so why would they bother with g******e?

Yes, Hunters didn't even want to be associated with humanity anymore, but when luring spell-casters to their side, they always used the same "we're both humans" excuse.

Unlike them, spell-casters and humanity actually wanted to have a definite victor and were therefore more ruthless in their battles.

As for Mikhael's words about mana earlier, he said them because Peru was a city bustling with spell-casters who freely used spells everywhere. Under the protection of vampires, spell-casters were free to play as they wish and vampires used spell-casters as their cover to continue to live in this city. Most of the buildings here ran on mana just like the train station Mikhael came to, so it's natural there'd be abundance of mana in this place.

To the outside world, Peru is city built by neutral spell-casters and humans, thanks to the Hunters and vampires in government did their best to keep this place hidden. The seemingly peaceful city was nothing more than illusion weaved on layers upon layers of lies. How could true peace be easy to obtain?

Mikhael bitterly smiled.

   "It's fine as long as there isn't a world war, I guess," he sighed as he fixed his mask so that it completely covered his face before arriving to the counter.

The building of train station had no security as no one would dare to provoke workers here. If your ID terminal was faulty, you'd never be able to pass through the second doors anyway, so it was impossible to sneak in. Not to mention that people behind the counter were all powerful vampires or specially trained Hunters, so even if one wanted to beat them — they'd only get beaten in turn.

   "Where to?" A cold voice asked as Mikhael finally reached his turn.

He only silently pulled out a worn-out travel ticked before handing it over to the white haired woman behind the counter, along with a little blue crystal on top of it. The worker on the other side said nothing as she added another seal on top of that ticket and returned it to Mikhael, keeping the crystal for herself.

At the same time, more words and information appeared on that ticket.

   "Sixteenth platform, departing in five minutes," Mikhael hummed to himself before heading towards the platforms. There was his seat noted on ticked, as well as 160/160 marked in the left lower corner.

   "How lucky, the last seat."

He was indeed lucky. The train that he picked had limited number of seats and only operated once a week — so if he missed this one, he'd have to wait for another week. But he had some business after this trip, so he couldn't afford to wait for the next train.

Compared to those trains that used railways and electricity, there was no longer any need for them to move on the surface.

Spell-casters created seals that let trains rely on special mana fields around Earth and allow trains go levitate above its surface — making it possible to go wherever you want — making it more convenient since traffic in the air was more relaxed as well. The driver of such train was naturally a spell-caster himself.

There was another, more common railway that went all over the word built by special material and also levitated above the surface of Earth at lower magnitude, but the place Mikhael wanted to go to was a bit special, hence he picked the one operating on mana. Since his destination was well-hidden, it could only be reached by special means, so this mana train was created.

The reason it didn't work often was precisely because resources needed to move it were too large for daily expanses.

Even the spell-caster that drive it would have their memory sealed by a powerful Higher Noble until he had to drive it again — yes, the place Mikhael was heading to was that special.

When he came in front of the platforms, there were only sixteen of them, maker with numbers from I to XX — but VI, VIII, XVI and IXX were missing. Still, the lack of his platform didn't surprise him at all.

He walked between the XV and XVII platform before taking out the ticked from earlier. There was only a simple elevator-like space in between with another triangular stand with a simple opening for tickets. Mikhael calmly moved to the middle before putting the ticket in that opening.

At the same instant he did that, the ticket glowed with white color before the ground under Mikhael's feet became filled with odd runes. They slowly began to detach from the ground before suddenly enveloping Mikhael's whole body. People around him only curiously glanced at him, but didn't threat it as anything special. It was advanced spell used for teleportation, and ticket served as the medium to guide a person from one place to another.

In the next moment, Mikhael disappeared from that spot and reappeared underground where four pitch black bullet-trains waited for him. There were fifteen cars for one train, each around fifty meters long with somewhat misplaced windows. Some cars were completely closed off while others had windows visible.

Instead of using curtains, the windows were completely closed off with the same material as outer coat of the train.. It also helped in case of accidents. The reason why windows were misplaced was because some of them were closed completely, making it look like there were none in the first place.

There were few trains that led everywhere around Egypt, but only those four were special and couldn't be boarded by just anyone. First, one had to have a corresponding identity and ticket leading to their destination that was by no means easy to obtain, and second — they had to be invited by residents of that place.

If you say that Peru was city where various vampires and Hunters mingled, then the two destinations those four trains led to were something only vampires and spell-casters could enter, or spell-casters and Hunters.

One was the home of vampires. Another the home of Hunters

Anything else would be killed on sight — not even the Esteemed Seats were allowed in territory of vampires, nor Purebloods in territory of Hunters HQ.

The place this train was headed for was City of Evernight — it can be said that it's the home for vampires. Only vampires were allowed in this place, and only a handful or spell-casters or humans that wanted to settle down with vampires could be invited.

Over seventy percent of all Nobles and Higher Nobles also stay in this place all the time, while others are scattered around the world. It's a place vampires can always return back to, no matter where they are in this world nor how long they stay outside.

Purebloods don't really stay here, since they prefer to always be on the move, but they all have a mansion in this city. Sometimes you could find them here, at other times you can't. If depends on their mood.

City of Evernight was originally a simple place where many vampires had homes to return to — for once they needed to disappear from secular world, they'd all retreat here. Mikhael was no different; he also had one house here, and for the past five centuries since he found this city — if he wasn't on his island — he would come here for holidays.

However, ever since the deal with spell-casters, the city was separated into outer and inner circle — with the outer serving as temporary home for spell-casters and new vampires. Mikhael, as the resident of this place, could naturally use his own residential ticket to enter, but he was here for other business, so he didn't use his identity as a vampire.

So he relied on someone else, and entered as a spell-caster instead.

Being a Half-blood who hid for eight centuries, Mikhael had many identities to use varying from a vampire to Hunter and even a spell-caster. There's no place in this world he could get into and no important position he didn't grab onto.

He even used to run a country once when he was younger.

The business this time was something he dealt with important person in secret, so he can't afford to let his identity be known. It's possible for many people to hunt him once they found out about it, so he decided to act like a seemingly unimportant spell-casters and sneak inside the City of Evernight.

He is meant to enter a Deep Slumber once he handed over 'that thing', after all.

The train leaving from Sixteenth Platform was the one leading directly to the inner city, and it was harder to board compared to Nineteenth. Not only did you have to use an invitation, you also need to pay with mana crystals — and those things were so rare that even spell-caster would kill each other to obtain.

But what were rules in front of Mikhael, jack of all trades?  

XVI and IXX led to City of Evernight. The other two led to the Hunters HQ — who in spite of vampires named their territory City of Dawnbringers.

They were that petty, indeed.

Spell-casters also couldn't get aboard this train unless invited by important resident of inner city, they could only casually enter VIII and XIII Platforms — even the two cities' layout was the same.

As he appeared in this place, he calmly took back his ticked before moving to the train on his platform. Above those four trains gathered in one place were the missing four platforms and he soon found his own. There was no one waiting outside his train, but even so — Mikhael just went to the last car before placing his ticket on the black surface.

At the same time, the square opening appeared on its surface just enough to let him pass through before immediately closing after him.

Compared to the simple exterior of the train, the interior was like completely different world. Not only was the space inside of cars twice as big from how it seemed on the outside, it was quite luxurious too.

Be it the carpet, the walls or doors to the cabins, they all looked like someone demolished a castle before putting it inside this seemingly ordinary train. At the same time — Mikhael clicked his tongue, cursing the rich bastard responsible for this train — no matter how many times he got on it, he could never get used to its extravagance.

Since he had everything covered, he had nothing to fear and began to search for his own cabin. The journey should last for half a day to entire day since the city was well hidden from the outside world. Because the people boarding this train all had special identities, this train only had private cabins with luxurious seats. Meals were free and they had various forms of entertainment. Even their cabins could turn into bungalows because of spells if passengers wanted to sleep. And because of special outline of this train, their cabins were like small rooms instead.

Coming in front of a golden door with delicate craftsmanship, Mikhael gently knocked twice before opening to see the situation inside.

There were three men seated inside.

Two of them — naturally, vampires — wore white robes. The two of them sat on one side, and seeing their clothes coupled with their white hair, Mikhael didn't even need to think twice before guessing their identity.

Nobles.

Or Higher Nobles.

But from their positioning and careful observation of Mikhael when he walked in, he assumed that they were here as escort for the third guy.

For a moment there, Mikhael was shaken silly when he saw the guy lazily reading a book in his seat.

Handsome. Too handsome! Just Mikhael's type!

Just like him, the other party wore a mask which hid half of his face, but he didn't hide those crimson eyes of his. Coupled with his square jaw and tall body, the mask didn't hide his handsomeness at all — it only highlighted this guy's good points, giving him a mysterious air! It made one's imagination run wild to uncover what's beneath that white mask, appearing like a celestial you could only look at, but not touch.

His long raven black hair was elegantly tied into a ponytail without a single hair lose that made ones fingers itch to comb through. Even though he also wore a suit like those two guys, but compared to two Mikhael labeled as "bodyguards", this one was the real deal, like the boss standing on the very top! He wore a blood red tie perfectly matching his eyes, which gave of illusion of wilderness lurking underneath that reserved elegance.

He also had a white coat casually draped over his shoulders — no matter how you looked at him, it was obvious that he wasn't human at a glance.

He didn't spare a glance at Mikhael, and instead flipped the page at a steady pace — finally waking Mikhael from his stupor.

   'As expected of his aura, it's really obvious who are the followers, and who's the main boss!'

Mikhael guessed that this guy was most likely a Higher Noble. Despite just sitting there and reading a book, his body exuded a dangerous aura of predator that could not be ignored.

Mikhael resisted the urge to glance down at his body and compare their fashion sense.

Looking at those three guys dressed elegantly in white and then at himself... He really didn't fit in this cabin!

   "It looks like we'll be companions on this journey, right?" He still asked shamelessly, he was always someone with extremely thick skin! A chance to sit next to this handsome specimen, Mikhael won't miss no matter what!

   "Please come in," his deep voice laced with dominance was all Mikhael needed to hear before he came inside and closed the doors.

Luckily, the free seat was next to the guy and window, so Mikhael happily claimed it as his. He preferred sitting next to windows and watching the scenery pass by. Although the four trains were underground, after few miles they'd emerge above the surface before reaching their destination.

It's just that some parts of the journey were intentionally underground so that the road remained hidden.

The train also had big windows covering the entire side of the cabin, but if you weren't satisfied with scenery outside — you could always put another holographic scene on the glass to look at.

In between the two wide seats was a luxurious table with various specially crafted snacks and under were few bottles of wine and blood. Above their heads hung a crystal chandelier which — even though it looked like it ran on ordinary candles, was actually made of spells.

   'Really extravagant...'

To even use spells to make ordinary candles, what were the people who constructed this train if not wasteful!?

No one said anything after he sat down, but people who used this train were of no ordinary background and didn't feel the need to seek company in the first place.

Although Mikhael appeared to causally glance around, he actually observed his fellow passengers. The other two bodyguards were respectfully avoiding the guy next to him, not to mention how they waited for his opinion when Mikhael spoke earlier — it only confirmed his doubts that he's the boss.

Those guys being Nobles was something he was certain of. There was something about those guys and their love for white color everyone knew about — if not because it was unusual for humans outside, they'd most certainly go around with white hair as well. Together with their red eyes, they were easy to spot in the crowd.

Mikhael wasn't exaggerating — within the City of Evernight, all Nobles flaunted their white hair like they were showing off their wealth.

In any case, Mikhael also wasn't a talkative type, so he took out his earphones and plugged them in his phone. He didn't fear two Nobles led by a Higher Noble at all, at this point even a Pureblood would find it difficult to deal with him.

Hell, they would be in greater danger if they got trapped alone with Mikhael since their blood was quite special to Mikhael and he would not hesitate to drain them of it!

   'But still... Aren't those guys really obvious?'

Mikhael was extremely sensitive to killing intent, but he still pretended not to notice the hostile glares the two bodyguards were throwing his way. It's probably because he sat down next to their boss or something...

Mikhael couldn't help but glance at the guy next to him only to be caught in act by the other party. Still, he didn't shy away and winked at him before continuing to play on his phone — unfortunately, the other party couldn't see it from his mask.

Virtual Reality was no longer a concept people dream about. One could even play VR games on their advanced phones. But it required special earphones that transmuted brain waves to the phone and connected to special servers that required adequate receivers which ordinary people couldn't afford.

But because of the nature of this train, it had such receivers equipped so Mikhael could easily access the server to play games.

The moment Mikhael put on his earphones, a transparent glasses appeared under his mask before spreading all over its surface.

The VR equipment came in different shapes from wristwatches to masks, glasses and even earphones. There were even capsules for full-body VR dive, but since Mikhael only casually played a game on his phone and wanted to pay attention to his surroundings, he used this way to play.

It's not something a mask meant to hide his appearance should have... But who was Mikhael? Unlike other people, he just needed to slap a special talisman on top of the gaming mask and give it multitasking properties in an instant!

Despite casually picking identity of a spell-caster to enter this city, Mikhael was actually skilled in this profession.

Once he tapped on the game in his phone and started it, a part of his consciousness was sunk inside the game — while his body appeared to be sleeping, not moving an inch — and he began to play. While casually killing zombies inside the game, he also paid attention to the outside.

The man next to him continued to read the book in old-fashioned way while Mikhael played games with advanced technology — but their two respective actions brought an oddly harmonious feeling that made the two bodyguards across them feel weird.

One looked like he came from a street fight, while other looked like a refined leader of powerful family—  it  really made one's imagination bloom with different scenarios.

Still, the two across them couldn't say what made them feel odd, so they ignored that feeling while carefully eyeing Mikhael in case he made a move on their boss.

It can't be helped, although their Lord Sixth Pureblood pretended to be a Higher Noble, it's not like his disguise was perfect.

Anyone who has seen Ethan in the past can easily recognize the aura and his body shape— he always left deep impression, making other people unable to forget about him. Not to mention that there were too many situations where assassins pretended to be innocent passer-byes and attempted to assassinate him after he lowered his guard. Although it was impossible for them to kill him, it was still annoying to be unable to travel without getting attacked even once!

They once saw an eight years old follow that scenario, but Mikhael with his suspicious bearing and that shirt was really...

Forget about his shirt, three men in white suits and one boy with short trousers and jacked, not to mention his bearing that simply provoked vampires really made one's eyes hurt when they look at him!

If he was an assassin, he was too obvious! They simply couldn't not put up their guards against Mikhael, but their Lord ignored him like he was air!

There was also another thing that made them alert. They especially booked the ride for their Lord Sixth — and were clear that there would be a single free seat so no one would have to sit next to Ethan, yet this guy appeared in the last moment from a thin air! They didn't want to bother their Lord Sixth with some random extra person, but this little guy...

   'If you're going to join us or try to assassinate out Lord Sixth, at least be a beautiful woman with refined air, OK!?'

They assumed that if he really was assassin, he was just a stupid novice that didn't understand the world.

Mikhael had no idea about their chaotic inner thoughts, he only knew that the two of them were hostile towards him — but what of it? It's not like there's another free cabin for him to sit in, ah!

So he silently continued to kill zombies in the phone, wickedly smiling to himself when he cleared a stage — having only the sound of pages flipping at fixed intervals to accompany him. It was oddly relaxing, and for some reason — he had easier time killing those zombies than usual.

Around an hour later, just as he finished clearing another wave of zombies and decided to take a break— the doors to their cabin were opened by a train attendant.

She elegantly wore a pencil skirt and white blouse. Her hair which was tied into a little bun with blue ribbon and warm smile directed at the group made her look like your standard 'femme fatale'. Train attendants were usually humans, one of their jobs included offering warm and fresh blood to important passengers if they were unsatisfied with the one under their tables. Still, Mikhael's gaze when he saw this woman was somewhat odd, but luckily he had a mask to cover it up.

Since he focused on her face for a while, he naturally caught her gaze that lingered on the man next to him while thinking to himself: Beauty that can cause fall of a country, indeed!

   "Gentlemen, your tickets please," the two bodyguards were immediately charmed by her making Mikhael roll his eyes. 'What dumb bodyguards, don't you know that the more harmless they appear — the more dangerous they actually are!?'

The one closest to her immediately pulled out three tickets before handing them over. Accepting them with a smile, she checked them before putting another seal on top of them using a special seal infused with mana before politely returning them to the Noble.

Ethan only glanced at her for an instant before throwing a subtle glance at Mikhael. Catching the little guy who had his head turned at him, he only raised an eyebrow while Mikhael curled his lips upwards.

Good!

   'As expected of my next target to bed, you who aren't easily smitten by beauty will live longer!'

The reason he felt weird when he saw this woman earlier was simple: this sister was also a Hunter like him! Forget about being hunter, she's even an Esteemed Seat, ah! One of the top twenty Hunters in the world, it's not a simple position!

But what the hell is an Esteemed Seat doing aboard this train?

   "..."

   'Perhaps... trying to use a honey trap, ah?'

   "..."

   'Don't tell me she's after this Higher Noble next to me?'

Wanna play a round of 'chance encounter' to make him remember you after one night stand or blood meal, then have him seek you later, play few rounds of 'love-hate' or 'rich and poor position difference' scenes, then make him bring you into the City of Evernight where you'll live your happily ever after until you get what you need and kill him?

Fuck no!

   'I saw him first!'

Mikhael huffed angrily as she turned to him, her eye twitched when she saw his shirt, but didn't let it linger on her face for too long.

   "And yours?"

Mikhael took out the previous ticked and was about to stand up and hand it over when Ethan took it from his hand and then casually handed it over making the four people next to him speechless.

   "..."

Mikhael thought: 'We just met but you already won't let me suffer grievances. If I don't take you home or into my bed, I'll change my  last name to yours!

The woman though: 'This weird emo brat is actually with those Nobles? They can ignore his weird aesthetic taste?!

The two "bodyguards" didn't think at all. Their brains were too busy trying to figure out what just happened while Ethan, despite having a calm expression on his face couldn't help but feel curious about Mikhael.

He didn't pay much attention to this person — even if he was an assassin, he won't be able to hurt him anyway — but once he saw that ticket... Without a doubt, the aura on it belonged to his younger brother.

   'Someone invited by Dante to the City of Evernight... It can't be wrong, he should be 'that person'!'

But moreover, what the hell is wrong with that shirt of his?!