The Druid Who Devoured the Great Nature

“Who are you?”

“Taser, Gale. The under, boss of the Brotherhood…”

After that, to the basic questions I threw at him, he answered exactly as I knew. The effect seemed to have worked well. Only then did I get to the main point.

“The end of the continent, tell me everything you know about that place.”

“I…”

Taser paused for a moment as if recalling a memory, and then opened his mouth.

“At the end of this continent, I saw transcendence, phew, a fragment of transcendence.” The source of this content ɪs ⓝovelFire.net

“Transcendence?”

“Grasslands, forests, a giant tree… beyond that.”

The pupils of the man, who had been speaking in broken words instead of complete sentences, contracted. His bloodless complexion turned deathly pale, and cold sweat beaded on his entire face.

“Transcendence, it wasn’t a story to be dismissed as a mere urban legend. It was a world superior to this place, yes. Transcendence must mean the qualification to cross over to that world. But…”

Taser, as if he had forgotten when he had last closed his mouth, poured out a long speech without even breathing. The statement he poured out as if possessed was more like a reminiscence or a confession than an answer to my question.

“……It is a forbidden act. I didn’t even take a step. Just witnessing it made my head feel strange. It’s… strange. How is such a thing possible? I clearly saw it with my own eyes, but I couldn’t understand it at all. Transcendence is not a feat permitted to humans. The city government, yes, they might know the way. So they hide it from us.”

“Hey.”

Taser’s voice gradually became thinner, and eventually, it reached a point where I couldn’t even understand what he was saying. Was his body unable to hold on, and had he completely lost his mind? I still had a lot to hear.

The moment I grabbed him by the collar to make him come to his senses.

[You’ve finally caused an accident.]

On top of the collapsed wall. I found a bat that had flown in at some point.

[Was I speaking too difficultly? I thought I had delivered the key points kindly enough for a monkey to understand, so why did it turn out like this? Huh?]

A human voice came from the bat. It was a voice I had heard once before. The situation was similar to our first meeting, except that he had sent an animal instead of a representative, so I quickly remembered.

Right after the bat’s two pupils shone eerily.

Taser suddenly spewed blood from all seven orifices. I immediately threw him away and barely managed to avoid getting soaked in the blood.

「The World Tree grimaces, saying it’s disgusting.」

A puddle formed, as if all the blood in his veins had been expelled. The soles of my feet were getting wet with the blood that had overflowed. Taser was lying in it, a shriveled mummy. Even I, who had seen all sorts of dirty things, frowned.

‘He’s dead.’

He was a guy who had already consumed most of his vitality. The healing totem had barely kept him breathing. He would have had no way to resist an unexpected attack.

[You’ll have to think carefully and make an excuse.]

The bat’s two pupils were stained redder than blood. A powerful blood magic performed using the pupils as a medium. As far as I knew, there was no one else who could do this.

[If you don’t want to die a dog’s death, that is.]

A vampire. The master of the Blood Alliance had arrived.

***

“You’re quick on the uptake. I didn’t expect you to show your face right after the battle ended.”

The vampire’s approach. It wasn’t an unexpected development, but the timing was too fast. I had thought he would at least wait until I had recovered the spirit beast.

[You’re quite resourceful yourself. I really couldn’t have imagined that you would attack the underboss less than a few days after I warned you.]

“I’m quite competent.”

[……It seems so. Though you don’t seem to have thought about the consequences.]

The bat flapped its wings. A threat from a creature not even the size of a fist just felt like a tantrum or a complaint. But I didn’t think of acting rashly. The eyes that glittered like rubies. The opponent was a mutant designated as a ‘monster’, a target for worldwide extermination, a vampire.

‘I can’t fight now.’

Taser Gale was a strong person whose skills were not shameful for the position of an underboss. Not only the aftereffects of the domain declaration, but the fatigue from the battle itself was great. It was a different story if it was a small fry, but I wasn’t in a state to get into a scuffle with the head of one of the three factions that ruled the Brotherhood.

‘Fortunately, that side doesn’t seem to want to fight right away either.’

The vampire, upon arrival, had gone after Taser Gale first, not me. He must have been angry, but it meant there was still room for conversation. Or… he was testing the waters.

“It’s not wrong, is it?”

I said, licking my lips. Wagging my tongue was much easier than fighting.

“Seeing as you came as soon as the battle was over, you must have been paying close attention to this matter. But you sent a familiar. If you really wanted to fight, you would have come in your main body. As you saw, I’m quite competent. And bold. If you have something to say, say it. I’m willing to listen.”

[…….]

Vampires had the nickname of bats. It was a derogatory term that compared their blood-sucking eating habits to those of vampire bats. However, rumors that passed through people’s mouths were inevitably exaggerated or distorted and altered. Thus, the legend that vampires could turn into bats was formed.

It was wrong. Bats were just familiars they used.

‘On the contrary, the fact that he can use this much magic with just a low-level familiar like a bat is impressive.’

The reason he had used his power right away was not just to shut him up. It was probably to gain the upper hand. It was a trick that wouldn’t work on me. There was no way I would be scared in front of a familiar, and I wasn’t completely ignorant about the opponent.

[Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve met someone who knows even a shred of truth about our clan. Most of the data should have been destroyed, so where did you find out?]

“Do you feel some sort of kinship?”

[No, I want to kill you even more.]

The bat flew up.

[You’re close with the Public Security Bureau, right? It would be terrible if even a part of the knowledge in your head were to be passed on.]

A monster. If designated as such, human rights are immediately revoked, and a social stigma is attached that they are not people but monsters that must be caught and killed on sight. No matter how long ago the designation of vampires as monsters was, it was still in effect. For the vampire clan, who had gone to great lengths to hide their identity, even forming a faction called the Blood Alliance and carrying out all sorts of schemes, they couldn’t help but be wary.

“You’re talking nonsense. Do you really think the Public Security Bureau hasn’t noticed anything until now?”

The time I was active as a Public Security Bureau security officer. The information about the three factions of the Brotherhood was a top secret with a very small number of people with access rights. If the Public Security Bureau had known nothing about it, they wouldn’t have treated it as a secret. It was because there was a secret to be hidden that they had allowed only a few to access it. So that they wouldn’t provoke the vampires, who had admitted defeat and were quietly hiding in the shadows of the city, by dragging them out into the open.

[Of course not. Then the information in your head also came from the Public Security Bureau?]

“Well, that’s not important right now.”

The Public Security Bureau and the vampires. It was a waste of time to talk about their complicated relationship of knowing each other but pretending not to. That wasn’t the main topic we were going to talk about.

[Yes, that’s not important. I need to hear your excuse for ignoring my warning.]

“Are you going to let me go if my excuse is convincing?”

[No, if you talk well, I’ll kill you comfortably. You have to pay the price for ignoring my warning.]

“Then I have no excuse.”

[Why, are you going to run away?]

The vampire snorted.

[As you said, this body is not the main body, so I can’t catch you now. But later? Can you be at ease even if you get a broker and leave this city?]

The mocking voice was not a bluff, but stated a fact as if it were.

[Even if you live, you won’t be living. You’ll live in fear for the rest of your life, wondering when and where an assassin will appear and take your life.]

“A cliché threat. Don’t you have anything to say? You’re just talking nonsense.”

[You’re prepared, is that it?]

“I don’t know about being prepared, but if you have nothing more to say, I’ll state my business. Let’s negotiate.”

[Negotiate…?]

Was it unexpected? The bat flapped its wings as if to say, ‘Go on.’

“I still had a lot to hear from the underboss. But I’ll let it go. You should also let it go that I fought the underboss.”

[Hmm, the calculation doesn’t add up, does it? You’re the one who killed my subordinate even though I warned you, so why should I?]

“Weren’t you going to kill him anyway? I took care of a troublesome matter for you by dealing with him first, so if anything, you should be grateful to me.”

The opponent, upon arrival, had killed Taser Gale first, not me. The matter of the faction that the vampire had mentioned in our previous meeting must have been a purge, as I had suspected.

[Don’t play with words. It may not seem like it, but I’m quite angry right now. I don’t have much patience left.]

“If you think the scales are not balanced, I’ll add one more thing.”

[If you’re talking nonsense again, I’ll kill you.]

“You’ll change your mind when you hear it.”

No matter what, he wouldn’t be able to not cooperate.

“The evidence that the underboss was the one who laundered the funds and support materials for the terrorist organization Al-Raid. I’ll take responsibility and bury it.”

[…….]

The reason the vampire had approached me and warned me. The reason he had decided to purge a subordinate of the underboss level. Now everything was connected.

[……I don’t know what you’re talking about. Are you trying to slander me?]

“Do you even intend to deceive me? You’re not good at acting.”

[…….]

Silence again. It meant he had nothing to say. Because I had hit the mark. The vampire, as if giving up on glossing it over, asked with a sigh.

[How did you know? I was relieved that I had killed him before he could say anything unnecessary, but had that vermin already confessed everything, down to the trivial details?]

“No, various circumstances were telling me so.”

Why did the vampire secretly sharpen his sword to purge a key executive of the underboss level? And why did he rush over and kill Taser Gale himself with his own hands? There were many other questions.

The fact that he had come to me directly, who was considered to have the Public Security Bureau as a backer, and had stopped me from approaching the underboss. The fact that Taser Gale had prioritized the deal with Councilor Sorbet over retaliation against me, who had ruined his deal.

The conclusion that could solve all those questions at once was this. Taser Gale had fully cooperated in the laundering of the funds and support materials to be delivered to Al-Raid. That’s why he was obsessed with cooperating with the councilor and normalizing the smuggling market. And the boss, who had suspected his involvement in supporting the terrorist organization, had gathered evidence and prepared for a purge.

[Haa, fuck. This is fucked up.]

Vampires call themselves the nobles of the night. The fact that a curse word had come out of a vampire’s mouth meant that he was that cornered.

[Are you the only one who knows that fact? Who else knows?]

“For now, it’s just me. It was just a guess based on the circumstances, without any evidence.”

[Really? That’s great, then it means there’s no risk of the secret being revealed if I kill you here somehow.]

“With that bat? If you’re confident, go ahead.”

I tilted my head leisurely and provoked him. I had realized while talking that this vampire was too weak in psychological warfare. A bluff would work well.

“In the meantime, my comrades inside the building will recover all the legacy left by the underboss. If there’s a ledger of the deal with Al-Raid in it, I think you’ll be the one who regrets it more than me.”

Just the fact that the merchants of the smuggling market had cooperated with Al-Raid had started a large-scale crackdown. And the flames that had been burning the smuggling market had subsided with the underboss’s desperate lobbying. But that spark would flare up again and spread to the Brotherhood. Since it was a direct charge of supporting terrorism with a motive, not just a charge of contempt, the crackdown on the Brotherhood would not stop until it saw the end.

Whether the outcome was the victory of the Public Security Bureau or the survival of the Brotherhood. The vampires would be exposed to the open.

“There’s no time. The internal cleanup will be over soon.”

A group that has lost its head cannot last long. It would be quick for Hatig to cook the underboss’s subordinates who had lost their morale.

“I hope you make a rational choice that is beneficial to both of us.”

It was a notification disguised as a negotiation.

(End of Chapter)