Chapter 73: Landlord’s Fanatics
[Attention all tenants!]
[A curfew is in effect. Everyone is instructed to retire to their units.]
[If anyone is found outside, everyone in their units will be severely punished.]
A system notification appeared before everyone. However, no one minded it. Since they were done feasting on the bird, they quickly cleared the courtyard and retreated to their rooms.
James was the first to leave. After working in the workshop all day, he was naturally tired and thought Aiden had imposed the curfew to ensure everyone rested.
[Community loyalty has increased by 1%]
Perhaps eating with James had infected everyone with his misunderstanding syndrome. All of them thought the same thing, and seeing their landlord’s care, their loyalty increased.
Meanwhile, Aiden couldn’t care less about them. After ensuring everyone was in their rooms, he put the entire building under lockdown. It was another privilege of being the owner. Now, only he could unlock doors in the entire building.
"Come on," he said, looking at Amaela.
Amaela nodded and quietly followed him to the elevator. Since she had had her fun earlier, she didn’t even try to get on Aiden’s nerves.
The doors opened on the basement floor. Four corpses were waiting for Amaela. Her eyes shone, and she immediately forgot about the purpose of her visit.
"Food!" she yelled, lunging at the nearest corpse.
However, no matter how much she flailed her arms or tried to run, she couldn’t reach the corpses. Frustrated, she looked back only to see Aiden holding her like a kitten in an air jail.
"Did you forget the lesson already?" he frowned, pointing at the corpses. "Turn them into ghouls. Nothing more."
Amaela looked at him and hissed, showing her fangs. Yet, Aiden remained expressionless. Out of all the vampires that had hissed at him, Amaela was perhaps the most harmless one, holding true to her kitten status.
"Get it done quickly," Aiden said, dropping her and crossing his arms.
"Fine..." Amaela mumbled, letting out a sigh.
She walked over to the first corpse, crouched down, and grabbed its arm.
"Why not the neck?"
"Only someone special deserves that," Amaela pouted, blowing Aiden a kiss using the hobgoblin’s hand.
Veins bulged on Aiden’s forehead, but he remained quiet. Not wanting to let her get under his skin again.
Meanwhile, Amaela bit into the hobgoblin’s arms, barely sucking any blood out before spitting it right back out.
"Ugh, it tastes disgusting!" she frowned, clawing her tongue.
A moment later, the sound of a glass bottle rolling echoed in the silent basement. Amaela looked up and saw a blood-cola bottle hitting the hobgoblin.
"Keep going," Aiden said, bringing out another bottle.
"Ah... that’s the stuff!"
As she kept biting the other corpses, Aiden walked up to the first hobgoblin. Strange blackish veins appeared on its body, starting from the bite mark and moving towards its face and chest.
"Interesting. Looks like the venom is reactivating their organs."
[That’s not how ghouls of the Otherworld came to be.]
Amaela’s way of creating ghouls was indeed unique, even though the initial process was the same.
One bite to let the venom spread, but instead of resurrecting as mindless beasts, they probably held back some intelligence. As for how much, they would have to check when they get up.
They didn’t have to wait for long. Aiden had barely taken a step back when the hobgoblin corpse twitched.
"Here we go," he said, turning back.
The ghoul shot up to its feet. Unlike what one would expect, it wasn’t slow at all. If anything, it was faster than it had been when alive. Once on its feet, it turned towards Aiden and stood idly.
The rest of the ghouls followed, all joining a line and standing in front of Aiden.
"Um... why are they facing towards you?" Amaela asked, drinking the fourth cola. They don’t have eyes, but I’m pretty sure they are staring at you."
Aiden didn’t reply to her because of the notification in front of him.
[Four drifters have appeared on your property.]
How did this happen?
[I’m as clueless as you, Host. But the ghouls are bound by the Landlord’s rule.]
You know what that means, right?
Aiden smiled. He thought since Amaela had raised them, the ghouls would listen to her. That’s why he was planning to have her lead the ghouls to the Butcher Gang’s base.
However, if the ghouls were drifters under his authority, he didn’t need to send Amaela out, which lessened the risk of her acting up later.
+++
You have been assigned a mission!
• Mission type: Testing.
• Objective: Slap the ghoul next to you five times.
• Bonus objective: Slap yourself three times.
• Progress: 0/5 slaps delivered
• Reward: <error>
• Bonus Reward: <error>
• Upon failure: <error>
• Failure condition(s): <error>
• Time Limit: 1 minute.
+++
[Error! Failure to assign an incomplete quest.]
Aiden created a quest to check if the ghouls can follow instructions. However, he ended up discovering something else.
He couldn’t assign them rewards, couldn’t give them punishment for failing tasks. He couldn’t even define the conditions for failure.
Check their stats.
[Host... they are fanatics.]
A new loyalty tier had been unlocked called fanatics. All the ghouls were added to that tier, and the benefit of that tier? Their loyalty to him was absolute.
It was because of their absolute loyalty that Aiden couldn’t assign his usual conditions for failure. After all, the ghouls would never reject any command he gave them.
But instead of quelling his queries, it confused Aiden even more.
"Amaela created them, so why are they loyal to me?" he mumbled.
[Host, it might be simpler than you think.]
[That vampire is bound to you by a contract. As such, her creations could be considered subletters. The theory would also explain why they are recognized as ’drifters’.]
Aiden smiled, shaking his head in disbelief. Just what kind of overpowered system was he given this time around? Could even monsters be his tenants?
"Well done, Amaela," Aiden said, patting her back with his tiny finger.
It was more than enough contact he could muster with her. Unfortunately, someone was in a mood to complain.
"I would rather you do this," Amaela smirked, hitting her overgrown butt.
Aiden sighed and assigned the ghouls a new mission. This time, he changed the failure conditions and didn’t add any rewards. As expected, the quest went through on the first attempt.
A second later, they picked her up and tied her to a support beam.
"You can cool off here," Aiden said, buying a foldable chair from the shop to sit. "In the meantime, I’ll test these ghouls."