Chapter 402 – 402. The Vampire Race
Of the two visiting the ducal family and facing Alex and Eleanor in Alex’s office, Ayra bowed her head.
“Hello. I haven’t seen you in a long time.”
“Okay. Long time no see.”
“Come on. Ayra.”
Alex nodded and was greeted by Eira.
“Oh, how are you?”
Eira’s companion, who bowed her head at the same time, was a person she had never seen before.
However, since she had heard about Eira’s visit in her letter beforehand, Alex and Eleanor knew who he was.
“Nice to meet you. I am Alex Armitas, the minor duke in charge of managing this lord.”
“My name is Eleanor Armitas.”
“Yes. Yes… It’s called Cha Hanseong…”
Cha Hanseong was nervous right now.
Could he really have imagined that a situation would come when he, a mere knight, would meet the duke’s family, the second person in the country?
Alex was treating the two of them with the expression of a lord doing business, not the expression of meeting an old acquaintance.
“I heard that the captain of Artia has officially requested help from our territory.”
“Yes. Captain…”
Eira, slightly slurring her words, said, addressing her own father as ‘Chief.
It’s because he came for a public job, not a completely private one like Alex.
Before long, he stared at Eleanor and conveyed her own business.
“Eunhyeon. You asked for advice from him and for military support from the ducal family.”
“… Advice and support.”
Alex glanced at Eleanor’s face.
Unfortunately, Riod’s request to seek advice from Eun-hyeon could not be granted.
“I’m sorry, but he’s out of the office right now.”
Eleanor told the story of how she was away with Illyana at the request of her help from Regina, the queen of elves.
“That… I see…”
Eira nodded her head with a sad expression on her face.
Since her position was vacated, it became impossible to seek advice.
“Then let’s talk about requesting support.”
“All right.”
Eira slowly explained the reason why she and Cha Han-seong came to the Duke Armitas family for the next business.
“Recently in local estates… Mysterious disappearances are happening.”
“…”
As Eira continued her explanation with her hard face, Alex and Eleanor’s eyes narrowed as they listened to her story.
“It’s a missing person case…”
Ayra continued her explanation.
“A total of three territories that received reports of mysterious disappearances. The total number of missing people is about 120.”
“… A lot.”
Alex and Eleanor also sensed that something was wrong, and she frowned.
“… Yes. A lot. Currently, the Knights of Artia are dispatching knights to these three places to understand the circumstances of the incident.”
However, it was not easy to figure out the circumstances of the incident even during the investigation.
A family of four suddenly disappeared in the middle of the night.
Farmers who were running tenant farms suddenly disappeared.
The guards who were on guard duty at the guard post in the territory disappeared without even knowing it.
What was really strange was the traces left by the missing people.
“All of the missing people say only the body disappeared.”
“Only the body… ?”
“Yes. The clothes remain, only the human body. In the words of the article that reported it, it’s like… As if you drank all the water in the bowl.”
Upon hearing the story, the expressions of Alex and Eleanor frowned.
Can a person’s body disappear without a sound or rumor, leaving only the clothes?
It is a strange phenomenon that makes you feel uncomfortable just by listening to it.
“Furthermore… We could not find any commonalities among the missing persons.”
All 120 missing people could not find anything in common in terms of gender, age, place of residence, and human relationships.
“What I have learned so far is… The fact that all of the disappearances were at night, the fact that there were three villages that were reported, and the fact that there was a group that was moving in an organized manner that could never be organized by an individual.”
And it is that only the human body has disappeared, leaving behind the clothes one by one.
Through the witness information that all the missing people carried out their daily routine during the day without any problems, it was possible to narrow the time of disappearance to the time period from afternoon to dawn, but this is the only achievement at present.
Unexpectedly, it was Cha Han-seong, who had recently joined Artia, who provided a clue in that frustrating situation.
“For the two of you… Do you know about a race called vampires?”
“… Vampire?”
Alex tilted his head slightly at the word, which he seemed to have heard somewhere, but did not let go of his expression.
Eleanor, who was also making a similar expression, nodded her head and replied.
“Know. They are known as a heterogeneous race that climb out of graves in the middle of the night and suck the blood of living humans.”
“Also called Vampire.”
Cha Han-seong, who had been silently listening to Eira’s story until now, opened her mouth with a hard face, and Alex, Eleanor, and Eira moved their gaze to Cha Han-seong.
“The reason for bringing up the story of that tribe now. Do you want to say that the cause of the disappearance of the local people is the work of that vampire or a race called vampires?”
Alex asked, staring at Cha Hanseong, who participated in the conversation with sharp eyes.
“… That’s right.”
Despite the fierce question of the duke’s heir, Cha Han-seong calmly nodded in affirmation.
In Cha Han-sung’s eyes, there was no expression of nervousness after meeting Alex and Eleanor, and his eyes, which had a hardened serious face, contained various emotions.
Is it anger, sadness, guilt, or vengeance?
Those eyes, with many emotions, were eyes that had a certain certainty related to this incident.
It is not known what causal relationship the conclusion was made, but Cha Han-seong was convinced.
That the culprit of this mysterious incident is a vampire.
But just because he has that conviction doesn’t mean that other people have to go along with it.
Even Artia’s request to the duke’s family was to support troops, so it was a matter that had no choice but to be cautious.
“How can you be so sure? I think that vampire, or the race called vampire, is a race described in the book, and there is not enough evidence as there are no actual cases witnessed.”
Alex did not openly deny the race of vampires.
That’s right, now I’ve come into contact with the race called ‘Elf’, which I’ve only known about through books, through Eun-hyeon’s introduction.
Likewise, Alex is not foolish enough to deny that there is a heterogeneous race that has appeared before humans.
“That… ! Nice… !”
Cha Hanseong was about to say something, but realized it in a hurry and groaned and closed his mouth.
Alex’s point was also reasonable.
In particular, as it was a job to support some of the knights belonging to one’s own family, it was an important issue to accurately grasp the situation.
Vampires look very similar to humans, but they are a special, non-human race like beastmen and elves.
There is a tendency for beastmen to live in harmony with humans, but it is only natural that there are races like elves who hide and hide from humans.
Vampires are also a race that tends not to reveal themselves to humans.
“Do you know what a vampire’s stock is? It is human blood.”
They are human beings
A special race that maintains their lives by ingesting human blood and converting it into a large amount of magical power to make it their own.
The blood of animals or beasts cannot be replaced, and the race of vampires, who must consume only human blood, disappeared from the eyes of humans at some point.
It is like the Elves to have access to the knowledge that such a race existed, now only in books, but the cause is quite different from the Elves.
“The reason why vampires hide their identities from humans is to hunt humans in deeper darkness.”
They see humans not as humans, but as food.
Just as humans raise and kill livestock for food.
It is to systematically and systematically hunt humans in a darker place, and plan to keep their identities from being exposed for the rest of their lives.
“There are two reasons why I can be sure that the masterminds behind this incident are neither humans nor demons, but vampires. The first is that the bodies of the missing people are all gone, leaving behind only their clothes.”
Vampires, who suck and eat all the blood that exists in the human body, consider flesh with human blood as a delicacy besides blood.
As if a great sauce is put on a steak, they don’t even suck at all human blood, they eat the delicacies of flesh.
And the bones of the skinny humans left on the clothes are recovered as the spoils of the vampires.
The mystery of disappearing without a trace, leaving only clothes behind, has become a custom of the tribe formed by the vampire’s appetite and bad taste.
“And the second is that it all happened at night.”
“Okay. It’s a story that makes sense. But there are also contradictions. Why do you think that race, which has been operating in secret until now, has started hunting people in such a conspicuous way?”
“…”
Hearing Alex’s point, Cha Han-seong clenched his fists.
“This part… Sorry, but I don’t know either. However, in my own judgment, if the thoughts of the vampires began to change all at once and began to reveal themselves…”
“You mean there might have been an opportunity to abandon the old method of secretly hunting humans while hiding your identity?”
“… That’s right.”
“… Hmm.”
Looking at Alex, lost in her thoughts, Eira opened her mouth further.
“This opinion of Hanseong is very absurd and hard to believe, but… Since I was somewhat persuasive and had my own convictions, I came along to get advice from Eun-hyeon on this part.”
“Right.”
With time and effort, more information and clues can be gathered, but it is unpredictable how many more people will go missing in the meantime.
Therefore, Riod had no choice but to ask Eunhyeon for help.
Although it didn’t feel so good to receive Eun-hyeon’s help every time as the kingdom’s knights to protect the kingdom from a clear enemy.
The ability to grasp a mystery of unclear reality and solve a problem is a separate issue from the effort of ‘how well have you trained yourself’ as a knight.
Even if he hesitated due to feelings of pride or apologetic feelings, Riod knew well that the best way to get help from Eun-hyeon, who was no different in his field of expertise, was to do this.
As a result of the judgment that it was the more correct direction to handle the case quickly before there were any more missing people, Eira and Cha Han-seong, members of Artia’s knights, came to the Duke of Armitas for this reason.
“Surely… This is a problem that cannot be ignored…”
After hearing the story, Eleanor stood up.
“I will go home and try to contact him. Even if it’s impossible, I’ll try to get your opinion first.”
“Okay.”
Eleanor finished her story and immediately rose from her seat.
Soon after, she looked at Eira and Cha Hanseong and smiled sadly.
“It’s been a while since I’ve been here, and I’m sorry for waking up so early.”
“Oh, no… It’s okay.”
Ayra only smiled bitterly, probably because she had caught a glimpse of how busy Eleanor was right now.
Immediately after Eleanor left, Alex stood up as well.
“It won’t matter if I give you an answer by tomorrow, right?”
“Of course.”
On the contrary, she was thinking that she was lucky that she didn’t reject him right away.
“I will give you an answer by tomorrow morning. For now, I will prepare a room for you at the mansion, so you can rest.”
“Thank you.”
“And…”
Receiving thanks from Aira who bowed her head, Alex opened her mouth while staring at Cha Hanseong.
“Is it okay for a moment?”
