Chapter 71: Issue on the Trail!

It was another day, and the air was crackling faintly with residual mana as ash drifted through the terrain.

Broken trees lay snapped across the clearing, their roots torn from the earth, blackened by fire and splattered with blood and guts. The stench of burnt fur, blood, and scorched ozone lingered, thick and heavy.

Dead monsters littered the ground.

Dozens of them. Hounds with bone masks, insectoid reptiles with venomous tails, mana-corrupted apes whose bodies still twitched with posthumous sparks. All silenced now. All dead.

At the center of it all sat Albedo, cross-legged on a slab of cooled obsidian with Ember beside him, her breath quiet and steady with her eyes fixed on her partner.

She chewed slowly, jaws crunching through a Low Gold-Rank beast core he had just fed her.

“Easy now,” Albedo murmured, brushing her flank with long, rhythmic strokes, “You did well.”

Ember nickered in response, a soft, deep sound that vibrated through her throat like warm thunder. Her body leaned into his hand, like a cat pressing into a favored touch.

Albedo smiled faintly, retrieving another beast core from his pouch. This one pulsed faintly, frost-aligned mana swirled inside it like a trapped storm.

“Here,” he offered, holding the crystal orb in his palm, “You burned the ice-hounds. You earned this one.”

Ember leaned down delicately, lips brushing his fingers as she took it. She bit down, and the core cracked with a crystalline chime.

Mana bled into her like liquid moonlight, washing over her coat in a brief, shimmering pulse. Her flames flared brighter and hungrier.

Albedo reached up, brushing along her neck, where strands of her spectral mane curled in the air like fog caught in moonbeams. His fingers danced through the ghostlight. Ember didn’t shy away.

“You really do enjoy showing off,” he whispered.

She gave a soft snort, but still leaned in for more of the pets.

He unwrapped a ration of hardened mana bread and a preserved bloodfruit from his side pouch, tearing it in half. He took a bite himself, chewing slowly, then held the other piece up to Ember.

She sniffed it and gave him a look.

Albedo shrugged, “Don’t give me that. You love bloodfruit. Don’t pretend to be noble now.”

With a huff, Ember bent down and took the piece from his hand. Her fangs, not sharp but elegantly equine, crushed the fruit like a berry, red juice dripping to the ground beside burned moss.

They sat there, quietly eating together amidst the dead for a few minutes.

He tossed another core her way, this one from the corrupted ape that nearly tore through their flank earlier. It was still twitching faintly with kinetic mana, pulsing erratically.

Ember caught it mid-air, crushing it with a single bite. Sparks licked at her lips before she swallowed.

Finally, using his ’Voice of Beasts’ Albedo could tell Ember was full, so after using some basic water magic to wash her off, he quickly mounted her and they were on their way once more.

The sun shining brightly in the sky behind fractured clouds, staining the dying sky in hues of gold and violet as Ember galloped across the broken terrain.

Each of her hoofbeats left behind faint rings of shimmering heat, her celestial flames burning blue-white as they danced harmlessly above the cracked soil.

Albedo sat in the saddle with practiced ease, one hand casually resting on Ruin’s hilt, the other unwrapping another high-grade mana chocolate bar.

He bit into it lazily, eyes fixed on the road ahead, his senses half-alert as Ember weaved gracefully through fields of skeletal trees and ancient cairns.

“According to the map,” he muttered, glancing down at the map he had bought of the surrounding area before this trip, “Another day, maybe less before we reach Yazagoth. Once there, we can finally teleport into the Demon Kingdom.”

Yazagoth was the final stop. An intermediary city created by the Demons which is the nexus hub of all of those who wanted to travel to the Demon Kingdom.

While the more influential persons had their own ways to enter, for normal folks like Albedo, this was the only way.

The journey was basically made intentionally dangerous, to weed out the weak, as the Demon Kingdom more than any other, worshipped the strong.

Ember whinnied softly, her breath steaming with faint starlight. “Relax girl. Nothing’s gonna jump out at us. Most monsters know better than to approach a Celestial Mare.”

That was the truth. Ember came from Ancient Times, her Race was influential and her bloodline was Sovereign-esque. Most beasts from this era didn’t dare attack, the natural bloodline suppression being too much for them.

It actually took them jumping into a Den of monsters just to find those that they previously hunted for food, since they would all run away constantly from Ember’s bloodline aura.

Albedo took another bite of the mana-chocolate, looking at the map before he felt the air surrounding him shift.

It was subtle, too subtle for the untrained. However to Albedo, it was like a clear warning. The birds stopped chirping. The shadows deepened unnaturally, and the pressure in the air changed.

His eyes narrowed as he looked around.

From the left ridge, a faint giggle echoed through the air like the chime of silver bells… and from the right, a whisper like wind curling through old crypts.

And then they appeared. Two figures emerged simultaneously from the treeline like mirrors. They weren’t trying to hide. No, in fact, they seemed to enjoy the reveal.

The one on the left walked with an elegant grace, obsidian-black hair cascading down her back like liquid ink.

Her eyes were crimson slits, fangs peeking from her lips even though she smiled sweetly. Skin pale as moonlight, dressed in elegant black-gold robes that shimmered faintly with blood magic. A Vampire, a Noble one at that.

She seemed to bear absolutely no issues walking in the sun, something that only the top Vampire Nobles could say.

The one on the right was all fire and shadow. She was taller, probably around Albedo’s height, with dark purple skin marked with a variety of tribal tattoos, curved horns that peeked from her silver hair, and a spaded tail flicking lazily behind her. Her eyes were amber-gold and glinted with wild curiosity.

A Demon, and most likely a Noble as well.

Both of them looked to be around his age, maybe a bit older, and the longer Albedo looked at them, especially since they appeared together, the more he felt he recognized them from the Novel.

“Hello there, handsome,” the Vampire greeted, her voice syrupy and cultured, as if every word was dipped in honey.

“You’re a long way from safe territory,” the Demon added, licking her lips as she eyed Albedo… and more specifically, Ember.

“You’re not from the Hollow,” Albedo said, slowing Ember to a stop, his eyes wary.

“We don’t belong to the Hollow,” the Demon said, “Or to any of those pathetic cities crawling with weaklings.”

“We’re just out on a traveling trip right now,” the Vampire added, “searching for rare things. Exotic things.” Her eyes flicked to Ember. “And she is… exquisite.”

Albedo rolled his eyes, definitely recognizing who these two were from the Novel once he heard that. Ember’s fire flared slightly beneath her hooves, sensing the intent.

“You’re not getting her,” Albedo said flatly, a smile forming on his lips.

The Demon grinned, “Ooooh, so possessive. I like that in a man. I wonder if mom will let me chain him to the bed like the others, she was never fond of humans.”

The Vampire sighed dramatically, “Really now, don’t make this difficult. We’re just curious. We want to touch her. Maybe ride her. Maybe… own her.”

Albedo drew Havoc and Ruin in one fluid motion.

“No.”

That was all he said. The wind grew still. The girls stopped smiling as they saw him pull out the Dual Pistols.

“Well,” the Demon said, stretching, “Guess we’re doing this the hard way.”

“Try not to die too fast,” the Vampire added, licking her finger and drawing a blood rune in the air.

They moved at the same time.

The Vampire blurred, using bloodstep to vanish and reappear behind Ember. Her hand reached for the Mare’s mane, but Ember twisted with an unnatural grace, her flame-coated tail whipping around like a serpent.

~BOOM!~

Albedo fired backward with Havoc in Infernal mode, forcing the Vampire to dodge as a pillar of red flame exploded between them. He flipped forward off Ember, landing on the ground just as the Demon girl punched the earth.

~CRACK!~

Black flames erupted from beneath him, a ring of demonfire designed to trap and paralyze, but Albedo cast a snap-spell, and blinked out just before the fire sealed around his ankles.

“Oh, you dodged that?” The Demoness said in surprise, looking around for where Albedo blinked to.

He soon reappeared midair.

~BANG~BANG!~

Ruin’s Mana-Drain rounds curved through the space, one aimed at the Demon’s shoulder, the other at her thigh.

She flicked her hand, a barrier of molten obsidian forming just in time to deflect the first, but the second grazed her leg, and she felt a pain wrack her body as mana was extracted from her being and flowed into Albedo.

Her eyes widened as she realized what was happening.

“You little!”

“You shouldn’t have tried this,” Albedo muttered, casting another spell.

[ Firestorm Cage ]

Six blazing tendrils of flame burst from the ground, wrapping around the Vampire in a blazing prison, forcing her into defensive mode.

But she wasn’t panicking.

“Oh darling… I feast on flame.”

Her body dissolved into a blood mist and reformed outside the cage, her blood magic enhancing her speed tenfold. She zoomed toward him like a streak of shadow and velvet.

~CLANG!~

Her claws met Ruin mid-block, scraping across the pistol’s reinforced runes.

Albedo flipped back and fired, the shot hitting her side and draining more of her magic, but the Demon was already upon him.

Albedo dropped low and cast:

[ Firepath: Serpent Spinal Spiral ]

He twisted, flames erupting from his boots and shoulder in opposite directions, creating a corkscrew explosion that flung both girls back. He landed on a nearby boulder, breathing steadily, mana coursing like fire beneath his skin.

“This is your last warning.”

The Vampire wiped her mouth, licking blood from her lip. “I haven’t had this in soo long,”

The Demon’s tattoos flared. “He’s even more beautiful when angry.”

They charged again.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep