Chapter 63: Balthazar Knows Too Much

This was my first time torturing someone, but for some reason, I was kinda enjoying it, especially considering that bastard had tried to kill me.

With the pliers in hand, I used my other hand to force the vampire’s mouth open, and moved the pliers toward it.

"I’ll rip off one of your fangs," I said, showing no sympathy. "At the end of this, you’ll be the first toothless vampire. Nice, right? You’ll stand out from the rest."

Not that he didn’t already stand out, being without arms and eyes.

"Wait, wait," he begged. "I don’t know much because I’m not part of the higher-ups, but I know a few things. Please, stop!"

The vampire was trembling with fear in front of me. The rest of his wounds, whether the arms or the eyes, could regenerate if he managed to feed on blood and had enough time to heal. Without his fangs, though, that would be a lot more complicated. That was why he was scared to death when I threatened him like that.

A bit boring, honestly. I wanted to have more fun torturing him, but apparently he wasn’t as tough as he made himself out to be.

"Spill it out, then," I said, putting the pliers away. "What do you know about the invasion? And why are all the monsters from the rifts attacking everywhere?"

The monster problem had escalated so quickly no one quite knew the reason yet.

With a trembling voice, the vampire said, "As far as I know, our vampire leader wanted something from the academy. I don’t know what, I swear. And about the other attacks, apparently, there are intelligent beings controlling the weaker monsters to leave the rifts and invade. It’s not something the stupid monsters would do on their own."

I frowned. It made sense. Monsters leaving the rifts and attacking people or places happened all the time, sure, but having that many leave the rifts together, like a fucking army, wasn’t natural. That was far different from anything we had seen before.

Something was pulling the strings for that to happen. The demon we released? Could be, but I wasn’t sure. Only by investigating further would I get more answers.

"What did the vampires want from the academy? Tell me!" I shouted, forcing his mouth open again, moving the pliers closer.

I had to push him to make sure he was telling me everything.

When the vampire felt the cold metal on his mouth, he said one more thing to me.

"It’s something, alright, like an item, I don’t know. I just know they’re not looking for a person, but a thing. Please, I’m telling you everything I know."

From the way the vampire said it, I could even hear the distant crying in his voice. He was really shaken by the whole situation.

I wanted to kill him, and it would’ve been the right move too, but instead, I kept him locked inside that dungeon.

"I can’t let you go, for now," I said. "But eventually I can, if you prove yourself more valuable. I might need your help again. Are you willing to stay quiet and obey? If so, I might change this cell and give you blood."

"I’m willing to do anything, just don’t kill me. I don’t even like our group’s leader. He’s not thinking about our well-being. Attacking an academy? Isn’t that a stupid move?"

"Stupid or not, they’re succeeding, aren’t they?"

"For how long? Even if they destroy the barrier, everyone fucking knows that once an S rank hunter shows up there, all the vampires will either die or run like bitches. Our leader is counting on the current mess happening in the country, hoping no S rank hunter goes to protect the academy."

"Considering the academy’s invasion happened almost at the same time as the other attacks, your leader certainly knew beforehand that it would happen, so the person pulling the strings for these coordinated attacks talked to him somehow," I said.

The vampire realized he had said more than he should. At that point, he just went along with it.

"He received a letter," he said, "talking about the other attacks. That’s how he planned our attack. I think other intelligent monsters received something similar."

So the monster behind all of it was working with other intelligent monsters. Vampires were one of them, but there were lots of other creatures with similar or even higher intelligence. That octopus we met was certainly from a species with high intelligence. I wouldn’t be surprised if I ran into one of them in the near future.

I hit the vampire’s head with the pliers just to scare him a little. His entire body shook when I did that. He was almost peeing himself or something.

"See, you can be useful. If you keep it up, then you might survive."

Walking over to the table with the other torture tools, I put the pliers back. Then, I left the dungeon.

The vampire heard my footsteps going away, so he begged, "Can you give me blood? I can only last 1 week without it, or I’ll die!"

I smirked. He couldn’t see it, but I bet he felt it when I said, "Then we’ll meet again in six days."

Fucking stupid thing. He was my prisoner, so I would give him blood only when necessary. The vampire didn’t say another word, probably afraid I would get pissed and not give him any blood at all.

I left my pocket dimension, finding myself back on that mountain with a clear view of Seattle. No monsters had followed me there, which was good. From up there, I saw fire, buildings collapsing, and even destroyed cars on the roads.

It was worse than I expected... The news and the principal made it sound like it was just a coordinated attack that might end soon, but the damage was just too massive. The city was in ruins, and surely a lot of people had died.

I sat down for a moment. What should I do? The best thing was to keep getting stronger and see how the situation turned out. Hunters would have to adapt to this new reality, for sure.

"Just when I thought things were getting better..."

Then, as I was lost in thought, I heard a noise coming from behind me. Someone had stepped on a branch.

I quickly got up and turned around, already summoning my cube to use as a weapon. Then, I saw it. Two people.

One was that fucking Zeph, hurt all over with blood covering his body, clothes ragged. He was covered in dirt too.

"I know we didn’t get a good start," Zeph said, his voice barely audible. "But please, help me..."

He fell to the ground right after saying that, passing out.

As for the other person with him, it was one of my professors, Balthazar, the old man who had shown us the Unstable Rift back then. He had been missing for quite a while, so I was surprised to see him there.

"Professor?" I said. "Why are you here? I didn’t even see you at the academy."

Balthazar looked somewhat hurt too, but not as bad as Zeph.

"This might sound weird, like I’m not trustworthy, but trust me, please? I... I stole something from the academy. It’s something the vampires wanted too, but I got it first. Can you help me hide it?"

What the actual fuck? I wasn’t expecting that even in my dreams.

"Wait a second," I said. "You vanished, then showed up out of nowhere with a stolen item? And how did you find me?"

"I touched you," he said.

I frowned.

"Calm down, old man, what the fuck is this? You tried to help me, sure, but what do you mean?"

Balthazar shook his head. "No, no, I touched you when I grabbed your hand back then, remember? I put a tracking rune on you, so I knew where you went. I also know about the Primordial Serpent you met, and about your Primordial Slime too."

Now things got really serious. I wasn’t seeing him as a friendly professor anymore, but as someone who knew a lot of things he shouldn’t know.

"My tracking rune doesn’t let me see or hear what you do, but as you know, I’m a researcher who loves to know more about rifts, monsters, and history in general. I’m not the only one who knows about the Primordial Serpent or the Primordial Slime, though I might be the only one who knows you have their powers."

"How? The bloodline I’m not surprised about, since people can sense it, and if you knew the serpent was in that rift, then you could guess. But the slime?"

"I just thought, kid. If you got the serpent’s bloodline, then you must have something special for it to be willing to share with you. And considering how much stronger you got recently, plus my knowledge about some of the Primordial beasts, I guessed you could have the slime with you to multiply things. Just a hunch, but I think I’m damn right about it."

"Also, that got even more convincing when Lion Heart told me you showed up with lots of monster crystals to sell in his shop, and when he spoke with Camille, who met you in the first rift you explored, she said you guys didn’t get that many crystals. So how could such a weakling show up with so many crystals to sell?"

Damn it. I didn’t even think about that. Also this old fox was friends with Lion Heart too, which made me doubt my friendship with Lion Heart as well. Were they both against me?

Things weren’t looking good. The atmosphere tensed up.

"What now? Should we fight?" I said.