Harem System In A fantasy World - Chapter 277: More fun
Chapter 277: More fun
Celeste’s POV…
…
Celeste stood still on the endless surface of water, the ripples from her last movement long gone by now.
The space gradually returned to that same eerie silence that felt too deep and too empty, even for her liking.
She had just won her seventh fight, and though each fight had been difficult in its own way, proven by her somewhat currently battered state, she was still a bit distracted.
Her thoughts refused to move past what the Ancestor Darius from her first battle had said before vanishing into nothing after she defeated him.
Time magic.
She frowned slightly, her brows knitting as she lifted her hand slowly, staring at it as if she expected something to manifest, but nothing happened, no matter how much she focused on it.
She had done the same thing each time after every fight, to no avail, unfortunately.
There was no shift, no distortion, and no sensation that would even hint at such an affinity, and yet… he had said it so confidently, like he was sure of it, and that was not something an ancestor of his level would mistake so easily.
“Trial for two…” she muttered quietly, her hand lowering as her gaze drifted toward her stomach for the briefest moment before she straightened again. Her expression settled back into calm. There was no time to dwell on confusion.
A dark, bloody red glow engulfed her body, and she was once again healed to peak condition for the seventh time in this trial. It was the trial’s way of balancing things out.
Since she was up against a different opponent at their peak strength each time, it was only natural that she enter each battle in the same peak state as when she began.
And of course, that also meant her next opponent was about to make an appearance.
The water beneath her feet trembled slightly.
It was subtle at first, a faint ripple that spread outward in slow circles, but it didn’t stop, it grew steadily, the surface beneath her feet vibrating lightly as if something deep beneath it had begun to stir, and then—
Badum.
A loud heartbeat echoed out.
It echoed through the space, not through her ears, but directly into her mind, into her chest, syncing with her own pulse for a brief moment before it diverged again.
Badum.
The water began to darken.
What had once looked like an endless reflective surface now seemed deeper and heavier, the colour shifting into a thicker, darker, ink-like colour that bled through it.
Shapes began to form beneath the surface, faint silhouettes at first. They were indistinct and continuously shifting, but growing clearer with each passing second.
Celeste’s eyes sharpened.
She stepped back slightly, her stance adjusting instinctively as mana began to circulate through her body. Her senses expanded outward as she tried to gauge what was coming, and then the first figure broke the surface.
It was a hand.
A pale and slender hand.
It rose slowly from the water, droplets sliding down its length as it reached upward, followed by an arm, then a shoulder, and then a full body pulled itself free from the surface as if emerging from another world entirely, and then another, and another.
Dozens, no, hundreds of figures began to rise from the endless water, all of them similar in form and all of them carrying that same pale complexion, that same red tint in their eyes, though dim and incomplete, like shadows of something that had once been whole.
They were all female silhouettes of the same vampire.
Celeste’s gaze hardened.
“Blood constructs…” she murmured under her breath, her voice was low but steady as she took in the scene.
The famous vampire bloodline cloning spell. This technique was a nightmare to fight against, for plenty of reasons.
The first clone would carry fifty percent of the original’s strength. If you made two, that fifty percent would be split between the two copies, meaning they would both be twenty-five percent clones.
What truly made it monstrous was that creating clones had no effect on the caster’s own strength other than consuming mana, meaning you would have to fight against them as well as their clones.
No doubt, most would prefer to create clones and stay at the backline, let the clones do the work without putting themselves in danger. Probably what this new opponent was doing.
The better mastery one had of the technique, the more clones one could make.
It was a pain to fight against because, against a true master, you would find yourself against hundreds of opponents, like right now, even though that made the clones much weaker. Perhaps in a more dire situation, you might find yourself up against a thousand clones.
’Theoretically, it should be possible to create a whole army with this spell,’ she thought.
In truth, there was a rumor that this technique, as they knew it, was simply a cheap imitation of what a progenitor vampire could do.
It is believed that their clones do not suffer the same drawback of having their strength halved each time you create another one, and that it is possible to make a singular one-hundred percent clone of oneself, but that is a story for another day.
The figures had begun to move.
Their movements were slow, and their limbs were stiff as they adjusted to their forms, but that stiffness faded quickly, replaced by fluid, coordinated motion as their eyes all locked onto her at once.
Badum.
The heartbeat sounded again.
And this time, they moved all at once.
Woosh!
The first one lunged forward, its body blurring slightly as it closed the distance in an instant, its hand reaching out with clawed fingers aimed straight for her throat, but Celeste was already moving, her body shifting to the side with effortless grace as her hand rose in a simple motion.
“Blood Marionette.”
Her fingers curled.
The figure froze mid-motion and its body locked in on itself.
Crack!
It twisted unnaturally before collapsing into the water below, dissolving into dark particles the moment it made contact.
But there was no pause.
Three more were already upon her.
Celeste moved through them, her steps light, precise, and her body weaving between their attacks as if she had already seen them before they happened, her hand rising again, this time not to control, but to shape.
Blood gathered from the water, from the air, and from them. It condensed into thin, sharp threads that snapped outward in an instant.
Shhk—!
Heads rolled and bodies split to shreds.
The water beneath her rippled violently as more and more of them fell, dissolving as quickly as they appeared, but for every one she destroyed, more continued to rise, their numbers not diminishing, and their presence seemingly growing.
Badum.
The heartbeat grew louder.
Her breathing remained steady, and her expression was calm, but her eyes had sharpened further, the faint crimson glow within them deepening slightly as she adjusted her stance, her mana flowing more freely and more aggressively now.
This wasn’t about raw power at all.
This was about endurance and control, and about how long she could maintain this pace. Another wave surged forward.
Woosh—woosh—woosh—
They came from all directions now, their movements faster, more coordinated, their attacks less predictable as they closed in on her from every angle, and for a brief moment, the space around her filled completely.
Boom!
A pulse erupted from her body.
Red Mana surged outward in a violent wave, tearing through the nearest figures and forcing the rest back just enough to create space, her hand rising as her fingers spread wide.
“Coagulate.”
The water beneath her shifted instantly, hardening, thickening, and rising in jagged spikes that pierced through multiple figures at once, suspending them in place before they shattered into fragments of dark light.
Silence returned for a brief second as Celeste exhaled slowly. Her eyes flickered once.
Badum.
The entire space around her trembled. The water surged violently. And something far larger began to rise from its solid depths.
The ripples on the water were no longer gentle but chaotic, rising and crashing in uneven waves as more figures clawed their way out from beneath the surface.
Their bodies formed faster now, stronger, more refined, their movements sharper as they rushed her from all directions, forcing her to move continuously without pause, her steps light but relentless as she twisted and turned, ducking beneath clawed hands and slicing through necks with threads of blood that snapped outward like whips.
Shhk—!
Once again, heads split, bodies torn apart, and limbs scattered across the dark surface before dissolving into nothing, but they kept coming, endlessly, as if the trial itself was testing how long she could keep up.
Her breathing grew heavier, not laboured yet, but a bit deeper as her mana flowed in stronger currents through her veins, her hands moving almost instinctively now.
Blood Marionette snapped one enemy’s spine mid-lunge, while she used coagulate to harden the surface beneath another before spikes tore through its torso from below.
Crack!
Bones shattered, blood sprayed, but the blood never stayed; it always dissolved quickly, always returned to the pool, probably feeding it, strengthening it, and maybe serving to make the next wave faster.
It was odd how these constructs’ bodies seemed so real, which went to show, really, how the spell was so intricately made to be as real as possible.
Celeste was more than prepared to face another huge wave of constructs that had already begun to form, but just then….
Clap. Clap. Clap.
The sound of someone clapping their hands cut through everything.
The rushing figures stopped, and the unstable water around them stilled all at once.
Celeste froze for the briefest moment, her eyes snapping toward the source as a figure appeared not too far away from her position, standing calmly on the surface as if she had always been there.
Her hands came together in slow applause, and she had a soft smile on her lips as she tilted her head slightly, her long dark hair flowing gently behind her as her crimson eyes glowed with a deep, ancient intensity.
“Wonderful,” the woman said lightly, her voice smooth, almost amused, “your control is exquisite for someone so young, truly, I am impressed.”
Celeste said nothing.
She only stared as the woman smiled wider.
“Ah, the silent type,” she mused, lowering her hands as she took a slow step forward, the water beneath her feet barely rippling, “I suppose that makes this more fun for me.”
