Transmigrated as a Ghost

"Your Majesty?! Relia shouted, her face twisting into an aghast expression.

There was a deafening silence after her outburst, and Relia looked far paler than usual. As if he soul could leave her body at any moment.

"You're not serious, are you?" Marcus asked, not entirely sure if they were being messed with right now or not. The Empress had made her declaration so earnestly that it was hard to tell.

"No, obviously. I'm barely over four hundred years old. It's far too soon for me to start considering something so morbid as ending my own life."

Her lips twisted into a satisfied grin since her prank had the desired effect.

While no one had fully believed her, there was a bit of doubt in their minds that she might have been earnest.

"Please don't frighten me like that again. You're the heart of this nation and all of that have sworn ourselves to you. If you were to… die. I just don't even want to imagine it." Relia said, clutching her chest and grimacing as if she was experiencing the most horrid kind of pain.

"Sorry, Relia, I won't make a joke like that again. Marcus here just set it up so well for me, I thought I should play along."

Her close retainer still had a hint of horror in her eyes, but her expression as now mostly one of exasperation.

"Okay, I shouldn't have tried to bring some levity to the conversation. Let's finally get to the main issue. What do you want Lyra and I to do for you?"

Obviously, he did not think that a powerful ruler of a large underground nation had called them for something frivolous.

She had been watching Marcus for nearly as long as he had been on Mirrion.

His fight with Vesairous that had put him on her radar had happened before he even reached Borealia's royal capital.

"I suppose that I shouldn't joke around or delay any longer." The vampire empress said. "I need all of you to kill some people for me."

Marcus could tell that this was no jest this time. She truly meant it.

"So, we're to be assassins for you?" Marcus said, his tone filled with disdain at the idea.

"I was thinking more as fighters on my side but frame it how you wish. Certainly, you've noticed the tension and added security in the city. We've had spies from an enemy nation infiltrating us more often as of late. War is on the horizon, and I've delayed it for as long as I can already."

All had gone quiet again as Marcus, Lyra, and Quillon contemplated what the empress had just said.

Roxene, on the other hand, appeared to be completely disinterested.

She was here only to back Marcus up. Whatever decision he made was of little concern to her. It simply was not a matter she cared about.

"If someone as powerful as you can't defeat this foe your up against, I'm not sure what you really expect of us. Surely, we're each strong, but were only four individuals. There would only be so much we can do in a war." Lyra said, clearly uncomfortable with the prospect of participating in a foreign war.

After the civil war in Tralenstein, she felt she had had her fill of such widespread bloodshed for a lifetime.

"Ah, that shouldn't be a problem. The issue that we have with our current foe is more one of compatibility, instead of strength. Neither myself nor any of my top retainers can kill their leaders."

The empress explained that the hostile nation they were up against was led by a race of shadowy beings called Umbrashnul.

Those among their race that achieved a higher quality evolution became nearly impossible to put down.

Even if they were torn apart, they would merely burst into shadows and collect themselves to be put back together elsewhere.

"It makes it terribly difficult to finish them off for good. They have specific weakness that are impossible for us to wield. In fact, our two species have very similar vulnerabilities."

The most obvious one being light based attacks. Something that Marcus just happened to be very proficient with.

"If they are so dangerous, how have you not already lost?" Quillon said bluntly.

If the vampires were fighting a foe that they could not beat, it did make one consider how they were even still around.

"Because this issue goes both ways. Just as I am unable to finish off their king, he is unable to defeat me for good. Over the last seven years, we've fought each other a few times. I once completely obliterated his body, but he was mostly fine the next day. Another time he tore off all my limbs, decapitated me, and ripped my heart out and crushed it. But I simply turned myself to mist and returned to recuperate in my sanctuary."

When it became clear that neither side could defeat the other, they ended up in a sort of cold war where both sides began amassing power but knew that they could not overcome their enemy at the moment.

"I see. So that's why you want me. But what about Lyra? Certainly she is powerful, but she doesn't possess light magic."

"That is true, but her flames have special properties. There is an aspect of them that goes beyond simple burning. Of that I'm certain." The Empress asserted.

Lyra simply nodded her head and did not attempt to hide anything.

While normal fire was effective against both vampires and Umbrashnuls, it was not enough to destroy high tier evolutions of their races for good.

Marcus could use his strongest fire magic to incinerate the Draayer Empress right now, but that would merely inconvenience her for a little while before her ashes reconstituted back into her body.

Though vampires might have possessed some serious weaknesses, their race came with some powerful perks as well. Being very difficult to kill being one of them.