Chapter 295 Vampiric Calling



Yumi's eyes lit up with surprise, but she still kept her mouth shut, still unsure of my intentions. Despite my tone being quite menacing, my touch was gentle which confused her.

"Thank you, Miss. We will be on our way then." The head maid visibly looked relieved, but she made sure to not make it too obvious. The other maids all bowed and quickly left, leaving Yumi with me.

"Alright Yumi, come inside." I opened the door inside revealing a rather standard noble bedroom with a colour scheme of red and black. I quickly did a scan of the room to see if there was any magic at play and to check if my grandfather had the decency to not watch me in my room.

'If anything, that is what the maid is for, but seeing as she is new and timid, I can easily win her over. Still, he might have planted something inside that allows him to see the truth.' I grabbed a chair from the nearby desk and spun it around before sitting down to stare at Yumi.

'Tch, how troublesome, I'll need to be careful at least for a while until I'm certain that he isn't constantly watching.' Without realising it, my face contorted making it look like I was angry at Yumi. She stood by the door trembling, probably thinking that this was the end of her.

"Tell me Yumi, how much does my Grandfather see, and do you maids tell him everything?" Leaning onto the arm of the chair and crossing my legs, I wanted to give off a 'bossy girl' energy towards Yumi. I hoped she would crack under the pressure and tell me everything she knew.

'A lie-detection skill would be handy right about now.' I couldn't believe I never tried to get one before with how overprotective I was over Shaman, but I didn't think it existed as my perception of skills was purely battle-related.

"W-we maids are not privy to any information, we are just... tools to follow your orders. The Master of this place does not care for us, let alone get close to anything he doesn't deem important." Yumi gripped the apron on the front of her dress, hoping her answer satisfied me.

*Sigh* 'I know I said I will become a villainess, but I don't want this poor girl to go through any more torment.' An internal battle raged on within me about whether I should be benevolent or ruthless.

'Why don't you let me take control for once and stop repressing your true feelings.'

'Why now! The damn whispers are back, there has to be something in this journal about them.' It was rare, but at times when my emotions were quite volatile, the whispers were like the devil in my ear, edging me to go down the most destructive path.

I did sometimes listen to the whispers, but ever since I got more control over my emotions the whispers stopped. Nowadays they were barely a nuisance at worst.

'Just accept it already, if you let me take control of you, then everything will be easier.'

'Never, I don't want you whispering in my ear again.' Covering my eyes with my hand, I tried to avoid looking at Yumi as I felt a murderous urge build up. I clearly knew the intentions of the whispers, so attempting to block Yumi out of my vision was my best bet.

However, that didn't work at all, and the urge to kill Yumi grew. I didn't know the purpose of killing her, but my guess was that the whisper latched on to my anxiety about her being a spy for Teivel.

'You're not going to question why I can talk to you so easily now?'

The whisper is right, this was the first time I heard them so clearly, and it was like I was talking to a real person instead of just having some intrusive thoughts.

'Then kindly enlighten me. What are you?' My first thought was that this might be some kind of soul problem like Shaman's, where she had two souls. However, as far as I know I didn't randomly get transported into this body.

'Fine, maybe then you will finally agree. Now tell me, as you know you are only a partially transformed vampiric kitsune. What do you think my role is, considering you've so valiantly resisted me till now?'

'So you must be my vampire side, and if I were to accept you, then I will complete the transformation?' I still had no urge to suck blood, so I wasn't confident in my answer, but it was the only explanation I could think of.

"Fufu~, close enough. You may call me the... Dark urge and the feeling you see as your murderous impulses is the desire to drink blood. It is the final step to transformation, and it was such a shame to see you go for a bite but not take any blood.'

'Okay Dark urge, then why do you exist? To me, it sounds like you are a real person communicating with me from a distance, and only now can you speak clearly. Is your only purpose to coax people into transforming, or is there something else you want? Who are you really?' I instantly knew something was wrong, there was no way that this whisper was coming from within my body.

It finally clicked in my head. The most likely reason why the whispers were weak previously was due to me being in human territory, which was quite far from its base of operation. It leads me to believe that the origin of this vampiric power might be less natural than I initially thought.

If Shaman taught me anything about vampires from her world, it was that underlings were connected to some kind of elder vampire, a connection which can span across generations.

'Such a cunning fox, just like Teivel. I shouldn't have pushed my luck converting you. Still, Don't think you can hide your true feelings from me. Your mind is like an open book, and I can tell deep inside you want to have a taste of your true potential!.'

I had struck gold with my deductions, but now a new problem emerged. What do I do with this information, and did I poke a slumbering bear too much?

'We have much to discuss, Elysia Dahlia, but read that journal first, then we will talk more.' The dark urge vanished, along with the desire to drink blood. Finally, I was able to look at Yumi, who had been awkwardly standing there the entire time. She wasn't sure if something was wrong, but she also didn't dare approach.

'Finally, some answers, but what do I do with this information? Every conversation felt littered with traps to coax me in. To think this entire time the little devil on my shoulder was actually a person... well probably.'

'If I'm right about there being a limited communication range, then it would explain why it has been so faint up until now, but does that also mean Teivel hears this Dark urge as well?' I turned to the desk, letting the journal out of my inventory, and gave the cover a read.

[The origin of Dahlia]

'Even the Dark urge told me to read this, so it must have clues on who this being might be.'

"Yumi, get me coffee." Yumi, hearing the command, quickly carried herself out of the room without speaking. It probably came as a relief that she received orders, let alone ones that got her away from me.

'Maybe it is worth letting this Dark urge have its way. That way, I can obtain the power of a true vampire, but will that come at the cost of losing the last bit of empathy I have?'

'Oh well, let's just absorb all this book's information and be done with it.' I placed my hand on the thick journal and activated one of the system's most handy features.

The book slightly glowed, and suddenly a rush of words filled my head. All that the book held suddenly became common knowledge to me, and any hidden details were now obvious.

'Interesting... So that's who you are, Dark Urge.' I smiled, as I now had a good guess as to who was behind the voice and possibly the entire reason why our Kitsune clan are vampires.

***

<The Dark Urge>

"That bitch still refuses to embrace her true potential even after gracing her with my presence."

In a room where a massive glowing red magical circle was drawn on the ground, a blood-red-haired woman with red eyes sat in the middle. Magical red chains came out of the ground, restraining any movement and cutting off nearly all mana usage.

Her clothes were ragged to the point where they left her almost naked, showing just how long she had been restrained. There was no visible age on her face, but it was safe to assume she was over 1000 years old.

"Once she reads that journal from that good-for-nothing descendant, then surely she will come around. Now that she's back to her birthplace, there is no way she could hold me back any longer. It is just a matter of time until she learns the truth."

"Oh, to have a chance to be free of these restraints after being locked up for so long. That bastard has a lot to pay for using me to fuel that foolish, evil god's deeds. How much longer does he plan to take to summon the calamity?" Annoyance ran thickly through her voice as memories of how she got restrained flashed in her mind. Even the chains and the ground around The Dark urge rumbled as she felt the excitement of possibly escaping this place.