77: Bullseye

Bullseye

Quietly sneaking into the manor library, I traversed the multiple rows of bookshelves until I reached one that has been on my mind for a couple weeks now.1

It was a book that went into into the specifics of conjuring your own familiar, which has become an extremely rare branch of magic that isn't really used anymore, if at all. To be honest, from what I have read of it so far, the contents seemed to be quite interesting.

Ever since my first visit to this library, I have been constantly adding onto the pile in order to learn more about the world. Not only that, but I've been trying to glean a few pieces of lost information that the majority of people didn't actively know about.

The Vizac family may not have been deemed a noble house, but it did hold quite a bit of information about this world's strange history, and I wasn't even near a quarter of the way through reading it all.

--------------------------------------------------

The sound of a boisterous laugh sounded throughout the tavern as I made a clever joke, Drist and I sitting across from one another at a table located in a corner of the room.

Glancing to the side as the old man took another swig of his large mug, clearly intoxicated to a high degree, my red slit eyes met a set of bright purple orbs.

Shalu casually walked near our table in the direction of the main bar area with a tray full of empty assortments, which Meridel had been diligently taking care of for nearly the entire day.

Both women seemed to eventually notice my eyes roaming their bodies in an admiring manner, which had been a consistent thing going on between the three of us ever since I walked inside the establishment. They just giggled to themselves with a slight hint of embarrassment.

However, the reason that all three of us were being so forward with our physical attraction to one another was because of something that we had been planning on for a while now, which also had very clear sexual undertones to it as well.

Over the course of a few weeks, we had gotten to know each other to a much more intimate degree, but it hasn't reached the point to where we've crossed the line just yet.

That was all for a reason, of course.

It was to build up the sexual tension. Not only that, but we were holding off on it until a certain day that had already been decided upon, which wouldn't be too long before I set off on my journey as an adventurer.

There was a feeling of anticipation whenever I thought about it as well.

It was going to be my first threesome, after all.

--------------------------------------------------

Flipping over a pair of very sharp knives that were thrown at me by Norvella, an emotionless mask placed upon her visage, they went ignored in the background. I nearly lost my balance when a third one whizzed past my face after dodging it at the last second. It buried itself hilt-deep into the ground just a couple feet behind my current position.

I shifted my weight and rolled into a backward somersault, leaping up before she could land a hit on me. That's when I threw my own blade at the white haired maid, which cut through the air at breakneck speeds.

With a flick of her arm, she expertly intercepted the knife with one that was already in her hand. That's when the emotionless mask turned off, which was due to the fact that she thought the training session was over.

However, while her focus had been placed on the knife that was deflected...

Drawing back my arm, I added a small portion of my natural vampiric strength a split-second before launching the knife that I secretly picked up from the ground towards Norvella. It made a brief whistling sound after being thrown and that was what caught her attention, forcing the woman to quickly react by raising the shield in her other hand because of how fast it had traveled through the air once she finally noticed it.

The shield was made mostly of a wooden material with a couple additions of iron reinforcements in certain areas for better protection. It also had a crude drawing of a target within the very center.

Norvella only had enough time to raise the shield at the last second.

The knife that originally belonged to her tore through the wooden center, only stopping once the hilt made contact with the rest of the shield. The blade, however, was just a few centimeters away from leaving the woman with a horrible injury.

...She hadn't anticipated for another one to nearly take out her eye.

Norvella slowly lowered the shield with a shocked expression, staring at me as I tried to catch my breath in the aftermath of everything that just happened.

"Bullseye." I said, grinning in triumph after a couple of seconds passed by in silence.

My body was covered in sweat and grime, the hours we spent training just in one day leaving me with a strong case of exhaustion.

It was totally worth it.

--------------------------------------------------

Not long after that incident, the two of us eventually agreed to switch a few things around with my training schedule.

The woman apparently deemed my proficient accuracy with throwing knives to be good enough in our training sessions. She gave me a couple options to pick from after the choice to not focus on swordsmanship had been made.

When I asked for her reasoning behind that decision, Norvella explained that there were schools in certain areas for the sole purpose of learning each sword style. 'Nuff said.

At the least, she taught me the basics to practice by myself while I was traveling.

Eventually, one really stuck out to me, and it was for two reasons.

The option was to learn more about my inherent abilities as a vampire from my mother.

With all of the responsibilities that Norvella has piled onto herself, getting rid of our training sessions would free up a lot of time for her to actually have a longer resting period.

I picked that one within a heartbeat.

--------------------------------------------------

Tomorrow, I'll be leaving the village.

It had just reached past midnight and most of the residents had fallen asleep by now.

Quietly moving across my room, I opened a window before jumping through it, immediately turning into a bat. The rush of wind that had been caused by my quick descent was quite enjoyable, but it didn't last for very long as I spread my wings and began flapping them repeatedly in order to gain a bit of speed along the way.

Rising higher up into the sky, I eventually set my sights onto the area where Drist and Shalu Clover lived together. Their house wasn't nearly as big as the manor that I slept in, but it was big enough to keep the both of them content. Not to mention, their area had been cleaned up and upgraded a small bit from the slums that it used to be.

Eventually, it would look even better, but all of that was going to take some time to achieve.

Drist was most likely passed out from the alcohol that he constantly drank, which wasn't a very serious health problem. The big guy just had a high tolerance for it and was known for his love of that kind of stuff, which sort of made sense considering the tavern that he originally founded.

There was only a single source of light, which was coming from a bedroom window on the second floor, and that was the last level of the house as well. Every couple of seconds, I'd notice Shalu and Meridel walk by, most likely awaiting my arrival while talking about me.

That's exactly where I was headed.

For the plan to work, Shalu had told her father that it was going to be a sleepover with Meridel, and the older man seemingly accepted that half-truth with ease.

Swooping down towards the house, I landed directly on the window sill before reverting back to normal, casually sitting on the wooden surface in front of two scantily-clad women that were full of built-up lust.

It was going to be a long night.

pqdm.com