Chapter 345: Head Servant Hoffmann

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――I activate Swelling Spirit LegsIdeoplast>. The bluish-white spirit hand crushes the remnants of the small b.u.t.terflies, causing the b.u.t.terflies to vanish like a fleeting dream.

Is this a dream…? A dream of viscous, black b.u.t.terflies…no, the Death b.u.t.terfly women, who vanished, were real.

…f.u.c.k….what a failure…

I recall the scene of my disappearing. Toyz…she was a woman resembling Marianne, but now she’s gone. I wish this was all but a dream, but unfortunately it’s reality. It’s an outcome along the lines of what Marianne said…『What ought to happen will definitely happen』.

…What a humiliation. I, who have become a true, perfect, spiritual being through baptism…

Did I come back a second time to taste such a disgrace?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no! Absolutely not!

G.o.d chose a monster to establish the true thousand-year kingdom! Yes, a monster exceeding all heretics and renegades by far! He degraded me to a blood-smeared vampire! You can call this the epitome of irony for a former clergyman to be reborn as one of the chief beings defying the cross.

Having been born into such a nightmare, I suffered at first. Though, when I awoke with the awareness of Hoffmann, I understood everything…

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Everyday…I offered my prayers to the Lord…with feelings of hopelessness, sadness, and regret. Even though my body had turned into that of a vampire, my mind remained unchanged. Even when my body obtained abilities with impure names called skills, my feelings towards G.o.d, my Lord, didn’t change.

『Oh Lord, please protect me with your love and sincerity, never losing your compa.s.sionate heart』

『Having become evil, my body and mind were seized by sin. The number of sins is as high as there is sand at the beach, crus.h.i.+ng my heart. Oh Lord! Please save me. Please rescue me from this nightmare as quickly as possible』

Praying like this was rejected by my vampiric body. And yet, without minding that, I spent my days praying to the Lord everyday.

However, the G.o.d I knew never answered my prayers. It’s because this world is filled with all kinds of G.o.ds and spirits.

Because I could sense the guidance of my blood…I suffered in anguish and mortification all the more. To the extent of wis.h.i.+ng for my own death.

『At this rate, I’m on the way towards ruin…』

Having become desperate, I…a.s.saulted the city guards while screaming and lamenting. And I deliberately received the guards’ counterattacks with my brand new body. With the iron will to bear all my sins through spear and sword blades…

Even as I felt excruciating pain from my entrails through the vibrations from the spears pierced into my chest…I stoically and determinedly endured while closing my eyes and believing that I was basking in the sins of people…

The guards, who considered me dead, cruelly tossed my disfigured body into a ditch.

Next I employed horse-riding bandits wearing musty vests with knight crests imprinted, and headed into the wilderness. I dug a hole with everyone in the flat wasteland. And then I entered the hole myself…asking those I’ve employed to bury me in the soil.

With just my head exposed…I spent my days.

At this time I experienced the sensation of having my own eyeb.a.l.l.s pecked out by crows.

Then I used oil and glowing embers to set myself ablaze. Of course…my body kept regenerating, even while I tasted an indescribable pain and smelled the terrible stench of my skin being burned.

Following that, I ate meat infested with the bubonic plague as if the divine protection of St. Sebastian bore no meaning. Moreover, I scratched my chest apart with my sharp claws as if to gouge out my own intestines, and attempted to get beasts to eat me by entering their nest…

I might have surpa.s.sed all the mountaineering ascetics of Persia and ancient Spain’s a.s.syria…

I put my utmost effort into dying as if having completely succ.u.mbed to madness, but all of it was in vain. Because I’m a vampire. But, because of all of this, I also learned about my immortality.

Back then it might have been possible for me to get annihilated if I had managed to get hit by holy water after getting hunted down by vampire hunters…but, there were no vampire hunters.

Always carrying desperation in my heart, based on all those experiences, I continued wandering. And then I lay down on the ground, sprawled.

Would I be going back to the mud like this? I might also get killed if I encountered Death G.o.d Namtar.

While thinking all that, I wasted my days by sleeping.

At that point, I suddenly heard the voice of a human woman, asking me, “――What are you doing?”

“…I’m wis.h.i.+ng to die.”

“What was that? That’s a language I’ve never heard before.”

While lying on the ground, I had answered her in the language of my previous world.

“So far as it goes, I also know the common language…”

After I awakened, I understood the language of this land. After all, it felt more like waking up than awakening.

“Oh, you could talk normally then, huh? So, what are you doing right now?”

“I want to die.”

“…Haah? What stupid stuff are you saying despite still having all life ahead of you?” After sighing, she expressly bent one knee, grabbed my hand against my will after making sure to prop up my body, and helped me up.

She was a strong woman to lift a man, even disregarding that I didn’t have any decent personal belongings on me. Her light brown hair was adorned by a beautiful hair decoration with a coloring as if to complement her hair color. The smell of grapes hung in the air.

“――You’ve got a sulfur smell, don’t you? But, look, you can still walk, right?” She forcibly pulled my hand, dragging me all the way to her home.

It seems like I was clad in a rotten smell, and not one of grapes. It was probably because of or .

“…Why are you helping me?”

“You’re saying such things again! Do you want to be eaten by jackals?” She scolded me while pressing one hand against her hip and pointing a finger of the other at me.

Since she had big b.r.e.a.s.t.s, they swayed in response.

While looking at her chest, “…I have already experienced being eaten by stray dogs.”

“Pfft, how can you be alive after getting eaten? You’re so silly!”

She apparently interpreted it as a joke, and thus laughed loudly. When I saw her cheerful smile, I felt like I could forget my despair towards G.o.d.

While wetting my lips, I explained, “That’s because I’m not normal.”

I couldn’t tell her about me being a vampire, though.

“…Once again you’re spouting some incomprehensible stuff, blondie. You’re so dirty despite having such a nice face… Are you possibly a fallen n.o.ble from some place?”

She was a woman yapping lots and often.

“I’m not…”

“…Well, you’re here in the Highgland Forest, so no one will ask you about any details. And, you’re truly lucky. After all, the knights under Arebanos-sama have cleaned up all the monsters in the area, you see? Though there seem to be rumors circulating that a dragon and the Barrier King are still around.”

“…I see.”

Then again, I would also be included among those monsters.

“…Come on, blondie. If you can walk, it’s this way.”

“What are you going to do after saving me?”

“…What ought to happen will definitely happen.”

“Hmm? I don’t understand. Is that a family motto or something?”

“…What’s your name?” The woman asked for my name without answering my question.

“…Hoffmann.”

“I see. You’re free to despair, but I’ll regret it if it happened on my family’s plot of land. What ought to happen will definitely happen is simply something gramps always told me. Right now, our fields are about to fall into ruin. It’s because we’re lacking manpower.” She told me while pointing a sharp look my way.

To be honest, she wasn’t much of a beauty. But, she had a well-tempered character, and an impressively bright smile reminding me of a sunflower.

I was taken aback for a while, but she forced me along anyway. The place she led me to was a hut with the trees on its left and right side having been cut down. Her family lived in that hut.

She introduced me to her family with the simple words, “This man called Hoffmann is going to work here as a live-in from today,” resulting in a vampire like me working in the fields…

I remembered how I had helped out on a farm during my youth in my previous life, before I stood on a platform as a priest…

Why was a vampire like me…? Why didn’t I kill her by sucking her blood? Why didn’t I kill her after obtaining the ability to peek into the brain by tearing apart a head?

While such questions crossed my mind…I decided to obediently work on the fields, believing that it was the perfect opportunity to learn the language of this area.

However, I felt grat.i.tude towards her. I, whose flesh was swelling as a vampire, naturally felt nauseous because of my contradicting mind… But, back then I might still have had some of my memories as a human left.

And thus I began to live together with that woman. Her name was Marianne.

As I lived with Marianne and her family, I gradually learned their language. I probably could have learned it easily…if I had used the skill , but I didn’t use it at that time. Something like a new language was a breeze compared to dealing with a French woman.

『Ah bon…』『Et alors?』『De…』

I posed as human as I repeatedly worked hard while feeling the wind caressing my cheeks like the hands of my mother. I continued a life where I constantly worried whether I’d experience love just like in my previous life.

But, slowly but steadily, my vampire flesh swelled. I tried to repel the thoughts born within me one after the other, as befitting of a former, knowledgeable priest, but each time I did, I was repeatedly a.s.sailed by nausea, dizziness, and s.h.i.+vering. I couldn’t suppress my desire for blood. My past, pious thoughts vanished… My heart of compa.s.sion continued being worn down….and eventually resigned.

Now, even the beautiful women filled with radiating youth as they wore rosaries on their heads looked to me like no more than prey. I hesitated while confused by this, but…even their lips covered by rose extract didn’t look like anything but flesh stuffed with blood-smeared desires.

In my youth I had really liked the bewitching movements of the pure-white fingers of a woman with an alabaster-like skin tone plucking a koto. But, now everything had changed.

On a certain night…my body moved unconsciously. It desired blood, blood, and more blood. Although I should have sucked the blood of an animal the night before, I couldn’t resist my urge for human blood…

Once I came to, I was already hugging Marianne’s back.

“…At last, you feel like a.s.saulting me…fufu.”

While gently grasping my arms, she tried to turn around. I remember that I felt very happy about Marianne’s words. I, who was thirsting for human blood…buried my face in her nape while pondering in my head about her words of a.s.saulting her…and stabbed my extended canines into her delicious nape.

I kept sucking her blood little-by-little…her wonderful blood… And then, Marianne with her pretty brown hair, she…died while making me feel the autumn with her hair illuminated by the morning sun.

Sorry…Marianne. I knew that you loved me. And yet, I ended up killing you after succ.u.mbing to my desire for blood.

Ahaha, ahahaha…there is something on her cheek…oh, t-these are tears of blood?

At that moment,

※※ Permanent Skill acquired ※

Don’t f.u.c.k with me…it’s a skill…but, why don’t I feel any sadness?

I knew the answer to that. I completely understood it!

…Marianne’s face was soaked with my b.l.o.o.d.y tears.

While gazing at them…I irredeemably and repeatedly answered the questions of my own feelings.

Ever since then, my voice became hoa.r.s.e, as if blended with the voice of a woman, and my tone changed as well. I was sure that I had been hit by Apollo and Diana’s arrows

Thereafter, so as to not meet a woman like Marianne, befitting of a vampire…I continued a life of wandering from one cemetery to another, all similar to each other, while performing experiments in underground crypts located in desolated, old enclosures.

I kept catching a glance of the fragments of this world…learning that it was a devastated world with disputes which were full of angry bellows, saturated with the clas.h.i.+ng of weapons, and never died out in this strange era. Wars repeated themselves with the weak beings always weeded out in the most gruesome ways.

Even during times of peace, epochs of widespread disgrace and fraud continued under the cover of a false tranquility.

This resembled the activity of the Pope’s special envoy of my previous world. It was no different from the activities of the northern, b.l.o.o.d.y Crusades and the politics deeply dyed in corruption under the banner of a peaceful diplomacy. It was an a.s.sembly of all kinds of opposing principles.

I learned about the futility of trying to regulate evil with peaceful means while hoping for the advent of a messiah. G.o.d literally only shows his power through miracles, in the end he never saves people.

I became aware of vampire hunters who chased my sinful existence, and learned about religions such as the Holy Church of Light, but those were different from the church I knew. There were no two opinions either. Only ghosts with enraptured faces were dancing right above large, darkish rivers. Even the intense rain was made out of blood.

And then, another war started. n.o.bles of low standing, called Broken Lances, merchants, bandits, beggars, and animals all kept dying with their throats being torn apart, being devoured by beasts, and their limbs being plucked off while suffering in resentment. The sin with the name war invited grudges and crimes, creating a worldly order where sins covered the world.

Evil swords, an evil with the touch of a caricature, and riches were the rulers of this world. Evil, swords, and money were all that mattered in this society.

It made me wonder whether the abilities I had acquired weren’t the perfect counterbalance. , , and a skill related to those two, , which drew on the power of 250 living devils that were summoned from a city filled with things excavated from the depths of the abyss outside the dimension. And on top of that, which allowed me to steal abilities.

The great diversity of skills, including and , which I had plundered over several thousand years, became powerful weapons for me.

I recalled a beautiful woman who introduced herself as Sumeragi Fubuki. She talked about coming from the Land of the Rising Sun in the East, Nihon Country. And to be precise, from a place called 『Toukyou』 and 『Teito』. She asked me whether I know about the terms 『Sumeragi family』, 『Twelve Distinguished Families』, or 『Kikuchi Okaryuuzou』, but was that something like the 『Habsburg family』?

As I kept staring into her eyes while appropriately giving her confirmations to allow the conversation to go on…the black-haired woman immediately trusted me. She probably fell for my .

The and abilities she possessed were a tremendous boost to my power. After all, they raised my physical abilities and boosted the ability of Ten Evil Stars Lanwen which I had taken into my body by using .

Fuhahaha! Thinking back to that time, it makes me laugh!

I can’t forget the expression of despair on the pale face of that woman while I tore her forehead apart…and stole her abilities. And as thanks for giving me such a pleasant feeling, I closed up her severed forehead again…thinking that she might be still tenaciously clinging onto her life, somehow.

In addition, I repeated blood experiments using and , both skills derived from . I could feel my growth, knowing that blood was my nourishment and source to keep living.

A blood-stained power brought about by the Valmask family. This would become the truth of a new thousand-year kingdom.

That’s why I was born and thus accomplished my second advent as vampire

And then I was discovered by the empress, the top of the Valmask family, and managed to even climb all the way to becoming her

…But. Even my contributions to the family as