Almost immediately after cal passed out he was forced back into consciousness. It was almost as if something wanted him to experience every second of the pain that was racking his body. As he lie there on the ground screaming the pain started to change. it started pulsating with the beat of his heart to the point where cal had a second of bliss between every heartbeat and he could almost bear it. After an unknown amount of time passed the pain started to fade and once it was gone cal sat up to see a long list of prompts.

[you have gained the race of vampire]

[you have gained access to the vampiric status]

[you have defeated your prince in combat the purity of your blood has increased]

[the increase in the purity of your blood allows you to choose an evolution for the vampiric race]

[you are the last of your clan your bloods purity increases]

[the increase in the purity of your blood allows you to choose an evolution for the vampiric race]

After cal had finished reading the prompts he looked over at arisu who was staring at him wide-eyed. “Are you okay?” she asked in a shaky voice that was full of concern. Cal nodded and tried to stand but ended up slipping in something and falling back to the ground.

For the first time, cal really looked at his surroundings and was surprised by what he saw. He was covered in red sticky blood and the floor around where he had been lying was also covered in blood. “What happened.” cal asked arisu a bit of concern creeping into his own voice.

Arisu took in a shaky breath and started talking as tears rolled down her cheeks. “Right after you killed the vampires’ leader you came over to release me but then you fell down and started screaming on the ground and after a few seconds your blood started glowing and gushing out of your wounds in little bursts. You bled so much I thought you were gonna die.” by the ending of her short recollection, Arisu was sobbing.

cal was shocked by her words and sat there quietly before carefully getting to his feet and walking over to the throne. He picked up the keyring that he had seen earlier and walked back over to arisu. After he released her a cal was blinded by a bright light that was only broken by a prompt.

[you have completed the twilight fields trial you have reached all of the conditions for a hard clear you will be rewarded shortly]

After a few seconds, the light faded and cal was left standing in a stone room in front of him there was a table with two chairs. One of them was empty and the other was occupied by Alucard who was sipping at his wine glass. “Please have a seat,” Alucard said as he gestured at the remaining chair.

Cal sat down slowly while staring at Alucard the whole time. After a few seconds passed cal asked. “so why are we in this room,”

Alucard carefully put down his wine glass and answered cal. “There are two reasons first so that you can pick out your rewards for passing the trial second so that I can give you a crash course in being a vampire.”

“so you are a vampire.” cal asked. It was something that he had suspected because all of the vampires in the twilight fields had a similar aura even Belinda. After thinking of Belinda cal realized that both she and arisu had been left in the trial.

“Yes, I am a vampire in fact I was once the king of the vampires,” answered Alucard with a bit of pride creeping into his voice.

Cal hadn’t heard him as he began to worry about Belinda and arisu and he asked “what happened to arisu and Belinda.”

Alucard looked surprised at the change of topic but he easily answered without missing a beat. “They were parts of the trial and so they don’t exist anymore.”

cal shook his head at the answer. “No I have to take them with me they were living people Alucard I can’t just let them die.” cal stared at Alucard with pleading in his eyes but the vampire simply sat there impassively.

It seemed like he was about to refuse the request when his eyes lit up with an idea, “I will let you take them with you but they will have to be counted as part of your reward for the trial, and I have a few conditions” Alucard paused to gauge cal’s reaction after seeing that cal had no objections he continued “first you will let me choose your other rewards and second both of them will become bond servants to you.”

“I’m fine with the first condition but what is a bond servant.”

“a bond servant is essentially a servant that has to obey you no matter what. They aren’t often seen in your world but some people do have them.” cal paused to think about whether or not he should accept the offer. As he had said he had no qualms about letting Alucard pick his rewards but he didn’t like the idea of forcing the arisu and Belinda into servitude.

“Is there any way you can change the second condition.” cal asked hopefully but Alucard just shook his head.

“That is less one of my conditions and more of a requirement by the rules of the trial the actual rule would be hard for you to understand but put simply only things that you have a claim on can leave it with you. now you have to decide quickly.”

cal was flustered by his decision being forced but he was able to quickly decide. “Alright I accept your conditions.” with that Alucard smiled and cal felt a burning sensation in his wrist and when he looked down there were three small runes on the inside of his wrist. “What was that.” cal asked angrily, while he rubbed at his wrist.

“Those are the soul marks from your rewards,” answered Alucard.

There was a brief pause in the conversation before cal asked, “What are soul marks.”

Alucard let out a sigh and rubbed the bridge of his nose “how do you not know what soul marks are before you even entered the trial you had four of them”

Alucard’s words confused cal who glanced at both his wrists after making sure that there were no marks there he looked back to Alucard. “I only have the three that just appeared.”

Alucard let out another sigh and started explaining. “Soul marks are a mark on your body that signifies anything that is bound to your soul they can be placed anywhere on your body and be in any shape or size, before you came here you had three marks on your eyes and one on the back of your neck.” cal started to deny Alucard’s words but was quieted as a mirror appeared in the middle of the table.

Cal looked at his reflection for the first time since his grandpa died and was shocked at what he saw. His hair that used to be a pristine white was now stained brown and gray from a mixture of blood and grime. His eyes were sunken from exhaustion and his skin was caked in the same filth that was in his hair.

Cal remembered what Alucard had said about his eyes and looked closer at them. The first thing he noticed was a red ring around the iris of his left eye and as he inspected it he felt tanas bond stirring. He then noticed his pupils which were now a vibrant purple the same color as Kaze’s eyes. Cal looked for the third change but could not find it, he was about to ask Alucard when he finally noticed it.

His right eye had a blue ring around it. it was almost the same color as the rest of cal’s eye which made it very hard to see. The ring around his right eye caused iclyns bond to stir. That made sense to cal, he bonded iclyn and tana at the same time so it wasn’t a surprise that they had similar soul marks.

After cal was done looking at his reflection he asked Alucard. “So what does the mark on my neck look like.”

as soon as cal started talking the mirror disappeared and he was once again looking at Alucard. “It’s an odd symbol that I don’t recognize but we can discuss that later for now I need to teach you about your vampiric status.” cal wanted to learn more about his soul marks but he realized that he would have time to ask later and he had been wondering about what being a vampire would do to him. “First I need you to open your status” cal did so and cal quickly saw a few changes.

Level 1

Health 840/840

Mana 300/300

Stamina 336/336

Name: Calaeris Windlab

Race: Winterwraith

Name: Kelaris

Race: Windwalker

Name: Calee-aris

Race: frost Spirit

Skills:

[Archery: 25] [Small blade: 17] [Forestry: 13] [Swords: 24] [Pain tolerance: 8] [Acting: 9]

Abilities:

[ice magic:max] [cold immunity:max] [flurry:max] [water magic:max] [wind magic:max] [feather weight:max] [corporeal shadow:max] [spell school of water:1] [spell shool of shadow:1] [spell school of wind:1] [abelard:1] [brock:max] [imbue strike:1] [unending barrage:1] [insta-cast:max] [abelards catalog:1] [shadows chosen:max]

Spells:

[teir 1 splash] [teir 1 gust] [teir 2 miniature shadow summon] [teir 3 boreas’s rage]

Shadowblade: epic

Stormcaller: mythical

Class slot (empty)

Class slot (empty)

Kaze 72/72

Familiar slot (empty)

Familiar slot (empty)

Familiar slot (empty)

Familiar slot (empty)

Stats:

Strength: 12

Endurance: 14

Dexterity: 13

Wisdom: 15

Spirit: 13

Intelligence: 16

Free points: 3

{hidden}

Race: vampire (evolution is possible)

Abilities:

[favored by darkness:max] [heartless:max]

Spells: n/a

Clan

Name: umbra-nivis

Leader: n/a (if a leader is not selected within 1-year clan will be disbanded)

Members: 1

Average purity: 97%

Before cal could get a good look at his status Alucard started explaining the changes. First, it doubled all of his pools but not his stats. Second, it gave him a hidden section of his status that could not be viewed by inspection skills, like Abelard. In the hidden section of his status, there was his new race which was vampire, a section for abilities and spells, and a little information about his clan.

He didn’t get any spells with his new race but he did get another set of racial abilities. First was favored by darkness, which halved the cost for any shadow-related spells and increased his affinity for shadow magic. The second was heartless, heartless was a skill that cal had previously but it was now max-level.

Cal was confused that he only got two racial abilities and decided to ask Alucard about it. “Do vampires only get two racial abilities?”

Alucard seemed slightly surprised by the question and took a second to answer. “No vampires should get three racial abilities, favored by darkness, lights hatred, and heartless.”

cal once again looked at his status to make sure that it wasn’t there, and once he was sure he spoke. “I don’t have lights hatred.”

Alucard gave cal a small frown and then started staring off into space in the same way that he had done when he was looking at cals status. After a second his face relaxed and cal thought that he might have figured it out “you used to have an immunity for fire correct.” he asked while still looking into space.

“Yes,” cal said before realizing that Alucard had used the past tense. Cal checked his status and sure enough, his fire immunity was gone.

While cal was still stewing over the loss of his immunity Alucard started talking again “it seems that lights hatred and your fire immunity canceled each other out which makes sense seeing that they are from the same source that is lucky for you lights hatred is less of an ability and more of a curse so your not missing anything.”

cal wanted to ask what Alucard had meant by source but decided that that question could wait. “It also says I can evolve my vampire class.” cal said with a bit of a question in his voice.

Alucard nodded at the unspoken question and answered, “I would do it if I were you evolving a race is a fairly rare occurrence.”

cal sat there awkwardly for a second before asking, “how do I do that.”

Alucard looked back at cal for the first time in about a minute and then let out a sigh. “Just look at where it says you can evolve and will it to happen.”

cal did as he was told and another prompt appeared.

[you have decided to evolve the vampire race you have met the qualifications for 17 possible evolutions you will be shown the three you are most suited for]

after cal finished reading the prompt three more appeared in a line in front of him.

[noble vampire]

[lich]

[nightwalker]

Cal read through his choices but he wasn’t given much information. While he was trying to decide he heard a familiar voice from behind him.

“Choose nightwalker. Being a noble vampire would get you entangled in their politics and liches are cursed beings and that is not a life that you would want.” cal realized who the voice belonged to and spun around to see brock standing there with his patronizing smirk still etched onto his face. Cal thought about ignoring brocks advice but decided that there was no point in kicking a gift horse in the mouth.

As he chose nightwalker he got a new prompt.

[your racial abilities for the vampire race have evolved favored by darkness is now darknesses beloved and heartless is now shades body.]

before cal could look at what the changes were brock spoke again. “You qualified for a second evolution use that too” cal did as he was told and once again three choices appeared.

[specter]

[abyssal demon]

[faye of winters shadow]

“Specter is almost as bad as lich so that one is a no and abyssal demon will get you hunted by the rexallia church go with the Faye” brock said and cal who had already put his trust in brock did as he was told. After choosing winter fay a set of prompts appeared in front of cal.

[the umbra-nivis clan has been converted to a Faye court]

[as the only member of the winter’s shadow court you have been given the title of king of the winters shadow court]

[the umbra-nivis clan was given the authority of a vampire prince as head of the winter’s shadow court you can also exercise that authority]

[your racial abilities have evolved darknesses beloved is now ruler of shadows shades body has evolved into Faye sense]

Brock smiled at cal and started talking. “Of course my old friend you will have many questions but alas I can answer all of them. but I don’t want to so I’ll answer the ones that I do want to. first, your connection to shadow has grown a lot so your shadow magic will be very easy to cast secondly I am here because I can go wherever I want to, whenever I want to, and third yes I always look this fabulous.” cal was left dumbstruck by the onslaught of words and just sat there dumbly as brock finished his rant.

Brock then walked over to Alucard. For the first time since brock had appeared, cal looked over to where Alucard had been sitting just to see him kneeling with his forehead pressed against the floor. “Lukee my man long time no see, hey could you make sure to treat my old friend over there nicely while I’m not here and please explain to him everything that I didn’t have time to. after all, I am as you know a very busy man.” with that brock disappeared and Alucard stayed kneeling for another five minutes before finally getting up.

“He was a lot more polite that time.” cal said as Alucard shakily took his seat.

Alucard glared at cal and spoke in a hushed voice. “Don’t talk about lord brock in such a flippant manner he could easily punish both of us if he wanted to.”

“who even is he,” cal asked.

He was genuinely curious. Both Alucard and Gabriel had treated the name of brock with the utmost respect and from what cal had gathered they were both extremely strong. Alucard took in a breath as if to answer but the walls started shaking ominously and he stopped. The walls stopped shaking along with him and Alucard simply answered. “He is my boss.”