[V6C60 – Sorrow of a Silent Parting]
Qianye didn’t reply. He drew East Peak, beckoned the count, and simply stood there in silence. He was bathed in the light of the ancient essence fragment and could absorb the void origin power from within to replenish his stamina. The vampire count would surely lose in a protracted fight.
As expected, the count’s expression sank. “You’re courting death.”
He fired off a shot at a speed indiscernible to the naked eye, the bullet arriving before Qianye within a split second.
Qianye was able to clearly make out the trajectory with his True Sight since this vampire count had no special skills in marksmanship. He evaded the shot just by leaning to the side. Swordsmanship was the count’s true talent—a wisp of incisive blood energy followed the shot, accompanied by the cold flash of a blade’s edge.
Qianye felt a cold sensation sweep past his forearm, followed by a subtle pain. That was sword energy! He pulled back a dozen meters in an instant, borrowing the momentum to swing East Peak diagonally. The sounds of a dozen clashing swords coalesced into one.
“Good swordsmanship!” The count’s expression turned even more sinister. He sniffed briefly all of a sudden and reached for the sword’s edge.
The vampire count’s all-out attack had cut through Qianye’s skin, and a drop of blood was hanging upon the blade’s tip. This red, almost-animated drop of blood was emitting a fantastic fragrance that caused all the blood energy in his body to turn restless.
The count raised the sword to his mouth and slowly licked the blood clean with his long tongue. His eyes turned red as he praised, “Great taste!”
Qianye couldn’t help but frown. The Monroes weren’t the strongest among the primogenitor clans, but this count’s bloodthirsty expression was no different from that of a vampire on the eve of a blood feast.
The vampire count thrust his sword into the ground and produced an exquisite vampiric blade from his chest pocket. The copper bat-wing crossguard upon it had been polished until it was shiny, and its corners, rounded. Apparently, it possessed a long history or perhaps even a family heirloom.
The count slowly revealed his vampiric fangs and said, “Brat, I should be making you into a descendant, but unfortunately, your blood tastes too good. I really don’t want to miss such a feast!”
Layers of origin patterns appeared as he rubbed his fingers slowly over the vampiric blade edge. The vampire’s red eyes were overflowing with excitement. He particularly enjoyed a human’s fear before becoming his food, but Qianye was abnormally calm and didn’t seem startled at all. This dealt a serious blow to his appetite.
The vampire count growled and pounced at Qianye with great speed. The latter slashed out with a backward step, shifting East Peak into the count’s inevitable path at the exact moment.
But the count had no intention of taking a different route. He swatted East Peak away with a swing of his hand and, at the expense of a bone-deep wound on his palm, managed to plunge his vampiric blade into Qianye’s abdomen.
The vampire count immediately entered a state of blood boil as the hot essence blood flowed into his body. The supreme pleasure caused him to let out an uncontrollable moan.
However, at this moment, a vampiric edge appeared in Qianye’s grasp. It pierced straight into the count’s chest and through his blood core. The latter looked down at the blade which had sunk down to its hilt, thoroughly puzzled as to how his defenses had grown so fragile that even an inferior human champion could pierce through it.
The blood flowing out of his wound was black and putrid as though it had been rotting for several days.
“You… your blood…” The count finally understood, but it was too late. His strength leaked out like flowing water, and his entire body fell limp onto the ground.
Qianye let go of the vampire without drawing blood through his vampiric blade. He slowly pulled the count’s dagger from his abdomen and threw it onto the ground. He then removed the badly damaged inner armor and bandaged his wounds tightly.
After doing all of that, Qianye looked toward a certain direction and said, “Come out.”
Nighteye walked out of the darkness and glanced at the corpse on the ground. “Yet another from my clan has died in your hands.”
Qianye replied indifferently, “We were enemies to begin with. I kill vampires, you kill imperial soldiers. Isn’t it why we enter the battlefield?”
Nighteye’s expression was somewhat blank. “You’re right, I killed many Zhao clan people. Isn’t that right, Zhao Qianye?”
“My name is Qianye. Surnames hold no meaning.”
Nighteye took a deep breath and gazed at Qianye with eyes full of resolution. “Whether or not your surname is important, you’re still an imperial. As long as you live, there’s no telling how many of my clansmen will die under your blade!”
Qianye laughed casually. “So?”
Nighteye said word by word, “So, I must kill you here! Your glory, stained with the blood of our sacred-blooded scions, shall end today!”
There was some helplessness in Qianye’s smile as though he were reminiscing about something. “Are you going to fight to the end with me so soon? That fateful night wasn’t so long ago.”
There was no emotion on Nighteye’s countenance. “That night means nothing. All living beings will mate, and that is merely instinct. And I remember telling you not to run into me on the battlefield.”
“Yes, I said the same.” Qianye was fairly emotional. Then, he heard yet another familiar phrase.
Nighteye said, “Evernight and Daybreak are eternal enemies. There’s no other outcome!”
Qianye glanced at Nighteye with a sigh and saw his figure reflected within her eyes. His vision grew dark as a wave of excruciating pain wracked his entire body.
Qianye reacted immediately by activating Eye Ability: Control. He saw her face turn slightly pale as the figure in her eyes warped and disappeared. Qianye’s retaliation was far weaker than Nighteye’s, but it unexpectedly interrupted her eye ability.
Qianye rolled away and flashed behind a stone pillar. His silhouette had just vanished into the shadows when an origin bullet blasted a hole at his previous location.
Qianye pressed his back against the cold cave-wall and looked at where the bullet had landed. He could smell black titanium from the residual smoke. Although this wasn’t a Black Titanium Bullet of Annihilation, these high-grade origin bullets were also infused with black titanium to raise its destructive power against humans.
Qianye pressed a hand onto his blood core’s position as a wave of intense pain came through from his chest. The price of resisting Nighteye’s Eye of Destruction was significant, draining whatever was left of his blood energy. The wound on his blood core was badly shaken and opened up slightly.
Nighteye stood in silence without the slightest bit of aura leaking out of her body. There was no way to lock onto her with the exception of direct vision. Guns drawn, her figure flickered through the smoke and rushed toward the pillar behind which Qianye had been hiding.
However, the place was completely empty. There were some drops of blood where he had been hiding along with a spinning grenade.
Daybreak Flashbang!
Nighteye was more than familiar with this anti-vampire weapon, but it was too late to evade.
A mass of dazzling light erupted in the hall. For a moment, everything turned into a blurry field of white light.
When the light finally dispersed, Nighteye was kneeling on the ground with her hands crossed in front of her face to block the intense light. Without opening her eyes, she swung her right hand backward and fired thrice in quick succession. A certain silhouette nearby shook and broke into several pieces.
Nighteye leaped up and glanced over in alarm, only to find that it was a slender, human-shaped stalactite. Meanwhile, Qianye’s aura had completely vanished, and no one knew where he had hidden himself.
A dense color of blood emerged in her eyes as she scanned the entire hall, her muzzle closely following her gaze.
However, following a sudden click, a mass of light erupted once more from the pile of shattered rocks! Qianye had actually hidden a flashbang within that stalactite.
The light arrived too sudden, and Nighteye was a split second too late in closing her eyes. She let out a light groan and couldn’t help but raise her right hand to shield her eyes. But during this process, her left hand swung to the side and fired three more shots.
She finally heard Qianye’s groan amidst the gunshots.
After her regaining consciousness, Nighteye’s eye ability and perception seemed to have upgraded. Qianye’s aura was completely restrained and difficult to capture, but East Peak hadn’t calmed down completely from the previous battle—Nighteye had traced the minuscule origin power upon it to judge Qianye’s position.
The latter ran along the cave wall at lightning speed and fired several rounds from his Mystic Spider Lily. Nighteye’s figure was almost a blur as she flashed continuously with her eyes closed.
Even so, every bullet seemed to brush past her clothes. Apparently, Qianye’s marksmanship had reached the level of a master. Such a pursuit lasted only a split second—Nighteye’s vision was adversely affected by the flashbang and her perception was slightly off, causing one of her steps to fall behind. A flower of blood blossomed on her calf as she was struck.
The wound was neither large nor deep, however, the pain was several times that of an ordinary gun. Even Nighteye, with her staunch character, couldn’t help but let out a miserable scream. This was one of Mystic Spider Lily’s special abilities which weakened the enemy by magnifying pain and forming illusions.
With great decisiveness, Nighteye hurled a grenade between the two of them. The explosion and powerful origin shockwaves disrupted all perception, causing them to lose track of each other.
This firefight was extremely ruthless. Whether it was in terms of weapons used or the arts deployed, the two had already reached the extremes of their combat abilities. A slight miscalculation would result in heavy injuries.
Qianye exhaled deeply inside a natural gap between the cave ceiling. His breath immediately suffused the surroundings with a fragrance. It was rather similar to the one Nighteye had emitted when her blood core was wounded, but his scent was much deeper.
Without the need to look, Qianye knew that the wound on his blood core had opened up a bit more. He had been shot twice, and a tingling sensation was spreading out continuously from his wounds. That was a sign of spreading Black Titanium. Although it was only a tiny amount compared to the Black Titanium Bullet of Annihilation, Qianye had no more auric flame blood to neutralize it, as such, its effects were similar to that of a slow poison.
Qianye gasped deeply and continuously, counting down in his mind. He leapt out of his hiding place at the count of ten and tossed a grenade amidst rapid movements.