NOVEL SIMPLE Chapter 48: The Aftermath
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After Teressa woke up and all enemies were dealt with, Vlad and Alitheus quickly moved to heal any person that got caught in the battles or the destruction. At the same time, their mother also started to clean the streets from rubble while counting those that ended up dying.
Although they wanted to sit down and just talk about what happened, nobody had the time for that. With the walls broken open and a bunch of corpses everywhere, they had to get to work. Teressa called several workers and servants to their aid this time, though; although they didn’t have official soldiers of their own or anything like that, she had already employed a few dozen willing servants.
They were strong-looking people with stern faces, werewolves, some other orcs, and even a few imps that could conjure magic to lift things for her. They constantly commented about how everything was rather terrifying, but nobody really went against Teressa’s orders.
Vlad took care of the invaders and also of Helena and her son, storing them inside his inventory so there wouldn’t be any evidence of their deaths left for the moment. Meanwhile, after counting the casualties, they found that eleven people had died in the entire thing.
Perhaps not too many when there are over a thousand people living in Elderbridge, but it was still a big loss for Teressa, especially because there were young people there, including a child and their mother, who died crushed by their building falling over them.
The atmosphere had become even more negative, and it was rather palpable all over the city, especially in the area where everything had happened. People were terrified and had completely lost their trust in Teressa.
The only reason they weren’t reveling or doing a coup was because she was much stronger than anybody and could easily just kill anybody that dared to fight against her or complain about the terrible state of the city.
Although these people benefited from the vampire family’s strength and protection, they also had to be subservient and not get too ahead of themselves, as it was well known that vampires, especially those from the imperial family, were ruthless.
However, they didn’t really know how good they had it, as Teressa and her family were perhaps the “nicest” vampires of the entire empire.
“What will happen with the bodies?” wondered Vlad, seeing the corpses covered in clothes.
“I can’t revive them, unfortunately,” sighed Alitheus.
“It is fine; you’ve done so much already, Alitheus,” Teressa said. “This is… I’ll take responsibility for them. Their bodies shall be incinerated, and their ashes will either be given to their relatives, or if there aren’t any, they shall be placed in the graveyard.”
“So you don’t put people in coffins as they are?” Vlad wondered.
“What? Maybe I have never told you before? But usually only special graveyards can do that,” said Teressa. “That is a custom from different Realms. Obscuritas is a Realm filled to the brim with miasma and darkness. If you place whole corpses in a graveyard, you’re pretty much asking for them to rise as Undead and begin attacking people. Hence, it's better to leave them as ashes.”
“Oh… Makes sense then,” nodded Vlad, sighing. “At least the graves are still there.”
“Yes, we’ll go out of our way to place graves for these people, with their names…” Teressa sighed. “It is the least I could do for them…”
Vlad’s mother seemed genuinely upset over the people that died; even though she had tried to act coldly before, that was far from the actual truth. Vlad and Alitheus, and even Camilla, were beginning to better understand that most of the time, she hid her true feelings.
“Alright then,” nodded Vlad. “About the walls and... that draconic beast that fell asleep, what do we do?”
“Hm, it should be possible to fix the walls using magic; you are very proficient in that, right, my son?” Teressa asked.
“Haha, okay, I will try,” said Vlad. “But that Draconic Beast… It has fallen asleep, but the staff that can control it remained, and so did the collar it had.”
“Hmm… Although I wouldn’t have hesitated to slay it another time, a Tier 6 Draconic Beast could be a very valuable asset for us,” said his mother. “If only we could properly tame it. Whatever Curse Helena and her son obtained that was capable of controlling that thing won’t do for much longer. The monster will end up dying before it can last long enough to be an actual guardian of the city.”
“Hmm, we’ve been missing out on taking our Subclasses,” said Vlad. “Right Alitheus? Perhaps we could try getting a class that can help us tame the beasts.”
“Huh? Ah! Is that possible?” wondered Alitheus.
“You’re not offered every class out there, but it's usually based on your talents,” explained Vlad.
He had read a lot of guides online about how the class, skill, and status system worked in Fantasy Story Online. Although their characters started out with already predefined main classes, it is possible to go to a church of any god and receive their “blessings” in the form of a new subclass of their choosing.
This is where the further customization of the game began, as players would be able to easily combine abilities and skills from different classes to create their own unique abilities or results.
“Usually these Subclasses are related to other things than just fighting, such as alchemy… or monster taming,” Vlad smiled. “Also, we’re high enough that we should be able to also Rank Up our main classes.”
“Oh, so when can we Rank them Up? Does it have some sort of level requirement?" Chris wondered.
“Yeah, for the first Rank Up you need to be Tier 3 in your two growth cores,” explained Vlad. “Growth Cores mean things like the Blood Core, your Lust Stigma, my Psyche, Bloodline, or your Heavenly Core, for example.”
“Make sense!” said Chris with a nod. “Then what about further Rank Ups?”
“Hmmm… I think the second comes at Tier 6? Then the third at Tier 10, the fourth at Tier 15, the fifth at Tier 20... And that’s as much as I remember,” explained Vlad.
“Strengthening your Classes is important,” said Teressa, stepping into the conversation. “They’re a source of great power; if you want to get somewhere in life, you’ll need to always rank up; don’t forget that!”
“Yes, yes, mother,” nodded Vlad, feeling a bit tired. “Anyways, let’s go repair the walls first.”
Even after this entire disaster, there were many things they had to do before logging out and resting. They had to repair the walls, then rank up their classes and obtain a subclass, see what to do with the draconic beast, and lastly check the entire quest revolving around the latest events.
“Hm, like this, right?”
Vlad conjured the Spell Stone Wall several times and used Geomancy to rapidly shape the magic stone around the entire wall of Elderbridge, quickly filling the huge gap by almost emptying his Arcana. He had to conjure the same spell almost a hundred times to completely fill everything.
“It looks rough, but it’s better than nothing.” His mother nodded. “I’ll reinforce the walls using my Frost Magic. It’ll take me some time, so you are dismissed for now, son. Ah, right, bring your sister back home in the way, okay?”
“Alright, let’s go, Camilla.” Vlad held Camilla’s little hand as they walked away. The girl looked very sleepy already, so she was probably going to fall asleep immediately upon reaching his bed.
As Vlad walked across the streets, most of the people glanced at him with surprise; seeing a tall, armored knight seemed to be a rare sight to behold around here.
However, after seeing how he fought, rumors about the young lord of Elderbridge being an armored knight began to spread around, so some recognized him.
“Is that young lord Vlad?”
“If that’s him, then the girl with him must be Lady Camilla.”
“I heard something happen in the wall areas.”
“He’s covered in blood; he most likely fended off whatever tried to enter.”
“But... wasn’t the young lord crippled?”
“Who knows?”
“They sure love to bicker all they want…”
Vlad also saw some Players, although after the Raid’s disaster most Players decided not to come back here; some had chosen this place as their home, so they were slightly forced to be here, at least until their first Class Rank Up so they could leave somewhere else.
“Big brother…” Camilla muttered.
“Yes?” wondered her brother.
“How can I get stronger?” The sleepy vampire girl seemed to be worried about her own strength.
“Um… Well, you’re pretty young for that-”
“I want to become stronger! After Mama almost died... I want to be of help. Of any help…”
Camilla seemed on the verge of crying. The girl truly wanted to be of help to everyone, but because of her early age and her just recently awakened abilities, she couldn’t do as much as she wished.
Even with her brother’s accessories giving her a lot of Arcana, it wouldn’t have been possible for her to even hurt one of the orcs invading the city.
Her abilities can help if combined with another magician, such as her mother, improving the power of the elemental magic.
But alone, she could at most defeat small creatures, such as the octopus-like Cursed Monstrosities; although one of the big creatures emerged, she was left completely helpless.
“Right now, what’s your Blood Core Rank?” Paul asked.
“Hmm, it’s… Tier 1… Rank 5!” Camilla said.
“Rank 5 already? I guess that’s pretty high for someone who hasn’t fought before,” said Chris. “Where did she get the blood?”
“It must be because of the blood we drink daily, but that’s just normal and very slow growth over years,” explained Vlad. “Well, to get stronger, you must drink the fresh blood of defeated foes, so you can gain Blood Energy and Rank Up your Blood Core, Camilla. It’s important that you defeat them, or help defeat them, as you’ll gain much more Blood Energy like that.”
“So you can’t bring me a half-dead foe, and I kill it?” she wondered.
“I… maybe we could do that,” wondered Vlad, rubbing his chin. “But it would be better if you defeated the foes yourself anyway; you’ll gain the most Blood Energy that way. Once everything calms down, we could explore the dungeons again and help you defeat monsters to drain their blood. How about that?”
“Nice! Sure!” Camilla really liked the idea.
“Hey, is this the place?”
Suddenly, Chris pointed at a huge church that was located in the southwest of Elderbridge. It had seven windows painted of different colors, and then another three resembling moons above.
“This must be the church,” said Vlad. “It is a special church, a temple of the gods where every god divinity can easily reach you… It is through their divine intervention that we can Rank Up, apparently…”
“So that’s how the lore goes, huh?” Chris smiled. “Okay! I’m going first!”
“Wait, Chris, you need to pay a fee!”
Vlad tried to catch Chris, but it was too late. When Chris tried to enter the church, two monks stepped in, wearing completely black clothes and with their faces covered by red clothing in the shape of eyes.
They summoned spears of blood and crossed them, stopping him from advancing. It was as if they had been there the whole time, even when no one really saw them until the very last moment.
“You cannot enter the Temple of the Gods without paying the fee, incubus!”
“Don’t you dare give another step, or you’ll pay for the crime of trespassing into the Temple of the Gods illegally!”
“W-Who are you guys?!” Chris was confused.
“Those must be the church of the seven gods’ priests,” Vlad stepped in. “They are the people that take care of this Temple.”
“It is a shame we have to take care of a Divine Temple shared with the three moon goddesses…”
"But, well, what can be done about it?”
They seemed overly cocky and rather annoying; Chris grew furious, and they dared to stop him.
“In what sort of place do you need to pay to enter a church?!”
“Enough, Chris; don’t get angry; it’s their job…” Paul sighed. “Anyways, I’ve got the fees for all three of us here.”
“It is a thousand credits per person,” said one of the guards. “Can you afford three thousand yourself, sir knight?”
“Easily,” Paul threw a bag of coins into the priest’s face and then broke their spears with his bare hands. “Let’s go.”
“Y-You insolent…!”
“He paid, though…”
The priests could hardly do anything to them, as they counted the money, and it was indeed three thousand.
Making his way inside, Paul marveled at the interior designs until he saw a huge green crystal sitting in the middle of the temple’s interior.
“The Divine Class Stone…”
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