I couldn't help thinking about blood. And not just blood but human blood. There was such an allure from its taste, like a vintage wine that had only gotten better with age. My need for it only grew with each passing moment. As much as I wanted to keep myself in control, my suddenly growing addiction to human blood would probably turn me into a monster.
The only thing that could pull my attention away from my craving for human blood long enough was my current predicament with the massive crater I had made on the mountain. The mountain that the Vampire's were required to mine was some how spelled or enchanted to deliver a shock equivalent to every single hit that was delivered to its infrastructure. All lot of vampire had died under the onslaught, but a lot of them survived and have only grown stronger. They developed a tolerance to it and now the shocks received was nothing more than an itch for them.
It was to my esteem pleasure that I truly discovered what that mountain was meant for, or it might be meant for something, but it was now serving a different purpose. The constant shocks from the mountain and the tolerance they built towards it, gave them stronger, healthier and more agile bodies. It was like a forge, and the constant hammering has shaped and made them a whole lot more durable than was normal for a member of the vampire race.
But I also found out the hidden blessing in it. It did not just temper the body, it also tempered the mind. This was too much of a fortuitous event for me to not be suspicious about it. But I was grateful none the less, things did not come easy to anyone so the pain gotten from the shocks was a price I had paid. And if I can't withstand it, then that's it for me.
But this mountain was more mysterious than it seemed, apart from the fact that it had an unnatural and bountiful collection of rare ores and minerals which as of this moment I learnt mainly included the magic metal orichalum also know as god's gold, the silver colored but extremely hard and magically adaptive metal Mythril and then it had lesser more rare ores and minerals than those two that included a liquid like red magical compound that was found in a layer of red rubies called Das, the compound was officially called Daseinite.
And it could be anything from an explosive, a healing agent or even cement.
It was a binding agent that could react with any organic material and even magic to cause different reactions or create new compounds and a whole host of weird things.
The second was a blue metal with white veins called Ionite. It was called the ore of void. It was easy to shape and in its raw form it was actually a naturally formed chemical compound. But its hard to mine for almost anyone except master dwarves. This metal had the express ability to negate magic and abilities rendering it null and void. Should a single piece of it come into contact with the flesh of any living being without it being processed or contained, the person would be poisoned by it and lose access to all their abilities and magic for nothing less than six to eight months.
The prison had a regular vaccination for all vampires in it. Even the children were not spared. It strips them of their natural abilities, like their natural strength, speed, flight or the vampires ability to use the allure. An Innate ability of all vampires once they advance to the Nosferatu rank, that let's them plant suggestions or even control the minds of others.
Everyone was left with the most basic of their physical abilities, and coupled with the seal that blocked the WAY, everything seemed a little too bleak for all of them.
Xaseah also explained to me that my blind rage at the mine was also an enchantment from the mountain itself. It had led me to mining what could most probably be a few weeks worth of ores for the weekly quota. And with Nisi's extraordinary earth abilities she would be able to safely extract orichalum an other ores from the sediments and remnants of rocks.
And with my first successful weaving, my quota was taken care of, at least for a few more weeks and the excess left would be used by Teluna and Nisi for practice, and maybe exchange for a few things at the market.
All in all it has been rather eventful day for me, I felt as if every nook and cranny of this prison had a secret or story of its own. There was not much I could do about it, so I was stuck swimming in a wave of random events and an uncertain future.
However Xaseah and Bob had more to say than just the explanation they had given me. And right from the start, alarm bells were ringing in my head.
"So how did you like the cocktail?" Bob asked with an inquisitive look on his face.
I felt wary, but I still had to give an answer, after all, it would be rude not to answer after they had taken their time to explain to me why I had taken a trip to the strange dream of face less people, and how a lot of things worked in the mine."
"The cocktail was exquisite.(exquisite? Seriously! I sounded like a nerd, a stuck up rich nerd.)"
"What if I tell you there's a way and a place you can get more." Bob cajoled
"Well then I would be very grateful if you can give me the directions" I answered with all honesty I could muster in my current state of dishonesty.
"The cocktail is a produce of our Night Wraiths gang. It had to go through a lot of revisions and tastings, not to mention the intense amount of experiments needed to create something so sublime. Anyway we're about to laugh it as a product in the pit, and we're in need of an endorsement. Especially one from somebody with an influence, someone like you."
At the mention of the word gang, I noticed how Nisi shrunk back and hid behind me in fright. I didn't really know who Xaseah and Bob were, so it would be quite stupid for me to judge their characters this early into out relationship. But with the way Nisi reacted when the word Gang was mentioned, it was obvious this two were not associated with a good crowd.
But I really did not know how to tell them no. I don't claim to be intelligent, at least I don't think I am, but I like to think I'm wise enough to trust my instincts on a lot of things. And right now it was telling me that this people were not the right kind to associate with.
"Well you have to give me some time to think about it. You know everything here is rather new to me, and I have to get settled down properly before I start making any sort of decisions."
I spoke softly, but not too softly that they would think I'm weak and easy to pick on. Well I am weak, and they can kill me in a second if they wanted, but much like me they were also sealed. They were just as strong as average humans now.
"Naturally there would be benefits if you decide to work with us." Xaseah spoke up in a hurry. Then she bent down a bit and exposed her bountiful cleavage while also whispering.
"Well. Endowed. Benefits." Then she blew into my ear, making me shudder as if I had been thrown into a pool of icy cold water.
This woman was dangerous no doubt, and right now I was like a fly caught and trapped in her web.
"Tha...…thank you fo...….for the assurance, but I still need to think about it."
This was a pathetic display really, but there was nothing I could do about that. Xaseah and her ridiculously hot body had their hooks sunk deeply into me. I knew it, she knew it, and so did out two friends Nisi and Bob.
"Well I understand, but don't take too long. I can only wait for so long before someone else comes along and sweeps me of my feet. But when you've made up your mind, you can find one of our stalls in the market, once you get there tell them you're looking for me. Don't take too long. Bob let's go."
And then she turned and waked away, her bountiful backyard bouncing and jiggling to the swing of her hips, and the falls of her step. I felt the urge to make a strange sign, I raised my right hand to my forehead, brought it down to my left chest then moved it to my right chest, then I kissed my hand.
"What was that?" Nisi asked with curiosity behind her dark eyes.
"I think that's the sign of the cross."
"ooooh! What is it?"
"I don't know."
" what does it do?"
"I don't know that either."
"You....you meanie."
Our conversation ended with a huff as she moved herself back to the massive rubble of rocks I had broken off from the mountain. There was bound to be quite a significant amount of ores in that rubble. But I could not help but ask myself what I did wrong. I really had no idea what the sign of the cross meant, or why I did it. It just suddenly happened.
I watched as Xaseah and Bob disappeared back to the assigned area. It was then I realized that Bob was actually Xaseah's subordinate. They might have been on a first names basis, busy from the way they had talked and he was now following her, I could see the deference.
It was a slow progress, much to slow than I expected. Sorting the ores from among the rocks was a bland and thankless job. Not to mention I had a seriously huge pile of rocks to sort through, I gave a sigh of annoyance, because I knew, I was going to be here for a while. But thankfully I was not alone, now where's that pick that I had weaver the word BREAK onto. It was time for my moment of truth.