Seeing Milian willing to help, Murphy immediately told her his plan. Afterward, he eyed her up and down, then added:
"Lastly, I need your blood."
"I knew it!"
The cautious Milian instantly stepped back, drew the light crossbow from her back, aimed it at Murphy, and shouted:
"I knew I shouldn't trust you! Damn vampires! For a bit of blood, you dogs would betray anything!"
"Calm down, let me finish."
Murphy waved his hand, making a 'small' gesture, saying:
"I just need a little bit, enough to invigorate me and stimulate the recovery of spiritual energy in my body. One vial is enough. Miss Milian, surely you don't want to see me die in front of your eyes and then you being burned alive by the witch hunters, do you?
Look, I am negotiating with you.
But in fact, I could also not negotiate..."
---
The unlucky people of Morlan village didn't provoke anyone, but war and destruction still inexcusably fell upon them. Their geographical identity was erased with the massive fire last night; all that remains now are corpses waiting to decay and be forgotten, attracting the vultures chasing the scent of death.
At dusk, when day turns to night, on a pathway outside the ruins, a group of witch hunting cavaliers are cautiously approaching the village.
The hunters within the group who possess spiritual talents continuously spread some kind of powder, to block any possible enemies from spiritually detecting them.
This small method is nothing in front of a genuine psychic, but as of now, it is the most effective counter reconnaissance method the witch hunters who have lost organizational support can come up with.
"The last traces of Marus' Squad are there."
An old soldier put down his rust-stained 675-style single-tube telescope.
It was designed and made for the warriors of Avalon Church by the half-body people during the Unification War on Green Island in the year 675. It has been over 400 years, but classic designs never fade with time.
Regrettably, the once flourishing Avalon Church is now barely even mentioned by name; it is only referred to as the "Old Church," but such forgetfulness is logical.
The old soldier straightened himself on the saddle, he held the handheld crossbow hanging from his waist to load it. He then whispered to his comrade, a woman who was obviously a woman despite wearing a caped hood like the other rough men, and who carried a heavy leather bag on her back:
"They have exceeded 8 hours without contact, it seems they have fallen. Actually, I am very suspicious that the village was burned down by Marus himself."
The female witch hunter who was the leader of the squad remained silent. But another one-armed old hunter said coldlybehind her:
"Who else but him?
Of the ten squads hunting around Cardman City, theirs is the most mad and fallen. Losing their devotion to Avalon has allowed their souls to be consumed by evil thoughts.
The innocent ones who have perished in the hands of these corrupters..."
"Shut up! Porter!"
The old soldier holding the crossbow reprimanded with a furrowed brow:
"That's the order, no chit-chat! And don't mention the name of Avalon's god again, if the lackeys of the Circle Tower hear it, it'll be bad."
"Am I afraid of them?"
The one-armed old hunter, Porter, bared his teeth. Years of the hunting life had ingrained in him an irascible character. He retorted as combatively as a fighting dog:
"Alone, I could take down ten of those stupid psychic hunters! Pah, they're nothing more than cheap imitations of the warriors we've trained."
"Then you would be disintegrated into scraps even a dog wouldn't eat by the psychics. Don't provoke the Circle Tower, they are our 'masters' now. Thanks to their protection, we have survived these past ten years."
Finally, the lady leader of the squad spoke up.
Her tone was cold and husky, it carried a tinge of scarcely concealed fatigue. She lifted her left hand and made a light waving motion; the remaining seven members of the group immediately dispersed into an assault formation.
Holding the hilt of her hunter's sword, adorned with strange oakwood embellishments, the female hunting squad leader looked at the two sub-team leaders on her left and right, and said:
"No matter what Marus did to this village, it can be confirmed that he and the wanted vampire messenger had a battle here.
I trust in the combat power of Marus and his squad members. Even if that vampire messenger isn't dead, he's definitely seriously injured. The letter in his hand must be obtained.
At all costs."
"Norman, what's the movement of other teams nearby?"
"I contacted them with the hawk at noon once. All squads other than ours are retreating from the border as one phase of the tactical cut-off has hit its targets."
The veteran leading the way sheathed his crossbow and examined the eerily quiet village in front of him, even catching sight of overturned carriages and the bodies of bloody slaves.
He responded to the female hunter:
"After we collect the body of the vampire messenger, we'll also have to leave Transylvania. Maybe, we'll never come back. I despise this place. I hope this is our last mission here.
However, this village... it gives me a bad vibe."
"Now it's dusk, even if that vampire is hiding here, he wouldn't dare confront us. And in two hours, it'll be dark. I don't know what you guys are thinking, but I don't fancy hunting a vampire that could kill the maniac Marus in the night.
I think we should start acting now."
The one-armed hunter sneered, shared his opinion, looked at the female hunter, who hesitated a bit, made a gesture, and said:
"Team two stands guard at the outskirts of the village; team one follows me into the village."
At the command, the slightly heated exchange among the team members immediately subsided.
The one-armed hunter attached a mechanical movable fist blade to his amputated arm, the jagged, blood-stained three-claw blade flexing at his fingertips, then followed the hunting team leader with his three teammates into the village.
But the stench of the corpses, seared by a great fire, then baked in the sun, changed the expressions of these hunters who knew the true face of hell.
This was not a scene of battle, this was a damn massacre!
"Marus should consider himself lucky he's dead!"
The one-armed veteran spit, then coolly said:
"If he were alive, I'd have strangled him with my own hands. The commander has strictly forbidden such actions."
"But I heard that the psychics of the Circle Tower are unhappy with the commander's soft stance in enemy territories. These indifferent jerks seem to prefer the reckless maniac like Marus."
The hunter in the team with psychic abilities muttered under his breath.
She couldn't bear to take in the scene, so she stepped forward, took out a special vial, and smashed it on the ground.
Green dots, after mixing with the spiritual energy in the air, created a breeze that swept through the entire village, somewhat diluting the horrible stench.
"Oh, Avalon above, when will this hell of slaughter end?"
The scout murmured. At the vigilance of the other three, she sheathed the crossbow, crouched down, and extended her hand to touch the ground, using her unremarkable psychic skills. In an instant, her perception, like a radar, expanded with the land beneath her as the medium.
While expanding her investigation to the entire village ruins in this way, she said to the female leader on guard with a sword:
"There are no alive in the village... Marus's body is in the cellar at the back of the village, with his head blown apart by his own bullets and his pants still off... I can guess what he did before his death. What a disgusting beast.
Wait?
No!
There's one alive!
In the house on the left at the end of the village!
It's a young woman, an ordinary human! She's injured and bleeding!
She's weak, no threat."
The female hunter wielding the sword nodded, and waved her finger forward.
The old warrior with a mechanical claw immediately moved towards the direction pointed out by the scout with a middle-aged man holding a shotgun, while the remaining two continued to investigate and be on guard.
All this did not escape Murphy's eyes.
The vampire was hiding in the shadows of the tallest water tower on the other side of the village, watching the team that looked formidable.
He shrank back into the shadow, confirmed that the enemy had split into three parts before entering the forum, then opened the group chat:
Alpha: [@[all members]Guys, get ready to log in! Test time is here!]