'Is this because I am on a different path of cultivation? I mean, that sounds right since my qi should be different in nature from me having an impure skill.' Abel deduced.
Deciding that he wouldn't be learning much from his school library, the only person he could turn to was to Zeke.
At the end of their school day, he went up to him before he was to head back home.
"Hey, Zeke!" Abel said, before he could leave.
"Hi, you don't need blood again, do you?" Zeke asked.
"No, I was asking about skills. I can't use any skills in the skill books, they just don't work for me." Abel explained.
"Ah, that makes a lot of sense. You can't use those skills because they're based on the human path of cultivation. To use them, you must be under the human path but you are not. Follow me, I have some stuff I can teach you." Zeke explained.
Abel eagerly followed with a smile, barely able to wait to use his first skill. These were just the first steps he needed to be taking to progress, and he was certainly impatient to begin.
The two had eventually ventured into a forest area near the edge of the city.
On their path, a group of hunters were being dragged away on stretchers and had grave injuries. This wasn't an alien sight throughout the city, as going outside the city walls was very dangerous.
Abel saw a man grunting in pain, holding a bloody wound on his chest and almost felt drawn to it. He could feel his demonic form manifesting, but Zeke grabbed him to pull him further away from the injured warriors.
"Control yourself. You cannot reveal your identity here." Zeke ordered, increasing his pace.
The city walls were only a few hundred metres away. Red, glowing lanterns illuminated the streets, and they could see towering pagodas in the distance, that were as tall as even a hundred metres.
They had lanterns dangling off each floor, enchanting them with what looked like small balls of glowing gold from afar.
"Alright, so I'm a vampire and I was only taught techniques that mainly vampires use. Demons all fall under the demon path and so, can interchangeably use skills but the skills that a species uses will be tailored toward that species' skills. You are a werewolf, but you are also a vampire, so this should help you in some way too." Zeke explained.
"One of the first techniques that vampires are taught is the blood pellet technique. I don't really use this very much so I apologise if I can't explain it to you well." Zeke stated.
Zeke began to run through the form of manipulation that one would want to have for this technique.
"Flow the qi into the arms, and you should feel your qi in the hands by about this stage."
"Twist your body around and extend the chosen arm."
As he twisted his hips, he shot forward his right hand and his palms glowed red.
The veins in his arms also looked somewhat visible, and a mixture of qi and blood seemed to be formed from his palm. A ball of red energy was released from his hand and hit a tree beside Abel, who reflexively stepped away to be well out of the way of the incoming blast.
BOOM!
The explosion shaved off a large part of the tree and caused it to come stumbling down to the ground.
"That was only me using a slither of my qi. Even though the attack is basic, it's powerful. Many of the fledglings in Nudra use and abuse that skill." Zeke added.
"Oh yeah, what are fledglings? You talked about them before and called that other guy a fledgling. What is that?" Abel asked his friend.
"Well, vampires fall under special rankings. The lowest rank of vampire is the fledgling. These are almost like the foot soldiers of vampires, while ordinary vampires that aren't really soldiers fall under this rank as well. The next rank above is the neonate rank. A vampire can become a neonate through either killing a neonate and siphoning their power, or by just getting stronger."
This explanation fascinated Abel, and the unknown words he was hearing just ignited his curiosity even more.
This new world he had entered sounded very exciting to him.
"What is siphoning?" Abel asked, interrupting his friend's explanation.
"I'll come to that. The next ranks are the Ancillae rank then the elder rank. My father is an elder and I am a neonate. I could've only claimed the throne as an Ancillae, and all the other heirs my age were ancillae, and I was ridiculed by almost everyone around me for it." Zeke continued.
"Siphoning is a power that demons possess. If you kill a supernatural and then eat their heart, you take their power for yourself. You get an immediate boost to your qi and physical strength. It is looked down upon, and intraspecies siphoning is illegal in almost every district of Nudra. In Abryssia, it's public execution if you are caught."
"Woah. Surely that means other species are constantly trying to kill each other so that they can steal each other's powers, right?"
"Not necessarily. I mean, there's generally an accepted code to not do so. For example, for werewolves, their siphoning is almost crucial to continue their power." Zeke added.
Abel wanted to ask so many more questions but they both realised that they wouldn't get far in their training if he was to continue rambling on. It was better that he just learned more over time, instead of just being bombarded with new information.
Abel began his training and practicing this move. At first, he was just trying to master the manipulation of his qi. Just as he expected, following Zeke's descriptions were much easier than the skill books in the library.
His qi was following his command, and he was starting to see how a skill could spawn out of the movement of qi that he felt within his body.
However, it would take a lot longer than a day for him to make this skill his own.
Abel's training continued, and his progress was skyrocketing. At the beginning of his training, Zeke was also kind enough to give him a special cultivation inscription, specialised for vampires.
He could feel his qi being enriched and invigorated as he utilised the inscription given and the cultivation technique.
It was great to feel this power within himself growing, and the most growth that he was receiving was in his physical strength.
Before he had activated his vampire side, he was getting stronger through putting his body through strenuous training.
Now that he had activated his vampire, he could feel he was making a lot more progress with that specific training regimen, and he could tell that his body was now robust and powerful.
Abel was now with Zeke, in the centre of Fragan. They had walked past a large pagoda and were now in some of the poorer quarters of Fragan. This was where the lower middle class and working-class people of Fragan would live. Some were cultivators, more than their home neighbourhood, but not many.
In the backstreet of an alley, they had cornered an individual, who was a middle-aged man. He had brown hair and hazel eyes, with a slim, unathletic physique and Abel took a drink of his blood.
Zeke did his wonders of compelling him to forget about what had happened, while also feeding him a healing pill that he had stolen from the academy. Using his compulsion ability, he had acquired a vast number of them, to make sure that wounds weren't left on their victims.
The man crunched and crunched as he ate the pill, and was allowed to leave by Zeke.
As he walked off as if nothing had happened, a man started to take a closer look at his neck. He could see four puncture wounds, with two large ones as if two canines had been dug into his neck.
The holes were steadily closing, but he had caught a good enough glimpse to know what was at stake. The man was muscular and looked around 40, but was nearly a hundred years of age. He was a cultivator and so, his aging had slowed a considerable amount.
'Vampires in Fragan? I never would've thought. I need to inform the hunters!' He realised, turning around.