Chapter 1579: Chapter 1579
The man's voice echoed from within the deepening blood-mist, punctuated by his booming laughter. Then, Jenkins heard a strange beeping sound from overhead.
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His first instinct was to grab the cat on his shoulder and tackle Miss Capet to the ground. But to his astonishment, she was a step ahead. She lunged, shoving him under the table and shielding him with her own body.
The very next moment, a deafening roar erupted from above—a chain of steam bombs detonating in a blast so powerful it threatened to shatter their eardrums.
The banquet hall was the heart of the maze. A place , secured by a conceptual ritual, should have been impervious to any non-supernatural assault. But the knowledge the Countess had acquired had been tampered with. Over thirty bombs, planted in key locations across the manor and rigged for remote, supernatural detonation, had actually demolished the entire hall.
A deluge of stone, glass, and splintered wood rained from the ceiling, burying everything in its path. The thick crimson mist that had saturated the banquet hall, stirred by the violent rush of air from the explosion, billowed out and spread to every corner of the manor.
Jenkins stared up at Miss Capet, who held him pinned beneath her. Her face was flushed, and a moment later, she gasped and coughed up a spray of blood as a chunk of falling stone struck her back.
"What are you doing?"
He had no time to think. Shoving a hand past her head, he braced it against a falling support beam. He ignored the shards from a crashing crystal chandelier that sliced open his palm and, with a sudden surge of strength, hauled Miss Capet behind him. Then, dropping to one knee, he thrust both hands upward and managed to catch a massive stone slab, heaving it into the air.
Though badly injured, Miss Capet had been pulled from immediate harm. She sat on the dusty floor, her face deathly pale, and stared at the back of Jenkins, who was straining to hold the massive stone slab aloft. An unreadable emotion flickered in her eyes.
"Are you insane? Trying to save me in a situation ?"
Jenkins roared, shifting the great stone that served as their temporary shelter. He managed to prop one end on the rubble-strewn floor while he held up the other. Even as he strained, he didn't forget to scold the woman behind him. "You're the one who scared the hell out of me!"
"Because... you're my brother," she said, her voice weak. "I don't have much family left..."
The word "brother" made Jenkins cringe. No one had ever called him that before—not even Newman, who just used his name. He especially disliked being called that by women his own age. And yet, he was moved. The family ties he'd found in this world were a gift, one he had come to cherish deeply.
"Don't ever call me that again," he said. "Even if our connection becomes public, don't call me that. Just call me Jenkins."
He spoke through gritted teeth, pushing upwards with all his might. The banquet hall was on the ground floor, which meant three more stories were collapsing down on top of them. Though the initial explosion and collapse were over in an instant, what Jenkins was holding up now was far more than just the stone slab. God only knew how much debris was piled on top of it.
Hearing Miss Capet's breathing even out, he knew she was healing herself. Jenkins tried to lower the slab, and surprisingly, he managed to find the right angle to wedge it against something unseen in the darkness.
Only then could he sit down and catch his breath. He felt the woman behind him lean against his back:
"Sorry, Jenkins. I'm... a little tired."
These weren't her last words. She was drawing on a massive amount of life spirit to heal herself, which was leaving her drained. As far as Jenkins knew, he was the only one with a healing ability that came at almost no cost. All other methods—be it rituals, abilities, or even potions—demanded a price.
Jenkins turned and gathered her into his arms. Already succumbing to exhaustion, Miss Capet could barely keep her eyes open. The very last thing she saw was Jenkins's purple eyes—so captivating, so magnetic, that she felt herself go limp and then plunged into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Suppressing the rage in his heart, Jenkins took off his coat and spread it in the small corner for Miss Capet to curl up on. Then he turned, a chilling light in his eyes, and stared at the path ahead, blocked by the slab and building debris.
The remarkably well-behaved and perceptive Chocolate padded over to Jenkins and began to lick his still-bleeding palm. The cat knew someone was in for a world of hurt.
The bombs had demolished the building at the center of the manor's courtyard, but this hadn't been enough to completely dispel the maze. The Orthodox Church members waiting outside the courtyard noticed the disturbance within the manor, but when they tried to pass through the gate of mist, they found it had become impassable.
This time, the Treehouse had only sent a single level-six Enchanter to keep an eye on the Countess. Although confident they could subdue her, they worried the Church's interference would complicate matters. Therefore, the explosion that destroyed the maze's core also served to completely sever it from the outside world.
Only the Church's demigods and a handful of powerful Enchanters could ascend into the sky. From their vantage point, they could only look down upon a manor completely shrouded in crimson mist. Within the churning fog, they could just make out the writhing forms of a cursed legion crawling across the grounds as the mist itself seemed to drain the very strength from their bodies.
Atop the ruins of the central building, two figures faced each other. The Countess, though caught in the blast, appeared completely unscathed. She held a fan adorned with peacock feathers, hiding half her face. In her left hand, she gripped a short dagger that looked as if it were carved from red crystal. The dagger continuously absorbed power from the dense fog—it was an energy weapon forged from the combined power of the maze and the Blood Mosquito Curse, a blade condensed from pure blood energy.
The man from the Treehouse stood atop the jutting wreckage of the banquet table. He held a silver pistol, its surface etched with an intricate, vein-like pattern. The gun was clearly absorbing the blood energy from the crimson mist as well, causing the patterns on its otherwise pristine, silver-white frame to glow with an eerie, sinister light.
"To deal with you, I brought a special weapon left behind by an ancient vampire hunter. This gun has a beautiful name: B-04-3-2863, the [Stormblood Rose]. It's a weapon blessed by the Church, further enhanced with the power of vampires by a traitor from among their own kind, making it the perfect counter to the vampire race and the Blood Mosquito Curse. While it doesn't have the one-hit-kill effect of B-05-4-3911, the [Vampire Buster], it's just right for dealing with someone like you, who embodies both the vampire and the Blood Mosquito Curse. Today, you are destined to die by my hand. Nothing can stop it."