Beyond the doors were more vampires, and plenty of them. This was the real lair; the building above was just a front, lightly manned and unimportant.
Down here?
Mordred's laughs filled the air as the darkness was constantly broken by flashes of light from Clarent II as she rained fire down on the attacking vampires.
While behind Lancelot and me, the members of the Church slowly followed along, struggling to navigate in the unnatural darkness.
"Are you sure you shouldn't help her? Those vampires are far stronger than expected." One of them asked, worried.
"Mordred can handle herself." I didn't share his worry; Mordred wasn't someone who could be dealt with easily. After all, she had once killed me, so I understood her strength well.
"I am more worried about you, good Sirs, are you sure you should continue forward?" Lancelot asked, his voice clearly conveying his doubt about their abilities.
"Don't underestimate us, we have killed countless vampires, it is just that these are… different, stronger, faster, harder to kill." One of them defended himself.
I gave a small nod, because he wasn't wrong. I had noticed that right away. These vampires were modified, not much, not yet at least. But they were enhanced, empowered.
While the others might not notice, I easily saw the truth, a peak of my Fae eyes was the night vision, far beyond what even Mordred and Lancelot had. And I saw, in that darkness, tiny runes carved into the skin of the vampires.
The runes themselves were gone, cuts healed, but the magic remained. Blood magic, the power of witchcraft, and higher vampires.
Someone had tried to strengthen these vampires; in fact, some of it reminded me of the most famous vampire hunter of the Marvel universe, Blade. Because these vampires had their inherent weaknesses weakened.
The weakness to sunlight, silver, and holy water was slightly less deadly. They still weren't daywalkers, but someone wanted them to be.
I couldn't blame whoever did this, vampires were powerful and had great potential as an army, they were loyal to their masters, easy to control, they could grow in number quickly, and they were strong enough to be useful, smart enough as well.
The problem was their weaknesses, their inability to go out in the day, which really limited their usability. If that could be solved, it would be possible to quickly build a massive army to contend with normal human forces.
A few million vampires could handle any army and any military, conquering entire nations easily.
The room rumbled slightly as a pair of vampires tried to flank Mordred. She met them with glee, sliding low beneath their swipes and unleashing a burst of rapid fire at them, turning one to cinders with a headshot, and quickly dispatching the others with a mix of hand-to-hand combat and gunfire.
"I see what you mean," the Church hunter beside me muttered, watching with both awe and dismay. "She fights like a devil."
"She fights like a berserker," Lancelot corrected, his tone flat.
We advanced slowly, stepping over ash piles and broken stone, deeper into the carved subterranean hall. The space opened up into what must once have been an ancient catacomb or ossuary—long since repurposed into a bloodstained altar-chamber.
The smell hit us next—iron and rot.
Mordred, meanwhile, kicked down a heavy iron door like it was made of balsa wood and shouted, "Hello boys! You miss me?"
A dozen pairs of red eyes turned to her, and she beamed like a child on Christmas morning.
My eyes were locked on the far end of the room, there, a small group of very different people, or rather beings stood.
Two vampires, one human, though one that stunk of blood as badly as the vampires, of blood of dark magic, of death and rot.
Those three were without a doubt the ones in charge of this place.
Mordred stepped forward without fear, casually reloading Clarent II with a flourish. "Finally, someone worth my time."
The trio didn't move.
The vampires were taller than the others we'd faced, not in height, but in stature — the kind of stillness that came from centuries of predation.
Lancelot tensed. "A traitor to humanity."
The man in question clearly heard Lancelot and scuffed loudly. "A traitor? Hardly, I am just someone who knows the truth, that only strength matters. And I have plenty of that, as do my friends." He motioned to the two vampires at his side.
"That's right, strength is all that matters, and while those rabble outside might not have been able to stop you, these people." The male vampire said, holding a hand towards the dozens of other vampires. "Are our elite force, and they hunger for some fresh blood."
"You should consider it an honor to die under their hands." The female vampire added, her voice cold and dripping with malice, in particular as she looked at me, her eyes burning with jealousy.
"Mordred, I want the mage alive." I said, and let her have free rein of this situation.
"Just sit back and enjoy." Mordred wasted no time in setting out.
Mordred didn't charge in like a fool — no, she strutted, cocky, confident, like a star stepping into the arena. Clarent II was already humming in her grip, its barrel glowing faintly with pre-charged energy. And when the vampires lunged, a dozen at once, claws out and fangs bared, Mordred smiled.
Then she vanished into motion.
The first one never got close — Clarent II barked once, and his head exploded like an overripe melon. The second reached her flank, only for Mordred to duck under its strike and drive her fist—not her gun—into its chest with enough force to send it crashing through a pillar. Stone shattered like cheap plaster.
"How is that possible?" One of the vampire hunters whispered beside me, stunned.
"Because she is Mordred," I replied.
It didn't fully answer the question, but honestly, what more could I say? Should I explain how a heroic spirit, given a body through Incarnation, operates? Or her stats and their significance? There's no simple way to describe how Mordred managed to do what she did, because she was Mordred, and Mordred was powerful.
Another wave came, this time coordinated — three from above, two from the sides. It was the kind of strike that would overwhelm most. Mordred laughed.
She backflipped off a coffin lid, twisted mid-air, and raked an arcing spray of plasma across the ceiling. Two of the attackers disintegrated mid-leap, falling as ash. The third landed, slashed at her, and hit nothing. She'd already rolled low and spun into a rising punch that lifted the creature clean off its feet.
Its spine broke audibly. She followed up with a stomp that cratered the floor.
"By God," another Church man breathed. "She's unarmored. She's not even— Her skin stopped that claw swipe."
"She's built different," Lancelot said, his voice dry as ever.
Clarent II belched fire again, blowing holes through three more vampires as Mordred dashed between them like a dancer, her legs striking with the power of a wrecking ball, her elbows snapping ribs like twigs.
"She's not just strong," the hunter muttered. "She's… she's playing with them."
It was true. Mordred was laughing, taunting them, grinning like this was a show made just for her. Every movement radiated joy, the kind only someone born for battle ever knew.
A vampire twice her size barreled forward. She holstered Clarent II, gripped the creature by the collar mid-sprint, and threw it — a spinning, howling arc that ended in the far wall, embedded halfway through the stone. A heartbeat later, she leapt after it and punched the wall where its head had been.
The chamber shook.
"I think the vampire exploded," one hunter said, wide-eyed.
"It did," I confirmed, calmly.
The elite vampires — at least those who hadn't charged yet — hesitated. You could see it. Even they weren't sure this was the kind of foe they could swarm.
Mordred raised Clarent II in one hand, blood and dust painting her red jacket. "Well? What are you waiting for?" she shouted. "You scared of a little girl in shorts?"
The chamber howled again with battle cries.
And Mordred smiled wider.
"Perfect," she whispered.
Then she vanished into the horde again, and we stood back, watching the storm made flesh.
…
The smell of scorched flesh clung thick to the air. Ash coated the ground like snowfall, and the once-grand altar chamber looked more like a collapsed battlefield. Stone walls cracked, coffins shattered, scorch marks painting grotesque murals across every surface.
The two elder vampires were dead — or rather, what was left of them was a bubbling mess across the floor. One had been torn in half by Mordred's bare hands after his regeneration proved too stubborn, the other reduced to a smoking crater courtesy of a point-blank Clarent II blast to the skull.
Mordred stood at the center of the ruin, panting lightly, arms crossed as the barrel of her weapon hissed with cooling plasma. Despite the carnage, she barely looked winded — a few smudges of dust on her face, a tear at her sleeve, and a good amount of vampire ash in her hair.
"I told you I'd clean it up," she said proudly.
"I never doubted you, though I think we were lucky you didn't break the ceiling," I muttered, glancing up at the cracked vault overhead.
"Oops," she said without remorse.
The only one still breathing in the room besides us was the mage — if he could still be called that. He lay slumped against the far wall, legs broken, one arm twisted unnaturally behind his back. His robe was shredded, revealing skin covered in stitched tattoos, many of which glowed faintly with residual blood magic.
"Is that one still alive?" Lancelot asked, sword already half-raised.
"Barely," I said, approaching. "But that's enough."
He looked up at me with one eye swollen shut and the other filled with loathing. "You… you think you've won…"
Mordred knelt beside him with a cheerful hum and tapped Clarent II against his forehead. "Oh no. We know we've won. Now comes the fun part."
He coughed blood. "You won't… get anything…"
I crouched down, gaze level. "Let's find out."
My green eyes turned gold, glowing with divine light as I looked into his soul, into his very essence. I saw everything: his thoughts, his memories, his past, everything he saw, everything he knew. I saw it all.
Almost all of it was useless to me, I had no interest in any of that, so I moved past it, like skipping ahead in a movie.
Went right up to the present, and looked around for anything important, what was he doing here, how did he come to be here.
And in that, I got my answers.
"We are done here." I said, standing back up.
"Just like that? No torture?" Mordred asked, sounding disappointed.
"No need for such crude things, if you want him, he is yours." I gestured to the still stunned hunters, who had no idea what to think after seeing Mordred's display.
Though I honestly couldn't see why they were so shocked, even Blade could pull something like this off, so for Mordred? Wasn't even breaking a sweat.
"Ah, yes, thank you, we will, and we won't let this help you offered us be forgotten, should you need help, the Church will help you."
"Good," I replied simply. "Because this wasn't the last nest. Not even close."
The lead hunter swallowed, still visibly shaken, though doing his best to hold onto some measure of composure. "I believe you. If this… this was only one of many…" He trailed off as he looked once more at the battlefield, at the dozens of ash heaps that used to be monsters.
Mordred was leaning against a broken column now, casually shaking dust from her hair. "Well, if they're all gonna be that easy, you guys can just leave it to me."
"Please don't encourage her," Lancelot muttered.
"No, no—let her," one of the younger hunters whispered back, eyes wide with admiration or fear. "She can take the next five nests alone if she wants."
---
(End of chapter)
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