Originally, the vast majority of vampires lived inside sealed cities. Their laws and social order were no different from those of human society, though their racial habits meant they slept during the day and emerged at night.
The outskirts of their cities were perpetually shrouded in thick fog, storm clouds, and violent winds. As a result, even during the daytime, the vampire cities remained dim and sunless.
The vampires were ruled by two factions: the Tepes Faction and the Carmilla Faction.
The two sides frequently clashed over all sorts of trivial matters. Several wars had even broken out throughout history, but every one of them eventually ended without a clear resolution.
Recently, however, a coup had erupted within the Tepes Faction, and war had once again broken out between the two vampire factions.
As a result, some vampires had taken advantage of the chaos to escape, while others had been dispatched on special missions outside their territory.
The vampires Rod had found belonged to the Tepes Faction, where the coup had taken place.
To strengthen their forces and secure sufficient funding, several High-Class Vampires had come to this city. Through a combination of threats and temptation, they turned the human authorities into low-ranking servants.
Money and supplies were secondary.
What truly mattered was the blood factory, which could provide them with an endless supply of fresh blood.
As everyone knew, vampires were humanoid monsters with fangs who drank human blood and feared sunlight, garlic, and crosses.
In this world, however, neither sunlight nor garlic could actually harm vampires. Only crosses were effective against them.
Sunlight could still weaken their powers, though.
And to restore that strength, they needed to drink blood.
Animal blood worked as well, but it was far less effective than human blood.
Thus, the blood factory project had naturally come into existence.
Most of the humans hanging from the storage racks like livestock had been brought here through kidnapping, fraud, and other illegal means.
"How many other factories like this do you have?"
Rod asked.
"A-About three or four. In the past, we had little contact with human society, and the Church's exorcists watched us closely, so we didn't dare act too openly. But recently, for some reason, those annoying exorcists..."
The female vampire glanced at Rod and hurriedly corrected herself.
"The Church's exorcists suddenly became far less active. Combined with our control over the local government officials, our efficiency improved considerably."
"This is already the largest blood factory in Romania."
After hearing her explanation, Jeanne was utterly shocked.
In her eyes, vampires had always been nothing more than a group of insignificant creatures who could never openly show themselves.
During the Crusades, not only had the Church beaten the followers of other faiths into submission, but it had also driven the vampires all the way back to their homeland.
If God had not withheld the order for their extermination, the Church would have wiped them out centuries ago.
Yet in just a few short decades, these vampires had risen from the ashes and begun causing trouble in the human world once more.
They had even built horrifying facilities like these blood factories.
This was intolerable!
If Rod had not still been questioning her, the enraged Jeanne would already have hacked the vampire before them into pieces.
Rod asked several more questions afterward, but gained no further valuable information.
Although she was a High-Class Vampire, she only knew the general situation.
Her primary responsibility was managing the local blood factory and transporting fresh blood back to headquarters for the vampire nobility.
As for matters related to the actual plot, these vampires probably knew even less than Rod did.
When Rod stopped questioning her, the High-Class Vampire looked at him fearfully.
"I-I've already told you everything I know. And I... I was only transferred here recently. I haven't killed anyone yet."
"I don't want to die. I can become your slave, my lord. You can do anything you want to me!"
To improve her chances of survival, the vampire deliberately showed Rod her impressive cleavage.
Unfortunately, she seemed to have forgotten that the purple flames had already burned away patches of flesh all over her body.
The sight of her trying to pose seductively nearly made Rod vomit.
He quickly looked toward Jeanne to cleanse his eyes and said,
"Don't worry. I'm not planning to kill you."
"Really?"
The vampire looked overjoyed. She had thought she would never survive the day.
"I never lie. You can leave."
Rod did not even look at her and instead began examining some of the machinery.
Hearing that, the vampire immediately turned and fled.
Jeanne, however, gritted her teeth.
"Are you really going to let that disgusting vampire go? She was definitely lying just now!"
After learning the truth about the blood factory, Jeanne's hatred of evil had reached its limit.
Still, since Rod had told the vampire she could leave, Jeanne restrained herself despite her resentment.
Rod looked at her in surprise.
"Are you stupid? I only said that I wouldn't kill her. Why don't you do it?"
"?"
Jeanne failed to react for a moment.
Once she understood, however, she quickly chased after the vampire.
Before long, a miserable scream echoed through the corridor leading back to the surface.
Jeanne returned shortly afterward.
Her exquisite face was cold and expressionless, while the blood coating her Holy Sword was still evaporating.
Looking at Rod's back and the humans hanging high above them, she silently put away her sword, countless thoughts racing through her mind.
She could not understand what had happened to the world.
Why had these innocent people been forced to suffer such a fate?
And what exactly was the Hero Faction under Cao Cao fighting for?
They attacked mythological factions, claiming that it was to improve their chances of awakening Balance Breaker.
They even used the new snakes they had obtained from Ophis to forcibly stimulate their Sacred Gears.
Even when their own companions died as a result, they refused to stop and continued recklessly down the same path.
Yet while the Hero Faction was carrying out terrorist attacks, countless innocent humans were still being persecuted by criminal forces throughout the world.
Wasn't helping people like these what they should truly have been doing?
What was a hero?
This was what it meant to be a hero.
Only now did Jeanne finally understand what Rod had meant when he said that heroes fought for others.
If someone wanted to become a hero, growing stronger was never the true objective.
Protection was.
She walked up behind Rod and watched him operate the machinery.
"What are you doing?"
"I have no idea."
Rod knew absolutely nothing about this sort of specialized experimental equipment.
And because the machines were connected to the ordinary humans, he did not dare press anything recklessly.
Just then, a new mission appeared before his eyes.
[Mission: Rescue the Hostages]
[Objective: Destroy the blood factories and rescue the imprisoned humans.]
[Reward: Jeanne Affection +50, Hero Faction Reputation +30, one random reward.]
Once the mission appeared, a simple step-by-step operating guide materialized before Rod's eyes.
At the same time, more than a dozen mission targets appeared on his system map, clearly marking the locations of the other blood factories.
All he had to do next was follow the map and destroy them.
Rod was not surprised that a new mission had appeared.
What surprised him was this:
Why did completing the mission increase Jeanne's affection?
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