BXBX NOVEL Chapter 220: Blood, soul and will [1/2]
"White Guard?"
"They are the elite unit serving the princess of the North American battle front. Their fighting skills are rumored to be on par with the Specters."
"Why would they bother with your men at all?"
"It seems that our attempts to find you were tracked on both the Grave Network and the Surface Web. There have been reports of an elite hacker recently taking over the Graveyard."
"..."
Bella told me that they wanted to protect Earl\'s family. My heart felt warm at the Sirens\' immediate action. At times like this, I remembered that these wonderful women were all in my corner.
"Actually, my lord. It was not only the White Guard. The ebony death stalker, the shooting star, the white-tailed spider, and the Valkyrie of Ivaldi. My men have almost died several times in the last twenty-four hours."
Why were there so many big names guarding my family? They must have been part of the White Guard or something. After all, I was told that only Phantoms were given nicknames.
Well, if they were guarding my family, I did not care what they called themselves. Besides, these gangster bastards needed to learn some manners. With a weight off my mind. I focused on my most pressing concern.
"Can I get my damn car already? I still have things to do."
"Of course, this way, my lord."
"Why do you keep calling me that?" I asked.
"Because we are your servants and you are our new master."
"But I am not yet? Don\'t you still belong to Raymond?"
"We no longer do, though that may be true on paper. Our loyalty now lies with you. No matter what happens today or two days from now. You have become similar to our progenitor."
"Calm down Vincent, I am not anything yet."
Vincent walked me down to the elevator behind his office. All the way we passed huge, burly guys who looked like they bench-pressed 400 pounds.
After a few minutes, we finally arrived at an underground parking lot filled with Cadillac Escalades.
When we arrived, Vincent directed me to a small table and stayed there as we continued our conversation.
"Frankly, I have everything riding on you, my lord."
"What do you mean?"
"I actually took advantage of your lack of knowledge of reaper matters. Giving Reaper blood to a human is extremely frowned upon. Almost illegal under certain circumstances. Most Reapers would not even consider my proposal."
Huh? Why would giving blood to a human become illegal? The only downside I could think of was that humans with lousy fighting abilities would just die.
Even the Production guilds and schools for Academics were expected to be able to kill at least a rank F. If one did not have at least that level of will to fight, the humans would die immediately during their enlistment.
"My lord does not seem to know. While the existence of the Reapers is an open secret to politicians and the truly powerful, it is generally kept confidential. So normally, unless one gains the support of a powerful or influential Reaper. Rogue Reapers are killed."
"Rogues?"
"Yes. They are people who became Reapers outside of the will of the battle front. The Reapers who have gone through the proper process are called official Reapers. All seven continents have one answer to rogues."
"And what is that?" I asked.
"They are terminated with extreme prejudice."
"..."
Vincent seemed to be a walking goldmine of information. I didn\'t even know Rogue Reapers existed. This calls into question the whole story Lilly told me.
\'John, do you know how many people joined your enlistment? It was twenty thousand. That was all the entire world could produce for a month. Each day over 80,000 die. That over 2.4 million people in a month. Yet despite our best efforts July only had 20,000 who accepted the terms to join the reapers.
And just like with your case, out of that 20,000 only 200 survived the first night.\'
Both could not be true. If David\'s forces were killing off rogue Reapers, they weren\'t desperate for more people. Otherwise, if they were desperate, they would be hiring the rogues instead to allow them to become official.
Unless there was something fundamentally different about the rogues that could not be tolerated.
\'What could that be? Oversight? Skill? Or perhaps something darker?\'
I asked Vincent. I felt like I had developed an itch I couldn\'t scratch.
"Then wouldn\'t you and your family become rogues by drinking my blood? Why does my blood even matter?"
"My lord, for a reaper to be born, three things must be satisfied. A willing human on the verge of death. The blood of an existing Reaper. And souls for transformation. The cost varies according to my master, but the reaper must pay for a human to be reborn."
My finger unconsciously went to the spot where Roland Winchester had bitten. His words about my last moments as a human echoed in my mind.
I had assumed that he had sucked my blood like a vampire. But in reality, he probably did something similar to what I had done to Aki.
\'That\'s because you\'re already dead, boy. Anyway, your heroism earned you an invitation to join the Reapers. You had a lot of regrets, didn\'t you? I offer you a second chance to live again and fulfill them all.\'
"Blood, soul, and will," I murmured.
If I used my knowledge of anime and manga, vampires prioritized bloodlines because it measured the power one would gain from their heritage. The purer or closer a vampire was to their roots, the more powerful that vampire would be.
If the purity of a Reaper\'s bloodline was necessary to become one, then the less people knew about it, the better. Famous ones would be coveted and possibly even murdered for their blood.
Once again, I felt I was in way over my head. If I was going to give my blood to the Derycks, I needed to know why they had chosen me.
"Why did you decide that I would accept you? What would you have done if I had refused?"