When Eudes, Evie, and the other second-generation vampires arrived, the civil strife of Ayric had not yet ended.
It was the evening of the second day, and it was close to dusk. The sun had already set beyond the mountains.
Rackel and his civilians were still fighting for the convoy of the lord mayor Marcus, and they wanted to win the chance to survive this winter.
However, the moment they saw several hundred Hexbats had surrounded the group of people, they were down to 700 people left.
Rackel’s joy of imminent victory had turned into the fear of being dragged into the abyss by demons.
They only needed to take one more step before victory was theirs.
But now everything had changed.
“We are the Vampires of the Divine Light, lay down your arms. Anyone who lays down their arms will not be harmed. I repeat again, lay down your arms.”
When the proud voice came from above accompanied by giant bats flying all over the sky, it was like the murmur of an abyssal demon.
Fear spread throughout the area.
The crowd fell into a panic, and the humans who were still fighting wildly earlier seemed to have had a bucket of ice water splashed over their heads, and felt a chill down their entire body.
Damn it, why are there vampires here?!!
Evie got off from the back of a Hexbat and cast a Second Circle spell, Featherweight before she floated into the air in front of all the humans.
Her long black mage’s robes stunned the panicked refugees.
A mage, there was a mage in this group of vampires!!
“Goddess of Life above, are you going to abandon your believers?”
“Oh heavens, it’s a bat, a vampiric bat!!”
“We’ve run into vampires?!”
The crowd’s morale instantly collapsed.
If not for the large number of Hexbats deployed around the periphery, this group of people here would have run for their lives.
The vampires were often the manifestation of evil in the eyes of humans.
Mysterious, elegant, bloody, and terrifying.
This group of human blood-sucking creatures possessed all of the elements that humans fear.
Evie frowned as she looked at the panicked crowd below, and waved her hand.
A group of light green magic orbs flew into the air, and a burst later, green light spots all over the sky rained down.
Second Circle spell—Concentration.
The crowd’s fearful hearts were comforted to a certain extent, and their original anxious looks were relieved by a lot too.
“We are the Vampires of the Divine Light and not those evil vampires you are talking about. Give up your resistance, and you will not be in any mortal danger.”
Evie’s magic-infused words further reduced the crowd’s anxiety.
Many people looked at her suspiciously. Vampires of the Divine Light, and evil vampires?
Even vampires had good and evil?
But it had to be said that the name Reed gave them still gave the humans a good impression. Divine Light, while this suffix was common, it also very prevalent, just like light and justice, it will never represent darkness in human hearts.
Plus, the vampires were a race that had maxed out their looks meter.
When Evie, a very beautiful mage, said that, even if there were hundreds of terrifying Hexbats around them, she still garnered quite a bit of trust.
There was a saying that beauty was justice applied regardless of location.
Rackel suppressed the fear and anxiety in his heart as he took two steps forward and shouted at Evie in the air, “Who are you?! What is your purpose for stopping us?”
Evie slowly landed on the ground, and walked up before the strong human, and raised her head slightly.
“No, I am here to save you, human. You are my captives now.”
Rackel, who was still stained with blood, looked a little chagrined.
“Didn’t you say that you will not bring harm to us?”
His held gripped his great sword even more tightly.
Marcus seemed to have met his savior. He knew that if this group of vampires had not appeared, these filthy refugees would have plundered his riches, and hang him on a tree with a rope.
“Honorable Master Mage, I am the master of Ayric, a baron of the empire, Marcus Ayric. As long as you help me subdue this group of damn rebels, I am willing to pay you half of my property… No, all of it!”
Marcus’ words filled all of the civilians with fury.
Although both sides had reached the point where only one could survive, colluding with the vampires still made them very angry.
“Damn you, Marcus! I will rip your head off!”
“That’s a vampire, not a human you bastard, they will suck you dry!!”
Whoosh!
More than a hundred bats transformed by the vampires landed on the ground, and the situation was instantly under control.
With the huge Hexbats flying in the sky and surrounded by the mysterious and powerful vampires, the voice of the crowd was instantly suppressed.
The courage that had just risen was crushed to pieces in the face of absolute power. Remembering the legends of the vampires, many women and the elderly simply fell onto the ground.
Evie understood the cause of the matter instantly after looking at the scene. In her long life, she had seen far too many instances of humans fighting one another.
Moreover, in the human world, the nobility and the common folk were never of the same kind, but it was still relatively rare for civilians to strike against the nobility like this.
She became a little curious about that burly human. Who gave him the courage to fight against a nobleman?
“The Vampires of the Divine Light never lies. Human, the fight between your kind has nothing to do with us. However, as you are now our captives, thus you are our property.”
Rackel was furious.
“Your property? We are not slaves!!”
“You have no choice, to begin with.”
“Hmph, it’ll all end in our deaths anyway. Rather than letting you suck our blood dry one by one, it’s better to use our God-given courage to defeat you.”
Rackel’s voice had roused the spirits of the humans that were awed by the vampires.
Remembering the legends of the vampires, one by one, they clenched their weapons tightly.
“Death? No, our Patriarch is building a city and needs plenty of workers. You will not die, and instead, you will be protected by the Vampires of the Divine Light and will have white bread to eat every day. None of you will be killed, what we need are people who can work, not corpses. You will get enough food to survive the winter. Human, consider yourself lucky to get the aid of the Vampires of the Divine Light.”
Evie’s words resounded in everyone’s ears.
They would not be killed? And they would be getting enough food?
The courage Rackel had initially mustered had faded away again. Humans had always been like that. Unless their backs were against the wall, no one would choose death.
As long as there was a little hope, they were willing to convince themselves.
Ollie, who was beside Rackel was enraged, his young body trembled with fury.
“No, you are lying, how could a vampire be so kind!1 You are just like those damned nobles, and are just lying to us!!”
The crowd suddenly tensed up again.
These were vampires, would they really provide them decent treatment?
Evie was not angry. Instead, he wore a faint smile.
“Human, you know too little about the vampires. We, vampires, were never a race that was good at lying. Remember, we are the Vampires of the Divine Light, and not those foul and evil vampires you have mentioned.”
As she said that, she turned her head and glanced at the crowd, her voice indifferent.
“What’s more, what do you have in you for me to even deceive you? If I wanted it, I could kill all of you at any given moment.”
The Hexbats in the air reacted with agitation as the vampires on the ground roused out potent magical energies.
The powerful show of force froze everyone in place.
“See that? Only the weak would need to deceive the strong, and the strong will never bother to lie. Human, it is your fortune to meet the Vampires of the Divine Light. I am not negotiating with you. All of you are my captives, and you have no room to resist. I have told you, the vampires will provide you work, and food to survive the long winter. Whether you believe it or not has nothing to do with me, and your lives are in my hand. So I have no need to deceive you. Now, lay down your arms, or else I will have my kinsmen strike. Don’t think about resisting, and that will only send you to the realm of the God of Death sooner.”
Her words, both soft and tough at the same time became the last straw that broke the camel’s back.
As she said that under Rackel’s painful gaze, someone threw away his weapon. Following that, all of the humans dropped their weapons.
Seeing this, Rackel knew that he no longer had a choice.
Fate was no longer in their hands.