Our group has just arrived at Valen City, I must say I’m impressed, the architecture, the people, the magic.
Everything here surprises me, I see a woman who seems to be shopping making everything she buys float and follow her, even in the food stalls I see people creating fire with their hands to cook, I even see a carriage being pulled by iron horses, they must be golems like the ones I read in the books.
“Let’s get going, I’ll get in touch with Diana on the way.” (I)
As we walked down the street I closed my eyes, imagining the image of Diana and concentrating hard on it, I tried to extend my awareness through the image and then through my connection to Diana until an image of a pitcher of beer appeared in front of me.
“(Diana!)” (I)
“Master!??” (Diana)
“(I’m speaking in your mind Diana.)” (I)
“(Did something happen for you to talk to me like that?)” (Diana)
“(Nothing happened, I just wanted to let you know that we are already in town, come meet us at the fountain in the center of town.)” (I)
“(I’m going right now.)” (Diana)
“Waitress how much do I owe?” (Diana)
I pulled my awareness back and opened my eyes.
“Diana will meet us at the source.” (I)
“What was she doing?” (Érica)
“She was drinking.” (I)
“As I expected.” (Érica)
“You managed to connect really fast this time, congratulations.” (Kira)
“Thanks to the training we did before I evolved, it now feels easier somehow.” (I)
“That’s because Vampires are known to have strong connections to their Kindred.” (Irina)
“That explains, I can even feel the direction Diana is focusing on.” (I)
“I didn’t know Diana was a Familiar, it’s usually difficult to turn someone into a Familiar as for a Familiar connection there’s also the issue of compatibility.” (Irius)
“Not just Diana, I’m also a Familiar to the master.” (Kira)
“You should know Father is different, usually mages choose Familiars for melee combat or to further increase the power of their elements.” (Irina)
“For Vampires, it’s different as they have higher stats, a strong body, and lots of energy, they choose Familiars to be extensions of their eyes and ears, they can even use some of their power through their Familiars if the connection with them is strong.” (Irina)
“But you have two Familiars who are people, that’s usually difficult as people’s unconscious usually rejects that kind of connection.” (Irius)
“To be honest I don’t even know how it happened.” (I)
“It’s not like I have control over what a person will become when I use my abilities on them.” (I)
“I actually thought about it for a long time and I think when I use my power like in the case of girls, the race becomes more dependent on themselves than on me.” (I)
“Why do you always talk about these complicated things? Ibuki can’t understand.” (Ibuki)
“If you don’t have control over it then just forget it, whatever has to be will be.” (Byakko)
“You finally woke up, I thought you were going to sleep all day again Byakko.” (Kira)
As we walked down the main street to the center of town, everyone was talking about various things, but as soon as we got to the square in the center I could see the large number of people walking everywhere and the buildings that are around, some of them called my attention, must be the Guilds that Diana and Érica told me about.
We go straight to the fountain and see someone tall waving at us, we go to that person as we recognize Diana from afar.
“You guys arrived faster than I thought, I was having my breakfast near here, so I managed to get there before you guys.” (Diana)
“Who drinks beer for breakfast?” (Érica)
“It was just a jar, it was just to start the day off right.” (Diana)
“Let’s not talk here, there are a lot of people around, I’m not used to being surrounded by people yet.” (I)
“Did you get the keys to the Diana mansion?” (I)
“Yes, I also made the change you requested master, the vice master of the Trade Guild was surprised by my sudden request, but he understood why.” (Diana)
“That’s good, lead the way.” (I)
“What change are you talking about?” (Kira)
“You will know soon.” (I)
Diana guides us to the noble district of the city, as we walk she explained that the mansion is in an isolated part of the district, she said it was the biggest mansion with the biggest land in the city after the one the Duke owns.
On the way we passed many mansions, most of them had guards on both sides of the gate, there were small and large mansions, there were even some that had walls so high that I couldn’t see the mansion, what bothered me was that the guards of the various mansions stayed looking at us whenever we passed, not only them but also the patrols of soldiers who were passing by, on the way we encountered two patrols.
When we finally arrive I am surprised by what I see, the gates are made of iron and painted black, beside the gate is a sign with the name of the mansion.
On the sign it says “Eclipse Mansion”, this was the change I asked Diana to organize, this is no longer the King’s deceased brother’s mansion, this is no longer the Trigan mansion, this will now be our home, for that, I had to change the name of this mansion.
“The plate looks great Diana.” (I)
“Wilson arranged it for me, as the master said he didn’t want too much decoration it was like that.” (Diana)
“So that was the change you were talking about.” (Kira)
“From now on this is no longer the Trigan mansion, now this will be the Eclipse mansion.” (I)
“I like the name, it suits you master.” (Érica)
“Let’s go in.” (I)
As soon as we passed through the gate we saw a thin layer of mist on the ground, I could suddenly feel the same sensation I had in the ruins within the forest of blood.
“It’s weak but that’s definitely miasma.” (Irina)
“How did this place get like this?” (Irius)
“I’ll tell you later” (I)
I keep looking around and see the mansion, it’s three stories tall it’s big enough to belong to a royal family, the outside of the mansion is beautiful with lots of flower gardens and trees, there’s a small fountain at the entrance to the mansion with a smooth stone path that leads from the gate where we are to the entrance to the mansion, the mansion is simple but elegant, without the extravagance I expected to find.
“This is a beautiful mansion, even bigger than my family had.” (Érica)
“Let’s go in.” (I)
We head to the doors and enter, at the entrance, there is a large hall with wide stairs right in front of the doors leading to the second floor, as soon as we entered we saw that the place is minimally decorated, but still to my taste.
We go into a room to the left of the entrance where there is a large dining table.
“This place is really big, do you have the drawings of the mansion with you Diana?” (I)
“Here is a master.” (Diana)
Diana spreads the drawing of the mansion on the table for all to see, looking at the drawing I see that everything I asked has been done, rooms for alchemy, rooms for the Forge, vault rooms, library, swimming pool with thermal water in one of the bathrooms, a large kitchen, a room for a tailor, a training ground outside, from the drawings of the mansion I see that the training ground is behind the mansion.
The workshops are on the third floor, on the second floor are the bedrooms, on the first floor are offices and rooms that are unused for the time being, on the ground floor there is a ballroom, the entrance, the dining room, the bathroom with thermal water and the kitchen.
“Choose your rooms.” (I)
Soon everyone started talking about their rooms, I wanted to choose a simple and small one, but everyone forced me to have the suite, it was no surprise that everyone else chose rooms close to each other.
It was still early so we were exploring the house for a few hours before heading out into town, we wanted to find a place to eat.
Diana and Kira took us to where they were, said the food and beer here were very good.
“The mansion is much bigger than I thought.” (I)
“By size, we’re going to need at least fifteen to twenty employees, at least.” (Érica)
“The problem is that they have to be trustworthy people, we have a lot of secrets and the mansion has miasma, it will have to be a strong person.” (I)
“I and my brother can make some Vampires for our family, they would be grandchildren so they would serve us.” (Irina)
“We can buy some master slaves, Irina and Irius can turn them into Twilight Vampires, then we can choose slaves who are old adventurers, those would be responsible for helping the Vampires and feeding them, what do you think?” (Kira)
sigh
“I think this plan makes us look more and more like a clandestine organization.” (I)
“But let’s follow your plan.” (I)
“Tomorrow we’re going to the Adventurers’ Guild to register, after we get out of there we can buy the slaves we need.” (I)
“(I can’t get used to this slave business, it gives me a bad feeling as there is no longer a slavery system in my old world.)” (I)
“If the master wants to go to the Guild tomorrow, I can take this opportunity to introduce the whole group to Mari.” (Diana)
“Could be, I’ve always wanted to meet this friend of hers, she seems to be a good person for her stories and if you trust her then that’s fine.” (I)
After eating we went to buy some clothes for everyone and then back to the mansion where the brothers went to their rooms to sleep and the girls came to my room which I discovered had a big bed to sleep on.