Chapter 94
Clutching his chest, Yair knelt on the floor.
"Gah.... Noble.... The harmony of a black dress, pale skin, short stature, and an imperious voice.... What indescribable nobility...!"
He was muttering something incomprehensible.
I felt rather proud.
'Is this the effect of [Noble Dignity]?'
It wasn't for nothing that it was a unique skill of an EX-rank class.
Hadn't I subdued such a powerful dark mage with a single word and made him kneel?
Moreover, seeing as he kept repeating, 'Noble, so noble,' he had clearly felt my noble bearing with his entire body.
But then.
"My liege. I shall execute the death sentence as commanded."
Goooooo!
Katarina rose from her seat and began to radiate killing intent.
The air in the office shimmered like a summer haze.
"I'll take care of it, Master."
Clack!
Si-yeon also drew [Blood Clawhands] in both hands and approached Yair.
“Huh?”
Yair was startled by the sudden turn of events and let out a scream.
"T-True Ancestor-nim! I'm sorry! Please spare me! Tell them to stop!"
Of course, I was startled inside too.
'I can't actually have him executed!'
I had only shouted to show a little dignity; I had no intention of killing him.
Still, fortunately, I had firmly instructed them always to get my permission before killing anyone, so they did not rush at him without a second thought.
Unless the situation was urgent, it was the retainers' rule to wait for my orders first.
I quickly cleared my throat and raised a hand.
"Ahem. Stop. Since the mortal appears to deeply regret his actions, I shall spare him the sentence this once."
At my command, Si-yeon immediately retracted her claws.
Katarina also withdrew her killing intent, but still looked down at Yair with an extremely displeased expression and warned him.
"Human. Never again utter such profane words in my liege's presence."
"Ah, yes! Got it, sis! I'll remember!"
"The liege is a noble, supreme, and great being. To dare think of the liege as 'cute' is a serious offense, even if it is merely entertained in your mind. Understood?"
“Yes!”
Yair nodded.
But then.
“Eek…?! Cough! Cough-cough!”
Sera, who had been standing beside him, suddenly turned deathly pale and began coughing violently.
“?”
Everyone looked at her in bewilderment.
"S-sorry.... I suddenly, um, started coughing...."
She apologized, not knowing what to do.
'Oh dear.'
I felt sorry for Sera as I watched her shoulders bob while she tried to hold back her cough.
Did she choke on something all of a sudden?
‘Looks like she swallowed wrong. Things like that happen sometimes.’
Anyway, once that brief commotion had passed, I turned my gaze to the bewildered lord and the guide girl.
"Lord. That child worked hard guiding us here. Since she did a good job, feed her plenty of delicious food, give her a generous payment, and send her home."
The lord hurriedly bowed his head.
"Yes! I shall immediately obey the Distinguished One's command!"
"Wow! Thank you, Vampire! Goodbye, dark mage!"
The guide girl also gave a bright smile and a deep bow, as if she had never been afraid.
After sending the two of them off, we headed to the underground warehouse to complete the trade.
Guided by the attendant the lord had assigned us, we opened the warehouse door, which had been firmly shut, and saw the bishop's corpse lying in a corner amid the damp air.
It was perfectly preserved, with no smell of rotting flesh.
"Wow."
Yair's eyes sparkled.
"This is excellent material. The blood was drained cleanly, too, so it's in remarkably good condition. Quite some time has passed, but there isn't a trace of decay."
After giving his favorable assessment, he summoned once more the fat, ugly undead monster we'd seen in the forest.
Then he pushed the bishop's corpse into the monster's enormous mouth.
Gulp!
The monster swallowed the corpse and patted its belly with its stubby arms.
That must be Yair's inventory.
‘Now that I think about it, the more I see that monster, the more likable it becomes.’
It had a certain ugly cuteness.
After completing the trade, I checked the timer on the status window.
'Whoa. Has this much time already passed?'
Quite a lot of time had passed since we entered.
We had obtained many things, including the forest monster's blood that Sera had brought and the monster blood Yair had offered, but I still felt a little disappointed.
'Twenty-four hours is shorter than I thought.'
This was not a dungeon but an entire world.
Realistically, there were many things that consumed time, such as traveling between locations and talking with people, so it was impossible to run full farming for twenty-four hours straight like in a game.
As I swallowed down that disappointment.
Yair spoke to me respectfully.
"True Ancestor-nim. If I acquire more high-quality blood in the future, I will be sure to come and offer it to you."
The moment I heard that.
A flash of realization passed through my mind.
'Huh? Wait a minute.'
What if I established relationships with the people in the tower like this?
Even while I was outside the tower, wouldn't they continue living inside it, gathering blood and hunting?
Since I had heard that the time in Infinite difficulty did not remain fixed but flowed in sync with time in reality.
'Then isn't this basically an idle game?'
The NPCs would farm experience on their own and offer it to me the next time I logged in.
There couldn't have been a better system than this.
I looked down at Yair with a pleased smile.
"What a commendable attitude. If you devote yourself wholeheartedly, I shall grant you useful corpses whenever I happen to acquire them."
"Ohhh……!"
Yair's face looked deeply moved by those words.
"Thank you! Um, would it be all right if I offered tributes other than blood as well?"
"Offer whatever you like. What is it?"
At my willing reply, Yair took out a dagger and respectfully offered it to me with both hands.
It was a splendid dagger with a dark-gray blade and a single green gem set in its center.
"This is a ritual dagger I made myself. It has two effects. If you hold it forward like this and swing it through the air, it greatly boosts the user's magical power for a moment. If you swing it backward, you can summon and command the wraith sealed inside this sword."
‘Oh.’
From his explanation, it sounded like quite a useful item.
'It's nice, but I feel a little bad.'
Was it really all right to accept something this precious so readily?
He wasn't offering up everything he had because I'd shouted about executing him and scared him half to death, was he?
Still, I couldn't disregard his sincerity, so I solemnly nodded and accepted the dagger.
"In consideration of your sincerity, I shall put it to good use. It is a fine object."
"Haha! I'm very happy that you are pleased, True Ancestor-nim!"
Smile.
Yair wore a blissful expression, as though he had gained the whole world.
A smile like that of a doting father.
'……Has this guy suffered some kind of mental contamination?'
Why was he smiling like that while being fleeced of such a precious item?
I couldn't understand how he could smile so innocently.
Holding the dagger in my hand, I fell into another dilemma for a moment.
'But now that I think about it, you can't take items obtained inside the tower outside.'
Blood didn't need to be put in my inventory, since I could simply drink it right there, but equipment items like this couldn't be taken outside.
The system blocked their removal unless they had been officially awarded as rewards.
Should I just leave it with the lord and use it only when I came to this tower?
Just as I was thinking that.
Ding-!
Suddenly, a translucent system window appeared before my eyes.
[Ominous Ritual Dagger (A+)]
A dagger painstakingly crafted by a genius necromancer.
It temporarily amplifies the user's magical power or allows them to control the sealed wraith.
(*The Infinite difficulty exclusive acquisition ruling applies, allowing it to be taken into the real world.)
'Huh?'
The fact that an item appraisal had appeared meant the system recognized this dagger as an official reward.
And it could even be taken into the real world?
'Whoa. Is this the true value of Infinite difficulty?'
It meant I didn't have to limit myself to quest rewards; I could endlessly farm items inside the tower by myself and bring them outside.
It was truly an absurdly overpowered cheat.
***
Thus, Yair left the lord's residence with a smile blossoming across his face.
Before he left, I told him that I would stay at this lord's castle once a week.
In response, Yair promised that he would be sure to find good blood and come visit at least once a month.
Now, there wasn't much time left for me to remain in this world.
‘Hmm. I don't see anything else worth farming.’
Should I just drink the blood I'd collected and level up during the remaining time?
The moment I looked at the lord standing beside me while pondering that.
I suddenly remembered something I'd forgotten.
‘Oh, right. The Holy Imperial Church spy.’
The fellow who was locked in the underground prison and refusing to say a word.
He was one of the lord's headaches, wasn't he?
‘Should I help convert him?’
Besides farming in Infinite difficulty, didn't I have one more goal to accomplish?
Repaying the grudge against the person who killed Sera's parents.
If I could coax him properly and make him my ally, then since he belonged to the same Holy Imperial Church, he would be a great help in tracking down the enemy I wanted revenge on.
‘If I recruit him properly, I could even have him handle the tracking full-time while I'm outside the tower, couldn't I?’
Just like Yair, it would create another idle auto-hunting route.
There couldn't have been a more efficient method.
“Let us see the face of that Holy Imperial Church spy.”
I immediately ordered the lord to take me to the underground prison.
“Oh! I am deeply grateful that the Distinguished One is taking action personally!”
The lord, overwhelmed with gratitude, immediately led me to the prison.
I had the other retainers rest upstairs and went down alone with the lord.
Deep underground, where no sunlight reached.
Julius's appearance beyond the bars was extremely gaunt.
“He refused all food and drink and resisted, so we forcibly fed him only the minimum amount of water and bread.”
The jailer accompanying us briefly reported on his condition.
At that sound, Julius, who had been curled up on the floor, slowly raised his gaze.
“……!”
His eyes widened in shock when he spotted me.
Bang!
He roughly seized the bars and glared at me with eyes that looked as if he wanted to kill me.
“You evil vampire…! Have you come to tempt me again?! Kill me instead. The will of the Light shall never be broken!”
‘Hmm.’
I furrowed my brow.
Perhaps because I'd provoked him so thoroughly last time, even invoking his god, he seemed to be thoroughly enraged.
‘This is going to be harder to convert than I thought.’
I'd intended to gently smooth things over through conversation and bring him over to my side, but there was no way to talk sense into him while he glared at me with murderous intensity.
Then.
‘Huh? What if I do that?’
It felt as if a light bulb had suddenly flashed on in my head!
A very good idea came to me.
I naturally took a smartphone out from inside my clothes.
Then I opened the gallery app and displayed a picture on the screen.
It was a beautiful painting of red roses on a black background, drawn by Auntie Su-yeon.
‘If they see this, people will end up worshiping me, right?’
It was that very cognitohazard that had even made the Association President break out in a cold sweat when he called it mental contamination.
“Look at this.”
I casually held out the smartphone screen through the bars toward Julius.
“Uh……?”
His eyes went blank the instant they met the screen.
‘Heh heh heh. It's a hypnosis app, you bastard!’
I silently cheered.
Since it was a work infused with Auntie Su-yeon's A+-rank illusion talent, no matter how much of a priest of the Holy Imperial Church he was, he would have no way to withstand it.
‘Once he becomes docile like this, I'll put him to work tracking down Sera's enemy.’
I was just beginning to feel pleased at the thought of easily obtaining an informant.
“K-kraaagh…! Omnipotent Light, protect me…!”
Julius suddenly grabbed at his own hair with both hands and began screaming in agony.
Faint white energy rose from his body as he writhed on the floor.
‘Huh. Is he resisting?’
I was a little taken aback.
Perhaps because he was a trained priest, or perhaps his faith was stronger than I'd expected.
He was struggling with all his might to escape the painting's allure.
“M-my soul belongs only in the embrace of the Light…! I will not succumb to the temptation of darkness, ngh!”
He crawled across the floor with bloodshot eyes, reciting prayers nonstop.
But despite all his efforts.
“Great Light, cover my eyes……
and dye them red...
Ah, no. This isn't right…!”
The sentences flowing from Julius's mouth gradually began to go awry.
“Light that illuminates the darkness…
that devours the light, O King of darkness and blood.
”
His unfocused eyes remained fixed on the smartphone screen as his body trembled.
Tears streamed from his eyes.
And finally.
He dropped to his knees with a thud.
“A-ah…. Only the True Ancestor-nim is my true master….”
“?!”
The lord, who had been watching the situation beside me, looked at me with a shocked expression.