The four of them sat on the ground, their minds just starting to reboot, still a little dazed.
They looked at their soaked clothes and their drenched, bedraggled hairstyles, then glanced at Krexia standing not far in front of them, her garment hem slightly dirty but otherwise composed.
Soon enough, they recalled what had happened just a few minutes ago.
Fana, whose mind worked relatively faster, quickly grasped the situation.
They had probably made a huge mistake.
If the Blood Clan acted according to their usual style, encountering clearly weaker enemies meant toying with their prey like cats playing with mice before swiftly killing them.
There was no way they would have spared their lives until now.
“You damned—”
“Waaah…”
Falco, blunt as ever, was about to speak, but Fana immediately dashed behind him and covered his mouth, afraid he’d upset this unfamiliar and powerful stranger again.
“Uh, um…”
Fana herself felt awkward now, unsure where to start the conversation.
Krexia remained silent, just quietly watching them.
The other swordsman, whose mind was evidently a bit sharper than Falco’s, sensed something was off and sat still like a quail, staring silently at his longsword.
Finally, the Little Priest stood up from the ground, silently approached Krexia, and bowed deeply.
“Um, I’m truly sorry, miss…”
“Wuh?”
Falco, still with his mouth covered, watched the Priest’s action with a pair of wise eyes full of confusion.
“Shut up, you fool!”
“Wah…”
Krexia’s brows twitched slightly—this big swordsman was even simpler-minded than she’d imagined.
She cast a simple strengthening magic on her finger, then gently scratched her arm with her nail.
A faint scratch appeared starkly on her pale arm.
Drops of bright red blood slowly seeped from the wound, gathering into a bead that trickled down her arm.
“See that, you big dummy?”
At this moment, Fana let go of Falco’s mouth and gave his clothes a disgusted wipe, smearing the saliva off her palm.
Krexia stepped in front of Falco, showing him the bloodstain on her arm.
“You keep saying I’m Blood Clan, but have you ever seen a Blood Clan member unable to self-heal even such a shallow wound?”
Falco fell silent.
After a brief moment of shock, his mind seemed to clear. Understanding some things, he stood up.
As a swordsman trained from childhood with the goal of joining the Imperial Knights, Falco was the tallest of the four.
Now standing before Krexia, she seemed like a child in comparison.
Falco then took two steps back, bowed solemnly to Krexia, and loudly declared, “I am truly sorry!”
Seeing this, the other swordsman and Fana quickly followed, also apologizing to Krexia.
“We are sincerely sorry, respected senior. We truly misjudged the situation because of your appearance.”
“This area is on the border of the Kingdom of Weirrant, a frequent haunt of vampires. We acted out of caution when attacking.”
“We are very grateful that you spared us and hope you accept our apologies.”
Fana spoke sincerely to Krexia.
Seeing the four soaked, dripping wet people bowing in apology, Krexia seemed to realize her earlier mistake.
She let out a light hum and waved her hand.
“Alright, alright, the misunderstanding is cleared. You didn’t cause me any harm anyway.”
“Clean yourselves up first. If you keep getting this drenched, you’ll catch a cold.”
The four, seeing Krexia calm, hurriedly thanked her and moved aside, gathering around Fana, who used her magic to dry their clothes.
“The Kingdom of Weirrant, huh…”
Krexia also moved to the side, glanced at the scratch on her arm, casually wiped away the blood, then sat down in a dry spot, beginning to chew over the information she’d just gleaned from Fana’s words.
The Kingdom of Weirrant was also one of the four principalities under the Empire of Huangyu, located in the eastern part of the empire, and was the largest in territory among the four.
But this was because it bordered the Blood Clan Territory and bore the heavy burden of border defense.
Within the Empire of Huangyu, any human would have certainly heard of the Blood Clan’s fearsome reputation.
As a species with thousands of years of enmity with humans, the Blood Clan was known for their overwhelmingly powerful individuals, near-immortality, and predatory relationship with humans—a legacy deeply ingrained in the minds of every human.
Before the Empire of Huangyu was established, humans were scattered across several small states, and they had little means to resist the Blood Clan’s threat.
The Blood Clan, with their long history and formidable strength, freely hunted humans for blood, especially the human settlements near the borders, which were almost like their own sheepfold.
This situation had persisted for countless years—until a thousand years ago, when Emperor Macalo of the Kingdom of Huang launched a unification war, bringing these scattered human states together into the unified Empire of Huangyu.
That was when things began to improve.
The heavy burden of border defense thus fell upon the Kingdom of Weirrant.
Over time, humans living far in the rear gradually lost some of their terror of the Blood Clan.
This perhaps explained why, when Krexia was a child in school, there wasn’t much mention of the Blood Clan in her textbooks.
After all, her home was the Leia Principality, over three thousand kilometers away from the Blood Clan Territory.
In a place like that, as long as the Kingdom of Weirrant, or even the Royal City, remained secure, and she stayed home quietly as a noble lady, she might never see a vampire in her lifetime.
“You really did it, Coutia, sending me this far away.”
“Are you planning to hand me over to the vampires as a blood bag?”
“You’re complaining about this? With your current condition, what difference does it make where I send you? I can’t exactly toss you straight into the Royal City to die, can I?”
“…”
“Um, this elder sister…”
Suddenly, a voice interrupted Krexia’s internal conversation with Coutia. She turned her gaze toward the source.
There stood the Little Priest, clad in a pure white nun’s robe, timidly standing there. The robe bore some stains from the earlier fight.
“Ah, it’s you. Do you need something?”
The Little Priest’s eyes flickered nervously, occasionally glancing at Krexia’s still slightly bleeding arm.
“Um… if you don’t mind, may I treat your wound?”
“Consider it a small, insignificant way to make up for our earlier rudeness.”