The New York night sky was dyed a dark purple by the neon lights below.
Diluc’s crimson hair whipped in the wind as his Wind Glider silently unfurled behind him, carrying him swiftly between the towering skyscrapers.
Suddenly, a bizarre, bloodcurdling screech pierced the night, immediately followed by an agonizing scream.
Neither sound was remotely human—they carried a twisted, deeply malicious undertone.
Diluc frowned.
Activating his Elemental Sight, his fiery red eyes swept over the dilapidated industrial zone below.
Within the deep shadows of an abandoned factory, he caught the faint trace of a dark, bloody, and thoroughly ominous energy fluctuation.
He folded his Wind Glider and dropped down, landing on a corrugated iron roof as lightly and silently as a cat.
In the empty lot below the factory, three men in sharp suits were sprinting for their lives in a state of sheer panic.
Their skin was so pale it was almost translucent, fresh blood stained the corners of their mouths, and their pupils glinted with a faint crimson light in the dark.
Vampires!
Yet right now, they weren’t playing the role of apex predators.
They were the prey.
Not far behind them, over a dozen cloaked figures were in relentless pursuit.
Their speed completely eclipsed that of the vampires.
They flickered like ghosts, their footfalls so impossibly light it looked as though they were stepping on thin air.
Their faces were entirely concealed beneath pitch-black hoods that seemed to swallow the surrounding light.
“Dammit!
Why can’t we shake them?!”
With a furious roar, one of the vampires grabbed a shattered concrete pillar and hurled it blindly over his shoulder.
The heavy concrete chunk whistled through the air, aimed squarely at the leading pursuer.
But right before it could connect—
Bang!
The cloaked figure casually waved a hand, and the concrete pillar exploded into a cloud of fine dust, as if crushed by an invisible force.
Gritting his teeth, a second vampire shoved a rusted iron wall down, desperately trying to block their path.
Crash!
But the cloaked figures didn’t even break their stride.
Before the heavy metal wall could even hit the dirt, their silhouettes phased right through it like a cloud of dark mist, relentlessly closing the distance.
“We can’t outrun them…” the third vampire whispered in pure despair, the red light in his eyes flickering violently.
“Then we fight them!
Graaagh!”
The lead vampire let out a ferocious roar.
The blood-red glow in his eyes flared brightly as his fangs elongated, and his fingernails rapidly extended into razor-sharp bone blades.
He stomped off the ground with such explosive force that the thick concrete instantly spiderwebbed beneath his feet.
He shot toward the nearest cloaked figure like a fired cannonball!
“Die!”
His lethal bone blades tore through the air, aiming straight for the cloaked figure’s throat with terrifying speed.
Yet, the figure simply tilted to the side, letting the bone blades graze harmlessly past its cloak.
Schlick!
The vampire’s reflexes were incredibly sharp.
He seamlessly shifted his momentum, sweeping his left hand out like a claw to carve five deep gashes across the figure’s chest!
But no blood spilled from the wounds.
Only a thick, black ooze seeped out.
The vampire’s pupils shrank in shock.
Before he could even process the sight, the cloaked figure retaliated.
Smash!
A devastating punch slammed into the vampire’s gut, launching him over thirty feet backward to crash cleanly through three solid brick walls.
Amidst the flying debris, the vampire coughed up a mouthful of blood.
But he pushed himself back up with a savage grin, his wounds knitting together and healing at a visible rate.
“Is that all you’ve got?!” He stuck out his tongue to lick the blood off his lips, then charged once more!
This time, he changed his tactics.
Relying on his innate vampiric speed, he blurred around the cloaked figure, launching a torrential downpour of slashes.
The figure’s cloak was shredded to ribbons, revealing the ashen, rock-like skin underneath.
Thwack!
Finally, the vampire found a fleeting opening.
He delivered a brutal roundhouse kick to the figure’s knee.
As his opponent stumbled, the vampire crossed his arms, aiming a lethal, scissor-like strike at the figure’s neck—
“Time to end this.”
The cloaked figure suddenly shot a hand up and caught the vampire’s wrist with absolute precision.
To his total horror, the vampire realized that no matter how hard he strained, he couldn’t push his blades a single inch further!
The cloaked figure slowly lifted its head, a bizarre, clicking noise echoing from beneath the hood.
The vampire thrashed wildly, but the figure’s grip was like an immovable iron vise.
“Im… impossible…”
Schlick!
Suddenly, a grotesque, barbed, petal-like maw burst from beneath the figure’s hood!
Like a blossoming carnivorous plant, it instantly clamped down, completely swallowing the vampire’s entire face.
“Mmph!
His agonizing screams were completely muffled within the foul, fleshy maw.
His limbs spasmed violently.
Though he clawed and kicked, leaving countless shallow scratches across the figure’s body, it was entirely futile.
Gulp, squelch…
Seconds later, the vampire’s struggles ceased completely.
Thud.
The cloaked figure retracted its grotesque maw and casually tossed the vampire aside.
The corpse was a shriveled, withered husk.
It was a sickening, pathetic sight—as if every single drop of blood and ounce of muscle had been violently sucked dry.
Witnessing their leader’s horrific end, the remaining two vampires suffered a total mental collapse.
“No—stay back!”
One turned to flee, but two cloaked figures instantly intercepted him.
Their barbed maws shot out, sinking deep into his neck and draining the life from him in the blink of an eye.
The final vampire collapsed to his knees.
Trembling uncontrollably, he threw his hands up in a desperate plea for mercy.
“Please!
I know where the Vampire Council’s stronghold is!
I can take you there!
I can—”
Crunch.
The cloaked figure didn’t give him a chance to finish begging.
Its maw mercilessly pierced straight through his chest, pinning him to the ground until he, too, was reduced to a dried husk.
With the three corpses casually discarded, the dozen cloaked figures stood in absolute silence, as if the brutal slaughter was nothing more than a trivial chore.
Up on the roof, Diluc watched the events unfold with cold, calculating eyes.
These cloaked entities clearly weren’t vampires, nor were they human.
Their raw strength, their speed, and that incredibly grotesque method of feeding completely defied logic.
‘They look an awful lot like the Reapers from Blade II,’ Diluc thought.
Suddenly, the leading cloaked figure slowly tilted its head up.
The pitch-black void beneath its hood stared directly at Diluc’s exact location.
Immediately after, the second figure… then the third… all of them turned their heads in unison, locking onto him.
There were no words, no aggressive movements, but Diluc could feel the oppressive weight of their gaze.
They had known he was up there the entire time!
The night wind abruptly died down.
The air itself seemed to freeze.
Diluc’s hand slowly fell to the hilt of his Blackcliff Slasher, the flames resting within the blade practically humming with restless anticipation.