"Garam, did you find anything in the Deep Crystal Cave?"
While Ha-yeon had stepped out for a moment to use the restroom.
Hae-rang asked him.
"Something I found?"
Plenty.
A great deal, in fact.
A guy who handles Blood Point Stones, for one.
Or several Blood Point Stones being put into a single monster.
He had even seen a monster in the shape of a human.
'They definitely said Lord Rumania.'
The man called Pyo Dae-rim had said "Lord Rumania" right before attacking him.
'It might be the name of the organization making these Blood Point Stones, or of a person.'
The man he had seen back there was definitely human.
And the fact that he still possessed Blood Point Stones laced with Vampir power.
meant that man alone surely wasn't all of them.
"Garam?"
"Ah? Yes. I saw something."
Garam, who had been spacing out, barely came back to himself at Hae-rang's voice and opened his mouth again.
The safe zone he had seen in the Deep Crystal Cave, Pyo Dae-rim and the Bat-Man, and even the matter of Lord Rumania.
He told her everything except the unstable Blood Point Stone he had hidden away.
The longer Garam spoke, the more he could see Hae-rang's expression hardening.
"Haah, so that's how it is. A man who handles Blood Point Stones......."
While Hae-rang sank into thought, Garam watched her with an expectant look on his face.
'Even leaving out the unstable Blood Point Stone, that's a pretty decent result. I should get some money out of this, right?'
Paying no mind to his stare, Hae-rang spoke.
"Garam, you also saw a Vampir in there, didn't you?"
"Cough, a Vampir?"
At that, Garam, who had been drinking water, sprayed it without meaning to and asked back.
"That's right. Kim Tae-hyeon said he faced one briefly before rescuing you. A Vampir wearing a mask."
He had seen it.
Seen it, hardly. That Vampir was me.
While he hesitated for a moment over what excuse to give.
"Lord Rumania, and that masked Vampir. They might be connected to the Worshippers."
Lord Rumania he could accept.
But what on earth were Worshippers?
"Ah, the Worshippers are a kind of cult that reveres the Vampir."
If such a thing existed, why hadn't she told him beforehand?
When he looked at Hae-rang with that question in his eyes.
"Honestly, the Worshippers move in secret, so I didn't think they were a force capable of doing something like this on a large scale. It seems I'll have to revise that."
At Hae-rang's words Garam gave a small nod.
"So if we want to trace these two, this Lord Rumania and the masked Vampir, we'll have to shake down the Worshippers first."
'Why me, though?'
The other things were one matter.
But he had really done nothing wrong beyond stealing a few Blood Point Stones.
[That's generally the sort of thing people call wrongdoing, you know?]
'Ah, is it?'
Still, if he got caught up in this the wrong way, he would be killed outright.
Wasn't that too harsh?
"In any case, Garam, well done. At this rate you might really make S-Grade before long."
"What? That's a bit far off. Though I did make C-Grade this time."
To be precise, he had risen by taking a spirit medicine containing Hae-rang's mana.
Even accounting for that, Garam's growth was astonishing, and a sly smile spread across Hae-rang's face.
It was the look of a university professor who had found a student showing promising first leaves.
"It's only been a week since you became a hunter and you're already C-Grade?"
Considering that it took a hunter roughly three years on average to raise a single Grade, it was a frankly abnormal pace.
"This is going to taste so damn goo... I mean, what a fine talent."
And Garam, with no idea that Hae-rang was drooling like that, took a Blood Point Stone from his coat and set it down.
A Blood Point Stone shining so red that anyone who didn't know better would mistake it for a ruby.
This was one he had set aside specifically to show Hae-rang.
Lowest-tier, but still.
'It would look strange to come out of that situation with no physical evidence at all.'
He had quietly taken it from the sack Pyo Dae-rim dropped.
"With this included, about how much will the commission fee come to?"
Hae-rang turned the Blood Point Stone he held out this way and that, inspecting it.
"A Lowest-tier Blood Point Stone, the location where the abductions take place. The culprit, and the missing people found as well, dead though they were."
After a pause, Hae-rang spread her hand wide.
Hae-rang's hand, five fingers extended straight.
"Fifty million won...?"
Insane.
Fifty million won for just this.
Wasn't that the kind of sum he would have to clear ten gates to earn as he was now?
As he sat there with his eyes shining, full of excitement, Hae-rang slowly shook her head.
"Five hundred million."
F-five hundred million?
The sum was so overwhelming that his head felt as if it might blow off, and an answer wouldn't come out easily.
An electric thrill ran down his spine.
A thrill absolutely no good for the body of a patient under strict orders to rest.
"Urk."
Perhaps from too great a burst of dopamine.
Garam passed out again on the spot.
***
Thanks, perhaps, to the drip made with ground mana stones.
Garam recovered quickly and was able to leave the hospital in two days.
'Though I do have to rest a few days.'
Only the external wounds had been treated; the internal damage from True Progenitor Form hadn't fully recovered.
Even if he entered a gate, he could manage only a D-Grade gate, where he could hunt without the True Progenitor's power.
'If that's the case, training is the better use of the time.'
The hospital had told him to refrain from strenuous exercise for a while.
'And I need to absorb the Blood Point Stones I set aside.'
Taking that into account too, staying home and quietly recovering was a hundred times better than going hunting and risking aggravating his wounds.
So, returning home right after his discharge, Garam went to reach for the sack of Blood Point Stones set in a corner of the house.
[You fainted, right there? Kyahahahahak!]
Carmilla was doubled over, clutching her stomach.
And.
"Pfft, ahem. Don't laugh, Carmilla!"
If only Yeon Ha-yeon hadn't been there beside her, covering her mouth and laughing faintly.
The two of them were reminiscing about how he had fainted at the hospital earlier upon hearing "five hundred million."
Of course, fainting at the words "five hundred million" embarrassed even him.
But it was in the hundreds of millions.
Money on a scale he hadn't dared imagine for the past eight years, coming in all at once. How could anyone not get excited?
'Of course, it isn't all good news.'
The price of that five hundred million, if you could call it a price.
The masked Vampir.
In other words, his existence as a user of the True Progenitor's power had been exposed.
They hadn't found out he was a True Progenitor yet.
But the fact that he had been marked by the Holy Knights under the name of the masked Vampir didn't change.
Even so.
He had no thought of holding back the True Progenitor's power.
It had been barely a week and a few days since he gained this power.
In that short span he had come into money he could never have imagined before.
Proof that what he was capable of was steadily changing.
'And I'm supposed to spare a power like this out of fear of being found out?'
Nothing could be more foolish than that.
[What's the matter? Embarrassed?]
Seeing Garam stopped in front of the sack and taking it for embarrassment, Carmilla hovered about in front of him.
And this time, Garam didn't hold back.
SMACK.
[Urk!]
When Garam swatted her with his palm like shooing a gnat, she went flying off into the distance.
She hit the wall; she didn't look badly hurt, but the impact must have been strong, because she wobbled dizzily in midair.
"Ha-yeon."
"Eep!"
When he turned to Ha-yeon after sending Carmilla flying, she hurriedly covered her mouth.
Even then, plenty of mischief showed through.
"You're... haah, never mind."
Shaking his head, Garam opened the sack of Blood Point Stones.
Inside were five Lowest-tier Blood Point Stones and the unstable Blood Point Stone of unknown nature.
Garam took the Blood Point Stones out of the sack and set them on the floor.
The Blood Point Stones glowed red as if resonating around the unstable one.
Garam lifted the unstable Blood Point Stone, the strangest-looking of them.
A small Blood Point Stone clinging parasitically atop one enormous Blood Point Stone.
As if to prove it, the larger one looked ready to shatter at any moment.
From within it he sensed an alien power alongside the usual scent of blood.
"Big brother, this is..."
Ha-yeon seemed to feel it too; she narrowed her eyes and came closer.
Standing beside Garam, Ha-yeon reached a hand over the unstable Blood Point Stone.
"This is an orc's energy. The scent that comes off orc blood, to be precise."
"Orc blood?"
She had identified the alien energy in the unstable Blood Point Stone in a single stroke.
"Yes. I've seen them at school a few times, captured and brought in for the upperclassmen's training."
At Ha-yeon's confident words Garam gave a small nod.
Certainly, it was natural that Ha-yeon, who had attended the Hunter Officers' Academy for the past several years, knew more than he did after drifting among low-Grade gates.
It also made sense of how the Bat-Man had come to have that uncanny regeneration and hardened muscle.
"What on earth is this?"
Ah, Ha-yeon still knew nothing about the Blood Point Stones or the abductions.
Garam gave her a brief explanation of it.
"So that means they made an ordinary Blood Point Stone absorb another Blood Point Stone holding an orc's regeneration?"
As if to prove that she hadn't gotten into a prestigious school like the Hunter Officers' Academy on tattered blood channels for nothing.
she grasped the situation quickly.
"I've never even heard of Blood Point Stones... but stealing a monster's ability? That's not something Vampir can do in general, not just because I'm a half."
[That's right. For an ordinary Vampir, blood-drinking is nothing more than an act of eating.]
Wait, stealing a monster's ability was impossible for ordinary Vampir?
For all that, he could do it.
'What sets me apart from other Vampir is being a True Progenitor.'
Which meant.
Lord Rumania's Blood Point Stones.
They let their user wield power similar to his own as a True Progenitor.
'A completely inferior version, though...'
If the point was simply to use skills, his own Absorb was superior in terms of versatility.
'But it doesn't feel like that's all there is to it.'
For something made merely to let one use other monsters' skills.
it was far too elaborate.
"For now, let's try absorbing these Blood Point Stones."
Setting the unstable Blood Point Stone aside, Garam turned his gaze to the other Lowest-tier Blood Point Stones before him.
The moment he reached out to feed them into the unstable Blood Point Stone.
"Oh, come to think of it, Ha-yeon, do you want to try absorbing one too?"
Garam picked up a Lowest-tier Blood Point Stone and handed it to Ha-yeon.
A thought that had struck him just as he was about to absorb them.
Sealing a special power into a Blood Point Stone might be an ability similar to a True Progenitor's.
But couldn't an ordinary Vampir absorb one?
Given that simply absorbing one made you stronger, it would be an unbeatable spirit medicine for Ha-yeon as she was now.
'And absorption isn't a True Progenitor-only ability.'
Absorbing blood was something ordinary Vampir could do.
"M-me? Um... I'll give it a try."
With a bewildered expression, she reached toward the Lowest-tier Blood Point Stone Garam held out.
HMMMMM
The once-solid Blood Point Stone turned into a blood-red liquid as though it had never been hard, and began flowing into Ha-yeon.
The red energy that drifted around Ha-yeon's body for a moment soon scattered as if vanishing.
"Huh?"
An unmistakable reaction of failure.
When Garam stepped closer to her, she too was looking down at her own body with a puzzled expression.
"Why isn't this working?"
Garam tilted his head.
She might be a half, but she was unmistakably a Vampir.
When it came to absorbing blood she was no different from any other Vampir, and yet she had failed to absorb the Blood Point Stone.
Judging by how the Blood Point Stone had lingered in her body for a moment.
'It's less that the absorption itself failed and more that the absorbed energy leaked back out.'
In the end, her ruined blood channels had tripped her up again.
"Ha."
The absurdity of the situation drained the strength out of him.
Garam sighed and looked at the other Blood Point Stones.
"I-it's fine! It was a 'try it and see' thing anyway."
Ha-yeon, who seemed to have noticed why the Blood Point Stone couldn't be absorbed, comforted him awkwardly.
"Whew, right."
Even so, the disappointment was unavoidable.
All the more because the cause was him.
Which was exactly why he had no leisure to sit down now and wallow.
Whether by absorbing Blood Point Stones or by draining monster blood.
the fact that he had to climb to S-Grade quickly didn't change.
When Garam lifted the Lowest-tier Blood Point Stones together with the unstable one.
[The Unstable Mid-tier Blood Point Stone responds.]
[5 Lowest-tier Blood Point Stones are absorbed.]
HMMMMM!
Along with a red light, the Lowest-tier Blood Point Stones were absorbed into the unstable Blood Point Stone.
When the red light soon settled, there was a Blood Point Stone the size of a fist.
"So that's what absorbing meant."
And a Mid-tier Blood Point Stone at that, one that made his mouth water just from looking at it.
'Absorb this and it's the First Molting.'
[The Unstable Mid-tier Blood Point Stone has stabilized into a Mid-tier Blood Point Stone.]
"Absorb."
Garam murmured it low.
[Lower Skill: Absorb is used.]
The Mid-tier Blood Point Stone on Garam's hand began to be drawn into his body.
"Guh!"
"Big brother?"
Power beyond what his body could bear spread through every part of him.
It was different from the spirit medicine he had taken before.
If that had been merely a great volume of water.
the power he had just absorbed was a torrent.
A torrent that smashed through everything in its path.
[All conditions for the First Molting have been met.]
[The First Molting begins.]
CRUNCH—!
Along with the System message, the grisly sound of breaking bone filled the room.
Bones reset themselves and muscle repeated contraction and expansion.
"GRAAAAGH!"
How long did the agony of his body being reassembled go on?
When it finally seemed to end, Garam clutched his chest, the area around his heart to be exact, and rose to his feet.
"Big brother, are you all right?"
Ha-yeon came up beside him.
"Seems like I'm all right."
Barely upright, Garam looked down at his own body.
The pain that had been racing through his whole body moments ago was gone without a trace; instead, vitality was overflowing from him.
'It feels as if I raised a Grade one more time.'
A sensation similar to when the spirit medicine raised his Grade.
'Not that I've become B-Grade.'
From B-Grade up, it wasn't a plane you could reach simply by having high stats.
[DING!]
[First Molting reward granted.]
[Lower Skill: Veil (A)]
[Can completely erase the Vampir presence from beings of B-Grade and below.]
[Can partially erase the Vampir presence from beings of A-Grade and below.]
[Can substantially erase human presence.]
[One skill is available for creation due to the First Molting.]
[Lower Skill: Kindred Conversion (A)]
[Allows a target to be made a kindred. A being that becomes a kindred is strengthened according to the blood concentration granted by the main body.]
[Required: Mid-tier Blood Point Stone 0/1]
"This is..."
The rewards floating before his eyes.
Veil and Kindred Conversion were skills that fit his situation exactly.
Veil, which would help hide his identity now that the Holy Knights had marked him.
And Kindred Conversion, which could help Ha-yeon.
The reason Ha-yeon couldn't sustain skills for long was that her body couldn't handle the power leaking from her collapsed blood channels.
'Even if it's only a stopgap, if her body itself grows stronger, she should be able to use skills longer than she does now.'
Both were skills he absolutely needed.
'I just used one Mid-tier Blood Point Stone, so I'll need to get one more for Kindred Conversion.'
Once he had finished checking all the skills.
Garam looked at Ha-yeon and asked.
"By the way, shouldn't you be at school right now?"
She wasn't skipping, was she?