At first, he considered dealing with the mercenaries in the village.
But if he was to kill around thirty villagers, then the number of mercenaries must have been at least five or six, or as many as ten.
No matter how many times he thought it through, there was no chance of eliminating all of them without casualties in a place where all the villagers were gathered.
Then there was only one way.
Kill them all where no one was around.
"What is it!?"
The young mercenary behind him panicked and drew his short sword. At that instant, Eugene lunged straight into the man's arms and thrust out his hand without hesitation.
Thud!
"...!"
The mercenary, his chest pierced through by claws that had grown as long as fingers, collapsed with his eyes wide open.
At such close range, it would have been wiser to raise a shield before a sword, but he seemed far less experienced than the first two.
"Eek!"
"You monster bastard!"
The reactions of the remaining mercenaries split sharply.
Eugene's half-naked form, wrapped in black scales, was a monster incarnate—and three of them had fallen to that monster in the blink of an eye.
"Aaaargh!"
"spare me!"
Three obvious rookies, judging by their poor equipment, fled without even looking back.
But the other two charged in, their faces twisted with a mix of fear and excitement.
"Raaah!"
"Die!"
A wooden club studded with metal fragments flew toward Eugene.
Clang!
Dodging one and batting the other aside with his arm, Eugene drove a dagger into the mercenary's jaw as the man stared in shock, then flung him upward and away.
Crash!
The mercenary who collided with the corpse hurled by the vampire's monstrous strength tumbled along the ground together with it.
Crunch!
Black claws cleaved through the fallen mercenary's face and throat in one stroke, killing him instantly.
"Grrr...!"
Shaking the blood and flesh from his claws, Eugene turned.
"you damn bastard! I can't see! I can't see anything! Aaaargh!"
The red-haired mercenary whose face had been shredded at the very start—and who had completely lost his sight—was raving in madness.
Thud!
Eugene struck the back of the man's neck and knocked him unconscious. Then he stared at the rest, who had already fled far away in that brief moment, and kicked off the ground hard.
With every leap, a distance of five or six steps vanished in a flash.
Closing the gap with the mercenaries in an instant, Eugene let murderous light burst from his crimson eyes and slashed his hands in a cross.
"Kyaaaah!"
"Kgh!"
With shrill screams, the mercenaries collapsed forward, blood spraying from their backs.
"Hic! please, please…!"
"Spare us!"
With blood running down their backs and urine pouring from beneath their waists, the young-looking mercenaries begged for their lives.
But to the vampire who had once been hunted by humans before his regression, their pleas held not the slightest value.
Eugene's hands crossed swiftly.
Three human facesplit completely along with the skulls inside one by one tipped backward as their bodies fell.
"So what? You put forward some guy named Ziegler as a fake illegitimate son to make a big score? You planned to kill all the villagers, then slaughter the rookie subordinates as well and pin the crime on them?"
Ziegler was the name of the young mercenary Eugene had killed third.
It was beyond absurd.
Before his regression, the massacre of the Broadwin villagers, his own capture and exposure as a vampire, and even his eventual beheading by a holy knight after a long flight
All of it had been caused by the greed of this mercenary named Timothy and his men standing before him now.
"Please forgive me! I only thought it was a good opportunity to make a quick fortune! If I had known someone like you was in Broadwin, I would never, never have done such a thing! please, just spare my life!"
The blinded red-haired mercenary, Timothy, wailed as he begged for his life.
Confess everything and hand over all your possessions, and I'll spare your life.
A trite line he had used countless times before.
Of course, he had never actually spared anyone even once.
But now that he himself was hearing those same words firsthand, having lost his eyes and under horrific torture, he could understand why all those people had sobbed and spilled every truth they had and every lie they could invent.
"Did Lord Tiwyn commission this directly?"
"No! Lord Tiwyn fell ill at the end of last year, so we received the order from his two sons."
"Sons?"
"Yes! Kamara Tiwyn and Bertel Tiwyn. all the daughters were already married off, so those two effectively manage the territory."
Bertel Tiwyn.
At the name of the pursuit unit captain who had relentlessly chased him before his regression, Eugene narrowed his eyes.
He had never clashed with him directly, but he had seemed like a fairly strong young knight.
"P-please, please! I'll live quietly from now on, so please just spare my life…!"
Eugene slowly approached Timothy, who was bowing toward empty space in blind terror.
To think he had been discovered as a vampire and killed because of fools this unbelievably stupid and greedy.
Long, black claws pierced through the back of Timothy's skull.
"...!"
Timothy died without even managing a scream. Laying the corpse flat, Eugene searched through his belongings.
This is it.
He might not know how to read, but he knew the crest of the lord's family perfectly.
The very same crest had been embroidered on the surcoat Bertel Tiwyn had been wearing.
After tucking the letter unmistakably Lord Tiwyn's order deep into his clothes, Eugene gathered the mercenaries' bodies into one place.
Then he ran toward the distant mountains, where only the ridgeline was visible.
The black wolves of this region were beasts even veteran mercenaries feared.
They were large and fast, and cunning enough to flee without hesitation if they judged their opponent stronger than themselves.
But to an awakened vampire who had embraced the night, they were nothing more than slightly troublesome "wild dogs."
Mobilizing all five senses, Eugene ran through the mountains for several hours before finding a pack of five black wolves.
Two full grown adults presumed to be the parents, and three still growing cubs.
Despite their instinctive terror, the two adults bared their fangs at Eugene and he killed them with his daggers.
He let the cubs go. He only needed two or three adults anyway.
With black wolves as large as oxen slung over both shoulders, Eugene returned to the place where he had killed the mercenaries.
Using the mercenaries' own weapons, he carved wounds across the wolves' torsos, and conversely used the wolves' claws and fangs to mutilate the mercenaries' corpses.
After scattering the human and beast bodies appropriately, Eugene calmly inspected the scene he had created.
The perfect crime was now complete.
After returning to the cabin, Eugene took Mirian with him to the village chief's house.
At Eugene's report that a group of mercenaries and black wolves had been found slaughtered not far from the village, the chief was thrown into an uproar.
Led by the village chief, the village men carrying torches and farm tools hurriedly followed Eugene.
When they arrived at the spot, about an hour from the village entrance, they could only gape in shock.
"Blergh!"
"It's real."
"Damn…"
"Looks like they ran into the wolves on their way to our village!"
From those vomiting up their dinner to those boldly rummaging through the mercenary and wolf corpses, the men clamored noisily, each in his own way.
"You found them while returning from hunting?"
"I found them while checking my traps on the way back. I don't usually come this way, but I heard black wolves had been appearing in this mountain and thought I might be able to catch one. There were three cubs as well, but I chased them off."
Eugene deliberately left the blood on his body, and the chief and villagers believed it had come from driving off the wolves.
"Oh! I see."
Not only had Eugene come to properly pay his respects right after recovering from illness, he had even driven away the black wolves everyone feared. The village chief felt deeply grateful to him.
"But why would these mercenaries be coming to our village in the first place?"
"Hm. I thought I might deliver their belongings to their families, so I searched their clothes…"
As he spoke, Eugene took out the letter he had tucked away inside his clothes.
"This n't this the seal of Lord Tiwyn, the lord of this land?"
"Yes, that's right."
The village chief hurriedly read the contents after seeing the shield crest where a long sword and a rose were intertwined. He was the only person in Broadwin who could read.
"Good heavens! What in the world is this…?"
"What does it say, Chief?"
Looking around at the gathered men, the chief spluttered as he spoke.
"These mercenaries—listen to this! They came to take Pellid!"
"To take Pellid? Why?"
"It says Pellid might be the illegitimate son of our lord, Sir Tiwyn!"
At the chief's words, an uproar broke out once again.
"So… you're saying you'll take Pellid to Sir Tiwyn's castle yourself?"
"That's right. I think I'd be better suited than anyone else. The black wolves might still be around, and on the way to the lord's castle we could run into beasts or monsters. At the very least, I know how to fight."
The reason Eugene wanted to take Pellid Sir Tiwyn's alleged illegitimate son—to the castle
was to obtain a proper status for himself.
If he completed the commission in place of the dead mercenaries, he believed the lord would surely grant him at least that much in return.
"Hmm. That is true."
The chief nodded heavily with a dark expression.
Going to the bigger towns with merchant caravans two or three times a year, the chief knew better than anyone how dangerous the outside world was.
Even if wild beasts and monsters rarely appeared outside their own territories, mercenaries and true bandits who could turn into robbers at any moment depending on the situation were a serious problem.
And then there were the knights, who wouldn't bat an eye before cutting down one or two peasants in a remote village if they were in a bad mood.
The knights were the very same people who treated even the high-ranking members of the trading guild the chief once worked for with contempt and abuse.
"Um, pardon my asking, but are you perhaps from a knightly or noble family?"
Recalling Eugene's extraordinary face now that the mask was off and the fact that he had driven off black wolves that even several grown men couldn't handle the chief asked carefully.
Caught off guard by the sudden question, Eugene was inwardly startled.
But since he had started all this to obtain status anyway, and instinctively felt this might be an opportunity, he nodded immediately.
"Yes. I am Yan of the Eugene family."
The only thing he remembered about himself was the name "Eugene," but he attached the suddenly came up name "Yan" to it, forming a surname and given name like the nobles.
"Please forgive all my impudence until now, Sir Eugene!"
"Wow! You're as good at lying as you are at killing people. Well, I suppose vampires are nobles of the night anyway."
Ignoring Mirian's remark, Eugene shook his head.
"No, it's fine. I never said anything, so it's only natural."
"Thank you. Sir Eugene is truly merciful."
Eugene felt a little bewildered by the chief's deeply deferential attitude as he bowed repeatedly even after getting back up.
'Why is he being so submissive?'
Eugene didn't know that the chief had personally experienced or at least witnessed the abuses of nobles and knights more than once in his youth.
"In any case, we will proceed according to Sir Eugene's proposal. Since you are a knight, going alone should be more than enough, and since these are the words of someone so noble looking, Sir Tiwyn will surely believe them."
'Noble looking? Me?'
Eugene felt puzzled.
All he thought was that it was fortunate his skin had become clear and that his nose and mouth were at least in the right places.
But the chief, who had seen real high nobles several times in his youth, thought differently.
'Even the direct descendants of the Duke of Cosa, who had elf blood mixed in, didn't look this good. He must be the descendant of a family with quite a story.'
Thinking that, the chief rubbed his hands eagerly.
"Sir Eugene, you must have had a hard day today. Wouldn't it be best for you to go and get some good rest now?"
"Very well. Then tomorrow I'll depart at once with the illegitimate son."
"Yes! Please take care on your way. Ah, and I will properly write up everything that happened today and give it to you tomorrow. You can deliver it to Sir Tiwyn."
"Thank you."
Though he found it strange that the chief accepted his hastily made lie so readily, the chief seemed to truly believe it. So Eugene showed no sign of doubt and left the chief's house.
'It's good that the chief believes me, but this alone won't be enough. Real nobles and knights probably won't believe me so easily. In that case…'
"I'll have to learn how to read and write."
Commoners who could read, like the chief, were extremely rare, and he had even heard that most knights were illiterate.
So if he could read and write while posing as a knight, his credibility would rise all the more.
"Good grief, you ignorant vampire. Unless you get hit by silver or staked through the heart, you'll live at least another two hundred years. At least learn how to read. While you're at it, learn the ancient script and the imperial language too."
"You're right."
Nodding, Eugene suddenly glanced down at Mirian as another thought came to him.
"By the way, you can read, can't you?"
"Nope."
"...."
"Spirits don't need to know how to read. I never need to write, and other humans can't even see me anyway. Why would I learn?"
Mirian boasted confidently with one hand planted on her waist.
Are all spirits this shameless?
'In any case, if I get the chance, I absolutely have to learn how to read and write.'
There was still much he had to do, and the road ahead was long. But Eugene was certain that all of it would become weapons to protect himself and triumph in this world.
(To be continued in the next chapter)