Chapter 72: Alucard (I)

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Serafall's eyes twitched, her fingers shaking a little as she observed the situation in front of her. 

"Pandora." 

"Yeah?" 

"What is the meaning of this?" The Leviathan was using every fiber of her being to not summon a blizzard upon the Dragon in front of her. 

"I'm not sure what you're talking about." Takauji said shamelessly, yawning as he brought his hand up to his mouth. 

The atmosphere around them plummeted in temperature, the woman stood next to Takauji quickly running behind him for cover. 

"Do you really think now is the time to be playing games with me?" Serafall's pupils shone with a cold light. "I'm asking why in the name of Lucifer you have King Tepes's daughter with you?" 

"You're the one who asked me to look for the Sacred Gear possessor, well here she is." 

"What?" 

"Eh?" 

Both Valerie and Serafall were equally as shocked, the Dhampir looking at Takauji with a questioning gaze. 

"I also got you the ceasefire you wanted with King Tepes, so if anything you should be congratulating me for a job well done." 

"Wait a minute, even if she's the one, I'm confident I told you that you were only to report her presence to me, so that still doesn't explain why she's with you at the moment." 

"What's the problem? I didn't steal her or anything, her father gave her to me. Isn't that right?" He looked at the Dhampir, receiving a stiff nod from her in return. 

"Hold on, what do you mean—gave her to you?" Serafall put heavy emphasis on the word gave, noticing Valerie's face turning a little red. "You're unbelievable." She facepalmed. "But if you really did get the ceasefire drawn then I suppose all is well, I also succeeded in getting Queen Carmilla to agree to it." 

"Uh, excuse me for asking but, what do you mean Sacred Gear possessor?" Valerie questioned. 

"You have one, a Sacred Gear." He stated plainly, causing her to go bleary eyed. 

"I do?" 

"Mhm, it's still sound asleep at the moment which is why it has no active presence, only eyes like mine are capable of detecting it." He nudged Valerie's back, pushing her towards Serafall. "You should probably take her back to Kyoto, Masa will know what to do." 

"You're not coming with?" 

"Not for now, there's a spatial distortion nearby and I want to go have a look. It's not located in either of their territories so you don't have to worry about me starting anything—probably." 

"A spatial distortion? I was never told about that." 

"That's because it's a barrier masked within a barrier within another barrier." There was the main separation that kept the Vampire territory outside of the human world, then the fog that protected the King and Queen's territories from one another, and finally the spatial distortion itself that Takauji had sensed. "You weren't told about it not because they didn't want you to know, but rather they themselves probably didn't know about it to begin with." 

Like [Dimension Lost], spatial distortions were absolutely worthless in front of Takauji. 

"As long as you don't ruin the progress we've just made I guess you can do as you please, try not to take too long though alright?" 

"Sure." 

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Takauji found himself staring at what looked to be a fairly normal landscape, located about a few thousand feet away from both the King and Queen's territories. 

Keyword, looked. 

He reached his hand out to the air in front of them, feeling his energy course through a dome-like structure that had been constructed for some reason, concealing the space within it. 

"Now this is really something, I doubt even Azazel is capable of creating such a thing. Just how long has this thing been here? It's no wonder Tepes and Carmilla never noticed it." He had been exposed to modern applications of barrier technology through Masashige and Azazel, but this didn't even remotely resemble their work. 

His hand coated itself in iridescent lights, enabling him to effortlessly push his hand through the dome and walk through it just like had done with Georg's [Dimension Lost] mist. 

The landscape no longer resembles its former self, now gray and barren, with not a speck of life to be seen no matter where you looked. The trees were withered, the bushes had been reduced to naught more than a few twigs, and the ground was filled with joints that hadn't seen a drop of water in what could only be millenia. 

"Strange, this barrier should have some purpose beyond sheltering a whole bunch of nothingness." 

His eyes continued to scan his surroundings, narrowing upon being met with some sort of entrance, one which led underground upon approaching it. 

The air around it felt terribly cold, colder than the presences of Carmilla, Tepes, and Serafall combined. 

Something ominous lurked below, that much was certain. 

"Interesting." 

Takauji started to descend the staircase with piqued interest, taking a gander at the antique decor and furniture around him as he entered into what looked to be a hallway, with a large double-door at the very end of it. 

Before opening the door, his nose twitched, taking in a smell that was all too familiar to him by now. 

The smell of death, of rot, of decay. 

With his strength he barely needed to exert even a fraction of his might to open the doors, finding himself in the confines of a large empty room, a red carpet leading from the entrance towards the middle of the room. 

There was a throne, alongside a table that had been placed beside it, with nothing but an empty chalice with a few specks of dried blood on it.

"I'd say hello, but you don't seem very responsive at the moment." 

On the throne sat an unmoving woman, with disheveled, grimy, long flowing black hair and skin that not even a thousand bottles of moisturizer could save. Her eyes only had a faint crimson glow to them, pretty much lifeless in nature. 

She wore a dirtied white suit and pants, with some sort of wool-laden hat on her head. 

He leaned closer towards her face, putting his hand in her mouth and opening it a little. 

There were indeed fangs on the top row of her teeth. 

"So you were a Vampire, just what on earth are you doing down here? And what possible reason could there be to keep you sealed within that barrier?" He scratched his chin, having no knowledge on the specimen in front of him. 

He picked up the gilded chalice, noticing a bit of writing around the rim of the cup. 

"Hellsing?" He said aloud, pronouncing it poorly due to his lacking english. "Strange, I've never heard of this Hellsing before." He continued to explore the room, finding a few bits of weaponry here and there such as guns, swords, and spears. None of which he had any interest in obtaining, Sayafushi was all he needed. 

Eventually he found a few portraits, all of which looked to be men and women with bright-blue eyes, seemingly of British descent. 

"Vampires have red eyes don't they? How confusing." 

He returned to the throne, wondering if there was anything he could do with the decayed figure. 

"I might as well give that a try while I'm here," he shrugged. 

He opened his mouth, piercing the tip of his finger against one of his sharp canines, allowing a few drops of blood to land on the woman. 

"Hello? Anyone there?" He waited for a few moments, but nothing of note seemed to happen. "Oh well, I guess this place has already long outlived its use." 

He turned around in preparation to depart, but upon doing so he felt a strong grip latch onto his wrist, preventing him from going anywhere. 

"So there was some activity going on up there after all." 

The woman's head short forwards, plunging her fangs into his arm and starting to drain his blood without hesitation. But Takauji himself made no effort to stop her, watching on with interest as she continued to greedily consume his liquids. 

"I'm impressed, any other Vampire should've imploded into a million pieces after consuming that much of my blood." Instead, he chose to commend her, witnessing her body start to regenerate at a rate that surpassed even his with a smile on his face. 

"That's not right," she spoke all of a sudden. "You are not a Hellsing, how did you get through the barrier?" She licked the blood around her mouth, her eyes reigniting with a fierce light as she stood up, equalling Takauji in height. 

"Hellsing? That word is inscribed on this cup of yours over here, what is it?" 

She didn't answer his question, her mood souring as she continued to observe him. 

"Answer my question first," she folded her arms together. 

"I walked through it." 

"Bullshit." 

"I did though? I'm not sure what else to tell you." He scratched his scalp. 

She frowned, not able to detect an outright lie from his body language, but there was still the chance he was just a very good actor. 

"That's impossible, even if you broke through the barrier I would've been alerted of it the moment you did so. The only people capable of passing through without resistance are those with Hellsing blood in them. Setting aside the fact you are not a Hellsing, you aren't even a human by the looks of things." 

Takauji sensed distinct hostility in the atmosphere, the woman clearly about to lose her patience with him. 

"So allow me to ask you one more time, how did you get through the barrier?" 

"Like I said, I walked through. Spatial distortions don't work on me. Also, I still don't know what this Hellsing thing you keep talking about is. Mind filling me in?" 

She clicked her tongue, still feeling like he wasn't lying, but at the same time still finding him awfully suspicious. 

"I only entered through it out of curiosity, I wasn't expecting to find someone like you here in the first place. Speaking of which, what exactly are you doing down here?" He tilted his head. "Waiting for something maybe? Or by the sound of things, someone?" 

"Indeed, and that someone was supposed to be here, but instead my slumber was interrupted because of some nosy Dragon. So you can imagine that I'm not exactly in the best of moods." Her eyes widened. "Wait a minute, you didn't kill a group of humans on your way here did you?" 

"Humans? There weren't any humans outside, or any life for that matter. It's a desolate wasteland out there. There is the Vampire territory beyond the barrier, but there aren't any humans there either." 

Her face contorted in disbelief. 

"You're lying!" She roared, clearly outraged by his claim. An overwhelming presence rushing out of her figure, beyond that of anything Tepes or Carmilla could even dream of mustering. 

Even Takauji felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up a little. 

"We can go take a look outside if you want," he offered, motioning towards the entrance. 

The two of them left the underground room, coming to the surface as her expression froze in place. Looking around her with unparalleled bewilderment plastered all over her face.

"See? There's nothing here." 

"How can this be…" 

It didn't matter where she looked, there were no buildings save for a few piles of rubble, and no people except heavily decomposed bones here and there. 

"My purpose… my future…" She muttered. "How can it all be gone?" 

"Not sure, how long have you been down there for? You mentioned humans, you probably already know this but their lifespan isn't nearly as long as yours and mine. All things succumb to the river of time eventually, or something like that." 

He felt a great deal of despair seep out of her pores, as if her very reason for existing had been dismantled right before her eyes. 

"Lies… All lies…" She spoke like a broken record. "It was you wasn't it?" Her expression darkened, the redness in her eyes burning brighter as she looked towards Takauji. "You Dragons are all the same, destroying everything you see with no regard for the life around you." 

"What are you talking about? It was already destroyed by the time I got here." He reached into [Vacio], pulling out a bun and handing it to her. "Here, have some glucose, it helps the brain." 

She pulled out a silver handgun from within her suit, shooting a hole right through the snack in his hands. 

"Hey! That was a quality bun you know? I only gave it to you because I thought you were cute. Hmph, how rude." He put his hands on his hips, wagging his finger at her. 

"Don't worry my masters, your humble servant shall avenge your deaths right this instant." She pulled out another handgun, dual-wielding them as he sensed the situation turn grave. 

And here I thought this would be an easy in and out mission. Oh well, I'm in need of some fights anyways so I might as well enjoy it. 

"Actually on second thought, Yes! It was me who killed the uh, Hall-ting, wait no was it Hellfring? Ah, whatever it was you were talking about, it was me who killed them! Hehehe!"