Draconic Vampire: Curse of the Blood

Keith rushed out of the lab with an agitated face. He was really hoping to learn from Mr. Visit, but he didn't want to impart his knowledge to him. The only thing he said he would give was a book on blood rituals and runes written by him.

Without direct learning, he couldn't copy the accurate methods. Learning from the book will take a lot of time mostly through trial and error. He had to start from scratch and learn every rune and its perfect form by himself.

'Let's forget about the blood rituals for now.  I need to choose a department to get into.'

As he glanced at his rune card, he noticed it was already time for the academic office to open. The office was open for twelve hours, six hours in the day, and six hours at the night. It was the last slot for him to register his department.

Most of the students had already registered their choice so Keith headed to the registration office. The office was located in the central part of the campus which was ten minutes walk away from the blood warrior department.

Arriving at the counter, he showed his identity card and the one in charge looked through his report frowning.

'You are Keith Ennes. First place at the orientation."  A young lady asked while looking through his report.

"Yes, miss. I'm here to choose a department." Keith said.

"So, What do you have in mind?" 

From his report, she could see that he got invited to join all four departments, and of all the students who got four invitations, almost all of them chose the blood esper department. Her question was only a formality. 

"I would like to join the blood summoning department," Keith said calmly.

"Huh!" The vampire lady was taken aback by his response.

Who didn't know that blood espers were the most powerful blood-qi manipulators in the vampire society. They were small in number but their strength more than made up for it. With their versatile blood-qi techniques, they could rival the top powerhouses.

But the boy in front of him was choosing the blood summoning department. It was not a bad discipline by any means, but compared to the esper department it was not that good. For average vampires, the blood summoning department was something they looked up to, so it was still the top sought-after department.

"Are you sure? You can choose better options, you know." She reminded him.

"Thank you miss for your consideration but for some personal reasons, I can't join the blood esper departments, so you can go ahead and register my choice," Keith said with a calm face.

"Alright, if you say so. Don't regret afterwards." 

She used his rune card to register his choice of the department and returned his card. 

"Here you go. Now you have to wait till morning to see the confirmation on your rune card. All the details will be sent to you as well so make sure to read all the instructions." She explained to Keith.

"I will." Keith left the registration office and headed back to his room. 

The rest of the day was normal and he chatted with Rena for some time about the other vampires and her experience in the building. The residential building had its very own open space and garden which was very big, almost as big as three football fields. Paved roads were all around the garden so it was easy to walk around.

Rena had been collecting some plants and bringing them to the living quarters. These plants emitted a very pleasant fragrance and some bore fruits that tasted amazing. From her descriptions, these plants were planted by servants of the previous student's hundreds and thousands of years earlier.

She tasted many fruits that couldn't be found in the other parts of the continent. This place was the best place for humans as they could enjoy a certain level of freedom and also eat so many good things.

As vampires only consumed human blood, the fruits were useless to them, but at the same time, the humans benefited immensely from this. The humans who consumed these fruits had better quality blood than regular humans.

After the conversation, Rena showed him a fruit which in her opinion was the sweetest and the tastiest fruit she had ever tasted. Keith held the fruit in his hand and looked at it carefully.

If he was a human, he would've definitely tried the fruit, but as a vampire, it could affect his blood-qi. He missed the days when he could eat many varieties of food ranging from sweet to sour, all the way up to spicy. 

Now, he had to consume the same bland-tasting blood his entire lifetime. Sure, different humans taste different, but it was not a significant change. Most of them had the same taste. It's like you had a dish from several restaurants, they will taste different but the overall taste will remain the same.

Carefully looking at the fruit, he sensed a faint fluctuation in the core of the fruit.

'System, what is it?'

[ It's a fruit with life energy in it. It is of the purest form but the amount is minuscule. I can absorb it but it wouldn't amount to much. You better drink some blood than waste time absorbing this]

'So that's how the humans who eat these increase their blood-qi quality. That's why they taste so good. I wonder how they affect the human physique. Can you check Rena's body?'

The system immediately scanned Rena and her life force. After the upgrade, the system could pick the faintest of life energy fluctuations around it. The only thing limiting was the user's level. So scanning low-level beings was not hard.

[Her life energy has been significantly improved. Her glow is noticeable and I think she will reach her peak in a couple of months.] 

The system explained the details of her life energy to Keith.

'Peak? What is that? Her limit of consumption?' 

[Her limit to store life energy. That is the limit of the human physique. Any more life energy will simply dissipate into the atmosphere.]

'I see. She is at the peak of her physique. Can you estimate her stats based on the life energy as you do with my blood-qi?" Keith asked.

[ Sure, but her stats will be very low compared to yours.]

'Just do it.' 

The system started analyzing her body and decrypted her life energy signature. It was possible to completely analyze her because of her lower power level. Keith couldn't use it on higher-level vampires like Valencia and the Deans.

[ Rena ]

[ Body detected: Human ]

[ Level : 0.01 ]

[ Life energy : 0.05]

[ Health : 90%]

[ Physical Strength: 0.01 ]

[ Vitality: 0.03 ]

[ Agility : 0.02 ]

Keith stared at the status window for a while. She was incredibly weak. As barons were level 1, she was a hundred times weaker than barons. Her each stat was fragile like glass, he could extinguish in a moment.

'Are all humans have this kind of stat?'

[ Not necessarily. Males are usually stronger than females, but there are always exceptions. And the blood type, ancestry will affect their stats as well. She is just a normal human so, her stat is identical to the rest of the humans.]

"What are you looking at, young master?" Rena waved her hands in front of Keith.

"Nothing, I was just analyzing the fruit. It looks so tasty. Too bad, I can eat it." Keith returned the fruit to her.

"I wasted a lot of time talking about random things, I apologize.." Rena lowered her head.

"I like to hear your experiences as it allows me to get informed about the things happening in the building. Keep an eye on every event and tell me if anything comes up." Keith excused her.

"Yes, young master." Rena left the room and Keith walked to the windows. He peeked the garden from the partially opened curtains.

'Can you detect the levels of the trees and other humans as well?'

[Why? You want me to check the stats of ants too…] The system replied with annoyance.

'I was just thinking, maybe there might be some trees that have denser life energy than this. Also, we can train our senses for minute fluctuations of life energy.'

The system sighed and expanded its senses outward and covered the whole garden. As there was no powerful existence in here, the sense didn't get interrupted. 

Scanning the whole garden. Keith looked at the various trees with different life energy signatures. Some were dense and some were scattered. Some formed symbiosis and depended on each other for forming a life energy cycle.

As his senses were scanning through the garden, a small plant stood out from the rest. It was a tiny plant the size of a pinky finger but the life energy coming off from it was very dense, way denser than regular plants.

It was so dense in fact, it was similar to an animal or human. Still, it was nowhere near the level of vampires.

'What is that plant?'

[ It is indeed peculiar. I want a closer look. Let's go.]