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“To summarise, I’ve run an analysis on the retainers you’ve come in contact with recently. They were all on Mr. Chong’s list of missing persons, which proves our hypothesis right. There’re two outcomes when a person’s blood is being sucked: they either perish or turn into a retainer in which case they stay off the public’s radar and act in the dark.”
Kou did not dig in together with me, but kept on showing me how to use the programme and her findings with it.
“This app doesn’t have a facial recognition function though, so I could only compare and update data manually.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll write up a magical spell for you tonight to compare photographs and incorporate it into the programme!” I promised without hesitation.
Comparison magic isn’t some sort of advanced magic. If she could decipher ‘Magicae Detection’, a much more complex spell in nature, and add it to the programme, this is gonna be a piece of cake for her!
“Nice!” Kou’s eyes lit up with that weight off her mind. “So, Sakura, are there any other concerns at this stage?”
I let out a sigh and put down my chopsticks, then retrieved some notes from my handbag for her review.
“Handwritten notes? Why didn’t you type it out?” Slightly confused, she asked as I handed them over.
“You know how electronic gadgets aren’t my thing…alright, have a look.” As Kou went through my notes, I spoke about my doubt regarding the name ‘vampire’.
She continued with her bowl of ramen frowning after returning the notes to me. “The meaning of the name huh…this is gonna take us some time to figure out.” Moments later, she said, “But after hearing you out, I’m actually curious: are ‘vampires’ capable of absorbing magical powers of any attribute?”
“This is also my point of interest. Logically speaking, as Dark Creatures, they are unable to take in magical powers of the light attribute. However, we can’t identify what the magicae attribute of the dead was during their life just from their corpses. Even if that weren’t the case, with the retainers’ bodies being fully eroded by the dark magical force, we can’t tell if they all belonged to the dark attribute while living.” To my surprise, we had the same question in mind, making me feel like we were in sync.
Kou lowered her head and thought for a while. “Although Sakura had explained to me before about Glace’s magical theories, there’s still something I don’t quite understand. If I remember correctly, every living creature is born of either the ‘light’ or the ‘dark’ attribute. And not only do they counter one another, but they also give multiple sub-attributes. However I’m not sure about anything beyond this. Could you perhaps…explain that to me again?” she asked.
Judging by the hint of embarrassment in her tone, it seemed like she had been wanting to bring this up for a long time but did not know how to.
Silly, why do you look like you’re scared of asking me? I really don’t mind explaining it again.
I chugged down the tonkotsu ramen soup, wiped my lips gently, then began giving her a tutorial on the magical theories of Glace like a teacher.
“Legend has it that at the beginning of the world, there was light and darkness, followed by sky and land. Light was divided into sun and moon, while the dark was split into shadow and night. In the sky, there was wind, and on the land, there was soil and water. Henceforth the light attribute is a blend of sun, moon, sky and wind, whereas the dark attribute is a collective set containing shadow, night, land, soil and water.” This was verse one from chapter one of Introduction to the Magicae Attributes, a primer for magic.
“The ‘Light’ and ‘Dark’ as referred to here are not literal equivalents of luminance and darkness from a scientific perspective. Rather, they’re the general designations for multiple attributes, as well as two of the main attributes in the magical system.”
“Every living creature is born of either the light or the dark attribute, and the inclination of their magical powers towards certain sub-attributes is subject to the differences in habitat and personal development. For example, a mage who is born of the light attribute where his powers lean towards the sky attribute can be a sky mage in the future if he takes on this path. Meanwhile, as his being is founded on the light attribute, he is also capable of using magic of other sub-light attributes. This applies to creatures other than humans too, including animals and mysterious creatures.”
“The attributes ‘light’ and ‘dark’ counter one another. For example, if dark magical force is inserted into the body of a person of the light attribute, that person would experience overwhelming pain. It’s comparable to transfusing the wrong blood type to a person - the consequences could be fatal. Therefore, theoretically speaking, beings of the light attribute can only absorb light magical powers, and vice versa for those of the dark attribute.”
“I see. Now it makes much more sense to me. The ‘Dark Creatures’ you’ve been referring to all along are beings of the ‘dark’ attribute, including those of the shadow, night, land, soil and water sub-attributes. But does that mean not even the most powerful Dark Creatures out there can avoid death once they’ve absorbed a drop of light magic?” Kou pondered for a while and asked.
That’s the Kou I know; the one who can deduce so much from what I’ve just said with those remarkable comprehension skills of hers.
“That’s not the case,“ I shook my head and replied, “in fact, more powerful Dark Creatures have a stronger resistance to ‘light’. No doubt repulsive reactions would take place, but that doesn’t cause instant death. However, long-term exposure to the light attribute would certainly bring upon irreversible changes to their composition, given they’re beings formed by dark magical force, which is why they’d avoid doing so.”
“Then…how about ‘vampires’? Are they strong in this sense?” Kou asked.
“No, they’re not, which is the real mystery here: where did all the blood they sucked out go?” Her question once again drove our ‘vampire’ discussion back to square one. No breakthroughs were made. Perplexed, I rested my chin in my palm.
“Another question is: where’s their stronghold? I remember you said that the rumoured vampires like staying in places like old castles and graveyards. But as far as I know, there are no old castles at all in Hong Kong. In this case, graveyards would be their most probable stronghold, right?”
“We don’t have those old European castles around here,” Kou contemplated for a while and answered, “but there’re plenty of those archaic Chinese buildings and abandoned schools. However most of these architectures are situated in the New Territories. There aren’t many in Hong Kong Island. Didn’t the ‘vampires’ you fought off before all make their appearances in the Eastern District? They could hardly be coming all the way from Yuen Long, right?”
That makes total sense. With the whole Victoria Harbour sitting between Yuen Long and Hong Kong Island, wouldn’t it be easier for them to do evil near their habitat, rather than taking the long, difficult trek from the other side of Hong Kong?
Now that archaic buildings are out of the question, I guess graveyards are the only option left. But hold up…
“I’ll pass on graveyards.” My instinct told me that Kou would definitely say something like “let’s crash the graveyards!” and so I had to block the idea off by turning her down preemptively.
“Why? Could it be that you’re scared?” Kou asked earnestly.
…this gal really had that in mind, as expected.
“Me? No, don’t get me wrong, I’m not scared! How could a mageka be afraid of something like this?” Upon hearing the word ‘scared’, I had to speak up for myself. “I was just thinking, aren’t these graveyards monitored by security guards? I mean it just doesn’t sound normal for two girls to be walking into graveyards in the middle of the night. I can tell we’d be heavily questioned, and they’d probably even keep a close eye on us for the entirety of our stay there. This would for sure startle the ‘vampires’ enough that they wouldn’t show up in the end. Also, if they’re really inhabiting the graveyards, there would’ve been traces of tampered soil, which someone would’ve noticed before us!”
I never minded going to these places. In fact, there were times when I had to visit graveyards for work purposes when I was in Glace.
All that I’m worried about is us acting suspiciously in the public eye for doing so!
Kou nodded in agreement, yet her eyes failed to hide her disappointment.
I don’t care if she’s upset. I’m just not down for that!
As such, the proposal of locating the habitat of ‘vampires’ as our next step in the investigation was abandoned.
Even though investigating ‘locations containing and emitting dark magical forces’ was a possible means of locating their habitat, this metropolis was just full of places that matched the criterion - that back alley in North Point we went to two weeks ago, deserted sites of interest to nobody, secluded nooks with criminal activity in play... The list goes on. With this big of a scale to investigate, how exactly were we going to pinpoint our target?
Sigh, guess we’ll have to resort to other means instead.
…wait a minute - the Eastern District?112Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhnT9DhJrda
